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GNOME

Submission + - GNOME Shell No Longer Requires GPU Acceleration (phoronix.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The GNOME 3.0 Shell with the Mutter window manager no longer requires GPU acceleration to work while still retaining the compositing window manager and OpenGL support. GNOME Shell can now work entirely on the CPU using the LLVM compiler via the Gallium3D LLVMpipe driver. This will be another change to Fedora 17 to no longer depend upon the GNOME3 fall-back, which is expected to eventually be deprecated and further anger GNOME2 fans.

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: spoof an email bounce? 2

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: One cool feature I used on kMail years ago was the ability to generate a spoofed email bounce for any given message I had received, which claimed delivery failed because of an unknown recipient. While this doesn't exactly align with expected behaviour from a mail client, it was a useful way of easily getting off mailing lists (automated, or manually created by freaky acquaintances!).

This is something I really miss, so I'm wondering if there are any mail clients for Windows that provide similar functionality?

Submission + - Could crowd-sourced democracy be made to work? (google.com) 1

Submitted by maccallr
maccallr writes: The Occupy Movement is getting everyone talking about how to fix the world's economic (and social, environmental...) problems. It is even trialling new forms of "open" democracy. Trouble is, it's easy to criticise the physical occupiers for being unrepresentative of the general population — and much of their debating time is spent on practical rather than policy issues. Well-meaning but naive occupiers could be susceptible to exploitation by the political establishment and vested interests. In the UK, virtual occupiers are using Google Moderator to propose and debate policy in the comfort of their homes (where, presumably, it is easier to find out stuff you didn't know). Could something like this be done on a massive scale (national or global) to reach consensus on what needs to be done? How do you maximise participation by "normal folk" on complex issues? What level of participation could be considered quorate? How do you deal with block votes? What can we learn from e-petitions and Iceland's crowd-sourced constitution? Is the "Occupy" branding appropriate? What other pitfalls are there? Or are existing models of democracy and dictatorship fit for purpose?
Privacy

Submission + - Feds' Use of Fake Cell Tower: Did it Constitute a (wired.com)

Submitted by
hessian
hessian writes: "Federal authorities used a fake Verizon cellphone tower to zero in on a suspect’s wireless card, and say they were perfectly within their rights to do so, even without a warrant.

But the feds don’t seem to want that legal logic challenged in court by the alleged identity thief they nabbed using the spoofing device, known generically as a stingray. So the government is telling a court for the first time that spoofing a legitimate wireless tower in order to conduct surveillance could be considered a search under the Fourth Amendment in this particular case, and that its use was legal, thanks to a court order and warrant that investigators used to get similar location data from Verizon’s own towers."
United States

Submission + - 'Dump Your Bank Day' appears to catch on (cnn.com) 3

Submitted by suraj.sun
suraj.sun writes: Customers are dumping their banks in droves ahead of the nationwide "Move Your Money" and "Bank Transfer Day" movements this Saturday. Given the recent spotlight on attempts — and ultimate failures — by some of the nation's biggest banks to tack on new debit card fees, thousands of disgruntled consumers have already either left or pledged to leave their current bank for a community bank or credit union, which are known for having fewer and/or lower bank account fees.

At least 650,000 consumers have already joined credit unions since Sept. 29, the day Bank of America announced plans to impose its controversial $5 debit card fee, according to a nationwide survey of credit unions by the Credit Union National Association. And while Bank of America and other banks have since backpedaled on imposing the fees, consumers are making it clear they are still fed up. More than 4 in every 5 credit unions said new customers cited days like "Bank Transfer Day" and new fees imposed by their banks as reasons for opening accounts.

