The_Hun - Slashdot User

+ - Ad Agency Phorm Sends Legal Attack to Quiet Media-> 0

Submitted by on Saturday February 28, 2009 @03:28AM

An anonymous reader writes "Earlier this week the independent UK consumer group Which? sent a press release to news media agencies which included survey findings stating that users were against the monitoring of their web browsing using software called Webwise developed by internet ad agency and security company Phorm which is working in collaboration with the companies BT, TalkTalk and Virgin Media. The survey findings by Which? are in contradiction with unpublished but cited market research done by Phorm. Phorm placed legal pressure on Which? to withdraw the press release causing several major media agencies including The Press Association, Channel 4 News, the Telegraph and the Daily Mail to hastily remove or edit their articles today to no longer say that users were against browser monitoring.

The Register (UK): Phorm unleashes legal attack on critics"
Link to Original Source

+ - Linux Boot on Dell E4200 0

Submitted by

MBAslug

on Saturday February 28, 2009 @02:07AM

MBAslug writes "As the proud owner of the svelt Lattitude E4200 from Dell (in blue), I am obsessed with the tiny "Instant ON" button on the left corner. This boots the laptop into a Linux shell that should allow me access to the Outlook database on my high-speed SSD drive. The neanderthals running the corporate IT have chosen Lotus Notes and so the feature is useless to me. I want to boot to the application of my choice. Having moved into management, my geek credibility and skills have atrophied to that of an 8-year old and I haven't been able to figure out how to hack this feature to boot directly to a linux shell instead of Dell's application. Please, for the sake of this old man, can someone guide me into the promised land of a dual-boot Dell laptop with dedicated linux processor? Help us Obi Wan, you;re our only hope."

+ - Does climate change affect bushfires? 1

Submitted by TapeCutter on Saturday February 28, 2009 @02:05AM

TapeCutter writes "After the devastating firestorm in Australia, there has been a lot of speculation in the press about the role of climate change. For the 'pro' argument the BBC article points to reaseach by the CSIRO. For the 'con' argument they quote David Packham of Monash university who is not alone in thinking "...excluding prescribed burning and fuel management has led to the highest fuel concentrations we have ever had...". However the DSE's 2008 annual report states; "[The DSE] achieved a planned burning program of more than 156,000 hectares, the best result for more than a decade. The planned burning of forest undergrowth is by far the most powerful management tool available... ".

I drove through Kilmore on the evening of the firestorm and in my 50yrs of living with fire have never seen a smoke plume anything like it. It was reported to be 15km high and creating it's own lightning, there were also reports of car windscreens and engine blocks melting. So what was it that made such an unusual firestorm possible and will it happen again?"

+ - CPSA: Destroy Childrens Books Made Prior to 1985-> 0

Submitted by

bitrex

on Saturday February 28, 2009 @01:16AM

bitrex writes "An article at Overlawyered.com discusses some of the ramifications of the Consumer Products Safety Act of 2008. Under the provisions of the bill, which took effect on February 10th of this year, it is now illegal to distribute, sell, or lend children's books printed in the United States prior to 1985, when lead paint was banned from children's products — unless each item can be proven "safe" through expensive testing. Given the harsh economic math of the process, some libraries have determined that disposing of thousands of vintage books is the only option. Here is a guide for consumers to the effects of the new legislation."
Link to Original Source

+ - Changing the Way We Wee 0

Submitted by

theodp

on Friday February 27, 2009 @11:59PM

theodp writes "Valleywag isn't sold on the Green Movement's plans for your bowel movements. However, the NY Times embraces urine-diversion toilets, an unapologetically 'piss-poor solution' to the sewage crisis, while conceding that getting a man to empty his bladder sitting down is a bigger obstacle than one might think. Devices like the NoMix Toilet aim to spare our oceans and fertilize our farms by splitting the bowl so No. 1 goes fore and No. 2 goes aft."

+ - Xfce 4.6 released 1

Submitted by

sofar

on Friday February 27, 2009 @09:16PM

sofar writes "After two years of development, the my Xfce friends have managed to create yet another great Xfce release. The new release builds out to improve the desktop management. Session management is drastically improved and the window manager now detects hung applications. Internally, Xfce now sports a full-fledged configuration system. All in all this new release brings a long awaited update that brings a lot of maturity to the light-weight desktop. Go take the 4.6 tour!."

