Slashdot

Greg Locke, a machine designer and bass player, has created a self-playing rock band that is becoming an Internet sensation. "The Trons" took six months to build, and Locke lists The Velvet Underground and washing machines as their biggest influences. The band consists of Wiggy, the lead guitarist, Ham, on rhythm guitar, Swamp the drummer, and keyboard player Fifi. Along with their success on YouTube, The Trons have performed five live gigs in their hometown of Hamilton in New Zealand. I wonder what their groupies are like.

gyrogeerloose writes "According to a National Geographic News story, what may be the fossilized wing bone of an ancient parrot has been dubbed by its discoverers 'The Danish Blue' in honor of the famous Dead Parrot Sketch. If the 54 million year old bone did in fact belong to a parrot, it would be 'the oldest and most northerly remains of a parrot ever discovered.' There is some dispute among paleontologists about whether the bone was indeed that of a parrot. If it turns out to be so, however, it never had a chance to pine for the fjords — they were not carved out until an ice age millions of years after the bird lived."

BendingSpoons writes "A Seattle school board has placed a moratorium on screenings of 'An Inconvenient Truth', having found its subject matter too controversial. Echoing the language of the evolution debate, the school board found that students must be told that global warming is only a theory and presented with an opposing viewpoint. The ban was prompted by the complaints of a parent: '"Condoms don't belong in school, and neither does Al Gore. He's not a schoolteacher," said Frosty Hardison, a parent of seven who also said that he believes the Earth is 14,000 years old. "The information that's being presented is a very cockeyed view of what the truth is ... The Bible says that in the end times everything will burn up, but that perspective isn't in the DVD."'"

kpw10 writes "Dr. Jeff Masters from Wunderground has a great summary of this year's rather abnormal weather (his blog is the best source on the net for in-depth weather analysis). The post discusses some of the cyclical climate forces at work this year and compares this year's record temperatures to records from the past. There are some interesting differences, particularly in the extent of the northern hemisphere seeing record highs this year." From the article: "December's weather in the Northeast U.S. may have been a case of the weather dice coming up thirteen — weather not seen on the planet since before the Ice Age began, 118,000 years ago. The weather dice will start rolling an increasing number of thirteens in coming years, and an ice-free Arctic Ocean in summertime by 2040 is a very real possibility..." Here is the The National Climatic Data Center's report announcing the entry of 2006 into the record books.

ZekeDaniels writes "Sergey Brin gives an amazing plug for Slashdot in a podcast posted at: http://www.podtech.net/home/technology/1758/podven turezone-lost-google-tapes-part-3-sergey-brin. The interview was recorded in January of 2000 as part of "The Lost Google Tapes" series, by John F. Ince who was then a reporter with the now defunct Upside Magazine. At approximately the 9 minute mark in Podcast #3 in the Lost Google Tapes, Sergey Brin says that Slashdot's first mention of Google back in 1999 melted the company's servers. In the interview Brin was talking about Google's frugal approach to advertising and he said, "The main way we've gotten traffic is through word of mouth. And actually I remember when we were just starting and had about 10,000 queries a day .... and then the first time we were mentioned in Slashdot ... you know Slashdot ... basically it's called 'News for Nerds.' They generate an awful lot of traffic for Websites. And so the first time they listed us, our computers melted. I don't know exactly how many queries, but it was like double what we'd been used to and we didn't handle it very gracefully. Of course, these days we get mentions in Slashdot pretty routinely and it's hardly a blip on our traffic graph.""

Rub3X writes "Earlier I reported that Google had a flaw in which it stores contact details in a JavaScript file on their server. A website could in return declare the function "google", and put all your contacts and their details into an array. From there it could have been parsed and sent to the malicious server using Ajax. Earlier today there were reports on zdnet that said the flaw was fixed, however at the time it wasn't true. Currently as of 8 PM EST the flaw has been fixed. When attempting to execute the attack, all you get is a blank page now. Visiting the old page on Google that revealed all the data in an XML file now gives an error. If you don't get the error log out of Google's services and back in."

