Comment: Ops (Score 1) 174
The parent post said snail-mail, I misread it and thought they said email - I Should have double checked before I posted my bad.
Moon landing missing link. 1
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shoetick
shoetick writes "So, we landed on the moon. We left a flag. We have over the years some really great telescopes. What does the flag look like now? How long would it take to spot the flag from earth? Haven't we been tracking the moons orbit and wouldn't it be easy to calculate the mark? If not, does this aid the skeptics?"
Mom blasts Ballmer over kid's crappy Vista OS-> 6
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Lucas123
Lucas123 writes "While on stage at a Gartner's ITxpo conference today, Ballmer got an ear-full from the mother of a 13-year-old girl who said after installing Vista on her daughter's computer she decided only two days later to switch back to XP because Vista was so difficult. Ballmer defended Vista saying: "Your daughter saw a lot of value"; to which the mother replied: "She's 13."
Ballmer said that Vista is bigger than XP, and "for some people that's an issue, and it's not going to get smaller in any significant way in SP1. But machines are constantly getting bigger, and [it's] probably important to remember that as well."
Says the mother: "Good, I'll let you come in and install it for me.""
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Link to Original Source
RedHat: Customers Can Deploy Linux with Confidence->
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mrcgran
mrcgran writes "Eweek is reporting: "Red Hat is assuring its customers that they can continue to deploy its Linux operating system with confidence and without fear of legal retribution from Microsoft, despite the increasingly vocal threats emanating from the Redmond, Wash., company.
In a scathing response to Ballmer's remarks, Red Hat's IP team said the reality is that the community development approach of free and open-source code represents a healthy development paradigm, which, when viewed from the perspective of pending lawsuits related to intellectual property, is at least as safe as proprietary software.
"We are also aware of no patent lawsuit against Linux. Ever. Anywhere," the team said in a blog posting."
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It's International talk like a pirate day
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Late-Eight
Late-Eight writes "It Be that time of year again Arrr! For the last five years September the 19th has been known as International talk like a pirate day, this invented holiday was created by John Baur & Mark Summers as a joke way back in 1995. But it wasn't until they submitted a letter in 2002 about their made-up holiday to humour columnist Dave Barry that it became global known.
So for today at least you have a valid excuse for talking like a pirate, just don't go over board, Arrr!"
Scientist suggests super-sticky Spidey suit
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Stony Stevenson
Stony Stevenson writes "A professor from the Polytechnic of Turin has developed a method for building a suit that could allow humans to cling to vertical surfaces like the comic book hero Spider-man.
The suit would use a similar principle used by geckos and spiders, which possess millions of tiny hairs on their limbs allowing them to stick to surfaces. Adhesion strength drops exponentially as the surface area and weight increases, so creating the same effect in a human-sized subject has been considered impossible.
"By using something like nanotubes we should be able to create sufficient attractive force to easily support a human, and by laying them out a hierarchical structure, the user should be able easily detach each limb in a simple peeling motion," said Professor Pugno. He predicted that we could see such suits by 2017, but added that they will need to be adhesive enough, easily detachable and self-cleaning if they are to be feasible."
The suit would use a similar principle used by geckos and spiders, which possess millions of tiny hairs on their limbs allowing them to stick to surfaces. Adhesion strength drops exponentially as the surface area and weight increases, so creating the same effect in a human-sized subject has been considered impossible.
"By using something like nanotubes we should be able to create sufficient attractive force to easily support a human, and by laying them out a hierarchical structure, the user should be able easily detach each limb in a simple peeling motion," said Professor Pugno. He predicted that we could see such suits by 2017, but added that they will need to be adhesive enough, easily detachable and self-cleaning if they are to be feasible."
Art Theft Prevention?
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Skye-of-Cydonia
Skye-of-Cydonia writes "Recently, I seem to have been a target for art theft, having mysteriously discovered various pieces of my DeviantART gallery — usually digital art — scattered across the internet. I logged onto my account this morning to find a note: a notice that now, my work is being sold on eBay, without my permission. Obviously this is illegal, and against UK, Ireland and International law, so I took the action of reporting it to eBay in the hope that it will be sorted. Although, that might not stop them entirely from perhaps submitting it elsewhere — perhaps in places that I am unaware of. I was wondering, Slashdot, if there is perhaps a way that I could prevent this — or digitally alter my artwork to be 'encrypted' to some extent. The only issue with prevention of my work being stolen like that, is that people will not be able to view it where submitted. I've already altered all of the work in my DeviantART gallery to contain watermarks, so that they cannot be used. But that doesn't stop them from stealing work from my website, Moons of Mars. I'd hate to have to upload everything again and place watermarks on all of my work — so perhaps there might also be a way that I could do something much easier. I'm not entirely sure what to expect as a response, or suggestion, but right now, I'm desperately in need of a way of securing my art from further theft like this, and I'll blindly take any offers."
Student and professor build budget supercomputer->
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Luke
Luke writes "This past winter Calvin College professor Joel Adams and then Calvin senior Tim Brom built Microwulf, a portable supercomputer with 26.25 gigaflops peak performance, cost less than $2,500 to construct, becoming the most cost-efficient supercomputer anywhere that Adams knows of. "It's small enough to check on an airplane or fit next to a desk," said Brom. Instead of a bunch of researchers having to share a single Beowulf cluster supercomputer, now each researcher can have their own. What would you do with a personal supercomputer?"
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Giant spider web spurs sticky debate-> 1
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Raver32
Raver32 writes "Entomologists are debating the origins of a massive spider web, which runs more than 180 metres and covers several trees and shrubs, found in Texas.
Officials at Lake Tawakoni State Park, near Willis Point, find the web both amazing and somewhat creepy.
"At first, it was so white it looked like fairyland," park superintendent Donna Garde said. "Now it's filled with so many mosquitoes that it's turned a little brown. There are times you can literally hear the screech of millions of mosquitoes caught in those webs."
Experts are debating whether the web is the work of social cobweb spiders working together, or a mass dispersal where the arachnids spin webs to move away from one another."
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NASA checks coastal waters from space
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Roland Piquepaille
Roland Piquepaille writes "Using NASA satellite imagery, researchers at the University of South Florida (USF) in St. Petersburg have found that it is possible to monitor coastal water quality. This means that water quality can be checked daily rather than monthly as done by traditional methods which involves expensive boat surveys. This information can be crucial for resource managers devising restoration plans for coastal water ecosystems. According to the researchers, this method can be applied to coastal waters worldwide with little changes — providing that resource managers have access to data from NASA satellites. Read more for additional references and images showing the water quality of Florida's Tampa Bay and how it decreases in winter months compared to summer."