Comment Re:The plural of anecdote (Score 1) 163
Exactly. I play games for having a bit of fun (like in first person shooters). If I have to really use my brain, why waste it on a game? Why not do something actually worth doing?
Comment Iron Sky (Score 1) 293
Yay, Nazis again. Computers are what got them to the moon!
I saw it in a movie, it must be true!
(btw: The movie looks like loads of fun)
Submission + - Erich Gamma leaves IBM for Microsoft (msdn.com)
DaPhil writes: "Dr. Erich Gamma, of Design Patterns and Eclipse fame, has left IBM to join Microsoft. He will work on the Visual Studio IDE. I for one hope he will manage to push VS into the Eclipse direction.
Submission + - Dunbar's Number: We're Limited to 150 Friendships (ieee.org)
joshuarrrr writes: The odd reality is that we are actually not capable of managing more friendships than you typically see on Facebook now. Across the primate order as a whole, there is a general relationship between the size of the brain's neocortex and the size of the average social group, and this relationship predicts a group size for humans of 150. This value is now known as Dunbar's Number, because I was the first to point it out, in 1992. The number pops up surprisingly often in human organizational life, not least in the military, where it defines the key unit on which everything else is structured, namely the company. It is also the average size of a personal social network—the number of people with whom you have some kind of reciprocated relationship.
Submission + - Minecraft to come to Xbox 360 (pcgamer.com)
RichM writes: Microsoft have just announced at E3 2011 that Minecraft is coming to the Xbox 360, with Kinect support.
This is going to be interesting...
This is going to be interesting...
Comment Correct link to translated version (Score 1) 1
...is here.
Submission + - Erich Gamma leaves IBM (architecture-day.de) 1
DaPhil writes: Dr. Erich Gamma, of Design Patterns fame, was scheduled for a talk at the Munich Architecture Day about the IBM Jazz plattform. However, the talk was canceled today due to Dr. Gamma leaving IBM (original article; English version). No word yet where he is going. I guess this means Jazz is dead.
Comment Vespa (Score 1) 57
"I am Princess Vespa, daughter of Roland, King of the Druids!"
Maybe they'll find a space camper on that rock?
Maybe they'll find a space camper on that rock?
Comment Re:borked link (Score 1) 203
Exactly. Same thing here in Germany. Had to switch to the "US" version on the Gizmodo page; after that, it worked.
Comment Re:Car analogy (Score 1) 281
Funny you should mention IMAX. They recently installed projectors in a cinema in Berlin, where apparently the system can't even be activated without being calibrated EVERY day.
On the other hand, calibration depends on user input as well... :)
Comment Comparison of 3D techniques with 45 test subjects (Score 1) 281
The German magazine c't (from Heise) has recently compared three 3D display techniques (with glasses) with 45 test subjects (original source - full text is not available online for free). Granted, the number is not statistically relevant, but I found it interesting nonetheless. They compared LCD screens with shutter glasses, LCDs with polarized glasses, and plasma screens with shutter glasses.
The result: The best technique is using polarized glasses, as those are the lightest and thus best to wear (i.e. a non-technical reason) while tester subjects found the shutter glasses to be too heavy and in some cases unbearable. Furthermore the reduced resolution of the polarization technique did not matter (most of the test subjects did not even notice). They also point out, however, that one of the main argument commonly heard against shutter glasses - flickering - was not a problem reported by any of the test subjects.
I would love to see a scientific study with a greater number of subjects...
Submission + - Solar Energy Telescopeare are Efficient and Inexpe (ispyce.com) 1
autospa writes: "A University of Arizona engineering team led by Roger Angel has designed a new type of solar concentrator that uses half the area of solar (PV) cells used by other optical devices and delivers a light output/concentration that is over 1000 times more concentrated before it even hits the cells. This comes as a result of a broader goal to make solar energy cost competitive with fossil fuels (target = 1$/W) without the “need for government subsidization.”"
Submission + - GNOME to lose minimize, maximize buttons (wordpress.com)
An anonymous reader writes: When GNOME 3 arrives in a month, users might be surprised to see old UI staples "minimize" and "maximize" buttons gone and replaced by... nothing, in the case of minimizing, and either drag-up or double-click-titlebar for maximizing.
Says Allan Day, GNOME Marketing Contractor:
"Without minimize, the GNOME 3 desktop is a more focused UI, and it is a UI that has a consistent high level of quality. Yes, moving to a minimiseless world might take a little getting used to for some, but the change makes sense and has clear benefits."
Some users already welcome the change, while others are in an uproar, swearing to wait for GNOME 3.2, switch to KDE or even Windows. What do you think? A better, simpler interface for new times, or a case of making something simpler than it should be?
Says Allan Day, GNOME Marketing Contractor:
"Without minimize, the GNOME 3 desktop is a more focused UI, and it is a UI that has a consistent high level of quality. Yes, moving to a minimiseless world might take a little getting used to for some, but the change makes sense and has clear benefits."
Some users already welcome the change, while others are in an uproar, swearing to wait for GNOME 3.2, switch to KDE or even Windows. What do you think? A better, simpler interface for new times, or a case of making something simpler than it should be?
Comment Thought Bus (Score 2) 137
I recently read a (very good) novel by Walter Tevis ("Mockingbird") which features telepathic buses called "thought buses". They'd listen to your brain stating a destination and drive there. In the novel, they originally also had the ability to "project" thoughts, but that was disabled due to "invasion of privacy".
By the way, is it just me or is the moderation system down?
Comment Billig (Score 1) 83
Their about page (http://www.bilibot.com/about) claims that the name "bilibot" stems from the German word "bilig" (cheap). However, the word is actually written with two l ("billig") in German. I hope they are more thorough in their computing research...
