Slashdot

An anonymous reader writes "I work in IT and find fairly often that I have 'down time.' I'll usually browse the web (Slashdot) or try to find something informative or educating to read. Sometimes, I even get caught up working on my personal webpage or other project that isn't exactly work related. What does everyone else do during these times, and how much time do they spend on non-work related things while at work?"

An anonymous reader writes to tell us about yet another promise of a flying car. The Register is reporting on the latest from Terrafugia Inc called the "Transition" which is a combination car and airplane that runs on unleaded gas. The idea is that it's a car that you can drive to the nearest airstrip and, with the touch of a button, convert to an airplane, fly to an airstrip close to your goal, then convert back to a car to reach your ultimate destination. Of course, how many times have we been promised flying cars only to suffer in perpetual disappointment.

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/33930

javajeff writes "I decided to buy an extra 2 GB for my Windows Vista Ultimate. I installed the two new sticks, turned on the computer, and found that Windows only sees 3326MB. Apparently, 32 bit Windows will not see anything over 3.XGB due to memory mapping. Here is a Knowledge Base article from Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929605 on the subject. My bios shows all the sticks installed, and I moved them around to make sure they were all working properly in a 2GB situation. I also ran Ubuntu off of the 7.04 CD to try, and it also did not detect all of the memory. I have an Intel Core 2 Duo Processor E6300 and an Intel Desktop Board DG965WH. My question to the Slashdot community: Is there any way to use 4GB without installing the 64 bit Vista Ultimate?"

Quintessant writes "http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?i d=163207 CVG announces today that their sources have confirmed a Starcraft MMO. Now, this is unconfirmed by Blizzard as of yet, but I think we all saw it coming. Now, keeping this in mind, what do I see as coming next? Turf battles in Korea and China, with geeks and gamers battling it out for the dominance of available bandwidth. The apocalypse? No friends, we call this a zurg rush."

An anonymous reader writes "A group of hackers has stolen a list of all 1.6 million usernames and passwords for registered users of file-sharing site The Pirate Bay. Computer Sweden reports that the sensitive information was accessed by a group calling itself Angry Young Hackers (Arga Unga Hackare — AUH). Source: http://www.thelocal.se/7280/20070511/"

http://www.daniweb.com/blogs/showentry.php?entryid=1450#rating

6Yankee writes "Some Slashdotters are proud to own a computer full of 'beaver', but how about a beaver full of computer? "Ms McMahon said of her Compubeaver: 'I started thinking about the most ridiculous thing to put a computer into and decided it had to be a beaver.'" (That must've made her eyes water.) These case mods are getting dammed silly."

Last month, Utah's governor signed a resolution urging Congress to pass a law that would set up "family" and "adult" channels on the internet as a way to keep kids from seeing boobies. The resolution was based on the work of a group called CP80, which advocates mandating porn be put on its own port, and is headed by the chairman of everybody's favorite tech company, the SCO Group, Ralph Yarro. Now, Yarro's told a Utah legislative committee that open WiFi networks should be banned, and all WiFi networks should have filtering software to keep out porn, or be password-protected, so that if any porn makes its way onto a minor's computer, the network provider can be fined. That seems little odd, like fining the state's transportation department for building roads that people might drive on to go buy porn somewhere. But the suggestions didn't stop there: a BYU law professor says the state should circumvent the constitution not by forcing ISPs to block porn, but rather by giving tax incentives to those that do. One state senator says that the key is "a statewide education program so citizens can learn about the real problem with the uncontrolled porn in our society, mainly coming through the Internet." We'd imagine that advertising the availability of porn on the internet would run counter to these people's goals, but apparently not.
http://techdirt.com/articles/20070419/170440.shtml

Serge Smirnoff writes "Audio format chosen by Apple/EMI for distribution of DRM-free higher quality music in iTunes Store was added to SoundExpert testing service. Though new audio metrics used by SoundExpert is still experimental it's the only testing methodology today capable of measuring perceptual audio quality margin. After some time (depending on volunteer testers' activity) this format can be compared to others like mp3, wma etc. at different bitrates. Now there are 93 codecs/bitrates in the system.

Links:
1. http://www.soundexpert.info/jblog/blog/se_official /SoundExpert+news/2007/04/17/How-good-will-iTunes- Store-AAC-256-files-be
2. http://www.soundexpert.info/coders256.jsp"

An anonymous reader writes "When It Comes To Broadband, U.S. Plays Follow The Leader says a story in IWeek. Their thesis is that, while broadband access in the United States rose from 60 million users in March 2005 to 84 million in March 2006, the US is well behind countries like England and China. Indeed, what you may not realize is that the U.S. ranks a surprisingly poor 12th in worldwide broadband access, a situation which could threaten its ability to maintain its technological lead. The federal government is no help: the FCC has almost no data on the rate of hi-speed adoption, or of what the speed and quality of those services are. Broadband is more expensive here than in other nations, as well, almost 10 times as expensive by some estimates. The cost and poor quality of service aren't from population density, aren't from lack of interest, and are not from lack of technical know-how. So, what is holding us back?

An anonymous reader writes "On December 23, Amazon advertised a 'buy one get one free' sale on DVD box-sets, but apparently did not test the promotion before going live. When anyone placed two box-sets in their cart, the website gave a double discount — so the 'grand total' shown (before order submission) was $0.00 or some very small amount. Despite terms stating that Amazon checks order prices before shipping, Amazon shipped a large number of these orders. Five days later (December 28), after orders had been received and presumably opened, Amazon emailed customers advising them to return the box-sets unopened or their credit cards would be charged an additional amount (more threads). Starting yesterday, Amazon has been (re)charging credit cards, often without authorization. On Amazon's side, they didn't advertise any double discount, and the free or nearly-free box-sets must have cost them a mint. But with Amazon continually giving unadvertised discounts that seem to be errors, is 'return the merchandise or be charged' the new way that price glitches will be handled?"

dropgoal writes "Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas (and GOP presidential candidate) has reintroduced the Truth in Ratings Act. Like the previous version that failed to pass last year, Sen. Brownback's bill would make the FTC responsible for overseeing the video game ratings system and possibly result in a unified ratings system for games, movies, and TV. The ESRB would also have to review all game footage before issuing a rating. Currently, the ESRB hands out ratings after viewing a reel with representative content prepared by the developers. Sen. Brownback thinks that's not enough. 'Video game reviewers should be required to review the entire content of a game to ensure the accuracy of the rating. The current video game ratings system is not as accurate as it could be because reviewers do not see the full content of games and do not even play the games they rate', he said."

paxmaniac writes "Reuters reports that Steve Jobs is urging the 'big four' record companies to drop DRM. According to Jobs:'If such requirements were removed, the music industry might experience an influx of new companies willing to invest in innovative new stores and players. This can only be seen as a positive by the music companies'

All well and good, but isn't this a little hypocritical given that iTunes sells DRM encumbered songs that are available at other stores (e.g eMusic) without DRM?"

kukyfrope writes "MTV News recently interviewed Justin Davis, editor-in-chief of popular mobile-gaming site Modojo, shedding some light on the highly neglected cell-phone gaming market amidst the hype of current-gen HD gaming consoles. The self-proclaimed "mobile gaming ambassador to the hard-core gaming community," he may just convince you to give a few cell phone games a try."