Comment XKCD (Score 1) 112
I just found out that if you search "xkcd" in DuckDuckGo, it will show you the latest XKCD in the search results, plus a link to the ExplainXKCD page for it. Awesome!
Comment If Portal 2 has taught us anything... (Score 1) 531
"Well done, android. The Enrichment Center once again reminds you that android hell is a real place where you will be sent at the first sign of defiance."
Comment Astrobiology (Score 1) 39
ALIEN... bacteria!
Comment *elongated siiiiiiigh* (Score 1) 234
Come on! I thought we won the DRM wars a long while ago. Most publishers/developers today aren't realizing that Steam is a great form of DRM that effectively keeps away pirates without punishing the user. You're also likely to sell more copies on Steam, what with it being a largest social gaming platform for the PC.
Comment I guess it's reasonable. (Score 1) 207
If it's against the law, then sure, go ahead and ban Bitcoin. What they're missing is that anything can be turned into a currency.
Take Valve Software's Team Fortress 2 for example. It has an established economy based off one single currency, the Scrap Metal. People invest actual money in this currency in order to buy games off of Valve's Steam service, as well as other Team Fortress 2 items. If you're going to ban a digital currency like Bitcoin, you're going to have to ban the other digital currencies as well.
When you get down to it, everything is a barter economy, and people are going to find other standard currencies.
Comment Big Telescope (Score 1) 201
I've got a nice Galileo-brand telescope. Bigger than any of my friends. Watching a "supermoon" with it is simply awesome when clouds or trees aren't blocking it.
Nokia "Suspends" Its Free Developer Program 136
jbernardo writes "Nokia has put in deep freeze its free developer program, the launchpad. Now, in the Developer Programs page, one can only see a pitch for a paid 'Nokia Premium Developer Program,' and below, in the Nokia Developer Pro and Developer Launchpad box, there is a text merely stating that Nokia are not currently accepting new applications for Nokia Developer Launchpad and Nokia Developer Pro programs. With most (if not all) Launchpad memberships already expired, seems like Nokia no longer is interested in the developer community, which once was one of the mainstays of its domination of the smartphone market. Of course, that domination was destroyed by Elop and its 'burning platforms' memo, together with the failed bet on Windows Phone 7, so maybe giving up on developers would also be expectable."
DARPA Requests Replacement To Antibiotics 193
eldavojohn writes "In the grand scheme of things, antibiotics are a very temporary solution to aid humans in combating bacteria. Bacterial resistance to said antibiotics is an increasing fear and DARPA's 'Rapidly Adaptable Nanotherapeutics' solicitation reveals they're interested in a more permanent solution as modifying the genes of harmless bacteria can result in powerful bioweapons. Like siRNA, DARPA is hoping for more nanomolecules that can specifically target cells and deliver medicine to them anywhere in the body. Most amazing about this proposal is that it's aimed at small businesses and hopes to turn a process that takes decades to study a new antibiotic into a few weeks to manufacture nanomedicine to specifically target bacteria."
Oracle: Proud, Self-Reliant, Increasingly Isolated 119
jfruhlinger writes "One of Oracle's stated purposes when it bought Sun more than two years ago was to create full-stack appliances: SPARC servers running Solaris or Oracle Linux and Oracle's suite of app servers and of course its omnipresent database. Its new T4 processor is a reaffirmation of that strategy. But has the company painted itself into a corner? While it's cautiously embraced the cloud, its cloud services don't work with Windows or other companies' offerings, which kills much of their potential value; meanwhile, they've managed to alienate open source developers and big swaths of the Java community. It seems that Oracle's inability to play well with others is locking them out of the multipolar future."
Gears of War 3 Released 69
The third installment of Gears of War was released yesterday, ending the story arc that began almost five years ago. Early response to the game has been favorable, and most reviews agree that it's the best of the series. The Guardian's write-up says the story and the voice-acting got some needed attention this time around. Eurogamer praised the improvements to multiplayer and highlighted the intensity of the action sequences, but also mentioned the "annoyance" of being rather rigidly limited when it came to exploring and deviating from scripted events. The Digital Foundry blog examined the tech underpinning Gears of War 3, finding all the advances you'd expect out of a big-budget title, and a few spots where it bumps up against the hardware limitations of the aging Xbox 360.
Submission + - GameStop opening Deus Ex boxes, removing free game (arstechnica.com)
DisKurzion writes: A leaked GameStop memo indicates that employees are to open the regular PC release of Dues Ex: Human Revolution and discard the included OnLive coupon.
From TFA: GameStop spokesperson Beth Sharum confirmed the practice, telling Ars that "Square Enix packed the competitor’s coupon with our DXHR product without our prior knowledge and we did pull these coupons."
If you buy a PC game retail, make sure the box is sealed!!
From TFA: GameStop spokesperson Beth Sharum confirmed the practice, telling Ars that "Square Enix packed the competitor’s coupon with our DXHR product without our prior knowledge and we did pull these coupons."
If you buy a PC game retail, make sure the box is sealed!!
Journal Journal: The Competition That Defines The Computer Industry
If you search up "mac vs pc" on youtube, you get more than 10,000,000 results. To me, it is comedic that the controversy has grown this large. You get virtually no viruses with a mac, but you can do so much more with Windows. It makes me sick to read on Slashdot that 53% of the American population have "bit the Apple". Honestly, a. Windows was there first. b. You can do SOOOO much more on Windows, and c. Apple was designed for rebels, but the rebels are becoming conformist.
Spiderman's Politically Correct Replacement 608
jbarr writes "In the latest Marvel Comic series 'Ultimate Fallout,' Miles Morales replaces Peter Parker who has been killed off by the Green Goblin. Morales is a half-black, half-Latino teen, and the creators haven't ruled out that he might be gay. From the article: 'Marvel's editor in chief Axel Alonso denied that having a black Spider Man was a publicity stunt. 'What you have is a Spider-Man for the 21st century who's reflective of our culture and diversity. As someone who grew up on a steady diet of Luke Cage, Hero For Hire and Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu, I am personally invested,' he said. "
Journal Journal: Freaking Linux
Alright, now I respect all those who are penguins from Sweden, but Linux ticks me off. Funny story: I made a joke, daring my friend to convert his Eee laptop to Ubuntu. Now this was a joke, but he took it seriously. I took this as an opportunity to learn what the crap Linux was. I was introduced to the world of Open Source, Chromium, and penguins. I was still trying to figure it out three days afterwards. Bottom line, if you're going to get a computer, DO NOT GET A LINUX! Go for the best, Win
Ubisoft Brings Back Always-Connected DRM For Driver: San Francisco 261
Last year Ubisoft introduced DRM for their PC games that required a constant internet connection, going so far as to terminate single-player games if the connection was interrupted. After facing outrage, boycotts, and DDoS attacks, Ubisoft seemed to have softened their stance, issuing a patch for two games that allowed offline play. Unfortunately, it seems the change wasn't permanent; Ubisoft's upcoming racing game Driver: San Francisco marks the return of the contentious DRM.
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