A Name Similar to Di - Slashdot User

Comment Re:Well.. (Score 4, Insightful) 189

by A Name Similar to Di on Thursday April 08, 2010 @10:34AM (#31776992) Attached to: Foursquare Turns Down $100M

I logged in for the first time in a year just to agree with you. There was a survey a few years back (sorry I couldn't find the link) suggesting that many business owners regret going public and losing control of their company, despite the cash they made.

I realize Four Square's case isn't the same as going public, but it's similar. If you love what you do and already make good money, why ruin it? And for the record, you can pay everyone's salary and still make zero profit, so "unprofitable" doesn't mean that the people working there aren't making good money.

Comment Only 100,000 a year? (Score 1, Insightful) 323

by A Name Similar to Di on Monday October 20, 2008 @09:36AM (#25440673) Attached to: Many Universities Spending $100K/Year Enforcing P2P Rules

So they hired one guy to watch the network. I'm guessing most universities spend 10x that on gardening alone... why is the writer up in arms?

Submission + - Programs cannot be uninstalled in Vista

Submitted by

Corson

on Saturday July 14, 2007 @11:44PM

Corson writes: "I am surprised nobody seems to have reported this on /. yet. Possibly after one of the latest updates in Windows Vista, two strange things happened: first, the Uninstall option is no longer available in the Control Panel when you right-click on older programs (most likely, those installed prior to the update in question, because uninstall works fine for recently installed programs; the Uninstall button is also missing on the toolbar at the top); second, some programs are no longer shown on the applications list in Control panel (e.g., Yahoo Messenger). A Google search returns quite a few hits on this issue (e.g., here, here, here, and here) but everybody seems to be waiting patiently for a sign from Microsoft. But M$ seem to have no clue or they would have fixed it already. I am just curious how many of you are experiencing this nuisance."

Submission + - AT&T slams Google over open-access wireless

Submitted by Robert on Friday July 13, 2007 @09:22AM

Robert writes: AT&T has asked Capitol Hill now to enable an open nationwide wireless spectrum, claiming that Google's lobbying of such a network is a bid by the search giant to obtain broadband airwaves at bargain-basement prices. Some companies, notably Google, have asked the FCC impose open-access requirements on the spectrum, which means any device could be used over the airwaves. Skype and satellite companies DirecTV and EchoStar are among the various proponents of an open-access network.

Submission + - Linux creator calls GPLv3 authors 'hypocrites' (informationweek.com)

Submitted by

AlexGr

on Wednesday July 11, 2007 @01:40PM

AlexGr writes: "We hear conflicting tales regarding Linus Torvalds acceptance of GPLv3. For example, this one by Paul McDougall (InformationWeek): Linux creator Linus Torvalds said the authors of a new software license expected to be used by thousands of open source programmers are a bunch of hypocrites and likened them to religious fanatics — the latest sign of a growing schism in the open source community between business-minded developers like Torvalds and free software purists. In an online post, Torvalds slammed executives at the Free Software Foundation, likening their mind-set to that of "religious fanatics and totalitarian states." Harsh! http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/ 2007/07/linux_creator_c.html"

Submission + - Groklaw Explains Microsoft & The GPLv3 (groklaw.net)

Submitted by

A Groklaw Reader

on Monday July 09, 2007 @02:40PM

A Groklaw Reader writes: "After all the questions about how the GPLv3 will or won't apply to Microsoft following Microsoft's declaration that they weren't bound by it, PJ of Groklaw wrote this story about how and why the GPLv3 will apply to Microsoft. Specifically, it covers in what ways Microsoft would convey GPLv3 software under the Novell agreement, and how Microsoft's refusal to allow previously sold vouchers to be redeemed for GPLv3 software would impact that agreement. Given that Novell said that they will distribute GPLv3 software, Microsoft may have had the tables turned on them already."

Submission + - Thompson Says Florida Bar Requested Psych Test (joystiq.com)

Submitted by

MBCook

on Tuesday July 03, 2007 @11:32AM

MBCook writes: "The referee for Jack Thompson's Florida Bar issues, Sheila M. Tuma, has allegedly requested that Thompson seek psychological testing and accept a 91-day suspension of his law license. The e-mail explaining the situation was sent to GamePolitics by Thompson himself. The claim could not be verified as the Florida Bar did not respond to requests for comment. The recommendation comes following issues stemming from Thompson's Bully case last year where there were issues regarding his professional conduct."

