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Submission + - National Police Board of Finland goes after Wikimedia

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: In Finland, the promised land of taxes and red tape, you can not ask for financial help without having a permit from the government to do so. And now, Wikimedia is feeling the pain as National Police Board of Finland has submitted a request for a statement regarding Wikipedia fundraiser. Basically, the NPB is making it's case by saying that Wikipedia asking for donations constitutes a campaign which, under the Finnish legislation, would require a permit. As a Finn I hope that Wikipedia will just drop traffic to .fi for a couple of weeks, this insanity needs to end.

Submission + - CmdrTaco: Anti-Beta Movement a "Vocal Minority" (washingtonpost.com) 30

Submitted by Antipater
Antipater writes: The furor over Slashdot Beta is loud enough that even outside media has begun to notice. The Washington Post's tech blog The Switch has written a piece on the issue, and the anti-Beta protesters aren't going to be happy about it. The Post questioned Slashdot founder Rob Malda, who believes the protests are the work of only a vocal minority or readers: "It's easy to forget that the vocal population of a community driven site like Slashdot might be the most important group, but they are typically also the smallest class of users." The current caretakers of Slashdot need to balance the needs of all users with their limited engineering resources, Malda argues — noting wryly, "It ain't easy."

Submission + - Slashdot Beta: Because They Hate You 3

Submitted by boolithium
boolithium writes: People on here are missing the point of the Beta roll out. The elimination of the existing user base is not a side effect, it is a feature. Slashdot as a brand has value, but as a site has limited commercial appeal. The users are the kids at the lunch table, where not even the foreign exchange students want to sit. Nobody ever got laid from installing NetBSD.

Once they are finished with their nerd cleansing, they can build a new Slashdot. A sexier Slashdot. A Slashdot the kids can dance to.

They aren't ignoring you. They are exterminating you.

Submission + - If we Buck Feta and leave, where should we go? 17

Submitted by Covalent
Covalent writes: I am a long-time slashdot reader (don't let the UID fool you), and I agree with most of you that the Beta is a disaster. Dice has promised a fix, but what if this garbage is the new reality? Is there a suitable alternative to slashdot that members would find equally (or more) fulfilling? Is someone going to fork slashdot and start it anew (Taco can you hear me?) Or is this just the end of an era?

Submission + - Slashdot Beta Sucks Elephant Penis 2

Submitted by ShaunC
ShaunC writes: Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes:

Have you even seen an elephant penis? Because I have, and the colors align to Slashdot. The beta is so bad, Roland Piquepaille is surrendering his account (as the French do). The GNAA has reorganized to post fake job offerings on Dice.com with an emphasis on affirmative action. Profane Motherfucker has come out of retirement simply to say: "fuck this shit."

Submission + - What Would The Founding Fathers Thought Of The NSA Controversy? (foreignpolicy.com)

Submitted by cold fjord
cold fjord writes: Stephen F. Knott writes in Foreign Policy, "While there are plenty of grounds on which one can disagree with the tactics employed by the Bush and Obama administrations in combating terrorism, it is a distortion of history to assume that these tactics run counter to the principles and practices of the nation's founders — as well as a distortion of their position on the importance of intelligence gathering and executive secrecy. ... the key members of the founding generation believed that intelligence operations were essential to the defense of the United States ... Washington knew how to tell a lie, and was ruthless in his quest for intelligence ... the Founding Fathers engaged in covert mail opening throughout the revolutionary war; Washington went so far as to provide instructions on successful mail-opening techniques ... Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams all served on a committee charged with disseminating excerpts from this intercepted mail for propaganda purposes. ... Thomas Jefferson ... noted that "all nations have found it necessary, that for the advantageous conduct of their affairs" certain secrets should "remain known to their executive functionary only." ... The restraint on intelligence gathering and the accompanying argument of "privacy" rights that Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald invoke is not our Founding Fathers' privacy, nor is it their understanding of the power granted the president in Article II of the Constitution — this is the "privacy" of absolutists ... the notion that the so-called "privacy" protections of the Bill of Rights should be extended "worldwide" would be categorically rejected by the Founding Fathers."

Submission + - German Domain Registrar Liable For Copyright Infringment (itworld.com)

Submitted by jfruh
jfruh writes: When the German domain registrar Key-Systems registered and maintained the domain h33t.com, should it have been obvious that their customer would use the site for unauthorized distribution of Robin Thicke albums? A regional German court says that they should've known, and once they had been notified they should have taken steps to prevent it from happening. Obviously domain registrars are worried that this will upend their entire business model.

