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Comment Don't we have this already? (Score 1) 113

"Green Power describes its process as a proprietary catalytic pressure-less depolymerization process (CDP) where municipal solid waste or a wide variety of organic wastes are 'cracked' at the molecular level and the long-chain polymers (plastic, organic material such as wood, etc.) are chemically altered to become short-chain hydrocarbons with no combustion. Combustion requires oxygen or a similar compound, but according to Green Power the CDP occurs in an anaerobic environment, exposed only to inert gases like nitrogen."

This sounds very similar to a heavy oil conversion unit, which takes long chains of hydrocarbons (organic materials) and breaks them into smaller molecules. Refineries have been doing this for decades! I'm not saying this isn't good to reduce overall waste or anything like that, but unless I'm missing something, this is hardly new technology...

As a couple examples of conversion units:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coker_unit

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_catalytic_cracking

Comment Re:Actually you're the one who is mistaken (Score 1) 236

Actually, the parent is correct. Fractional reserve banking means that the banks keep a fraction of what they loan out as a reserve. A bank will have 10 dollars and loan out 100 or more dollars. This is OK as long as too many people don't want their money at once (a run on the bank); the bank simply cannot repay all of the people who deposited money with the bank because they only keep a small fraction of what is actually deposited.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractional-reserve_banking

Comment Re:Google Maps (Score 1) 1188

That's nothing - wait until Version 2.0 comes out and not only will it tell you when the nearby rich person lives, it will show you their personal schedule for when they will be out of town, display the best method of entry into their house, and send all the police out to the opposite side of town!
Emulation (Games)

Submission + - Nintendo 64DD Emulation May Soon Be a Reality!

Croakyvoice writes: DCEmu have an article up about the Emulation of the Nintendo64DD now being possible because the ability to dump the games is now a reality. "kammedo of ASSEMblergames has pulled out some awesome & obscure Nintendo 64 development hardware that can potentially dump Nintendo 64DD cartridges. It has been very difficult to begin any Nintendo 64DD emulation, especially since there aren't any ROM Images dumped. With the development suite kammedo has: a Partner Nintendo 64 unit, PC Interface Card, RAM cartridge & cable, and a Nintendo 64DD Development Unit, it is now possible to dump Nintendo 64DD development or retail carts, but don't go around asking for dumps!"
Education

Coping Strategies for Women in IT 648

Ian Lamont writes "Female workers are losing ground in the IT profession, reports Computerworld, citing statistics which show a sharp drop in the number of female CS grads since the 1980s, and a decline in the percentage of women in the IT profession since 2001. According to the article, causes include pervasive stereotypes and the locker-room atmosphere found in some IT shops — attitudes which some readers may recognize from the comments in a Slashdot thread last week. The IT professionals interviewed in the Computerworld article discuss a variety of strategies for coping. They range from trying to 'out-boy the boys' to watching what you say, as one Sun Microsystems executive describes:'It's not unusual to be the only woman at a meeting, she says, and because of that, there's often a tendency to remain silent unless you think you have something really remarkable to say. "As one member of a small group, you feel you have no right to be mediocre ... You're not just representing yourself; you're representing [females] with a capital F.'"
Linux Business

Submission + - Italian parliament bets house on SuSE Linux (theinquirer.net)

An anonymous reader writes: http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=40 957 Italian parliament bets house on SuSE Linux Two-year switch to begin in September By Gijs Hillenius: jeudi 12 juillet 2007, 16:59 ITALY'S parliament is about to undertake Europe's largest governmental migration yet to open sauce. The IT department of the Italian parliament presented plans on Wednesday to begin migrating some 3500 desktop PCs, including those of its 630 MPs, away from Windows to SuSE Linux starting this September. The Camera dei deputati will also run SuSE on all of its two hundred servers. This makes it the second and largest parliament in Europe to choose open sauce. The French parliament, with 577 seats, voted last year to have open sauce installed on all of its 1145 PCs. France decided on Ubuntu this February and the migration in the Parliament should be underway. The size of the Italian migration to open source makes it an important case study, said Pietro Folena, member of the Italian Communist party, who earlier this year proposed the switch. "It will present all public offices with best practices." The Italian MPs may decide for themselves whether they will also have Penguins waddle on their laptops. The laptops were not included in the plans presented Wednesday, explains Folena, as they are private property. Folena estimates the switch makes PCs some 90 per cent cheaper and he expects larger savings to be realise on the servers. He could not immediately provide further details on this. "The savings are important, but the primary motive for this decision is to gain freedom. Freedom from single technology, freedom from a single software owner and a single contractor, freedom to develop our own applications and freedom from viruses."
Communications

Submission + - 75yr old has worlds fastest broadband connection (tech.co.uk)

BladeBot writes: Seems a pensioner from lovely Sweden has the honour of having the fastest residential broadband connection in the world at a whopping 45Gbps. The lady, Mrs Löthberg has only recently taken up computing however her son is the more well known Peter Löthberg who arranged the connection. One must ask though, why did he think his mother needed such a huge pipe, perhaps he has plans to compete with The Pirate Bay from his old bedroom? Tech.co.uk is carrying the story: http://www.tech.co.uk/computing/internet-and-broad band/news/75-year-old-woman-has-fastest-broadband? articleid=1857379299
Patents

Submission + - Optimum Copyright period decided by maths!

An anonymous reader writes: So how long SHOULD a copyright be valid for? There are as many opinions here as there are humans. But a Cambridge student has stepped into the discussion with a dispassionately calculated estimate of the optimal period a copyright should be granted for. Here is ArsTechnica's take: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070712-rese arch-optimal-copyright-term-is-14-years.html, and here is the original paper for all you maths dudes out there: http://www.rufuspollock.org/economics/papers/optim al_copyright.pdf
SuSE

Submission + - Italian parliament bets house on SuSE Linux

AnotherDaveB writes: ITALY'S parliament is about to undertake Europe's largest governmental migration yet to open sauce. The IT department of the Italian parliament presented plans on Wednesday to begin migrating some 3500 desktop PCs, including those of its 630 MPs, away from Windows to SuSE Linux starting this September. The Camera dei deputati will also run SuSE on all of its two hundred servers.

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