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Submission + - Amazing Cancer Drug Found; Scientist Annoyed.

sporkme writes: "A scientist was frustrated when the compound she was working with destroyed her sample of cancer cells. Further research revealed that the substance was surprisingly well suited as a cancer treatment. From the article:

"I made a calculation error and used a lot more than I should have. And my cells died," Schaefer said. A colleague overheard her complaining. "The co-author on my paper said,' Did I hear you say you killed some cancer?' I said 'Oh', and took a closer look." They ran several tests and found the compound killed "pretty much every epithelial tumor cell lines we have seen."
Lab test results on hapless mice have resulted in the destruction of colon tumors without making the mice sick. The PPAR-gamma compound is expected to be especially useful in combating treatment-resistant types of cancer."
The Almighty Buck

Submission + - Telephone Tax Refund

markmcb writes: "Few may know, but there is a new way to increase your refund when you submit your 2006 return: the 'Telephone Tax Refund.' Essentially, the federal government realized it was improperly taxing Americans on their long distance phone service and now it's giving those taxes back. The difficulty, however, is determining how much to give back. The government claims it has taken the work out of it for you by offering a standard refund amount based on the number of exemptions claimed, but this article describes how taking the alternative route of actually calculating the amount paid can significantly increase your refund. Read on if you like money ... or if you just don't like being 'tricked by Uncle Sam' (as the article puts it)."
Education

Submission + - Substitute teacher gets 40 years for porn popups

alphamugwump writes: Substitute teacher Julie Amero faces up to 40 years in prison for exposing kids to porn using a classroom computer.
From the Arstechnica article:

Amero was substituting for a middle-school English class and asked the regular teacher permission to use the computer to e-mail her husband. The teacher granted her permission, and asked her not to log him out of the computer. Amero, the self-professed techno-noob, then left the room to use the restroom, and upon her return says that she found several students gathered around the machine looking at a web site. A series of unfortunate events occurred from this point on, resulting in a slew of pornographic pop-ups appearing on the screen. The onslaught continued despite Amero's attempts to close the windows.

According to The Register

When the students told their parents what had happened, they told the administration, who vowed that Julie would never work in the classroom again. But they went further. The 40-year-old substitute teacher was arrested, indicted, tried and here is the kicker on January 5, 2007, she was convicted of four counts of risk of injury to a minor, or impairing the morals of a child (Conn. Gen. Stat. 53-21). Indeed, she was originally charged with exposing 10 children in the seventh grade class to the materials on the internet, but six of the charges were dropped.

I guess "Ambush Porn" really is dangerous.
Networking

Submission + - Charter pulls a Verisign

_peter writes: As of sometime today, Charter internet customers, at least in the St. Louis area, got their own version of SiteFinder. I just finished talking to their tech support for about an hour, and have verified that it is intentional, and the only way to ``opt-out'' is to let them set a cookie in your browser. Obviously this doesn't work for connections that aren't browser-based. When I asked to be transferred to account services to cancel, the very nice representative begged for a day to look into the issue. Perhaps any other Charter customers might want to check to see if they've received this feature as well.
Microsoft

Submission + - Microsoft Outlaws 3rd Party IM Clients

An anonymous reader writes: With the latest update to the MSN Instant Messenger client, now called Windows Live Messenger, Microsoft has required all users to sign a new contract which among other things forbids the use of 3rd party instant messenger clients to connect to the MSN messenger service, such as the AJAX Meebo client, Gaim, and Trillian among others. Worth noting, they do provide a list of authorized 3rd party clients, such as Yahoo Messenger, that are allowed access to the service.

Excerpt: "In using the service, you may not use any unauthorized third party software or service to access the Microsoft instant messaging network currently known as the .NET Messenger service."
Mozilla

Submission + - Firefox javascript/cookie vulnerability uncovered

mybecq writes: Michal Zalewski has uncovered and disclosed a serious vulnerability (BugZilla: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=37044 5) in Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.1, whereby a javascript string containing '\x00' (escaped NUL character) can cause Firefox to allow malicious sites to manipulate cookies for third-party webpages.

A demonstration of the vulnerability is available. The vulnerability requires javascript and session cookies to be enabled to be able to be exploited.
Programming

Submission + - Employer Ratings for Coders, by Coders

witten writes: "Coderific is new site for software developers where you can actually write reviews of your employers. The scores for the reviews are totaled up, and lists are generated for the best employers and the worst employers. Additionally you can look up employers based on geographical area, so the next time you're moving to a new area you can find out about the best companies to work for. There currently aren't very many entries on certain employers, but some do have enough reviews to give you a good idea of problems to look for."
HP

Submission + - 14 HP Company Secrets from a former employee

rob101 writes: A former Hewlett-Packard worker could barely wait for their non-disclosure-agreement to end so they could spill 14 company secrets to The Consumerist. Full article at the Consumerist. This article details secrets about HP printers, how to get past the voice prompt system, HP cartridges and warranty information.
Movies

Submission + - The Top 12 Movies that Were Ahead of Their Time

Alex Billington writes: "What makes a movie years down the road be referred to as ahead of its time? It's the visual effects and technical achievements that the filmmakers implemented, from the miniatures in Star Wars to the time-freezing camera system in The Matrix, these movies were vastly ahead of their time. FirstShowing.net has comprised a comprehensive list of the top 12 movies in history that were ahead of their time, ranging from Psycho and 2001 to The Matrix."
Google

Submission + - Turns Out Google Really Does Listen

SamThomp writes: "There's a perfect Google underdog story going on right now. It goes like this: A college student named Aaron Stanton has an idea he thinks Google will love. He tries to get in touch via phone, e-mail, and their web forms with no luck. Then, spurred by his father nearly dying of an embolism near Christmas, he takes a chance and flies to Mountain View, CA without an appointment, intending to sit in their lobby "like a spoiled child" until he gets a chance to meet with someone. He's been there about three days, now.

