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Comment Re:Least interest (Score 3, Interesting) 94

What you CAN do is exploit an otherwise secure OS so that you CAN do those things in spite of OS-level security methods.

I miss the days of needing a move a jumper in order to flash the system ROM. I've seen plenty of gaudy 'overlocking' boards with push-buttons on the motherboard itself for various esoteric functions. A toggle-switch for BIOS-write-enable would be a relatively cheap addition, and manufacturers can market the board with some extra security buzzwords.

Comment Re:Need for materials (Score 2) 265

I dare say that creating a rocket and fuel to launch tones of stuff far enough into space to reach an asteroid is going to be pretty rough on the local environment.

Don't forget that after a handful of mission to metal-rich asteroids and water-rich asteroids, you have all the materials needed to assemble further missions in orbit. Much cheaper than lofting all that stuff out of Earth's gravity well.

Comment Re:Unforeseen (Score 1) 361

Some UK reports suggest that the 'scientists' and 'tourists' on this ship were ecofreaks seeking publicity to show that some previous explorer's route had become eco-wickedly ice-free. So... they got stuck in 'unforseen' thick ice. And so did their rescuers. And then they were evacuated thanks to an awful lot of gas-guzzling machinery - and still (today) can't leave the area. In the UK, we really do enjoy a good joke like this.

I'd advise you to stop reading the Daily Mail.

Comment What step forward? (Score 1, Interesting) 65

Laminar flow fog displays have been around for literally decades. Every other year, a company will out their 'WOW Revolutionary!' desktop fog display with mid-air 'touch' sensing, then disappear after nobody buys it. I've yet to see anyone actually buy one of the things from the many start-ups that have produced them. This one in particular appears to have nothing to separate it from the string of flops before it.
Additionally, they are not in any way 3D. They aren't volumetric, there's no holography going on, you can;t stack them for interferometric displays, you can't even polarise their output. You could use a high framerate projector and shutter-glasses, but you're still stuck with all the limits of single-viewpoint stereography.
The problems to be solved to bring one of these to market aren't technical. Those were solved years ago. The problem to be solved is finding somebody who actually wants one.

Comment Re:SSL Security (Score 1) 464

so I'd be surprised if any browsers or servers used it as the random number source

It was recently discovered that the implementation of Dual_EC-DBRG in OpenSSL is flawed. Hard-crashes flawed. In a totally unusable state flawed. This was only just recently discovered because nobody actually used it.

Comment Pushing out the Cache drive (Score 1) 183

Looks like the first announced 2242 M.2 drive larger than 128GB, but it's still only 180GB. It'd be really nice to be able to put a 256GB drive where a cache drive normally sits, run the OS and programs from there, and keep a spinning rust (spinning glass, now perpendicular recording is standard) drive in the 2.5" space for media storage. Though by the time 256GB 2242 drives come onto the market, 256GB will probably feel overly restrictive anyway.

Comment Re:I question the value (Score 1) 35

I'd rather skip the whole balancing and walking subsystem for my avatar motion, and instead just to move my avatar like a new limb. Don't think "move forward" as a conscious action, simply move your avatar forward; in the same way that you don't think "right hand, move upwards", you just move your hand up.
The benefit of decoupling avatar movement from physical motion is the ability to do both simultaneously for the most adept, but more generally to avoid issues where you need to 'turn off' signals to the body in order to intercept them for avatar motion (that's one hell of a failsafe you'd need to build in), and even with a safe failure you could end up with inadvertent injury from flailing limbs.
But how would you precisely move your arms and legs in the virtual environment? Well, why have arms and legs in the virtual environment in the first place. If you're not not trying to ape body movements, there little need to ape body layout.

Comment Re:I see plenty of people reading (Score 4, Insightful) 264

Can I expect to be able to access my collection of e-books in 40 years?

Unless you're foolish enough to lock yourself into DRM, I don't see why not. Nearly 30 years on (well, 28) and Amiga software can be run in emulators from discs that have been format-shifted. And Amiga-specific files can and have easily been converted to new formats. Except for regular old text, because that still works fine. Or HTML, because that still works fine. Or BMP, because that still worms fine.
If a format works and does it's job, it'll stick around after many hardware and software changes. Calibre already makes it trivial to move between epub and mobipocket (and go to and from RTF, PDF, etc) so I don't see you suddenly being unable to read your library even in 40 years.

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