Comment Re:Terrible Article (Score 1) 256
Maybe Steve "Developers, developers, developers" Ballmer?
Comment Re:I want enforceable privacy (Score 1) 76
I'm not sure Google can effectively use info extracted from analysis of my private data (searches, gmail, etc.) to display relevant ads to me. Hell, they've been plastering my GMail with some sort of religious propaganda and astrology-related crap lately (me being a physicist), and it's been a week or so that AdSense has been showing throngs "Try Google Chrome" ads to me even when I'm using Chrome. You don't get much stupider and worthless advertisement than that :-)
It's pretty sad since some time ago I really hoped that Adsense will be actually useful by showing me ads for things that I would be interested in, both bringing revenue to the advertiser and making me a happy buyer.
Comment Re:Why so hard to fix? (Score 2, Interesting) 255
I don't get it. If they still have the data, why is it so hard for them to write up a script to fix the mistake?
Because they insist that it wasn't a mistake and, generally, they wanted people's profiles clean. Now if this is true or not remains to be seen: they could be covering up their asses by saying it was intentional, because a company that accidentally kills or blocks your data would receive event less trust than a company that does it intentionally. So practically by this announcement they could be choosing the lesser of the two evils.
Journal SPAM: Special Counsel Removes Potential Evidence with "DoD-Wipe"
A U.S. official overseeing a probe of former Bush aide Karl Rove yesterday refused to give federal investigators copies of "personal files" he deleted from his office computer, after it was discovered he hired a private computer-help company to erase all the hard drives belonging to him and two deputies. Special Counsel Scott J. Bloch hired a firm to perform a D
Submission + - Google experimenting with user-modified searches (networkworld.com)
carusoj writes: "Google is experimenting with letting users add, move, and remove search results. You can promote the results you like, remove the results you don't, and add URLs that you think are more appropriate. The move raises lots of questions, including whether Google would use this information to influence its PageRank system."
Submission + - Portraits of the Homeworld (esa.int)
Riding with Robots writes: "Two space probes have delivered striking new images of Earth in the past few days. Yesterday, Japan's space agency released still frames from new HDTV videos that capture stunning vistas of Earth rising and setting over the lunar horizon. Today, the European Space Agency has posted the first shots from the Rosetta probe's latest encounter with its home planet as that spacecraft swung by to get a speed boost on its way to a distant encounter with a comet. These first views come from Rosetta's navcam — the full-color views will be up soon."
Submission + - Google phone OS unveiled
Elgoog writes: Welcome to the Open Handset Alliance(TM), a group of more than 30 technology and mobile companies who have come together to accelerate innovation in mobile and offer consumers a richer, less expensive, and better mobile experience. Together we have developed Android(TM), the first complete, open, and free mobile platform.
Submission + - Military to have Invisible Tanks by 2012 (news.com.au) 1
lewko writes: "New technology that can make tanks invisible has been unveiled by Britain's Ministry of Defence.
In secret trials last week, the army said it had made a vehicle completely disappear and predicted an invisible tank would be ready for service by 2012.
The new technology uses cameras and projectors to beam images of the surrounding landscape onto a tank."
Submission + - Ubuntu Google $199 PC challenges Microsoft and com (itwire.com)
WirePosted writes: "While the One Laptop Per Child program tries to hawk underpowered US$200 computers in lots of 10,000 to third world countries, Walmart has put quite powerful Ubuntu Linux PCs on its shelves retailing for $199. What's more, the PCs from Taiwanese vendor Everex, come pre-installed with a range of popular online applications, including Google's office suite and Skype, among others."
Submission + - Linux in Retail for under $200 for real. (pantagraph.com)
cozytom writes: Walmart has a Linux PC for under $200 made by Everex pre loaded with a version of Ubuntu Linux, called gOS. Includes a VIA procesor, 512MB of memory, and 80GB HD. They are only for sale in only 1 in 8 stores, so not wide spread.
Submission + - Google Goes all Black in San Francisco for Energy (solarpowerrocks.com)
SunnyDE writes: http://www.solarpowerrocks.com/solar-competitions/google-goes-all-black-in-san-francisco-for-energy-conservation/
This is what you see if you go to www.google.com right now and you live in San Francisco. I guess they're doing geolocation specific homepages now. Yikes! Google's trying to raise awareness for solar power! Alright, alright, not JUST solar power.
Submission + - Cold Spring Harbor Suspends Chancellor Watson
mosel-saar-ruwer writes: We all knew that it was only a matter of time, and tonight, it's offical: Cold Spring Harbor has suspended its Chancellor, the Nobel laureate, Dr. James Watson. Watson now joins Harvard's ex-President, Dr. Lawrence Summers, among prominent academics who have learned that there are some topics which we just don't broach anymore. Oh well, so much for freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and freedom of inquiry. By the way, there was some worry earlier this week that Dr. Watson might actually be arrested in England, for having violated the British "hate crimes" laws; here's to hoping that he at least makes it home without being imprisoned.
Submission + - Linux Assemblers: A Comparison of GAS and NASM
LinucksGirl writes: This article explains some of the more important syntactic and semantic differences between two of the most popular assemblers for Linux, GNU Assembler (GAS) and Netwide Assembler (NASM), including differences in basic syntax, variables and memory access, macro handling, functions and external routines, stack handling, and techniques for easily repeating blocks of code.
Submission + - What is online privacy about, after all?
rumith writes: "Hello. What kind of data, exactly, should one try to keep private, and for what reasons (this also includes avoiding being monitored by Google and the like)? As far as one can assume, most of our personal data is perfectly known to at least one party, and an inquisitive mind wouldn't find it too difficult to connect all the pieces together, especially if tasked with such a mission by our new [insert your favorite here] overlords."
Submission + - Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) Released (aviransplace.com) 1
Aviran writes: Ubuntu, the most popular linux distribution is finally out with a new shiny version Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon). The home page of Ubuntu.com is not updated yet but the release page is live and images of the Linux operation system are available for download.
