tf23 - Slashdot User

Submission + - CNN Slams Apple For Trialware

Submitted by

gbulmash

on Saturday October 20, 2007 @02:41PM

gbulmash writes: "When you think of computers that have been overloaded with unwanted trialware and demo programs to try to improve the manufacturer's margins, who do you think of? CNN apparently thinks of Apple. In a video story on how to avoid excessive amounts of trialware on your new PC, they displayed 25 seconds (from 2:07 to 2:32) of footage of an Apple store while their expert described how stores will charge you up to $130 to remove trialware and optimize the machine you just bought. Is this fair, or does CNN owe Apple an apology?"

Submission + - Successful Department Documentation - Whats worked

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 20, 2007 @10:36AM

An anonymous reader writes: Those of us working in IT Departments face the age old issue of documentation. Managers love it, but everyone has a different idea on what documentation should look like. I'm interested to know what works for people. Do you have use wikis or does indexed standalone docs work for you. What software are you using to manage your docs, do you have a standard index and document struture. All up, what's been successful for you. If there's any info that might help me no reinvent the wheel, I'd be grateful to know.

Submission + - Why You Feel Like Less of a Man Once You Marry

Submitted by

theodp

on Thursday October 18, 2007 @10:38PM

theodp writes: "Just in case you haven't picked up this month's Current Anthropology, it's official — getting married saps your testosterone. After measuring testosterone in 205 Ariaal men in Kenya, researchers found that those with one wife had lower levels of the hormone than unmarried men, and men with more than one wife had the lowest levels of all. 'Testosterone levels are lower among married men probably because they are investing less in mating effort,' said Peter Gray of the UNLV. Ball Finder, anyone?"

Submission + - Slashdot Reverses Facts about Radiohead 1

Submitted by Apro+im on Thursday October 18, 2007 @02:16PM

Apro+im writes: The popular news aggregation website, Slashdot today reported that the new Radiohead album, In Rainbows was pirated more than it was procured via legitimate means, setting off a flurry of speculation on their online discussion board as to the implications of this "fact". Strangely overlooked in much of the discussion, however, was the fact that the article they linked contained the exact opposite information, stating:

"The file was downloaded about 100,000 more times each day — adding up to more than 500,000 total illegal downloads. That's less than the 1.2 million legitimate online sales of the album reported by the British Web site Gigwise.com"

Questions about what this implies about Slashdot's editorial practices and readership remain unanswered.

Submission + - Why Users Ditch OS X for Windows (osweekly.com) 7

Submitted by

coward

on Thursday October 18, 2007 @02:12AM

coward writes: "OSWeekly.com says users ditch OS X for Windows. Why? It's too pricey, the article claims. "If one more person points me to a Mini and tells me this is going to replace a 2.00GHz PC with standalone video and a SATA drive, I'm going to scream. Despite Apple providing a superior OS for the casual consumer, it remains a price issue for most people. You take any unsuspecting cash conscious family and if you actually tell me that they are going to be willing to drop $1,099 versus $499 on a notebook for their child, you had better present one serious sales pitch. Even considering the long-term value, malware-free environment, those parents would be presenting their soon to be college aged kid, the fact is they are not informed enough to understand that the $499 notebook is an utter junk, thanks to poor hardware quality."

Submission + - Online Poker Room Caught Cheating -Absolute Poker (nytimes.com) 1

Submitted by gus spangles on Wednesday October 17, 2007 @04:05PM

gus spangles writes: Absolute Poker, one of the major online poker rooms, has been caught cheating. Allowing some players the ability to see other people's cards. Absolute had issued a public statement denying the claims after an internal investigation but then provided self incriminating evidence to an outside researcher that implicated them beyond any doubts.
Even more shocking is that all early information points to it being an internal job headed possibly by former(current?) owners of the site. Credit to crazymarco, wacokid, n82, snagglepuss, adanthar, and others who have helped in this investigation.
Steven Levitt's nytimes blog writeup of the situation
solid summary of how some of the information was obtained on n82's blog
youtube video of a recreation from the hand history files of one of the instances of cheating in a $1,000 entry online poker tourney on absolute
latest discussion thread on 2+2 where the story was uncovered

Submission + - Unreal Tournament 3 Performance Revealed (pcper.com)

Submitted by

Vigile

on Friday October 12, 2007 @10:01AM

Vigile writes: "The Unreal Tournament 3 demo might just be dropping today, but with a launch on the PC, PS3, Xbox 360 and even an in-box Linux client it will definitely be one of the best titles out for the holiday. With an early take on the UT3 demo's performance, PC Perspective has posted an article that compares cards from NVIDIA and AMD in both single and dual-GPU configurations to see which are the best performers. It turns out that even mid-range cards are going to be more than capable of playing UT3 at impressive image quality levels."

