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Comment Re:It's a cost/benefit thing (Score 2) 495

Even good coders make mistakes. There can be various reasons for this, maybe someone was suffering from insomnia the night before and their mental processing is slower. Maybe they were working on a part of a project and there are integration issues in their code between a part of the project that they were not as familiar with.

Not every issue in code can be found by peer review, and not every issue in code can be found by testing. A good team has a combination of good coders, good peer reviews, and good testing. You need all of that (and more) for a good project. Good coders are not everything. Nor should they have an ego about their code. A good coder should realize that everybody makes mistakes, even themselves.

E3

New Nintendo HD Console Rumors Abound 154

pcgfx805 writes "Game Informer has reportedly received word from 'multiple sources' that a new HD console from Nintendo will be debuting at this year's E3. They report on conflicting information regarding the power of the console compared to the other current-gen consoles, but go on to speculate that 'Either way it will offer competitive specifications.'" This year's E3 is scheduled for June 7-9.

Submission + - Scubaboard sued over post content

Beardo the Bearded writes: In early 2008, several SCUBA divers were injured (one killed) due to contaminated air provided by a dive boat. Old news is exciting, but legal gears grind slowly.

The operator of the dive shop has filed suit against the owner of the board in an attempt to discourage discussion about the bad air, the fatality, and the conditions of the dive operation. Part of the issue is that the operator closed ship and moved to another company in January of 2010. The posters on scubaboard found that it was the same person and started warning divers against using the new company altogether.

Is it possible or reasonable to hold public forums accountable for the posts of its users?

Comment Re:Not really new (Score 1) 261

EMI and Zenph are two different animals altogether. If I remember correctly EMI creates new music in the style of a composer based on a database of the composers work. The Zenph technique currently takes existing recordings of musicians, analyzes the music, and essentially turns that into a MIDI file. Hopefully when played on an acoustic instrument that's been modified to play MIDI the result sounds as close to the original as possible.

At the moment all it can do is recreate what has already been done. As for what they intend to do in the future, that sounds more like EMI. However, I suspect they're going for something that can play existing music that sounds like it was played by that artist and not new music that sounds like it was written by that artist.

Comment Re:Too much time on their hands (Score 1) 502

As opposed to Mozart, who not only invented Classical music, but also music itself, starting with nothing more than the occasional, disjointed, a-harmonic noises that existed in the world before him.

I'm going to have to disagree with this statement. As much as I enjoy Mozart, he, like others before him built on those that came before.

Music from the Baroque period can be quite beautiful, and much of it was written before Mozart was born. For example, The Four Seasons (1723) by Antonio Vivalidi, Water Music (1717) by George Frideric Handel, and Brandenburg Concertos (1721) by J. S. Bach. Each of these was composed before Mozart was born in 1756.

Graphics

NVIDIA Shows Off "Optimus" Switchable Graphics For Notebooks 102

Vigile writes "Transformers jokes aside, NVIDIA's newest technology offering hopes to radically change the way notebook computers are built and how customers use them. The promise of both extended battery life and high performance mobile computing has seemed like a pipe dream, and even the most recent updates to 'switchable graphics' left much to be desired in terms of the user experience. Having both an integrated and discrete graphics chip in your notebook does little good if you never switch between the two. Optimus allows the system to seamlessly and instantly change between IGP and discrete NVIDIA GPUs based on the task being run, including games, GPU encoding or Flash video playback. Using new software and hardware technology, notebooks using Optimus can power on and pass control to the GPU in a matter of 300ms and power both the GPU and PCIe lanes completely off when not in use. This can be done without being forced to reboot or even close out your applications, making it a hands-free solution for the customer."
The Almighty Buck

America's Army Games Cost $33 Million Over 10 Years 192

Responding to a Freedom Of Information Act request, the US government has revealed the operating costs of the America's Army game series over the past decade. The total bill comes to $32.8 million, with yearly costs varying from $1.3 million to $5.6 million. "While operating America's Army 3 does involve ongoing expenses, paying the game's original development team isn't one of them. Days after the game launched in June, representatives with the Army confirmed that ties were severed with the Emeryville, California-based team behind the project, and future development efforts were being consolidated at the America's Army program office at Redstone Arsenal in Alabama. A decade after its initial foray into the world of gaming, the Army doesn't appear to be withdrawing from the industry anytime soon. In denying other aspects of the FOIA request, the Army stated 'disclosure of this information is likely to cause substantial harm to the Department of the Army's competitive position in the gaming industry.'"

Submission + - Heart patient with no pulse (straitstimes.com) 2

laggist writes: "Heart patient in Singapore implanted with artificial heart that pumps blood continuously, allowing her to be very alive without a pulse.

From the article: '.. the petite Madam Salina, who suffers from end-stage heart failure, would not have been able to use the older and bulkier models because they can only be implanted in patients 1.7m or taller. The 30-year-old administrative assistant is the first recipient here to get a new artificial heart that pumps blood continuously, the reason why there are no beats on her wrist.'"

Comment Re:how hard can it be? (Score 1) 165

Well, I'm not an engineer so someone else may correct me on this, but I suspect that it may have to do with the incompressibility of fluids. I would think that the pressure on the outside of the hull would be transmitted to the fluid which in turn would transmit the pressure to the inner hull causing a collapse.

This would be similar to how a free diver's lungs get compressed as they dive. The pressure is transmitted through the skin, muscle, bone, hits the lungs which are mostly gas and are compressed.

Comment Re:17000 tons of steel gone to waste (Score 1) 169

Yes, I'm sure it'll be nice for the fish and a few extreme divers

If the Oriskany (200ft max depth) ans Spiegel Grove(134 ft max depth) are any indication then more than just extreme divers will dive this. At the bottom both of these wrecks are below the recreational dive limit of 130 ft, but the top of the Spiegel Grove sits just around 60-70ft as does the top of the Oriskany. This is well within the depth limits for recreational diving and I understand that there is quite a bit to see in these wrecks above 130ft.

Comment Re:Stupid double standard (Score 1) 904

Go to the movies. you will see plenty of full frontal nudity of women in R rated movies. You won't get a single shot of a penis until you go to X.

While I agree that there is something of a double standard here, I can think of several movies containing full frontal male nudity that were not rated X. For example "Any Given Sunday", "Life of Brian", "Schindler's List", and "The Crying Game" all contain full frontal male nudity. While it may not be common, it's not exactly unheard of.

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