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Comment Re:Nintendo's new motto: (Score 4, Interesting) 426

by woohoodonuts (#20956861) Attached to: Wii 'Popularity Bubble' to Burst?
Bored and worried about saving for Christmas, would be more correct. While I'm still excited about the wii, I'm also sitting around waiting for the new mario Galaxy game to be released. I finished beating Zelda, never was too fond of 1st person shooters (Metroid Prime) and so am left with a small gap until the holiday season allows my game spending budget to pick up another game or two. Since I only buy a few games a year, I don't take changes. When Brawl and Galaxy come out, I'll buy. Since Nintendo has cultivated a mostly Non-hardcore gamer market, the majority of their customers are only going to buy the AAA titles because that's what they hear about in the media. Most of those will be released in the coming months.

Feed Court Wants To Hear The Case Of The Second Life Land Deal Gone Bad (techdirt.com)

From feed by techdirtfeed
Late last year, we described the complicated case of a lawyer suing Linden Lab for kicking him out of Second Life and "reclaiming" some property he had purchased within the world. The case was quite complex for a variety of reasons. The guy was clearly exploiting a bug in Second Life that allowed him to buy the virtual land at below market values. However, Second Life touts the fact that you own whatever it is that you buy or build in their world, so simply taking it away could be questionable. Even more importantly, since Second Life is a fairly free form world. there's an interesting legal argument that anything that can be done in the world should be allowed, even if it wasn't what Linden Lab intended. Well, we may get to hear some of those arguments as the court hearing the case has turned down Linden Lab's request to have the case dismissed. There are lots of questions raised by this case that could clearly apply to other legal issues within virtual worlds, so it should be worth paying attention to the arguments both sides make, as well as the eventual decisions (and appeals).
Security

Submission + - Personal Phishing Responsibility? (kelvinism.com)

Submitted by
kelvinn
kelvinn writes: "Like many of you, I'm in IT. Over the years I have seen every type of phishing attempt there is, yet I'm still grappling with my personal responsibility when I detect an attempt. Two days ago I received a phishing attempt from "Amazon", and reported it via Firefox's anti-phishing feature. Additionally, I went the extra step and sent an email to the compromised site's owner, the ISP of the compromised site, and the University where the phishing site actually resided. To my dismay, and surprise, the only action was by the Firefox Team. So I present this question to the Slashdot community: what do you do when you get phished?"
Security

Submission + - Cell phone viruses: No longer the next big threat?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The CEO of antivirus vendor F-Secure — a company who have long warned against the threat of cell phone viruses — seems to be backtracking on the company's stance in an interview with Silicon.com.
Back in 2005, the company said: "This is definitely not hype. We believe we are going to see a huge growth in threats targeting mobile devices."
Now, just this week the company's new CEO has stepped into the debate with this: "Independent of how we have communicated this in the past, we are making it very clear today that the threat level on mobile malware is not severe today. There are only 323 known malware on mobiles and over 300,000 on PCs. No hype. Period."
What a difference two years makes in the hype-fuelled world of the antivirus vendors.
Power

Submission + - science: fuel technology

Submitted by
Anonymous Coward Rides Again
Anonymous Coward Rides Again writes: "Someone please debunk this (from wykc tv news):

John Kanzius discovered that his radio frequency generator could release the oxygen and hydrogen from saltwater and create an incredibly intense flame. "Just like that. If that was in a car cylinder you could see the amount of fire that would be in the cylinder." The APV Company Laboratory in Akron has checked out John's amazing invention. They were amazed. "That could be a steam engine, a steam turbine. That could be a car engine if you wanted it to be." Imagine the possibilities. Saltwater as the ultimate clean fuel.

i googled this and didn't come up with too much; i hardly look to tv news stations for science... does the 2nd law of thermodynamics not apply because the energy released in salt water is so much greater than that being input by the radio waves and that being used to power the radio wave generator?"
Privacy

Submission + - Google Maps Street View NOT invasion of privacy (blogspot.com)

Submitted by
airshowfan
airshowfan writes: "Applicable laws say that Google Maps Street View is NOT a violation of privacy. The most relevant law here is probably the one used by Jennifer Aniston to sue a paparazzo! It says that an invasion of privacy only occurs when someone looks into your window while using "enhancing devices" (telephoto lenses, binoculars, etc) and sees/takes a picture that is more detailed than what a passerby could see from the street with the naked eye. So as long as Google's images are not as sharp as what you could see as you walk past, Google should be ok. This article explains these issues of how private your home really is, and goes into issues of surveillance and sousveillance, of how much privacy one can expect while in a public place, and of how the information age is all about organizing the crumbs of information you leave behind. It is no longer reasonable to expect that your information trail cannot be easily organized, interpreted, and broadcast to the world."

