Comment I don't get it. (Score 1) 180
Why are we oohing and ahhing over the Civilization 4 title screen?
Comment Re:#DearNetflix (Score 2) 349
#firstworldproblems
Ask Slashdot: Network Backup Solution Out of the Box? 251
First time accepted submitter file terminator writes "I want to buy a network drive for home usage, and am looking for something that would allow for secure and encrypted remote backups over the Internet to a second network drive, preferably advanced enough that all drive content does not have to be transmitted every time. The solution may come as a pair of network drives, and two-way synching would actually be a plus. The drives would be behind respective NATs and setup must allow connecting to any target port. The solution should be readily available (no obscure/local brands/solutions) and not unreasonably expensive. Does anyone have any recommendations for a full out of the box solution?"
Comment Re:I am looking (Score 1) 329
JavaDoc comments in your code would be a good start.
Comment Apparently the Army thinks the enemy is deaf. (Score 1) 309
To quote HTTYD: "Blind spot, yes! Deaf spot, not so much!"
All the fancy anti-IR plating ain't gonna do much when the sound of yer diesel engine is more than enough to let the enemy know you're coming.
Comment Good riddance, I say. (Score 2) 314
Starz content on Netflix Streaming has always been horrible quality. Fire up Tangled, skip to the scene where the dam breaks, and listen in horror to the audio compression artifacts. I've got pretty low standards of quality, and even I'm embarrassed for Starz.
Spam King Wallace Indicted For Facebook Spam 93
itwbennett writes "Notorious spam king Sanford Wallace is facing federal fraud charges for allegedly breaking into the Facebook accounts of 500,000 victims in 2008 and 2009 and using the stolen credentials to post 27 million spam messages. The charges are outlined in an indictment, filed July 6 but made public Thursday after Wallace turned himself in to federal authorities. If convicted, Wallace could get more than 16 years in prison."
Comment Re:Spiderman? Get the name right (Score 1) 608
Close, but no cigar. It's capital-s-spider-dash-capital-m-man. Spider-Man.
Comment Re:I work for a phone company... (Score 1) 207
Netflix contracts with companies such as Akamai, called content delivery networks. These companies pay ISPs to co-locate their servers so that each ISP gets its own local cache of the content served by their clients. And yes, this means that the Netflix content you watch, which counts towards your monthly cap, is being served *locally*.
Customers pay ISPs to access their network. The CDN pays the ISP for the bandwidth they use to transfer their data to their servers, and the CDNs are paid by the content providers, who are, in turn, also paid by customers.
Every step of the delivery between Netflix and the customers is completely paid for, yet ISPs want to whine and cry about how Netflix is harming their network. More like anti-competitive posturing, since the ISPs doing the biggest whining happen to be owned by big media corporations.
'Worms From Hell' Unearth Possibilities For Extraterrestrial Life 145
An anonymously submitted article says, "For the first time, scientists have found complex,
multi-celled creatures living a mile and more below the planet’s surface, raising new possibilities about the spread of life on Earth and potential subsurface life on other planets and moons (abstract). ... The research is likely to trigger scientific challenges and cause some controversy because it places far more complex life in an environment where researchers have generally held it should not, or even cannot, exist."
Comment Re:No, but CATV operators probably hope so. (Score 1) 367
Netflix already does this. Or rather, they contract with companies who do this (that's what a CDN is -- Content Delivery Network). The problem is that, in implementing the caps, ISPs are lumping in last-mile bandwidth that has almost no marginal cost with actual Internet-bound traffic that does have a marginal cost via upstream provider bandwidth charges.
Comment No, but CATV operators probably hope so. (Score 2) 367
I know for myself, that between an OTA antenna, Netflix Instant, and Hulu, I have everything I need. My Netflix sub is the closest I have ever come to paying for TV.
As more and more ISPs implement caps, I think the next step is going to be a home caching server. I.e. for Netflix, you could set your monthly cap and tell it what % to use, then it would download shows from your Instant Queue to the cache server during off-peak hours. Then, streaming devices would get the data over your LAN rather than across the Internet. The only traffic generated during viewing would be the DRM exchanges to ensure you are authorized.
However, if ISPs were honest (ha!) they would exempt content that is delivered via CDN (i.e. Akamai) because the only bandwidth used is "last mile" bandwidth--the bandwidth between the CDN server and the Internet is already paid for by the CDN provider!
Why Thunderbolt Is Dead In the Water 568
adeelarshad82 writes "In the same way that Apple championed FireWire for the replacement of parallel SCSI, Thunderbolt is meant as the next big thing in video and audio peripheral interfaces. Plus, it's Apple's move to beat USB 3.0. However, Thunderbolt is off to a slow start, for a number of reasons — from cost to the technology's features in comparison to USB 3.0 — which is why it may be dead in the water."
Mint It Yourself With a Browser-Based Bitcoin Miner 490
An anonymous reader writes "There's a popular discussion happening at the Bitcoin forums about a new browser-based bitcoin miner released today. This lets people mine for bitcoin straight from the browser. There's talk of making an embeddable version. How long until websites start using CPU power from their users to create Bitcoin for their owners?" As Bitcoin gets more attention, I foresee malware with payloads promising to do the same thing.
Modern Warfare 3 Details Leak 56
fysdt writes "Details on the next Call of Duty game, Modern Warfare 3, have not simply leaked onto the internet; they have flooded. Among other details, a November 8 release date was mentioned. According to a report coming from Kotaku, what was just a month ago among the best kept secrets of the gaming industry — information on the next Call of Duty game — has now become anything but."