+ - UUNet Founder owns Declaration of Independence-> 0

Submitted by

Tyketto

on Friday February 27, 2009 @05:55PM

Tyketto writes "In an opinion handed down today, The Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that a Virginia-based technology entrepreneur owns a rare 1776 copy of the Declaration of Independence, not the state of Maine. Richard Adams Jr. purchased the document in 2001 from a book dealer in London, while the state of Maine claimed that it belonged to the town of Wiscasset, where the town clerk kept it in 1776. Adams, founder of UUNet Technologies, the first commercial ISP, sued to establish title to the document, stating that there was no official record kept by Wiscasset. The Court agreed."
Link to Original Source

Comment: Re:that really is a really bad development (Score 1) 242

by The_Hun on Tuesday August 12, 2008 @04:53AM (#24565237) Attached to: First All-Drone USAF Air Wing

Let's just hope the operators won't become numb seeing those pictures.

+ - Orrin Hatch - Software copyright violater-> 2

Submitted by

fudreporter

on Saturday February 23, 2008 @03:05PM

fudreporter writes "Wired.com has an article referring to comments Senator Orrin Hatch(R-Utah) made about downloading copyrighted material from the Internet... Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) suggested Tuesday that people who download copyright materials from the Internet should have their computers automatically destroyed. But Hatch himself is using unlicensed software on his official website, which presumably would qualify his computer to be smoked by the system he proposes. The senator's site makes extensive use of a JavaScript menu system developed by Milonic Solutions, a software company based in the United Kingdom. The copyright-protected code has not been licensed for use on Hatch's website. "It's an unlicensed copy," said Andy Woolley, who runs Milonic. "It's very unfortunate for him because of those comments he made.""
Link to Original Source

+ - Linux / Unix boxes sweep Amazon's 'best of" 20-> 0

Submitted by

christian.einfeldt

on Friday December 28, 2007 @07:43PM

christian.einfeldt writes "Computers and handheld devices running default GNU Linux or Unix OSes have swept Amazon's 'best of' list for 2007, according BusinessWire.com for 28 December 2007. Best selling computer? The Nokia Internet Tablet PC, running Linux. Best reviewed computer? The Apple MacBook Pro notebook PC. Most wished for computer? Asus Eee 4G-Galaxy 7-inch PC mobile Internet device, which comes with Xandros Linux pre-installed. And last, but not least, the most frequently gifted computer: The Apple MacBook notebook PC. Microsoft makes only one appearance on the list, and it wasn't in games, but in the best selling software package: Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007. Microsoft fans will point out that 'all of these computers are capable of running Windows', but in years past, that line belonged to the Linux / Mac crowd."
Link to Original Source

+ - Florida election ballots to be printed on-demand 0

Submitted by davidwr on Friday December 28, 2007 @05:31PM

davidwr writes "The St. Petersburg, FL, Times reports that Florida is going back to paper ballots, but with a twist. They are printing the ballots on-demand, right there at the polling booth. This isn't machine-assisted voting where a touch-screen fills in your printed ballot for you. It's just a way to save printing costs and reduce paper waste."

+ - DIY Diamond Thermal Compound-> 0

Submitted by Jayson Anders on Sunday December 02, 2007 @02:22PM

Jayson Anders writes "Research has been done demonstrating a far superior type of thermal compound using diamond. Silver has a respectable thermal conductivity at: 429W/m K. Diamond on the other hand has a thermal conductivity of 900-2320 W/m K. So worst case scenario we double performance, and best case is roughly a 5x multiplier. The folks over at Recommendedspec.com have put together a article showing you how to make your own!"
Link to Original Source

+ - Help me fight the swiss dmca.-> 0

Submitted by

pyalot

on Sunday December 02, 2007 @12:31PM

pyalot writes "The swiss goverment has passed a law that would make it impossible to cirvumvent effective copy protection measures. I have created a page to inform and organize a resistance against this law. If we collect 50'000 signatures until the 24th of January however, we can force a national vote on this law. Help me in any way that you can fight this law. I was first made aware of this two days ago by this article on slashdot."
Link to Original Source

+ - U.S. Claims Right to Kidnap British Citizens-> 0

Submitted by

boarder8925

on Sunday December 02, 2007 @10:37AM

boarder8925 writes "The U.S. federal government has informed Britain that it has the right to kidnap British citizens suspected of criminal offenses. The Times continues: "A senior lawyer for the American government has told the Court of Appeal in London that kidnapping foreign citizens is permissible under American law because the US Supreme Court has sanctioned it.""
Link to Original Source

+ - Novell Make Linux Driver Project a Reality 0

Submitted by

apokryphos

on Thursday September 27, 2007 @07:22PM

apokryphos writes "Novell have relaunched the Linux Driver Project by dedicating well-known kernel developer Greg KH to work on the project full-time. Greg KH writes:

"My employer, Novell, has modified my position to now allow me to work full time on this project. Namely getting more new Linux kernel drivers written, for free, for any company that so desires. And to help manage all of the developers and project managers who want to help out...They really care about helping make Linux support as many devices as possible, with fully open-source drivers.""