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Submission + - Building The 'Smart Breast Pump" Of The Future (readwrite.com)

Submitted by Malicious_Cookie
Malicious_Cookie writes: Breast pumps seem to many like "sci fi technology," writes the MIT Media Lab, but as many a mother can tell you, these invaluable devices still rely on the mechanics of the last millenium. The "Make The Breast Pump Not Suck" hackathon will attempt to do for breastpumps what Bill Gates wants to do for condoms, bring them into the 21st century.

Submission + - 'Why I Hope to Die at 75'

Submitted by HughPickens.com
HughPickens.com writes: Ezekiel J. Emanuel, director of the Clinical Bioethics Department at the US National Institutes of Health, writes at The Atlantic that there is a simple truth that many of us seem to resist: living too long renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining, a state that may not be worse than death but is nonetheless deprived. "It robs us of our creativity and ability to contribute to work, society, the world. It transforms how people experience us, relate to us, and, most important, remember us. We are no longer remembered as vibrant and engaged but as feeble, ineffectual, even pathetic." Emanuel says that he is isn't asking for more time than is likely nor foreshortening his life but is talking about the kind and amount of health care he will consent to after 75. "Once I have lived to 75, my approach to my health care will completely change. I won’t actively end my life. But I won’t try to prolong it, either." Emanuel says that Americans seem to be obsessed with exercising, doing mental puzzles, consuming various juice and protein concoctions, sticking to strict diets, and popping vitamins and supplements, all in a valiant effort to cheat death and prolong life as long as possible. "I reject this aspiration. I think this manic desperation to endlessly extend life is misguided and potentially destructive. For many reasons, 75 is a pretty good age to aim to stop."

Submission + - SanDisk Releases 512GB SD Card (computerworld.com)

Submitted by Lucas123
Lucas123 writes: SanDisk today announced the world's highest capacity SD card, a 512GB model that represents a 1,000-fold increase over the company's first 512MB card that it shipped a decade ago. The SanDisk Extreme PRO SDXC UHS-I memory card has a max read/write rate of 95MB/s and 90MB/s, respectively. The card is rated to function in temperatures from -13 to 185 degrees Fahrenheit. The 512GB model retails for $800. The card also comes in 128GB and 256GB capacities.

Submission + - FAA grounds all UPS flights, blames UPS computer issues

Submitted by witherstaff
witherstaff writes: The FAA has sent an alert to ground all UPS flights regardless of destination. The Official reason is "AIRLINE COMPUTER ISSUES". My tinfoil hat wearing self wonders about something bad happening on 9/11. My tech self wonders what sort of computer problem UPS could have that would warrant stopping all traffic.

Submission + - Cuba calculates cost of 54yr US embargo at $1.1tn

Submitted by ltorvalds11
ltorvalds11 writes: Cuba says its economy is suffering a “systematic worsening” due to a US embargo, the consequences of which Havana places at $1.1 trillion since Washington imposed the sanctions in 1960, taking into account the depreciation of the dollar against gold.
“There is not, and there has not been in the world, such a terrorizing and vile violation of human rights of an entire people than the blockade that the US government has been leading against Cuba for 55 years,” Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Abelardo Moreno told reporters.
He also blamed the embargo for the difficulties in accessing internet on the island, saying that the United States creates an obstacle for companies providing broadband services in Cuba. Additionally, he said that the area is one of the "most sensitive" to the embargo, with economic losses estimated at $34.2 million. It is also the sector that has fallen "victim of all kinds of attacks" by the US, as violations of the Cuban radio or electronic space “promote destabilization" of Cuban society, the report notes.
The damage to Cuban foreign trade between April 2013 and June 2014 amounted to $3.9 billion, the report said. Without the embargo, Cuba could have earned $205.8 million selling products such as rum and cigars to US consumers.
Barack Obama last week signed the one-year extension of the embargo on Cuba, based on the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917, created to restrict trade with countries hostile to the US.

Submission + - Combating Recent, Ugly Incidents of Misogyny in Gamer Culture (doctornerdlove.com) 1

Submitted by ideonexus
ideonexus writes: 2490 gamers, developers and journalists have signed an open letter supporting inclusion in the gaming community after indie game developer Zoe Quinn received backlash and harassment when her ex-boyfriend posted false accusations that she traded sex for favorable reviews of her game and feminist critic Anita Sarkeesian was driven from her home after receiving death and rape threats for her videos illustrating the way some mainstream games encourage the commodification of and violence against women. The harassment has prompted geek-dating advice columnist Harris O’Malley to declare the backlash the "Extinction Burst of Gaming Culture", the last reactionary gasp before the culture shifts to become more inclusionary.