Submission + - An open letter to the management of Slashdot. 14

Submitted by onyxruby
onyxruby writes: I have been watch for some time now as Slashdot has started beta testing a new version of the website. As you are well aware the new site would constitute a complete change to the look, interface and functionality of Slashdot.org.

Change happens, and for those of us who work with technology for a living it is the only constant. Change is a process and in and of itself is not a bad thing when it offers improvement. Unfortunately the change that has been offered negatively impacts the look, interface and most importantly the functionality of Slashdot.
Many people have had trouble reverting back to the classic interface. The new interface simply does not offer the functionality of the old. Things like statistics, comments and layout are very difficult to find. You have a community that lives and breathes data and want to know their data. How is my comment ranked, how many people responded – it’s really all about the dialogue. Can I get the information that I want in a readily digestible format?

As you’re well aware the new site does not offer the very thing that people come here for. This in and of itself is not why your community has organized a boycott of Beta. The boycott was originated because the new version will be implemented whether the community wants it or not.

I want to explain why this change has gone down people’s throats about as well as Windows 8’s Metro interface. The reason has absolutely nothing to do with the interface and everything to do with the perception that the editors and management of Slashdot appear to have.

The message that has been consistently handed down is that we are “your audience”. We are not your “your audience” we are your product. People do not come to Slashdot for the news stories, there are untold other sites that provide those as well as professional and original writing about them. People come here for the community of insiders from across the industry.

Please respect the community and stop what you’re doing. You have commented that you don’t want to maintain two code bases. Your community works in the industry and understands this, which leads many to suggest you abandon the new code base entirely so that you are only maintaining once code base. Tell us what your trying to accomplish and I would imagine that a wide range of experts would be more than willing to help you meet your goals.

Submission + - A Modest Proposal, re: Beta vs. Classic 19

Submitted by unitron
unitron writes: Dice wants to make money off of what they paid for--the Slashdot name--, or rather they want to make more money off of it than they are making now, and they think the best way to do that is to turn it into SlashingtonPost.

They should take this site and give it a new name. Or get Malda to let them use "Chips & Dips".

Leave everything else intact, archives, user ID database, everything except the name.

Then use the Beta code and start a new site and give it the slashdot.org name, and they can have what they want without the embarrassment of having the current userbase escape from the basement or the attic and offend the sensibilities of the yuppies or hipsters or metrosexuals or whoever it is that they really want for an "audience".

Submission + - /. Beta comments don't work, users upset. (slashdot.org) 4

Submitted by magic maverick
magic maverick writes: Since the new /. Beta came to light, many /. users and commentators have tried it out. However, they are almost universally condemning the new commenting system. It simply isn't as good as the so called Classic system. Some users, however, haven't a bad thing to say. Mainly because they haven't had a chance to even use the new system. It simply doesn't load. One user, Magic Maverick , who lives in a third-world country with crappy Internet, had this to say:

I come to /. for the comments, but with the new Beta, I can't even see anything! It just says:

''Shazbot! We ran into some trouble getting the comments. Try again... na-nu, na-nu!

It seems like the "developers" need to take some advice from people who actually know what they are doing. I'm happy to help explain what graceful degradation means if they like...

Submission + - If You're Life Was A Video Game This is Your Walkthrough (oliveremberton.com)

Submitted by Xight
Xight writes: Life is a game, a fairly complicated game. Like with all games, someone usually writes a generic walk-through for it. It usually comes in the form of self-help books or [Insert Topic Here] for Dummies books. Most of which become very good dust collectors and or barbque fire starters. Oliver Emberton decided to write a very thorough walk-through for the game of life which everyone is currently playing.

Submission + - Dice Holdings, Inc, deleting unflattering stories from Slashdot firehose 4

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Stories submitted to the Slashdot firehose that take a negative view on the site's redesign are being deleted. 4 hours ago, it was full of anti-beta posts. Now they are gone. That's right. A forum that usually leaves V14GRA spam in place for posterity is deleting user content.

Submission + - Fans of original RoboCop movie recreate movie scene by scene

Submitted by Misagon
Misagon writes: Our RoboCop Remake is a fan-made scene-by-scene comedy re-creation of the original RoboCop from 1987.

"As big fans of the original RoboCop, and as filmmakers and film fans admittedly rolling our eyes at the Hollywood remake machine, we've elected to do this remake thing our own way."

The fan-film is available for free online viewing at OurRoboCopRemake.com. It contains (fake) nudity, blood and gore making it definitely NSFW

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