ihop0 - Slashdot User

Offline Book "Lending" Costs US Publishers Nearly $1 Trillion 494

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday January 19, 2010 @02:07PM from the oh-the-humanity dept.

An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from a tongue-in-cheek blog post which puts publisher worries about ebook piracy into perspective: "Hot on the heels of the story in Publisher's Weekly that 'publishers could be losing out on as much $3 billion to online book piracy' comes a sudden realization of a much larger threat to the viability of the book industry. Apparently, over 2 billion books were 'loaned' last year by a cabal of organizations found in nearly every American city and town. Using the same advanced projective mathematics used in the study cited by Publishers Weekly, Go To Hellman has computed that publishers could be losing sales opportunities totaling over $100 billion per year, losses which extend back to at least the year 2000. ... From what we've been able to piece together, the book 'lending' takes place in 'libraries.' On entering one of these dens, patrons may view a dazzling array of books, periodicals, even CDs and DVDs, all available to anyone willing to disclose valuable personal information in exchange for a 'card.' But there is an ominous silence pervading these ersatz sanctuaries, enforced by the stern demeanor of staff and the glares of other patrons. Although there's no admission charge and it doesn't cost anything to borrow a book, there's always the threat of an onerous overdue bill for the hapless borrower who forgets to continue the cycle of not paying for copyrighted material."

Big Dipper "Star" Actually a Sextuplet System 88

Posted by kdawson on Friday December 11, 2009 @01:48PM from the toil-and-trouble dept.

Theosis sends word that an astronomer at the University of Rochester and his colleagues have made the surprise discovery that Alcor, one of the brightest stars in the Big Dipper, is actually two stars; and it is apparently gravitationally bound to the four-star Mizar system, making the whole group a sextuplet. This would make the Mizar-Alcor sextuplet the second-nearest such system known. The discovery is especially surprising because Alcor is one of the most studied stars in the sky. The Mizar-Alcor system has been involved in many "firsts" in the history of astronomy: "Benedetto Castelli, Galileo's protege and collaborator, first observed with a telescope that Mizar was not a single star in 1617, and Galileo observed it a week after hearing about this from Castelli, and noted it in his notebooks... Those two stars, called Mizar A and Mizar B, together with Alcor, in 1857 became the first binary stars ever photographed through a telescope. In 1890, Mizar A was discovered to itself be a binary, being the first binary to be discovered using spectroscopy. In 1908, spectroscopy revealed that Mizar B was also a pair of stars, making the group the first-known quintuple star system."

Comment Medical Research Doesn't Scale... (Score 1) 484

by ihop0 on Monday November 05, 2007 @06:30PM (#21247325) Attached to: Former Intel CEO Rips Medical Research

At least not yet, it doesn't. But there are many aspects of it that are emerging that come closer to approaching the rate of progress you see in the tech industry. The pace of technological advancement in recent decades has been facilitated by Moore's Law. Only recently has the medical community been able begin taking advantage of this. Now there are advancements like imaging/MRI systems doubling the number of "slices" they can scan simultaneously, every so often, use of microchips to detect cancer markers, etc. Andy Kessler wrote a book about this convergence called The End of Medicine: How Silicon Valley (and Naked Mice) Will Reboot Your Doctor. http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/17/1623217&from=rss http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006113029X/andykessler-20

Submission + - EPA likely to block tougher pollution standards

Submitted by

HairyNevus

on Sunday September 16, 2007 @01:25PM

HairyNevus writes: "Starting with California, 11 other states have adopted tougher CO2 emission standards than the federal government regulates. The new state laws require automakers to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 22% in 2012 and 30% in 2016. 2 days ago a Vermont court allowed this law to go into effect. However, the EPA requires that all states who set tougher standards than the government receive a waiver. This generally isn't a problem, the EPA has issued 40 waivers in the last 30 years, but state officials in Washington are now saying the EPA is likely to refuse a waiver. EPA Administrator Steve Johnson will make the final decision on the waiver by the end of this year, for California. Arnold Schwarzenegger has said he intends to sue if denied a waiver.

Isn't there an issue of state's rights somewhere here?"

Submission + - Apple hides account info in DRM-free music

Submitted by

Mike

on Wednesday May 30, 2007 @04:35PM

Mike writes: "Songs sold by the Apple iTunes store without DRM still have a user's full name and account e-mail embedded in them, reports Arstechnica. After examining the files Arstechnica noticed their names and e-mail addresses in the files, and they've found corroboration of the find at TUAW, The Unofficial Apple Weblog. Since the entertainment industry is obsessed with the idea of "casual piracy," or the occasional sharing of content between friends it see,s likely that this information will be used to keep tabs on who buys what, and more importantly, where it ends up. Although spoofing the data is trivial, shouldn't the idea that your account name and email address are contained in the files make you uneasy, to say the least?"

Submission + - Japanese Government to Move to OSS

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 13, 2007 @02:05PM

An anonymous reader writes: linuxworld has an article on Japanese government's plan to reduce its reliance on a single IT vendor by moving to open source softwares.

Oracle, NEC, IBM, HP, Hitachi and Dell are among 10 IT equipment and software vendors that are forming a consortium to develop and sell Linux-based servers and computers for the Japanese market. The move by the vendors to collaborate on Linux in Japan comes from a edict from the country's government to make Linux and open source a priority for all IT procurements, starting this July.
Specifically, it looks to reduce Windows as the server OS.

The government has said explicitly it wants to decrease its reliance on Microsoft as a server operating system platform.

Submission + - Using Technology to Enhance Humans

Submitted by

Roland Piquepaille

on Sunday May 13, 2007 @01:03PM

Roland Piquepaille writes: "It's a well-known fact that technology can improve our lives. For example, we can reach anyone and anywhere with our cellphones. And people who can't walk after an accident now can have smart prosthesis to help them. But what about designing our children on a computer or having a chip inside our brain to answer our email messages? Are we ready for such a future? In "Robo-quandary," the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that many researchers are working on the subject. And as a professor of neuroscience said, "We can grow neurons on silicone plates; we can make the blind see; the deaf hear; we can read minds." So will all we become cyborgs one day? Maybe not, but read more for additional details about one researcher's work about transhumanism."

Submission + - AMD will deliver open graphics drivers

Submitted by

derrida

on Sunday May 13, 2007 @12:06PM

derrida writes: "After Intel's announcement, AMD also announced that they will soon deliver open graphics drivers, as Henri Richard said, at the opening keynote of the Red Hat Summit. Richard, AMD's executive vice president of sales and marketing, promised: "I'm here to commit to you that it's going to get done." He also promised that AMD is "going to be very proactive in changing way we interface with the Linux community.""

Submission + - AMD will deliver open graphics driver

Submitted by

FrankNFurter

on Sunday May 13, 2007 @10:46AM

FrankNFurter writes: "According to this blog entry, Henri Richard, AMD's executive vice president of sales and marketing announced during his keynote at the Red Hat Summit that AMD will soon deliver open graphics drivers. What is lacking are details about which products will be supported, when the drivers will be available and how open the license will be."

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