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Cellphones

Your Phone Number Is Going To Get a Reputation Score 136

Posted by timothy from the how's-my-driving-call-1-800 dept.
Jah-Wren Ryel writes "Yes, there's yet another company out there with an inscrutable system making decisions about you that will affect the kinds of services you're offered. Based out of L.A.'s 'Silicon Beach,' Telesign helps companies verify that a mobile number belongs to a user (sending those oh-so-familiar 'verify that you received this code' texts) and takes care of the mobile part of two-factor authenticating or password changes. Among their over 300 clients are nine of the ten largest websites. Now Telesign wants to leverage the data — and billions of phone numbers — it deals with daily to provide a new service: a PhoneID Score, a reputation-based score for every number in the world that looks at the metadata Telesign has on those numbers to weed out the burner phones from the high-quality ones."
Japan

River City Ransom: How an NES Classic Returned 20 Years On 39

Posted by timothy from the if-courtesy-were-common dept.
An anonymous reader writes "River City Ransom: Underground is the latest high profile game campaign on Kickstarter but as an interview with the title's creators this week highlights, it's not exactly a new game. Rather, it's an official sequel to a Nintendo Entertainment System/Famicom classic, belt-scroller River City Ransom. Remarkably, getting the license and the help of original River City creator Yoshihisa Kishimoto proved easy for the team, indie developers who were submitting game designs to Atari in crayon, aged six. 'I asked for the license and I asked Kishimoto-san if he had an interest in helping us make a better Kunio-kun game,' producer Daniel Crenna says. 'It's not particularly dramatic to say that, but I asked.' As the author points out, it's interesting to imagine what other games could be resurrected with a little bit of polite curiosity.""
Math

A Math Test That's Rotten To the Common Core 663

Posted by timothy from the two-trains-leave-chicago-with-opposite-polarity dept.
theodp writes " The Common Core State Standards Initiative," explains the project's website, ""is a state-led effort that established a single set of clear educational standards for kindergarten through 12th grade in English language arts and mathematics that states voluntarily adopt." Who could argue with such an effort? Not Bill Gates, who ponied up $150 million to help git-r-done. But the devil's in the details, notes Washington Post education reporter Valerie Strauss, who offers up a ridiculous Common Core math test for first graders as Exhibit A, which also helps to explain why the initiative is facing waning support. Explaining her frustration with the intended-for-5-and-6-year-olds test from Gates Foundation partner Pearson Education, Principal Carol Burris explains, "Take a look at question No. 1, which shows students five pennies, under which it says 'part I know,' and then a full coffee cup labeled with a '6' and, under it, the word, 'Whole.' Students are asked to find 'the missing part' from a list of four numbers. My assistant principal for mathematics was not sure what the question was asking. How could pennies be a part of a cup?" The 6-year-old first-grader who took the test didn't get it either, and took home a 45% math grade to her parents. And so the I'm-bad-at-math game begins!"
Operating Systems

OpenBSD 5.4 Released 102

Posted by timothy from the they're-not-in-it-for-the-money dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The release of OpenBSD 5.4 has been announced. New and notable advancements include new or extended platforms like octeon and beagle, moving VAX to ELF format, improved hardware support including Kernel Mode Setting (KMS), overhauled inteldrm(4), experimental support for fuse(4), reworked checksum handling for network protocols, OpenSMTPD 5.3.3, OpenSSH 6.3, over 7,800 ports, and many other improvements and additions."
Sony

Submission + - Can Sony dominate the next generation? (goozernation.com)

Submitted by kube00
kube00 writes: At the end of this year, we are expecting two new consoles from both Microsoft and Sony. A new generation of games will be born. The question Sony needs to answer is, how to dominate the video game console industry and ensure their replication of success from the era on PS1 and PS2? Goozernation takes a look at some of the ideas that made the PS3, PS2, and PS1 successful.
Apple

Submission + - Raspberry Pi in iPod (tumblr.com)

Submitted by
peterburkimsher
peterburkimsher writes: "The Original PiPod!
I thought that the Raspberry Pi was too bulky for my pockets. So I soldered some new connectors, and put it inside the shell of an original first-generation iPod!
Hopefully a Model C will be released so that the Pi can be compatible with iPod cases in future.
Peter"
Transportation

Submission + - Virginia Republicans propose taxing hybrids while eliminating gas tax (washingtonpost.com)

Submitted by mozumder
mozumder writes: This one is odd. Republicans in Virginia are attempting to bring a surcharge tax on hybrid cars in a misguided attempt to raise transportation funds. Hybrids reduced gas usage cuts into the gasoline tax revenue per miles driven. But, at the same time, the Republicans are proposing eliminating the gas tax altogether, so that it only becomes a tax for having a hybrid.

Can any of our freedom-loving Republicans that make up the bulk of our Slashdot audience explain this one? If this is "freedom", let's make sure never to have "freedom" ever again.

Comment Re:Worse is (Score 1) 461

by SCPaPaJoe (#35172612) Attached to: Court Says California Stores Can't Ask Customers For ZIP Codes
We must be neighbors. I'm in the same zip and my number is 867-5309! The card processor that I use in my business has zip code verification as a part of the transaction authorization for manually entered numbers. If the zip is entered incorrectly the processor will warn of the disparity but it will still authorize the transaction. If the cvv code is incorrect then the transaction will be declined. By the way, the cvv code should never be given when the card is physically present. When I'm asked for it I just say "no". If the merchant doesn't like that then I'll just leave.

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