Submission + - Cubans have to dress as tourists to use internet

Submitted by Stony Stevenson on Thursday October 11, 2007 @09:14PM

Stony Stevenson writes: When 32-year-old Yoani Sanchez wants to update her blog about daily life in Cuba, she dresses like a tourist and strides confidently into a Havana hotel, greeting the staff in German. That is because Cubans like Sanchez are not authorised to use hotel Internet connections, which are reserved for foreigners.

She and a handful of other independent bloggers are opening up a crack in the government's tight control over media and information to give the rest of the world a glimpse of life in a one-party, Communist state. But they face many difficulties. Costs are highly prohibitive (US$6 per hour for Internet access or the equivalent of a fortnight's pay for the average Cuban) and less than 2 percent of the population have access to the internet.

Submission + - Apple is more of a control freak than Microsoft (networkworld.com)

Submitted by

Anonymous Coward

on Wednesday October 10, 2007 @12:15PM

Anonymous Coward writes: "While still on the fringe, Apple is continually gaining ground in the corporate environment. Recent studies have shown that universities, too, are seeing a surge in OS X usage — some of which will soon translate into enterprise demand as those graduates enter the work force. While many users laud Apple for the freedom that it gives them, recent developments indicate that Apple might be even more of a "control freak" than Microsoft. http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/2007/101007tolly.html"

DHS Injects Itself With DDoS 136

Posted by CowboyNeal on Thursday October 04, 2007 @11:13PM from the shooting-their-own-feet dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Here's a story about what can happen to any enterprise IT department that overestimates the intelligence of its users. Only in this case, the enterprise in question is the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The spokesman says there's no Jack Bauer mentality. No kidding!"

2.5 Mile Deep Hole Drilled Into San Andreas Fault 204

Posted by CowboyNeal on Thursday October 04, 2007 @09:43PM from the heart-of-the-matter dept.

iandoh writes "Cool research: Geologists at Stanford University and the US Geological Survey have drilled a 2.5 mile deep borehole into the San Andreas fault. They've extracted over one ton of rock from 2 miles down, and they'll be installing sensors down the length of the borehole."

Submission + - Burma Shuts Down Internet 3

Submitted by

Hugh Pickens

on Wednesday October 03, 2007 @04:41PM

Hugh Pickens writes: "MIT Technology Review reports that in the aftermath of pro-democracy protests, Burma's military rulers have physically disconnected their country from the internet:

Last week — after images of the beatings of Buddhist monks and the killing of a Japanese photographer leaked out via the Internet — Burma's military rulers took the ultimate step, apparently physically disconnecting primary telecommunications cables in two major cities, in a drastic effort to stop the flow of information from Burma to the rest of the world. It didn't completely work: some bloggers apparently used satellite links or cellular phone services to get information outside the country.
One Burmese blogger reported last week that "Myanmar main ISP has been shut down by so-called "maintenance reasons" and most of the telecommunication services have been cut off or tapped. ""

Submission + - Police issue Death Threats to Man with Camera 9

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28, 2007 @07:00PM

An anonymous reader writes: Cops in St. Louis have taken objection over a local man filming their abuses of power, and have responded with death threats, and stalking. The guy they're harassing installed a pretty neat video system in his car after having received a speeding ticket that he that was unfair. What he ended up catching on tape was far worse than a speeding ticket. Luckily the news has picked up on it, so he is probably out of immediate danger.

Microsoft DRM Code for Netflix Streams Hacked 154

Posted by Zonk on Thursday August 09, 2007 @03:42PM from the don't-cross-the-streams-it-would-be-bad dept.

reddburn writes "Macworld has posted a story by IDN News Service about a hacker who posted instructions for saving streaming movies from Netflix, defeating Microsoft's DRM code designed to prevent users from saving the content. From the article: 'A hacker who calls himself Dizzie wrote late last month on the Rorta hacking forum that "Netflix doesn't easily allow you to save the flicks and watch them at your leisure because the films are entrapped in some ... Windows Media DRM wrapper," referring to Microsoft's DRM system. Word of his hack spread more widely this week in various blogs and Web sites...He writes that the process for removing the DRM could take a few attempts, and the process does not remove the time limit imposed by Netflix on viewing the content. The Netflix site was down for maintenance early Thursday, although it was unclear if it was related to the hack. The site was back up later Thursday morning.'"

Submission + - Just what we need another lawyer (reuters.com)

Submitted by jombeewoof on Friday June 08, 2007 @12:35AM

jombeewoof writes: Just what we need, another proven jackass with a law degree. Our dear friend Billy G goes back to Harvard to get an honorary law degree. Yup, law. No, really I'm not kidding. The article isn't terribly long, but it sure is painful.

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