Submission + - Credit industry opposes anti-ID theft method (yahoo.com)

Submitted by

athloi

on Tuesday July 03, 2007 @10:30AM

athloi writes: "Lawmakers across the country — pushed by consumer advocacy groups — are mounting a counterattack. They have passed laws that allow consumers to freeze their credit, a surefire way to prevent thieves from opening new accounts or obtaining a mortgage in a consumer's name. Under a freeze, a consumer cuts off all access to his credit report and score, even his own. All lenders require that information, so no one can borrow money in the consumer's name until he or she lifts the freeze. It's simple, and it works. So, of course, it's under threat from the Consumer Data Industry Association, which represents the Big Three credit bureaus. They make millions gathering and selling consumer data. Freezes cut into that business.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20070703/cm_usato day/aweaponagainstidentitytheft"

Submission + - Is RIAA's Linares Affidavit Technically Valid? 1

Submitted by

NewYorkCountryLawyer

on Monday July 02, 2007 @03:44PM

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: "In support of its ex parte, "John Doe", discovery applications against college students, the RIAA has been using a declaration by its "Anti-Piracy" Vice President Carlos Linares" (pdf) to show the Judge that it has a good copyright infringement case against the "John Does". A Boston University student has challenged the validity of Mr. Linares's declaration, and the RIAA is fighting back. Would appreciate the Slashdot community's take on the validity of Mr. Linares's "science"."

Submission + - CallerID spoofing to be made illegal (loc.gov) 1

Submitted by MadJo on Thursday June 28, 2007 @06:36PM

MadJo writes: US Congress has just approved a bill that will make it illegal to spoof CallerID.
If someone is found guilty of spoofing his CallerID, he could face fines up to $10,000 per violation.

From the bill:

The amount of the forfeiture penalty (...) shall not exceed $10,000 for each violation, or 3 times that amount for each day of a continuing violation, except that the amount assessed for any continuing violation shall not exceed a total of $1,000,000 for any single act or failure to act.

Submission + - The History and Future of Zork (gamasutra.com)

Submitted by

Matt Barton

on Thursday June 28, 2007 @01:38PM

Matt Barton writes: "I thought Slashdotters might be interested in my History of Zork feature on Gamasutra. I interviewed three of the original "imps" for the piece (you can see the full interviews here) as well as Nick Montfort (author of Twisty Little Passages) and Howard Sherman (president of Malinche Entertainment). The article covers the original trilogy, as well as Enchanter and the later Activision games such as Zork: Grand Inquisitor. Enjoy!"

Submission + - Interview with initiator of DirectX

Submitted by

Miguel de Icaza

on Tuesday April 03, 2007 @10:52PM

Miguel de Icaza writes: "there's a great interview from Shacknews with Alex St. John, one of the earlier DirectX / gaming guys. He talks about almost losing his job going against Bill Gates, and talks a bit about the MS development & political process.

'You know why the "X" on the Xbox is a glowing green X? The original codename for Direct X was "the Manhattan Project," because strategically it was an effort to displace Japanese game consoles with PCs and ultimately the Xbox. We called it "The Manhattan Project" because that was the codename for the program developing the nuclear bomb. We had a glowing radiation logo for the prototype for Direct X, and of course as soon as that got out and the press covered it, it caused a scandal' "

Submission + - The Wii's MEMS Inventor on Future Technology

Submitted by

eldavojohn

on Friday March 02, 2007 @09:14AM

eldavojohn writes: "IEEE Spectrum is running an artcile on the inventor of the motion sensor that the Wii uses. The microelectromechanical system (MEMS) gives Wii it's core ability to sense motion in the controller and, arguably, a distinct advantage over the competition. But what's really interesting is where Benedetto Vigna wants to take this technology: 'First he wants to make the sensor even smaller, even cheaper, even tougher. "I want it to fit in all kinds of places — shoes and textiles, for instance, where it might be useful for medical monitoring," he says. "Then I want to make a three-dimensional gyroscope, to measure rotation around three different axes. Today, such products are quite big, a cube 10 centimeters on a side. We want to do this in less than a 30-millimeter cube, to serve as an image stabilizer in cameras and to track a person's position in the intervals when he can't get a GPS signal." Better still, he adds, would be to throw in a magnetic detector, freeing the navigator from GPS altogether. It would be yet another marvel from Lilliput — the smallest compass ever sold.'"

Submission + - Politicians wising up on game legislation?

Submitted by Blackjack on Friday February 23, 2007 @12:31PM

Blackjack writes: Ars Technica looks at recent failures to pass laws regulating the sales of violent video games and asks whether politicians are finally wising up to First Amendment issues and the costs associated with lawsuits resulting from the laws. Recent attemps to pass video game legislation in Mississippi, Utah, and Indiana have either failed or been put on indefinite hold. 'Now, state lawmakers are more cognizant of the constitutionality issues at stake. The judicial landscape is littered with the charred husks of laws passed by Illinois, Washington, Michigan, California, Louisiana, and others. All of them tried in some way or another to regulate the sale of violent video games to children, and all of them were struck down on First Amendment grounds.'

Submission + - SETI finally finds something!

Submitted by

QuatumCrypto

on Wednesday February 21, 2007 @05:05PM

QuatumCrypto writes: "SETI(at)home is a distributed processing client from UC Berkeley that installs on the vounteers' home computers and harnesses their processing power in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Anyways, nothing worthy has comeout of that massive project... that is until today! One of the voluteers was able to track down his wife's stolen laptop using the IP address that SETI(at)home client reports back to the server. After getting back the laptop his wife said, "I always knew that a geek would make a great husband.""

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