mefdahl - Slashdot User

Submission + - Hands On: The $100 Laptop

Submitted by

Paul Stamatiou

on Wednesday March 14, 2007 @03:40AM

Paul Stamatiou writes: "I got my hands on the second release of the $100 One Laptop per Child laptop and wrote a review complete with pictures. It runs a custom version of Fedora Core 6 complete with an Xulrunner-based browser and an impressive 7.5-inch LCD sporting a resolution of 1200×900 with the ability to go monochromatic in sunlight. Other hardware features include a VGA webcam, 802.11b/g wireless, 512MB flash storage, 128MB DDR266 system RAM and a 366MHz AMD Geode CPU."

Submission + - RIAA sues paralyzed stroke victim

Submitted by

Waylon

on Tuesday March 13, 2007 @10:51PM

Waylon writes: "It seems the RIAA will sue anyone, anywhere, even if you're a paralyzed stroke victim. Yes, Warner Music and the RIAA are suing a retired railroad man in Florida whose left side has been paralyzed by a stroke and whose sole source of income is his disability check. From the article: "Although the defendant John Paladuk, an employee of C&N Railroad for 36 years, was living in Florida at the time of the alleged copyright suit, and had notified the RIAA that he had not engaged in any copyright infringement, and despite that the fact that Mr. Paladuk suffered a stroke last year which resulted in complete paralysis of his entire left side and severely impaired speech, rendering him disabled, and despite the fact that his disability check is his sole source of income, the RIAA commenced suit against him on February 27, 2007.""

Microsoft Quietly Releases Windows 2003 SP2 175

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday March 13, 2007 @08:20PM from the long-list dept.

Several readers noted that Microsoft has quietly released 32-bit Windows 2003 Service Pack 2 for download. (The 64-bit edition is still showing as a release candidate on the site.) The installation of SP2 may potentially regress hotfixes that have been deployed previously; Microsoft has released a script to scan for hotfixes that may potentially regress.

Submission + - Glow in the dark, in all colors

Submitted by

Matthew Sparkes

on Tuesday March 13, 2007 @07:05PM

Matthew Sparkes writes: "Glow-in-the-dark materials that shine with the whole range of visible colors, and can even produce white light, have been developed by Japanese researchers. It's claimed that they can be used to provide readable signs without the need for electricity. This could be very useful, as the International Commission on Illumination (CIE), the international authority on lighting, has suggested buildings be fitted with emergency lighting and signs that work without power as standard."

Submission + - Paying for Better Math and Science Teachers

Submitted by

Coryoth

on Monday March 05, 2007 @03:40PM

Coryoth writes: "While California is suffering from critical shortage of mathematics and science teachers, Kentucky is considering two bills that would give explicit financial incentives to math and science students and teachers. The first bill would provide cash incentives to schools to run AP math and science classes, and cash scholarships to students who did well on AP math and science exams. The second bill provides salary bumps for any teachers with degrees in math or science, or who score well in teacher-certification tests in math, chemistry and physics. Is such differentiated pay the right way to attract science graduates who can make much more in industry, or is it simply going to breed discontent among teachers?"

Submission + - Windows Vista Cracked by Paradox

Submitted by

AlienWarrior75

on Monday March 05, 2007 @03:39PM

AlienWarrior75 writes: "I have verified and tested the Paradox crack that allows OEM manufacturers to embedded their pre-activated certificates into the system, essentially activating the software, making the operating system fully genuine and able to receive Windows Updates."

