Follow Slashdot stories on Twitter

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Image

NASA Tests Flying Airbag 118

Posted by samzenpus from the drop-the-cloud-anchor dept.
coondoggie writes "NASA is looking to reduce the deadly impact of helicopter crashes on their pilots and passengers with what the agency calls a high-tech honeycomb airbag known as a deployable energy absorber. So in order to test out its technology NASA dropped a small helicopter from a height of 35 feet to see whether its deployable energy absorber, made up of an expandable honeycomb cushion, could handle the stress. The test crash hit the ground at about 54MPH at a 33 degree angle, what NASA called a relatively severe helicopter crash."
Censorship

Sharp Rise In Jailing of Online Journalists; Iran May Just Kill Them 233

Posted by timothy from the your-ethics-may-vary dept.
bckspc writes "The Committee to Protect Journalists has published their annual census of journalists in prison. Of the 136 reporters in prison around the world on December 1, 'At least 68 bloggers, Web-based reporters, and online editors are imprisoned, constituting half of all journalists now in jail.' Print was next with 51 cases. Also, 'Freelancers now make up nearly 45 percent of all journalists jailed worldwide, a dramatic recent increase that reflects the evolution of the global news business.' China, Iran, Cuba, Eritrea, and Burma were the top 5 jailers of journalists." rmdstudio writes, too, with word that after the last few days' protest there, largely organized online, the government of Iran is considering the death penalty for bloggers and webmasters whose reports offend it.
Image

Stoned Wallabies Make Crop Circles 104

Posted by samzenpus from the trippity-hop dept.
It's the tripnaut! writes "The BBC reports that Australian wallabies are eating opium poppies and creating crop circles as they hop around 'as high as a kite', a government official has said. 'The one interesting bit that I found recently in one of my briefs on the poppy industry was that we have a problem with wallabies entering poppy fields, getting as high as a kite and going around in circles,' says Lara Giddings, the attorney general for the island state of Tasmania. 'Then they crash,' she added."
Censorship

Submission + - iTunes Censorship - Artists, Lyrics and Videos

Submitted by
Apple Employee
Apple Employee writes: "iTunes Censorship is out of control — S**k my Kiss by Red Hot Chili Peppers. Such Great Heights video has been altered. Thousands of Artists iTunes won't let you hear. They won't even let you search for certain key words — So why carry Explicit Albums.?"
The Internet

Submission + - CyberCrime Treaty: Hidden costs expensive for all

Submitted by linuxtelephony
linuxtelephony writes: An article at Ziff Davis' CIO Insight shines a light on a Cyber Crime treaty drafted in Europe with help from the US that has implications for just about everyone with a network. From the article:
...sweeping authority given to participating countries to seize information from private parties as they investigate cybercrimes, even when the activity being investigated isn't a crime in the country where the data is located. If France is investigating a sale of Nazi memorabilia on eBay, the U.S. must cooperate, even though such transactions are not illegal in the U.S. ...data-retention policies for network traffic, and require any operator of a computer network to respond to requests for information from any participating country without compensation of any kind...These investigative and supervision costs will invariably be imposed on businesses without any real controls. Worldwide law-enforcement agencies, in other words, may now avail themselves of the opportunity to outsource their most expensive problems to you.

Slashdot Top Deals

Biology is the only science in which multiplication means the same thing as division.

Close