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Comment Re: The "Science" of Ad Adstra (Score 1) 89

There's a big difference in the Orion project ideas and the concept of just taking a normal ship (looks a bit like a capsule that might go to the moon), pointing it towards Earth, detonating a single nuke next to it, and having it fly all the way back to Earth from Neptune. Or from outside of the heliopause. The movie thinks those are the same thing for some reason.
Mozilla

Mozilla Issues Do-Not-Track Guide For Advertisers 74

Posted by samzenpus from the stop-following-me dept.
angry tapir writes "Mozilla has issued a do not track field guide to encourage advertisers and publishers to implement do-not-track (DNT) functionality. The guide contains tutorials, case studies and sample code to illustrate how companies use the DNT technology. Mozilla aims to inspire developers, publishers and advertisers to adopt DNT and wants to put the control over Internet tracking into the hands of users. The browser maker wants to put a stop to behavioral targeting and pervasive tracking on the Web. The guide can be found here (PDF)."
Space

Building Blocks of DNA Confirmed In Meteorites 145

Posted by CmdrTaco from the we-are-all-made-of-stars dept.
MistrX writes "Researchers announced that the components of DNA have now been confirmed to exist in extraterrestrial meteorites. A different team of scientists also discovered a number of molecules linked with a vital ancient biological process, adding weight to the idea that the earliest forms of life on Earth may have been made up in part from materials delivered to Earth from space. Past research had revealed a range of building blocks of life in meteorites, such as the amino acids that make up proteins. Space rocks just like these may have been a vital source of the organic compounds that gave rise to life on Earth."

Comment Re:I think there is something interesting here (Score 1) 283

by Shadmere (#36883586) Attached to: Scientists Discover Tipping Point for the Spread of Ideas

I agree. I'm interested in what is basically a form of psychohistory, but the way they describe it here is clearly and obviously wrong. Honestly it crosses over into stupid. Are they trying to claim that one 10% of a population never completely disagrees with another 10%? Are they saying that if 9% of a population beleives something, then they will never, ever be capable of converting anyone else? If I want my idea to gain traction, must I convert 10% of the population to my side in one single speech, or be doomed to obscurity?

It's ridiculous.
Cloud

Major Outage At the Amazon Web Services 247

Posted by CmdrTaco from the but-the-cloud-fixes-everything dept.
ralphart writes "The Northern Virginia datacenter for Amazon Web Services appears to be having a major outage that affects EC2 services. The Amazon Forums are full of reports of problems. Latest update from the status page: 2:49 AM PDT We are continuing to see connectivity errors impacting EC2 instances, increased latencies impacting EBS volumes in multiple availability zones in the US-EAST-1 region, and increased error rates affecting EBS CreateVolume API calls. We are also experiencing delayed launches for EBS backed EC2 instances in affected availability zones in the US-EAST-1 region. We continue to work towards resolution."
Google

Google Crowd-Sources Maps 151

Posted by CmdrTaco from the i'm-adding-moats dept.
Wamoc writes "Google has invited 'citizen cartographers' to refine the US map for Google Maps and Google Earth. 'Today we're opening the map of the United States in Google Map Maker for you to add your expert local knowledge directly. You know your neighborhood or hometown best, and with Google Map Maker you can ensure the places you care about are richly represented on the map. For example, you can fix the name of your local pizza parlor, or add a description of your favorite book store.'"
Advertising

AP Adopts Firefox's 'Do Not Track'; Others On the Way 80

Posted by timothy from the stop-staring-at-my-body dept.
theweatherelectric writes "As noted by the Mozilla Blog, the AP News Registry is the first large scale service to support the Do Not Track (DNT) feature of Firefox 4 and Internet Explorer 9. They write, 'The Associated Press (AP) is the first company to deploy DNT on a large scale, and it only took a few hours for one engineer to implement. The AP News Registry tracks 1 billion impressions of news content, with 175 million unique visitors per month, and has membership with more than 800 sites. When consumers send a DNT preference via the browser while viewing a story at one of its publisher's sites, the AP News Registry no longer sets any cookies. The previous solution was for users to opt-out via a link to a central opt-out page referenced in each participating news site's privacy policy. They still count the total number of impressions for each news story, but aggregate consumer data for those with DNT in a non-identifiable way.'"
Image

