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The Internet

UK Government Announces Broadband Tax 252

Posted by kdawson from the one-hand-giveth dept.
Barence writes "The UK Government is planning a 50p-per-month levy on fixed-line connections to pay for next-generation broadband. The Government claims that market forces alone will bring fiber connections to only two thirds of the country, so it plans to use the 'broadband tax' to pay for the final third by 2017. The plans form part of the Government's Digital Britain report, which also see the UK guarantee connections of 2Mbits/sec for every citizen by 2012." The report also threatens legal action and bandwidth restriction for repeat file sharers.
Moon

NASA To Trigger Massive Explosion On the Moon In Search of Ice 376

Posted by timothy from the smashing-darling-smashing dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "NASA is preparing to launch the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, which will fly a Centaur rocket booster into the moon, triggering a six-mile-high explosion that scientists hope will confirm whether water is frozen in the perpetual darkness of craters near the moon's south pole. If the spacecraft launches on schedule at 12:51 p.m. Wednesday, it will hit the moon in the early morning hours of October 8 after an 86-day Lunar Gravity-Assist, Lunar Return Orbit that will allow the spacecraft time to complete its two-month commissioning phase and conduct nearly a month of science data collection of polar crater measurements before colliding with the moon just 10 minutes behind the Centaur." (Continues, below.)
Software

Submission + - Opera 10.0 released, ready to "Unite" the (opera.com) 1

Submitted by
sherl0k
sherl0k writes: "Opera 10.0, dubbed Opera Unite, has been released. Built into the web browser is a full fledged web server, complete with nifty little gadgets such as a "fridge" where people can post notes onto, a chat room, ability to stream your music library anywhere, and a built-in file-sharing mechanism. It also scores 100/100 on the Acid3 test."
Government

Irish Reject E-Voting, Go Back To Paper 154

Posted by Soulskill from the progress-is-progress dept.
Death Metal tips news that the Irish government has announced their decision to abandon e-voting and return to a paper-based system. "Ireland has already put about $67 million into building out its e-voting infrastructure, but the country has apparently decided that it would be even more expensive to keep going with the system than it would be to just scrap it altogether." John Gormley, Ireland's Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, said, "It is clear from consideration of the Report of the Commission on Electronic Voting that significant additional costs would arise to advance electronic voting in Ireland. ... the assurance of public confidence in the democratic system is of paramount importance and it is vital to bring clarity to the present situation." He added that he still thinks there is a need for electoral reform.
Red Hat Software

Alan Cox Leaves Red Hat 163

Posted by CmdrTaco from the bet-wherever-he's-going-he'll-have-electricity-and-heat dept.
ruphus13 writes "Alan Cox — one of the lead Linux kernel developers at Red Hat — is leaving the company after 10 years and is heading to Intel, where he can focus on more low-level development tasks. Some are speculating whether this is indicative of a shift to a more 'application-centric' vision at Red Hat. From the article: 'Red Hat is integrating more application related, user- and enterprise-centric tools into its well-established "low-level," "core" development and support tools. It'd be more worrisome if Red Hat neglected to strike out in this direction. Cox was with Red Hat for ten years, and regardless of any suspected change of course within the company, that's a fair amount of time.'"
Books

Reading Guide To AI Design & Neural Networks? 266

Posted by kdawson from the open-the-library-doors-hal dept.
Raistlin84 writes "I'm a PhD student in theoretical physics who's recently gotten quite interested in AI design. During my high school days, I spent most of my spare time coding various stuff, so I have a good working knowledge of some application programming languages (C/C++, Pascal/Delphi, Assembler) and how a computer works internally. Recently, I was given the book On Intelligence, where Jeff Hawkins describes numerous interesting ideas on how one would actually design a brain. As I have no formal background in computer science, I would like to broaden my knowledge in the direction of neural networks, pattern recognition, etc., but don't really know where to start reading. Due to my background, I figure that the 'abstract' theory would be mostly suited for me, so I would like to ask for a few book suggestions or other directions."

Comment Re: Irelands crumbling infrastructure. (Score 1) 287

by DiarmuidBourke (#25257847) Attached to: Facebook Finds Grass Greener In Ireland

What are you talking about? Seriously? What crumbling infrastructure? For a country of 5million, we have a very good infrastructure. Are you aware of our new road networks? (yes i'm aware a lot of new motorways wont be finished until 2010), but our current roads are MUCH better than the 80s or 90s. CIE is undergoing radical transformations, same for bus-eireann. We've built many new and upgraded countless other hospitals, transport stations, public areas, town-centers and other facilities.

Oh and dont forget that we've done all this during a time of war (northern ireland), which has costed the state a lot of taxpayers money. Sure low corporate tax has helped us draw in foreign investment. We needed this because there was no employment before the 90s. Nowadays anybody can find work (probably not in finance atm, but that's their fault for overextending themselves.), including the many immigrants. The real underlying cause to our recent success has been the quality of our education system during the 90s.

Your backwards religious theocracy statement is complete rubbish too. Religious organisations have had minimal input into recent governmental decisions these days.
Moon

Moon May Have Once Had Water 89

Posted by CmdrTaco from the also-i-may-once-have-had-whisky dept.
Smivs writes "US scientists have found evidence that water was held in the Moon's interior, challenging some elements of the theory of how Earth's satellite formed.The Moon is thought to have been created in a violent collision between Earth and another planet-sized object. Scientists thought the heat from this impact had vaporised all the water. But a new study in Nature magazine shows water was delivered to the lunar surface from the interior in volcanic eruptions three billion years ago. This suggests that water has been a part of the Moon since its early existence."
Operating Systems

Submission + - Is 64Bit OS worth it for more addressable memory? 2

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: What is the current state of 64bit Operating Systems — both Windows and Linux (I plan on duel booting)? I ask because I would like to use more then 3GB of ram (I am also a gamer so if I have 2x 512mb Graphics Cards, that limits addressable memory to about 3GB on a 32 bit OS). My goal is 4GB of addressable RAM + about 1GB for Graphics. What is important to me on Windows is Games (most of what's on steam) and Development tools (Visual Studio/Photo Shop/Dreamweaver/etc). I am in the process of transitioning to Linux, but for now I need to run those programs for Windows. I ask the collective experience of the /. community: What are the current hurdles of running a 64bit OS AND Is it better to go 64bit with the potential hurdles it has, or is it not worth the gain of addressable memory (1 more GB) and stick to a 32 bit OS for now? If it makes a difference, I plan on building a new computer.
The Internet

The Pirate Bay About To Relaunch Suprnova.org 285

Posted by CowboyNeal from the but-for-how-long dept.
kungfujesus writes "The Pirate Bay crew has been working on this secret project for quite some time now. Back in April they wrote a cryptic post on their blog announcing that something was coming. In a response to this announcement TPB admin Brokep told TorrentFreak: "The past, the present and the future. It's all the same, but one thing's for sure, we will radiate for weeks", today it became clear that he was referring to the resurrection of Suprnova."

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