#Z100 writes "I'm going to be moving into a new home within the next few months and I want to get some feedback on this idea. Although the house is a single-family dwelling, when I give out my new address to organizations I want to append a fake, but unique, apartment number, like #A100, #101, etc. Then when I start to get spam to my house #A115, I can lookup in my database who sold my info (then complain and get free stuff). Will the (US) post office care? Is this legal? Will FedEx/UPS/DHL get confused? Yeah, yeah I know. slownewsday."

Having worked for Microsoft Corporation for a portion of my career, with stats such as 95% of the world uses Microsoft. I was in for a real eye opener on the number of different software packages available in the Open Source world.I have put together a list of the top top ten free tools for any internet professional. The first five are devoted to your desktop and the next five are for your website. If you do not have a website, you could consider getting one up and running with these free tools. top Ten-Must-Have-Free-Software-Packages-for-2007

nomoredreams writes "Take a trip down memory lane, and watch what this guy considers the top 10 game intros of all time. A little bit PC-centric, but still fun."

jcatcw writes, "Next Generation Security Software Ltd. of Surrey, England, compared bugs in Oracle and SQL Server that were reported and fixed between December 2000 and November 2006. The tally: Oracle had 233; MS SQL had 59. The products compared were Oracle 8, 9, and 10g; SQL Server 7, 2000 and 2005. From the article: '[The head of the survey said,] "The results show that the reputation that Microsoft SQL Server had back in 2002 for relatively poor security is no longer deserved."' Oracle's response: 'Measuring security is a very complex process, and customers must take a number of factors into consideration — including use-case scenarios, default configurations, as well as vulnerability remediation and disclosure policies and practices.'"

56 writes "At a press conference in San Francisco, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Novell CEO Ronald Hovsepian announced a

new partnership between Microsoft and Novell. The unprecedented deal will have Microsoft offering a degree of sales support for Novell's SUSE Linux while both companies work towards better interoperability between their respective operating systems. As part of the agreement, Microsoft also promises not to wield its patent portfolio against SUSE Linux."

According to Rajshekhar Bhatt, country manager in India for AMD, "the merger of ATI Technologies with AMD will provide new growth opportunities to the partners of both the companies." The integrated platforms that AMD plans to deliver in 2007 will benefit key markets, including commercial clients, mobile computing and gaming & media computing. Elaborating on the channel benefits, Bhatt said, "AMD, previously was not present in platforms beyond the PCs, so this is an opportunity for its partners to extend their business. As for the ATI partners, they can launch products in sync with the CPU technology trends."

Virtual_Raider writes "A survey indicates that iPod owners may not be as loyal to their devices as Mac owners are to their computers, thus opening the possibility for Microsoft's Zune to enter the market. Surveyed people also indicated a high likelyness of buying the much maligned brown device. But that doesn't mean that the market is now at Microsoft's mercy. RTFA for a change!"

Claus Valca writes "I just spotted over on the Windows Vista Team Blog the news that the Windows Vista retail licensing terms are being revised. Looks like PC home-brew system builders have been let back into the Vista party!" From the article: "Our intention behind the original terms was genuinely geared toward combating piracy; however, it's become clear to us that those original terms were perceived as adversely affecting an important group of customers: PC and hardware enthusiasts. You who comprise the enthusiast market are vital to us for several reasons, not least of all because of the support you've provided us throughout the development of Windows Vista. We respect the time and expense you go to in customizing, building and rebuilding your hardware and we heard you that the previous terms were seen as an impediment to that — it's for that reason we've made this change."

JaneWalker6847 writes "If you're looking for a crash course on Linux security, this is your guide to getting started. Bone up on the basics of working from the command line, get a few open source security tools, and discover SELinux and IT no-nos to avoid."