Submission + - Haiku debates kernel switch to Linux... or not. (osnews.com)

Submitted by taikedz
taikedz writes: A very interesting discussion is taking place in the Haiku mailing list. A developer has created a working prototype implementation of the BeOS API layer on top of the Linux kernel, and he is wondering if the project is worth pursuing.

Both 'sides' make a lot of compelling arguments, and it gives a lot of insight into decisions that went into the Haiku project, both past and present.

Submission + - How Facebook could accidentally make its engineers into military targets (thebulletin.org) 1

Submitted by Lasrick
Lasrick writes: Adam Henshke and Patrick Lin write that because of a lack of clear rules for cyberwarfare, technology workers could find themselves fair game in enemy attacks and counterattacks. 'If they participate in military cyberoperations—intentionally or not—employees at Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Sprint, AT&T, Vodaphone, and many other companies may find themselves considered “civilians directly participating in hostilities” and therefore legitimate targets of war, according to the legal definitions of the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols.' This is a fascinating read about the myriad questions that cybersecurity raises--among them: Would nations ever target Google engineers if a cyberattack was launched with gmail? Could a company be justified in launching it's own military operations if it were under cyberattack from a hostile country? Great read.

Submission + - Northrop Grumman Gives Early Look at its XS-1 Experimental Spaceplane Design (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: Northrop Grumman, in partnership with Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic, has unveiled the preliminary design it is developing as part of DARPA’s XS-1 Spaceplane project. Looking like a windowless update of a 1960s Dyna Soar orbiter, it’s the next step in producing launch systems that will dramatically reduce the costs of getting into orbit.

Submission + - Future hack: New cybersecurity tool predicts breaches before they happen (dailydot.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new research paper outlines new software that scans and scrapes web sites from today and the past, learns patters about what happens prior to a security breach, and then accurately predicts what websites will be hacked in the future. The new tool is up to 66% accuracy.

The classifier is focused on Web server malware or, put more simply, the hacking and hijacking of a website that is then used to attack all its visitors.

If it is possible to accurately predict which sites and servers are most at-risk, it becomes easier to keep an eye on and warn against dangerous websites, the researchers say. Website operators can be alerted ahead of an attack, and search engines can easily know which websites to keep an eye on for potential exclusion from search results.

The algorithm is designed to automatically detect whether a Web server is likely to become malicious in the future by analyzing a wide array of the site’s characteristics: For example, what software does the server run? What keywords are present? How are the Web pages structured? If your website has a whole lot in common with another website that ended up hacked, the classifier will predict a gloomy future.

The classifier itself always updates and evolves, the researchers wrote. It can “quickly adapt to emerging threats.”

Submission + - Would Scottish independence mean the end of UK's nuclear arsenal? (thebulletin.org)

Submitted by Lasrick
Lasrick writes: The referendum on Scottish independence on September 18th affects more than just residents of the United Kingdom. All of the UK's nuclear deterrent is located in Scotland (no wonder they want independence), and Alex Salmond and the Scottish government have pledged to safely remove and permanently ban nuclear weapons from Scottish territory within the first term of a newly independent parliament. Although the polls seem not to favor Scottish independence, you would think the British government would have some sort of contingency plan to quickly and safely remove these weapons from Scottish soil. Nope. There's no contingency plan.

Submission + - Leg Exoskeleton to sit anywhere without requiring Chair

Submitted by rtoz
rtoz writes: A switzerland based start-up company has created a low cost leg Exoskeleton that allows you to Sit anywhere. It is named as "Chairless Chair".

This device offers a wearable alternative for work areas where chairs or stools would take up too much floor space.

According to the makers of this device, the Chairless Chair offers better posture than a conventional chair by keeping the back straight.

Freedom of movement of the user is not reduced by this device. The users can walk, run, and climb stairs while wearing this device.

Although the focus is on production lines, the device has many other potential applications in our daily life.

Submission + - Dramatic Shifts in Manufacturing Costs Are Driving Companies to US, Mexico (yahoo.com)

Submitted by hackingbear
hackingbear writes: According to the new Boston Consulting Group Global Manufacturing Cost-Competitiveness Index, the often perceived as low-cost manufacturing nations — such as China, Brazil, Russia, and the Czech Republic — are no longer much cheaper than the U.S. In some cases, they are estimated to be even more expensive. Chinese manufacturing wages have nearly quintupled since 2004, while Mexican wages have risen by less than 50 percent in U.S. dollar terms, contrary to our long-standing misconception that their labors were being slaved. In the same period, the U.S. wage is essentially flat, whereas Mexican wages have risen only 67%. Not all countries are taking full advantage of their low-cost advantages, however. The report found that global competiveness in manufacturing is undermined in nations such as India and Indonesia by several factors, including logistics, the overall ease of doing business, and inflexible labor markets.

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