At last, our technology is starting to catch up to 1940s cartoons! I can't wait for my portable hole...

I bought a UK copy of PC Gamer recently when I heard they had a preview of Overgrowth in it. I was surprised to know that they'd have different content fro the US PC Gamer magazine, but I was shocked to find the entire magazine was bigger (like those old Life magazines in my grandparent's basement), longer, had many more features, and had a bonus disk. The US version looked positively emaciated next to it.

I suspect that isn't the only overwrought element here. In my, admittedly limited, search I have yet to find reputable sources confirming any but the barest of details in this story; let alone "Kill Half Humanity" (Wikipedia's already infected, care of rt.com.)

The Canadian Press, which brings us the Winnipeg Free Press article, fails to provide anything real to back up its statements. I can't really follow it any more than looking up the organizations provided and looking for related news postings (of which I found none.) Subsequent searching leads me to a Gizmodo article (links provided for those who wish to follow my searches.) Of it, there are two meaningful citations (that is, not links to the about pages of the source in question.) Science Insider and a pdf announcement detailing the schedule of the September influenza conference in Malta, in which this announcement is quoted as having been made.

The first thing I noticed within the pdf (aside from the garish design) is the absence of any announcement on GM influenza, (or Ron Fouchier, or his organization.) Admittedly, this hardly means this didn't occur; merely that this (what is essentially a flier) is not a meaningful source of information.

As for the Science Insider, it provides few additional details, mostly regarding vaguely related discussions on the classification/pre-approval of these sorts of studies. The closest thing it provides to something interesting is a (Dutch language) greenlight for what is supposed to be Ron's project.

Indeed, the Dutch link does concern GM influenza, and is an answer to a question on procedure for studying this sort of thing (of which they already apparently had a license to do.) It does not corroborate any of the stand out details of this article (how could it, considering it's from 2007.) Of minor note, there is no mention of ferrets; only standard embryonated [sic. Google Translation] chicken eggs.

Color me skeptical, to say the least.

You can't take back what you broadcast. Radio wave communication is sufficiently simple that it's not all together unlikely other civilizations wouldn't have at least used it at some point. Sure, eventually they may move beyond it. However, if we're receiving their radio signals just now, it's quite plausible they are now far more advanced than us. But, at the same time, in the time it takes for the signals to reach us (assuming they're even powerful enough to not get lost in the background) they could have easily wipe themselves out.

The cold war truly is over. I wonder how long until the US and Russia have a relationship like Britain and France.

Also: In Post-Soviet Russia, you link up transcontinental railway. In America, transcontinental railway links up you!

Haven't you heard? Valve can't count to 3.It's really true!

I should clarify that. I meant Java as far as the technology stack goes. So, Richfaces, JSF, served up by Tomcat, backed by Java classes.

I came off a project not long ago which involved a web app-running browser embedded in a native app. There was even a decent reason why: Users could pre-enroll online or walk-in at a dedicated station. Either way, the same steps had to be preformed at least once, before the rest of the application (which was native because it involved special hardware) did the rest.

All I can say was, it was...er, an experience.

To begin, the Web application was powered by Java while the Native application was run by C#/.Net. Don't let anyone tell you these two play nice, because they certainly don't; there were bizarre display issues present in the Native app that didn't happen in any other browser we were testing on (including IE.) Nevermind the challenges presented by getting the two applications to communicate and coordinate in order to provide a seamless integrated interface; we really should have relied more on Web Services than we did (but the reasons behind that are a whole other story.) Most importantly, in order to integrate the two well, you need a developer or developers who understand how to write good web apps as well as good native apps (also, in this case a developer who knows C# and Java, which I eventually came to.) I think you hit the nail on the head with your post; these are two very different things with their own strength domains. I'll just add that mixing them is questionable for most solutions, difficult for all of them (Fun, though!)

Too small, too small; think bigger! Soon, I shall have all the components I need to complete my electro-luminal brain! No more cumbersome, slow chemical interface at the synapse; the entire brain will run at the speed of light!

You're correct, at present we've only managed to find quasi-monopoles.
Large-scale cousin of elusive 'magnetic monopoles' found

I'm eager to see if the MoEDAL Experiment manages to pull of a find of true magnetic monopoles, though.