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Google

Submission + - Google announces fiber plans, pricing (kansascity.com)

Submitted by
Kiyyik
Kiyyik writes: "Google just announced the details behind their inaugural fiber optic service in Kansas City. They're doing a set of packages including $120/month for tv plus internet, $75/month for internet alone, and regular 'conventional' internet for a one time $300 fee. Rollouts are starting in the central areas and will work their way out on a demand basis: at least ten percent of a neighborhood must sign up for the service before Google will come in and start hanging fiber."
Security

Submission + - Face to face with the 'human barcode' (financialpost.com)

Submitted by silentbrad
silentbrad writes: From the Financial Post: "Fast-evolving biometric technologies are promising to deliver the most convenient, secure connection possible between you and your bank account — using your body itself in place of all of those wallets and purses stuffed with cash, change and plastic cards. Biometrics is the science of humans’ physiological or behaviourial characteristics and it’s being used to develop technology that recognizes and matches unique patterns in human fingerprints, faces and eyes and even sweat glands and buttock pressure. Its applications in the financial realm are a potentially huge time and effort saver, but that’s just a beginning for the technology’s usefulness. ... [BIOPTid Inc.]’s One Touch cube, set to be on the market within a year, is an external device that users can hook up to their computers and mobile electronics to replace passwords for Internet logins and banking. The cube reads a personal sweat gland barcode to verify identity from the moisture on a user’s fingertip. ... “Biometrics is something that’s used by governments, it’s used by ‘Big Brother’ to keep an eye on us and we want to change that,” says Mr. McNulty. “We think biometrics is something that can be actually used by the people and it becomes their technology that they use to protect themselves.”
Cellphones

Submission + - Windows Phone 8 SDK Leaked (i-programmer.info)

Submitted by mikejuk
mikejuk writes: The SKD for the new Windows Phone 8 has been leaked via a Chinese website. What it reveals for the developer is that WP8 is a restart. You can convert your existing WP7 Silverlight apps to the new WinPRT API but you can't create or maintain existing Silverlight or XNA applications that target WP8. You can't even convert existing XNA apps except by hand.
There are also enough differences between Windows 8 WinRT apps and WP8 apps to make life difficult.
The final big shock is that JavaScript apps are not supported. So basically if you developed your Windows 8 app using JavaScript thinking that you could port it to WP8 you are out of luck.
So in one move Microsoft has upset a good range of developers. WP7 Silverlight and XNA apps are now legacy and JavaScript apps just have to wait their turn.
It probably would have been better to stick to WP7 and just make it a bit better.
Windows

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: The Best Linux setup to transition Windows Users 1

Submitted by Quantus347
Quantus347 writes: I am trying to convince a number of people to give Linux a chance, arguing that it has come a long way on the road of consumer usability. Can you, oh Wise Ones of Slashdot, recommend a Lunix setup that will be as similar as possible to a Windows environment (Windows 7 or XP). These people hate and fear change, and so will latch onto nearly any noticeable differences, so I'm thinking in terms of both front end functionality and the look of the interface. It would also be very important for them to have to go to the command line as little as possible during daily use (meaning as close to never as can be managed).
NASA

Submission + - NASA's First New Spacesuit in 20 Years is its Own Airlock (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: The current U.S. space suit used by NASA is a dinosaur. Designed in 1992, it was only ever intended to be used by crews aboard the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS). That may have been good enough in the days of 14 kps modems, but with eyes turning increasingly toward missions to the Moon, Mars and the asteroids, space explorers need something better. That’s why NASA is designing its first new suit in twenty years. Developed by NASA’s Advanced Exploration Systems (AES), the Z-1 prototype space suit currently undergoing vacuum testing at the Johnson Space Center is a wearable laboratory of new technology. And it’s a hatchback.
NASA

Submission + - Greenland Ice Melt Is Actually An Expected, Routine Event (foxnews.com)

Submitted by swan5566
swan5566 writes: After NASA issued a report that Greenland is currently experiencing “unprecedented” melting this year, glaciologists have now come back saying that this phenomenon was expected, and not due to man-made global warming. The last such occurrence happened in 1889, and is on about a 150-year cycle. Yet another log in the fire for the climate change debate.
Google

Submission + - Google scrambles to restore Google Talk from outage (networkworld.com) 1

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: Google Talk, a desktop and mobile text and voice chat service used by many Google Gmail customers, suffered a widespread outage Thursday morning that the company said was affecting "a majority of users." The outage, first reported by Google a little before 7am eastern time, was being restored about 4 hours later, according to Google. Meanwhile, users of the downed cloud service took to Twitter and other avenues to voice their displeasure.
Printer

Submission + - The world's first 3D-printed gun (extremetech.com) 1

Submitted by
MrSeb
MrSeb writes: "An American gunsmith has become the first person to construct and shoot a pistol partly made out of plastic, 3D-printed parts. The creator, who goes by the name HaveBlue and is an AR-15/M16 enthusiast, has reportedly fired 200 rounds with his part-plastic pistol without any sign of wear and tear. HaveBlue’s custom creation is a .22-caliber pistol, formed from a 3D-printed AR-15 (M16) lower receiver, and a normal, commercial upper. In other words, the main body of the gun is plastic, while the chamber — where the bullets are actually struck — is solid metal. While this pistol obviously wasn’t created from scratch using a 3D printer, the interesting thing is that the lower receiver — in a legal sense at least — is what actually constitutes a firearm. This means that people without gun licenses — or people who have had their licenses revoked — could print their own lower receiver and build a complete, off-the-books gun."
Medicine