Feed Splash, Splash, You're Dead: The Military's Next-Gen Water Gun (wired.com)

From feed by wiredfeed
The next terrorist threat may come from the deep. In recent years, several homeland security alerts have focused on the danger of scuba-equipped terrorists targeting docked Navy vessels or ocean-side nuclear plants. Now the U.S. military is quietly developing a new generation of underwater weaponry.


The Internet

Submission + - Second Life sued in France for porn, gambling

Submitted by Submarine
Submarine writes: A (very) conservative French family union, Familles de France is sueing Second Life for making available to minors many things that should not be, including pornography, advertisements for tobacco and alcohol, and online gambling. The details of the lawsuit were not given in their communiqué ; it is conjectured that, if unsuccessful against Linden Lab, the maker of Second Life, they will seek injunctions against French ISPs, asking for blocks on the Second Life service. Familles de France was one of the groups pushing for the ill-written anti-happy slapping parliamentary amendment, and also for the "deontology commission" for Internet services ; it is also known for protesting against measures such as making it easier for minors to get contraceptive pills. Predictibly, the Odebi League is protesting.

Feed Flaxseed Stunts The Growth Of Prostate Tumors (sciencedaily.com)

From feed by sdfeed
Flaxseed, an edible seed that is rich in omega 3-fatty acids and fiber-related compounds known as lignans, is effective in halting prostate tumor growth, according to a new study. The seed, which is similar to a sesame seed, may be able to interrupt the chain of events that leads cells to divide irregularly and become cancerous.
The Internet

Submission + - Untapped Niche Markets (qelix.com)

Submitted by Zeluse
Zeluse writes: ....services like Flickr, Del.icio.us, Digg, etc. have cornered their niche markets and have rapidly moved from being "startups" to "market leaders", with the power of new 'social' phenomenon.

As Web 2.0 matures further, markets will begin to organize themselves and the leaders will become more obvious. There are, however, pockets of innovation going on beyond the developed markets, as I've stumbled across a few untapped, and essentially unexplored niche markets.

http://qelix.com/blog/index.php/2007/06/04/untappe d-niche-markets/
Wireless Networking

Google et al. Want 700 MHz Auction Opened Up 170

Posted by kdawson from the third-helping-of-pipes dept.
The 700 MHz spectrum could give birth to the much-anticipated third pipe, but phone and cable lobbyists are currently pressuring the FCC to sell companies like AT&T and Verizon our airwaves — in a flawed auction process — so they can hoard this valuable spectrum and stifle competitive alternatives to their networks. Google and other would-be providers are not taking it lying down. They want the FCC to mandate that whoever wins the auction be required to sell access to those airwaves, at wholesale prices, to anyone wanting to provide broadband Internet service. They also want anonymous auctions to prevent the giant incumbents from manipulating the results against small players (as they have done in the past).
Space

Space Elevator Company LiftPort In Trouble 257

Posted by kdawson from the going-dwn dept.
TropicalCoder writes "The LiftPort Group, founded four years ago with the lofty dream of building a stairway to heaven, has seemingly reached the end the line. The dream was to develop a ribbon of carbon nanotubes 100,000 km long, anchored to the Earth's surface and with a counterweight in space, providing a permanent bridge to orbit. Elevator cars would be robotic 'lifters' which would climb the ribbon to deliver cargo and eventually people to orbit or beyond. Now LiftPort has all but run out of funds, and the State of Washington's Securities Division has entered a Statement of Charges (PDF) against LiftPort Inc. dba LiftPort Group and founder Michael Laine."
Google

The Man Behind Google's Ranking Algorithm 115

Posted by CmdrTaco from the dear-god-no-more-seo-spam-please dept.
nbauman writes "New York Times interview with Amit Singhal, who is in charge of Google's ranking algorithm. They use 200 "signals" and "classifiers," of which PageRank is only one. "Freshness" defines how many recently changed pages appear in a result. They assumed old pages were better, but when they first introduced Google Finance, the algorithm couldn't find it because it was too new. Some topics are "hot". "When there is a blackout in New York, the first articles appear in 15 minutes; we get queries in two seconds," said Singhal. Classifiers infer information about the type of search, whether it is a product to buy, a place, company or person. One classifier identifies people who aren't famous. Another identifies brand names. A final check encourages "diversity" in the results, for example, a manufacturer's page, a blog review, and a comparison shopping site."

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