Submission + - Patent Office Going Web 2.0

Submitted by

Winton Davies

on Monday March 05, 2007 @03:31PM

Winton Davies writes: "The Patent Office is going to start soliciting user evaluations using web 2.0 techniques, such as ratings, wiki-editing etc.
Full Article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic le/2007/03/04/AR2007030401263.html

From the ACM summary: The United States Patent Office will soon allow members of the online community to post and evaluate information concerning patent proposals on a new wiki-style Web site. "For the first time in history, it allows the patent-office examiners to open up their cubicles and get access to a whole world of technical experts," said IBM's David J. Kappos. The pilot project will start this Spring and feature a community rating system that prioritizes the most respected comments. During the pilot phase of the project about 250 software design applications will be posted on the Web site since examiners have an especially difficult time finding documentation for them. Any user can post information relating to patent proposals, but a "reputation system" will be put in place to rank submitted materials and measure the expertise of contributors. In order to develop a reliable reputation system, the Patent Office has forged partnerships with several e-commerce specialists. Patent examiners will be able to award "gold stars" to those who provide exceptionally useful information. The information submitted will eventually be voted on by registered users, with the top 10 items being sent along to an examiner who will make the final decision on the patent. "The idea is to make something as important as decision-making about innovation more transparent to the public and more accountable to the public," says new York Law School Professor Beth Noveck. The system is expected to go through some changes, specifically the voting process, which may limit the ability to vote or give more weight to some votes."

Submission + - Who to thank for the Daylight Savings Time Change

Submitted by steverar on Monday March 05, 2007 @02:38PM

steverar writes: If you're in IT and having "fun" making sure everything's (OS, phone system, patient monitors, Blackberries, etc. ) updated/patched for the new Daylight Saving Time change coming March 11th, please thank Rep. Ed Markey. He sponsored and attached the amendment to the Energy Act of 2005. Read about him here http://markey.house.gov/index.php?option=com_conte nt&task=view&id=2624&Itemid=141

Feed News: Game Industry -1 Penny Arcade -0 (penny-arcade.com)

From feed by pennyarcadefeed on Monday March 05, 2007 @02:32PM

Gabe: Well we had ourping pongmatch with Sucker Punch last Friday and I must say things did not go well for us. The Sucker Punch Rockets lived up to their studio's name and left us with a big old purple shiner. Already there is talk here in the office that our glorious victory march through the game industry is now looking more like a trail of tears.

Submission + - Guess he should have used PGP

Submitted by

gkearney

on Monday March 05, 2007 @02:02PM

gkearney writes: "A man is suing Microsoft because the FBI was able to read his "secure" hard drive. He was arrested for selling an air rifle with silencer (Why an air rifle would need a silencer is another story.) when the ATF seized his porn ladened computer which he had secured with various software. When the FBI computer lab was able to read his drive he file d suit. Interesting that HP and Circuit City settled with him. Now about those silencer equipped air rifles...

http://www.informationweek.com/windows/showArticle .jhtml?articleID=197700861&cid=RSSfeed_TechWeb"

Journal Journal: RIAA kills internet radio

Journal by Reavantos on Monday March 05, 2007 @01:50PM

I am A internet radio DJ for DNDRadio.com (ddo.mmoradio.com) and i want to bring to your attention that the RIAA is at it again. this time, they are killing internet radio! "direct qoute from our website" The Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) has announced its decision on Internet Radio royalty rates, rejecting all of the arguments made by Webcasters (an MMORadio) and instead adopting the "per play" rate proposal put forth by SoundExchange (a digital music fee collection body created by the RIAA).

Submission + - Vista Finally Cracked

Submitted by

Espectr0

on Monday March 05, 2007 @01:18PM

Espectr0 writes: "Crack group PARADOX has cracked Windows Vista. It works by exploiting a 'feature' that allows bigger OEM's like ASUS to include their own version of Vista that doesn't require activation. Also, crack crack group Pantheon has included an OEM Emulation Driver, that virtually allows any kind of board to run this version."

Submission + - Why doesn't lab dark matter behave as it should?

Submitted by

Matthew Sparkes

on Monday March 05, 2007 @12:51PM

Matthew Sparkes writes: "Experimental results suggest that scientists have succeeded in creating dark matter in a lab. Although this is the stuff that is thought to make up about one-fifth of the mass of the universe, no one has ever managed to see a single particle of it before. But there's something about his team's results that makes no sense. Their dark matter particles — called axions — aren't behaving as they should. They seem to be endowed with a property that means they should have sucked the life out of the sun billions of years ago. Plainly this has not happened, so what is going on?"

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