Here's where it gets interesting. He creates a website called CanGoogleHearMe.com, and uses Google Video to document his journey in hopes that it might be seen by someone at Google and they'll show pity. At first he's turned away (links to Google Video) at the door and doesn't get a chance to talk to anyone. Then, apparently someone in Google does notice the website and it spreads — word of mouth — inside of Google like wildfire; 600 people visit the site in two hours from inside of Google's headquarters at Mountain View.

Then, late last night — three days into his trip — the guy gets an e-mail with the subject line, "We can hear you :)" that says they're willing to listen to him. No meeting for sure yet, but a step in the right direction.

It's like "actual" reality TV. :) If you're looking for an interesting story to pay attention to for the week, it'll be interesting to see how this turns out. So far, Google seems to be living up to their image of being a large company that's open to ideas. As far as I'm concerned, best of luck to them both."
Encryption

Submission + - TSA can't figure out security certificates

markgo2k writes: "The Washington Post reports that TSA has taken a new website live that people who are wrongly on the famous "no-fly" list can protest their status. Unbelievably, the website uses a self-signed certificate (and some have reported that you can submit forms insecurely as well). Perhaps contractor (Desyne Web Services, Inc. www.desyne.com) nor whoever was managing them ever actually tested the site or figured that flashing red certificate error warnings were something that might not be okay on a site that asks for name, address, height, weight, date of birth, hair color, eye color, passport number, birth certificate, drivers license number, military id number..."
Communications

Submission + - Text Messaging Device for the hearing impaired

spaceball1 writes: I was in the army and I did serve in Iraq — one of the side effects being some permanent hearing loss. I now wear hearing aids all of the time in both ears. Talking on a cell phone has become nearly impossible. I have considered moving to a device more geared towards text messaging but they are all very expensive and have a lot of the features that a cell phone user needs. Are there any devices out there that anyone has found that are geared only towards simple text messaging? The No-Frills-Cell-Phone concept has been largely ignored in the US; does a No-Frills-Text-Messaging device exist?
Programming

Submission + - Breaking into the C++ software engineer field

An anonymous reader writes: I have been working for about 4 years (mostly with Microsoft SQL Server and some VB.NET) but it is my desire to get a job as a software engineer doing C++ or even C. The only interviews I seem to get are those for Microsoft Jobs, which of course do want to hire me. Once I did get an interview for a real software engineering job, when switching my last job, but by the time the company got back to me with a decision (over a month and a half) I had already accepted another job.

I have seen many posts saying specific language skills aren't important but it is important to get a candidate who can think. I have also seen that some interviewers will have candidates write sample code...but all of these assume you get the interview. How can I even get the interviews so that I will have a shot at proving my worth and being hired?

I do know both C and C++ very well (intermediate level), but since I have never worked at a job using them, recruiters and human resources do not seem to care. They only care about skills they read in the bulleted point of work experience. Also, I refuse to lie on my resume, so I will not say I did something for work experience when I did not.

Finally, I think that if I do want to be really good at development in C and C++, doing it in my own time (which is less and less) is nowhere near as effective as doing it in my daytime job for 8-10 hours a day.

So short of lying, how can I score the interview for C and C++ programming jobs (while most of them not only want work experience, they are citing 5+ years of C++ experience, plus usually other misc skills as well (XML, Oracle, Java, etc.). Most of the other misc skills (short of Oracle) are easy to learn (XML is relatively simple, Java is similar to C++/VB.NET [and I know an older version...so it is just learning the new stuff]). Oracle would take some doing, but SQL Server is somewhat similar (TSQL -> PL/SQL, SQL, relational database skills, PRO*C is just embedding SQL in the host program, etc.). I have seen some C/C++ jobs up for months, so it would make sense that the month or two I spend learning the additional technologies while putting a dent in the work they have to be done, is better than not filling the job and having the work undone, isn't it?
The Almighty Buck

Submission + - Amazon asserts right to adjust prices after sale

An anonymous reader writes: On December 23, Amazon advertised a "buy one get one free" sale on DVD boxsets, but did not test the promotion before going live. When anyone placed two boxsets in their cart, the website gave a double discount — so the "grand total" shown (before order submission) was $0.00 or something very small. Despite terms stating that Amazon checks order prices before shipping, Amazon shipped the vast majority of orders. Five days later (December 28), after orders had been received and presumably opened, Amazon emailed customers advising them to return the boxsets unopened or customers' credit cards would be charged an additional amount. (You can read more threads about this here and here.) Starting yesterday, Amazon has been (re)charging credit cards, often without authorization. On Amazon's side, they didn't advertise any double discount, and the free or nearly-free boxsets must have cost them a mint. But with Amazon continually giving unadvertised discounts that seem to be errors, is "return the merchandise or be charged" the new way that price glitches will be handled?
It's funny.  Laugh.

Submission + - Genes Linked to Teen Delinquency

sporkme writes: "An Australian study has found a link between antisocial behavior and specific genes, independent of parents' emotional influence.

"Our data shows that marital conflict is not a major culprit," said epidemiologist Nick Martin, from the Queensland Institute of Medical Research. "Rows have often been blamed for ratbag behaviour but we've got no evidence to suggest that they are the problem." Researchers, including several from the US, studied 1,045 pairs of twins and their children to see whether the link between parental fighting and kids' conduct problems was genetic or environmental. They found that children of an identical twin had the same levels of behavioural problems regardless of whether it was their parent or their parent's identical sibling that had marital rows.
The study was published in the journal Child Development, which is available by subscription."

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