Comment SVS Video (Score 1) 137
Our friends at Goddard's Scientific Visualization Studio produced a short animation.
Comment Siderurgy (Score 2) 119
Doesn't the greek word for iron mean something like "came from the sky"? I've once thought about why the modern iron industry is often called siderurgy, and came across a few references for the use of iron from meteorites, as early technology wasn't sufficient to extract it from the ore.
Comment Re:What the what what? (Score 1) 270
Thank you.
Comment Re:Non-screen touch surface? (Score 2) 740
Like the Magic Trackpad? (I've seen it on PCs, too)
Comment Great... (Score 1) 218
Now /. will be getting a DMCA notice too.
Comment Re:Yeah, but... (Score 1) 181
Linux is touted to use less system resources... so it should prevent the WAM from overheating,
Comment Re:MORONS!!! (Score 1) 219
Reports of slashdot's demise are frequently exaggerated.
Unless Netcraft confirms it...
Comment Re:Can people actually tell the difference? (Score 3, Funny) 607
So... 240 fps ought to be enough for anybody.
Comment Re:Good and yet... (Score 3, Informative) 343
The last time I traveled with small children we had to drink from the bottle in front of the officers... they considered it a "proof" that it was edible. They said nothing of the high-power laser in my backpack.
Submission + - Town Turns Off the Lights to See the Stars
Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Stargazing skies all over the world all over the world are disappearing, as the sky above New York City is Class 9 on the Bortle ranking and American suburban skies are typically Class 5, 6, or 7. But some places are making an effort to preserve their skywatching heritage as Exmoor National Park was granted International Dark-Sky Reserve status in November and people in the Exmoor town of Dulverton were challenged to switch off their lights as part of the BBC's Stargazing Live, demonstrating that you don't need special equipment to see the stars more clearly, if you have a decent pair of binoculars. "The whole idea is to show that even a small town, which is still quite dark, can give off quite a lot of light," says astronomer Mark Thompson. The event in Dulverton gained a lot of support from local residents and businesses. "It needed a bit of organization to get everyone to say yes," says town mayor Chris Nelder. "We want people to just enjoy the night sky, to treasure the fact we have them and to look after them," adds Claire O'Connor from Exmoor National Park Authority."
Fake Apple Stores Mushrooming In China 241
siliconbits writes "A new worrying phenomenon has cropped up in China and Apple has been its first victim; meet the first fake Apple Stores, entire buildings that have been designed to look like the real ones. Chinese companies have long been known for being master copiers but this takes the concept of plagiarism and copying to a whole new level. As expected, everything, from the architecture of the building, the colour of the paint, to the products, the T-shirt worn by the staff down to the logo and the badge design come from Cupertino."
Comment Re:I had two rolls in for the final processing (Score 5, Informative) 262
It was a great film for astronomical photography... and I always liked the really dark blue in the sky background that no other film could give, at least on my area. Other films, positive or negative, usually turned it brown or greenish... or really green for some fujis.
Comment Re:Alternative ways to develop? (Score 1) 262
Kodachrome is a positive film... the kind that was cut and framed into slide mounts after processing.
Submission + - Ultimate Christmas Lights (vimeo.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Most computerised Christmas Lights displays have in the 10s or 100s of channels. For our first-ever display, we decided to go all out and we built a 1,110 channel display using custom hardware and software running on Linux. Since it's now after Christmas, we have synchronised the lights to The Black Eyed Peas — I Gotta Feeling.
Submission + - Anonymous Attackers Not So Untraceable (thinq.co.uk)
Stoobalou writes: Researchers at the University of Twente are warning that the LOIC DDoS tool used by Anonymous is easily traceable.
The tool of choice in the ongoing pro-WikiLeaks DDoS attacks by digital vigilante group Anonymous may leave its users open to prosecution, failing as it does to adequately protect their identity.
That's the claim of the Design and Analysis of Communication Systems Group at the University of Twente, which recently released a report into the Low-Orbit Ion Cannon, or LOIC, distributed denial of service tool favoured by Anonymous for attacking corporate websites by which it feels aggrieved.
In the report, the researchers claim that "even though the group behind the attacks claims to be anonymous, the tools they provide do not offer any security services, such as anonymisation. As a consequence, a hacktivist that volunteers to take part in such attacks, can be traced back easily" — and that means a possible prosecution under local computer crime laws.
The tool of choice in the ongoing pro-WikiLeaks DDoS attacks by digital vigilante group Anonymous may leave its users open to prosecution, failing as it does to adequately protect their identity.
That's the claim of the Design and Analysis of Communication Systems Group at the University of Twente, which recently released a report into the Low-Orbit Ion Cannon, or LOIC, distributed denial of service tool favoured by Anonymous for attacking corporate websites by which it feels aggrieved.
In the report, the researchers claim that "even though the group behind the attacks claims to be anonymous, the tools they provide do not offer any security services, such as anonymisation. As a consequence, a hacktivist that volunteers to take part in such attacks, can be traced back easily" — and that means a possible prosecution under local computer crime laws.
