Half a dent - Slashdot User

Submission + - BitTorrent Anime Downloaders "Fined" $3000 (torrentfreak.com)

Submitted by Odiumjunkie on Friday August 17, 2007 @06:30AM

Odiumjunkie writes: Odex, a company that distributes Japanese animated cartoons has tracked down thousands of BitTorrent users it accuses of breaching their copyrights and has successfully forced their ISPs to reveal their identities. Next step — threatening letters: "Pay Us $3,500 or Else".

Submission + - Bioshock on Steam (extremetech.com)

Submitted by Double_Duo_Decimal on Friday August 17, 2007 @06:25AM

Double_Duo_Decimal writes: Irrational Games' BioShock, which has been eagerly anticipated as the spiritual successor to System Shock, is now available for preloading on the Valve Steam network.

Preloading allows a user to download the game files in the background, which are then automagically transformed into game files when the game is unlocked, which in this case happens on Aug. 21 in the United States, and Aug. 24 in Europe.

Submission + - Hezbollah Releases Video Game (msn.com) 1

Submitted by

stoolpigeon

on Friday August 17, 2007 @04:45AM

stoolpigeon writes: "An msnbc blogger reports that on Thursday, Hezbollah released a game, "Special Force II" The game is based on the 34 day battle between Hezbollah and the Israeli military last year. Players can go into Israel to capture Israeli soldiers, launch rockets on Israeli towns and take on Israeli armor. Apparently killing Israeli soldiers garners the player bonus points. The game was said to be retailing for $10. A cnn story on the game states that the game is a tribute to what Hezbollah describes as, "...a divine victory." and a tool to teach children tactics in warfare."

Submission + - WoW player banned due to blue movie career (theinquirer.net) 1

Submitted by

Barny

on Friday August 17, 2007 @04:43AM

Barny writes: "Actress Mia Rose (star of a few World of Whorecraft episodes) has found her gaming days ended in the MMOG WoW. Fans identified Ms Rose in-game and mentioned in a public chat channel her website, the usual Blizzard CS reaction, ban and ignore, then ensued and continues."

Submission + - Physicists claim to have broken the speed of light

Submitted by

bain

on Friday August 17, 2007 @04:41AM

bain writes: "The Telegraph report that two German physicists; Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen of the University of Koblenz, claim to have broken the speed of light by 'conducting an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — travelled "instantaneously" between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart.' Since this goes against Einstein's special theory of relativity, you can expect a lot of people to dismiss this as rubbish."

Submission + - Red vs. Green (wordpress.com)

Submitted by on Wednesday August 15, 2007 @07:57AM

An anonymous reader writes: Will Halo 3 live up to the hype? And is the Master Chief more attractive than Kirsten Dunst?

Submission + - 3D Animations in Mid-Air Using Plasma Balls (gizmodo.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 15, 2007 @04:44AM

An anonymous reader writes: Japanese boffins are now making animations by creating small plasma balls in mid-air. The technology doesn't use vapor or strange gases, just lasers to heat up oxygen and nitrogen molecules: up to 1,000 brilliant dots per second, which makes smooth motion possible. They could be used as street signs, advertising or to create giant plasma monsters to destroy entire cities. Maybe.

Submission + - The Bush Administration Censored Climate Reports (depers.nl)

Submitted by AkumaReloaded on Wednesday August 15, 2007 @04:40AM

AkumaReloaded writes: The Bush administration actively censored reports on the environment from the World Bank. This was discovered by the Government Accountability Project (GAP). Apparently Paul Wolfowitz was actively engaged in this censorship. How does this effect the deminishing credit of the World Bank. And can it lower the faith in the Bush administration even more?

http://www.depers.nl/buitenland/92216/Bush-censure erde-rapporten-over-klimaatverandering.html.

Submission + - Is Microsoft losing the Xbox 360 PR battle? (itwire.com)

Submitted by mobius27 on Wednesday August 15, 2007 @02:57AM

mobius27 writes: http://www.itwire.com/content/view/13970/ Forget how well the hardware and software stack up. Is it the PR gaffs and disappointing marketing decisions that cost companies sales in the multi-billion dollar gaming market?

