Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×

Comment Wanted: List of companies AGAINST SOPA (Score 2) 180

While this list is a good start to see which companies to avoid doing business with, I would like to see a list of companies that are vocal about being against SOPA so that I can direct my spending dollars towards them. If a lot of people shifted their spending dollars towards those companies against SOPA, maybe the loss of income may change the pro-SOPA mentality.

Comment IE7 (Score 1) 2254

My IE7 doesn't render correctly either. The menu that should be on the left side (at least it does in my firefox browser) shows up way on the right on IE7. The stories are partially covered on the right side by my karma and poll boxes. The horizontal scroll bar thinks there is stuff way off to the right, even though it appears to be empty. The webpage doesn't seem to size correctly to the actual browser size. (My Firefox browser seems to render everything better.)

Comment Now the real test starts (Score 4, Interesting) 277

From the cnet article:

"RIAA lawyers have told the judge that LimeWire costs the record labels about $500 million in lost music sales every month."

So with LimeWire shut down, will record sales increase by $500 million every month? Hopefully they will use current sales figures including the 2 months AFTER the shutdown to calculate the lost sales prior to the shutdown and not just take the RIAA lawyers word for it. My guess is they will see little, if any, sales difference after the shutdown.

Comment Someone finally gets it! (Score 4, Interesting) 298

Thank you Ron Gilbert! At last someone finally gets what I have been saying for a long time and has the gonads to say it out loud. (Be careful though Ron, some blogs will ban you for such treachery. I know because I tried to say this very same thing and got my account deleted from a female blog dictator.) Now, don't get me wrong. The iThings are very nice products from a hardware point of view with the MAJOR exception of no user replaceable batteries. (Sorry, but having to spend $79 to replace the battery in a $99 iPhone 3GS is just plain idiotic.) The hardware is attractive, user friendly, and usually well designed (with another exception of the user-touchable antenna which de-tunes it.) I just have a major issue with someone else telling me what I can or cannot install for apps on my devices. If I am paying that much, I feel I have bought the right to install what I please as long as it doesn't interfere with the phone company network.

Comment Box Office by Patriot (Score 2, Informative) 516

I am currently using a Box Office by Patriot purchased thru CompUSA (TigerDirect) and it supports Linux kernal 2.4.1.0 or above as well as various Windows flavors and Mac 9.0 and above. The box supports a good number of video formats including MPEG-1 (MPG/MPEG/DAT) up to 1080p, MPEG-2 (MPG/MPEG/VOB/IFO/TS/TP/M2TS) up to 1080p, MPEG-4 (MP4/AVI/MOV) up to 1080p, DivX 3/4/5/6 & Xvid (AVI/MKV) up to 1080p, H.264 * AVC (TS/AVI/MKV/MOV/M2TS) up to 1080p, Real Video 8/9/10 (RM/RMVP) up to 720p, FLV, WMV9 (1080p) and ISO (1080p). Many audio formats including the regulars plus OGG and FLAC. Image formats include JPEG, BMP and PNG. The box has fast Ethernet, 2x USB 2.0 ports and internal 2.5" SATA HDD connections. (HDD sold seperately, but very easy to install.) A USB wireless adapter is available, but came included in my package. You can stream video from network storage devices. Best of all, it is small, quiet, has a remote control, HDMI output as well as composite A/V and S/PDI outputs.

Comment Problems with TurnItIn type services (Score 1) 439

1. A student writes a paper and submits it. These TurnItIn type services compare it to other papers and returns a score to determine if it was a copy of someone else's work. This student's own work now becomes part of that database to help the service make more money. Students need to copywrite their work before handing it in and demand that any service verifying that it is original remove it from their database. 2. A student writes a paper, it gets tested by one of these services and is found to be original and gets a decent grade. Later in a different class, another paper is required and it just so happens that this previous paper fits in precisely with the requirements, so the student uses it again. Remember, it is the student's own work. The service now says that he copied it word for word from another student and the student is accused of cheating. Now with scenario #2, reuse of a student's own work may be questionable, but it IS HIS OWN WORK and he should be free to use it however and whenever he wishes.

Comment No New Groklaw Accounts = Anonymous Cowards (Score 2, Informative) 81

Reguarding the Anonymous Cowards comment, PJ had disabled new accounts so it is currently impossible for anyone to create one. All new users have no choice BUT to be anonymous. Some also prefer NOT to be anonymous, but their accounts were disabled/deleted because they posted a serious comment that was against popular opinion and labeled a troll. That isn't to say there aren't a lot of trolls there, because there are.
Input Devices

Fighting With Your Fingers — A Canceled Indie Game Concept For Natal 45

ChiefMonkeyGrinder writes "Though Microsoft's Project Natal won't be released until later this year, indie studio Arkedo has already revealed a canceled project for the peripheral. Called 2 Finger Heroes, it was to be a beat 'em up where your fingers do the fighting. 'Characters would be controlled by moving your fingers, while special moves could be done by incorporating your whole hand. The environment could even be affected by moving your arms folded at your chest.' On why it was canceled, one of the developers said, 'One of the design flaws of this, apart from the fact that it demanded some very precise pattern recognition from the Natal system, is that it would have been HELL to localize. Yup, what can be understood as the victory sign in France could be a terrible insult in the UK, for instance. And we are not even talking about Italian. Oh, the possibilities...'"

Comment 21+ Bing links on MSN home page (Score 1) 406

When I looked at the homepage of MSN (which many IE browsers use as the default home page), I found a minimum of 21 links that you thought were links to articles but were only links to Bing searches. This is why they are gaining ground, not because of a better search engine but because of the sneaky way they get people to use their search engine.

Comment Running multiple products (Score 2, Funny) 191

Not only do the various security companies use different names for the threats they identify; they don't even identify the same threats.

This is why I have to run 6 different scanners: because there isn't one that detects all the threats. I currently run 2 antivirus programs along with SpyBot, SuperAntiSpyware, Windows Defender, and Malwarebyte's Anti-Malware.

Image

Mexico Wants Payment For Aztec Images 325

innocent_white_lamb writes "Starbucks brought out a line of cups with prehistoric Aztec images on them. Now the government of Mexico wants them to pay for the use of the images. Does the copyright on an image last hundreds of years?"
Businesses

Facebook Mafiosi Go To the Mattresses vs. Zynga 102

sympleko writes "Zynga has the lion's share of traffic in Facebook applications, and Mafia Wars is one of their most popular social games. Collapsing under the weight of over 26 million users, Zynga has been scrambling to thwart hard-core gamers who reverse-engineer URLs or script the game to optimize their enjoyment. Many of the workarounds have annoyed users who were accustomed to various game features, and even worse, the hastily-deployed changes have resulted in many players losing access to the game, in-game prizes, or statistics. Fed up with a software company seemingly bent on discouraging people from enjoying their product, a number of tagged players have organized a boycott of all Zynga games. The first 24-hour boycott on Sunday 12/13 resulted in an 11% decline in Daily Active Users, and an emergency thread on Zynga's forums (from which most of the flames were deleted). The current boycott, extending Wednesday through Sunday is being supported by a 428K strong Facebook group. At issue is the social contract between software companies and their devoted user base, as well as the nefarious tactics Zynga has used to raise cash."

Slashdot Top Deals

Always draw your curves, then plot your reading.

Working...