Submission + - New Chemical Restores Vision, Raises Hopes (medicaldaily.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A chemical that can temporarily restore vision has been found. Researchers say that someday this chemical might be able to restore vision in people who suffer from diseases like retinitis pigmentosa and age-related macular degeneration. In both diseases, the light-sensitive cells in the retina die causing vision loss.
The chemical called AAQ (acrylamide-azobenzene-quaternary ammonium) works by re-sensitizing the "blind cells" in the retina to light. The chemical binds to the protein ion channel in the retinal cells and alters the flow of ions through these channels just like a beam of light would.
IT

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Dealing with harassment and uncomfortable behavior 1

Submitted by zwei2stein
zwei2stein writes: My team of about 10 men (IT guys) is expecting new coleague: Female one. It is guaranteed, that there will be remarks, double entendres and inuendos with huge potential of getting worse. We already have woman in team which can somehow handle this (and deliver apropriate verbal slaps). How would you deal with this? We talked about some fun ways — anyone who will do this will have to wear embarassing tie, simple ways — instead of swear jar, having sexual innuendo jar and even fairly harsh punishments — people losing their bonuses for month or their extra vaccation days. I'd like to figure out solution that would be effective, not call much attention to itself and not abandoned quickly.
China

Submission + - Chinese Authorities arrest thousands over cyber-crime charges (paritynews.com)

Submitted by hypnosec
hypnosec writes: China is currently taking a tough stance against criminals involved in online crimes and the authorities have busted more than 600 gangs and arrested over 10,000 suspects as of June for crimes such as spreading lewd content, dealing in arms and collecting citizens' personal information illegally. The Ministry of Public Security said in a statement that as many as 3.2 million "harmful" online messages have been deleted and over 60 websites and online forums have been ordered to remove inappropriate content with 30 ISPs being punished for granting network access to unlicensed websites. The campaign also targeted pornography and the illegal sale of personal details.

Submission + - Remote Root Exploit in Kindle Touch

Submitted by 93 Escort Wagon
93 Escort Wagon writes: This week's SANS Consensus Security Vulnerability email reports there's a remote root exploit on the Kindle Touch, thanks to its NPAPI support, served with a side of full root privileges.

NPAPI support was newly introduced on the Touch with software update 5.1.0. I don't own a Kindle Touch, but if it's anything like my Kindle 3 — I can't imagine too many people are using its web browser. But still...
Desktops (Apple)

Submission + - New Mac Trojan Installs Silently, No Password Required

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new Mac OS X Trojan referred to as OSX/Crisis silently infects OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard and OS X 10.7 Lion. The backdoor component calls home to the IP address 176.58.100.37 every five minutes, awaiting instructions. The threat was created in a way that is intended to make reverse engineering more difficult, an added extra that is more common with Windows malware than it is with Mac malware.
Networking

Submission + - Comcast Launches Superfast Internet To Fight FiOS (itworld.com)

Submitted by
jfruh
jfruh writes: "Comcast customers who dream of superfast download speeds drooled when they heard the company would be offering 305 Mbps service. There's only one catch: the high speeds are only available in markets where the cable giant is going head-to-head with Verizon's FiOS service. It seems that competition really does improve service quality when it comes to ISPs."
Facebook

Submission + - Facebook Q2 Earnings Call: What to Expect (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by AlistairCharlton
AlistairCharlton writes: Facebook is set to announce its second quarter financial results tonight, its first earnings call since floating as a public company in May.

After booking a $1.1bn (£710m) charge for share-based payouts to staff and early investors when the company went public, Facebook is forecast to report a $673m loss before tax by its lead bank Morgan Stanley, according to the Guardian.
Wireless Networking

Submission + - Nokia Aborts Meltemi Linux-Based Feature Phone (techweekeurope.co.uk)

Submitted by
judgecorp
judgecorp writes: "Nokia has closed down the Meltemi low-end Linux phone which was supposed to replace its System 40 devices. The platform had never been officially announced and now, apparently, will never see the light of day. Feature phones still make up a giant market where Nokia has dominated, but this leaves its upgrade path in question."
Security

Submission + - Researcher wows Black Hat with NFC-based smartphone hacking demo (networkworld.com)

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: At the Black Hat Conference in Las Vegas Wednesday, Accuvant Labs researcher Charlie Miller showed how he figured out a way to break into both the Google/Samsung Nexus S and Nokia N9 by means of the Near Field Communication (NFC) capability in the smartphones. NFC is still new but it’s starting to become adopted for use in smartphone-based purchasing in particular. The experimentation that Miller did, which he demonstrated at the event, showed it’s possible to set up NFC-based radio communication to share content with the smartphones to play tricks, such as writing an exploit to crash phones and even in certain circumstances read files on the phone and more.

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