Submission + - MS Says: 360 MMOs Can Require Hard Drive (1up.com)

Submitted by powerlord on Tuesday August 14, 2007 @06:18PM

powerlord writes: MS Unveils new rules for MMOs on Live! Changes included are allowing Server based games to require hard-drives, and requiring that Silver XBL members don't have to pay "twice" to play an MMO (upgrade to Gold + pay subscription). On the other side, all games must submit their total disc requirements, and if the requirements go up over the life of a MMO (such as World of Warcraft)? "... Companies are allowed to expand the required size, but the game should always run on the original requirement — users have to approve the change. If the requirement goes up, Microsoft is playing with the idea of allowing the ability to degrade — those are Microsoft's words — the experience. Their ideas, straight from their presentation: Lo-res models/textures, Place certain areas off-limits, Stream assests from server (slower loading)"

Submission + - Couple who catch cop speeding could face charges.

Submitted by

a_nonamiss

on Monday February 19, 2007 @02:10PM

a_nonamiss writes: "A Georgia couple, apparently tired of people speeding past their house, installed a camera and radar gun on their property. After it was installed, they caught a police office going 17MPH over the posted limit. They brought this to the attention of the local police department, and are now being forced to appear in front of a judge to answer to charges of stalking.

from the article:

The Sipples allegedly caught Kennesaw police officer Richard Perrone speeding up to 17 mph over the speed limit. Perrone alerted Bartow authorities, who in turn visited the Sipples' home to tell them Perrone intended to press charges against them for stalking.
I have the utmost respect for most law enforcement. They have a difficult, dangerous and mostly thankless job to do, but shouldn't they be held accountable for casually breaking the very same laws they are supposed to be enforcing? Additionally, shouldn't we, as citizens, have the right to be able to bring this to someone's attention without having to face laughably bogus charges for our efforts?"

Submission + - Black Ops Games: Unannounced Titles

Submitted by

John Callaham

on Thursday January 25, 2007 @02:19PM

John Callaham writes: "There are a ton of games out there in development that have not technically been announced. We know they are out there, mostly through vaguely worded press releases announcing a publishing deal or a quick mention in an interview. While many, if not most of these games won't likely be out by the end of the year we decided to take a look into the crystal ball to see if we can make some educated guesses about these "Black Ops" game titles. In a few instances we even got comments from the developers in charge of the titles. Check out the article at http://www.firingsquad.com/features/black_ops_game s/"

Submission + - Google Earth to get a Second Life?

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 25, 2007 @11:29AM

An anonymous reader writes: Rumors are circulating that the search giant is planning to build its own virtual world based on Google Earth. And it's not as crazy as it sounds, with the latest version of Google Earth having added the ability to build and share rich 3D content using the company's SketchUp 3D modeling software. Meanwhile a second rumor doing the rounds is that the search giant has aquired game advertiser Adscape. With Google's real mission to organize the world around advertising, a virtual world would of its own would make sense.

Submission + - Pope decries video game violence

Submitted by sesshomaru on Thursday January 25, 2007 @09:25AM

sesshomaru writes: From an article on Macworld.com (Pope decries video game violence):

Pope Benedict XVI has added his voice to the discussion in Europe in favor of stricter controls on violent video games and their sale to children.

The trend to develop products including animated films and video games that exalt violence and anti-social behavior is repulsive, especially when such products are aimed at children, he said in a message delivered on Wednesday.

Further down, it says that the Germans are going to push for a Europe wide ban on "violent" games.

Submission + - PS1/2 game issue on PS3 fixed by a new firmware

Submitted by

News for nerds

on Wednesday January 24, 2007 @04:25AM

News for nerds writes: "PS3 had an interlace/progressive conversion issue for playing PS1/2 games on it which made Sony's claim of nearly complete backward compatibility dubious and had deterred user migration from PS2 to PS3. This problem has been finally fixed by the firmware 1.5 released today."

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