CNN: http://money.cnn.com/2011/11/03/pf/move_your_money_day/index.htm

Submission + - Anonymous takes on a Mexican drug cartel (chron.com) 1

Submitted by NarcoTraficante
NarcoTraficante writes: After one of their members was kidnapped in Veracruz, Mexico by the Zetas drug cartel, Mexican Anonymous members have issued an ultimatum to the Zetas in a recently posted YouTube video (Spanish). The video demands release of the kidnapped member and threatens to publish information of cartel members and affiliates in Veracruz if the victim is not released by November 5. The Houston Chronicle article warns that there will be bloodshed if Anonymous publishes information on the Zeta's operations, either perpetrated by rival cartels or reprisal attacks by the Zetas themselves.
Open Source

Submission + - $25 PC Prototype gets award at ARM TechCon (raspberrypi.org)

Submitted by
gbl08ma
gbl08ma writes: "The Raspberry Pi project, which aims to create a $25 Linux box, won a award for the category "Best in Show for Hardware Design", at ARM TechCon, even though they haven't yet released any final product (the release will be sometime in late November).
The director of the Raspberry Pi foundation, Eben Upton, shown at the event, demonstrating the capabilities of one of the prototypes that have been built. From advanced graphics at 1080p HD resolution to simple web browsing and desktop productivity, the small boards with ARM-based processors and PoP SDRAM have proven to be very versatile, fast and durable.
The whole Raspberry Pi team and community are very happy for this prize and they all hope this results in big success for the project. Lets just wait for the final boards to be released."

Submission + - Police claim BlackBerry outage made roads safer (sophos.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Road traffic accidents in Abu Dhabi and Dubai plummeted last week — and the local police have a theory as to why: Drivers' BlackBerrys weren't working.

Police in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have claimed that last week's worldwide BlackBerry outage, which frustrated business people around the world who were unable to communicate with their colleagues, had one positive result — less texting and reading of emails by people who should have been concentrating on driving instead.

There could be other factors at play, however.

For instance, popular UAE soccer player Theyab Awana was killed in a high speed crash near Abu Dhabi in September, amid claims that he was sending a message on his BlackBerry when he hit a lorry.

The football star's father, Awana Ahmad Al Mosabi, made an emotional plea to people not to use smartphones while driving, and a Facebook campaign against the use of BlackBerry Messenger while driving has grown in popularity.
Security

Submission + - Analysis of 250,000 Hacker Conversations (net-security.org) 2

Submitted by Orome1
Orome1 writes: Imperva released a report analyzing the content and activities of an online hacker forum with nearly 220,000 registered members, although many are dormant. The forum is used by hackers for training, communications, collaboration, recruitment, commerce and even social interaction. Commercially, this forum serves as a marketplace for selling of stolen data and attack software. The chat rooms are filled with technical subjects ranging from advice on attack planning to solicitations for help with specific campaigns. The forum is also a place where curious neophytes can find “how-to-hack” tutorials on various methods.
Sci-Fi

Submission + - SF Authors Predict Computing's Future (hp.com)

Submitted by
Esther Schindler
Esther Schindler writes: ""Over the past century a lot of science fiction has been published, showcasing a lot of wild ideas, and if you sit enough authors at enough typewriters or word processors, somebody is bound to get a few things right. Science fiction’s greater influence, though, goes beyond whether or not the authors can make a good guess," writes Kevin J. Anderson in Science Fiction’s Take on the Future of Computers: Visionaries and Imaginaries. "Rather than predicting the future, the SF genre is much better at inspiring the future. Visionaries read or see cool ideas in their favorite SF books or films, then decide how to make it a reality."

So Anderson assembled a set of visionaries, and asked them where they thought computing is headed: Mike Resnick, Robert J. Sawyer, Greg Bear, Michael A. Stackpole, Dr. Gregory Benford, and Christopher Paolini gaze into their crystal balls. "Forget artificial intelligence. The future of computing is artificial consciousness, and it will be here within 20 years, and maybe much sooner than that," says Sawyer. "Our future wired world will have smart, wireless robots — gofers in hospitals, security guards with IR vision at night, lawn mowers, etc. We ourselves will be wired, with devices and embedded sensors taking in data and giving it out — a two way street," contributes Benford.

And there's a whole lot more."

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