Facebook Boosts Your Self-Esteem 139

Posted by samzenpus from the friend-request-yourself dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Using Facebook can increase your self-esteem, according to a new study from Cornell University researchers, published in Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. Researchers Amy Gonzales and Jeffrey Hancock conducted the experiment with three groups of 21 students each in the university's Social Media Lab. The first one was the control group, which sat in front of blank computer screens for three minutes. The second group of individuals had mirrors propped up against their computer monitors and spent their three minutes looking at their own reflections. The third group was allowed to surf their own Facebook profiles and its associated tabs for the allotted time. At the end, all three groups were given a self-esteem questionnaire."

Comment Holy crap, Fox just gets better and better (Score 2) 1276

by Shadmere (#35209472) Attached to: Glen Beck Warns Viewers Not To Use Google
On one hand, this is freaking hilarious. Glenn Beck makes me laugh more than most comedians.

On the other hand, people will believe him. When Fox *does* start telling us to store our urine and wear special hats to block evil government rays, my dad will believe them. And half the people I know from high school on Facebook will believe them. Ugh.
Games

EA Simulation Correctly Picked Super Bowl Champs in September 124

Posted by samzenpus from the miracle-madden dept.
Just_Say_Duhhh writes "Before the NFL Season started, the guys at EA Sports simulated the entire season using Madden 2011. The sim told them the Packers would win the Super Bowl. If only we had listened. What's even more interesting is that according to the article, they've picked the winner 6 of the last 7 years. Make that 7 out of 8!"
Censorship

Amazon Censorship Expands 764

Posted by samzenpus from the seven-words-you-can-never-read dept.
Nom du Keyboard writes "Recently word leaked out about Amazon removing titles containing fictional incest. Surprisingly that ban didn't extend to the 10 titles of Science Fiction Grand Master Robert A. Heinlein that incorporate various themes of incest and pedophilia. Now, it seems that the censorship is expanding to m/m gay fiction if it contains the magic word 'rape' in the title. Just how far is this going to be allowed to proceed in relative silence, and who is pushing these sudden decisions on Amazon's part?"

Submission + - EPA Knowingly Allowed Pesticide that Kills Bees (fastcompany.com)

Submitted by hether
hether writes: The mystery of the disappearing bees has been baffling scientists for years and now we get another big piece in the puzzle. From Fast Company — "A number of theories have popped up as to why the North American honey bee population has declined--electromagnetic radiation, malnutrition, and climate change have all been pinpointed. Now a leaked EPA document reveals that the agency allowed the widespread use of a bee-toxic pesticide, despite warnings from EPA scientists." Now environmentalists and bee keepers are calling for an immediate ban of pesticide clothianidin, sold by Bayer Crop Science under the brand name Poncho.

Comment Confucious Peace Prize (Score 1) 213

by Shadmere (#34501666) Attached to: China Blocks News Websites In Protest of Nobel
I think it should go to China, as a whole. What other country or organization has done so much for peace?*


*Peace as defined by the Chinese government. Please check your Official 2011 Redefinition List for true definition. If you have lost your Official 2001 Redefinition List, please report to the nearest detention facility, and the problem will be corrected.
Government

FCC Approving Pay-As-You-Go Internet Plans 414

Posted by samzenpus from the I'm-going-to-need-another-10-minutes-of-internet dept.
An anonymous reader writes "As details emerge about the Federal Communications Commission's controversial proposal for regulating Internet providers, a provision that would allow companies to bill customers for how much they surf the Web is drawing special scrutiny. Analysts say pay-as-you-go Internet access could put the brakes on the burgeoning online video industry, handing a victory to cable and satellite TV providers. Public interest groups say that trend will lead to a widening gap in Internet use in which the wealthiest would have the greatest access."

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