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Comment It *could* be good (Score 4, Informative) 511

First, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamut for reference. The sample gamut picture in the top right shows a typical CRT--lets assume for the sake of argument that LCDs are similar.

If you add a yellow LED to that it just isn't going to add much. The yellow part of the spectrum is already fairly well represented.

*But* if they also change the hue of the green LED toward the blue spectrum then it has a good chance of really opening up the gamut.

The people saying RGB is enough don't understand chromaticity--go look for gamut plots of your favorite output devices and see how little of the full spectrum of colors they can actually reproduce. Printers are especially embarrassing. Your eyes can really see a whole lot of color detail.

Movies

The Lost Film That Accompanied Empire Strikes Back 195

An anonymous reader writes "'Alien' and 'Star Wars' art director Roger Christian was given £25,000 by George Lucas in 1979 to make a 25-minute medieval B-feature called 'Black Angel.' This spiritual tale of a knight on a strange quest was inspired by Christian's near-fatal fever when he fell ill in Mexico making 'Lucky Lady.' 'Black Angel' made a huge impression, not least because it shared the dark tone of 'Empire Strikes Back.' John Boorman showed it to the crew of 'Excalibur' as a template for how he wanted his film to look, and 'Black Angel' went on to influence films such as 'Dragonslayer' and 'Legend' throughout the 1980s and beyond. But it has not been seen by anyone since 'Empire' finished its theatrical run. Two weeks ago Roger Christian unearthed a print of a film that was thought lost forever, and in this interview he talks about 'Black Angel,' and provides the only picture from the film that has ever hit the Internet."

Comment Re:PEBAAC (Score 5, Interesting) 1146

It is exceedingly easy to test the Throttle Positioning Sensor in modern vehicles. In fact, your ECU probably tests idle throttle position every time you turn the key on for a while without staring the engine. The ECU will also log 'implausible signal' for TPS that get an out of range reading, or inconsistent reading throughout the range.

You are basically correct. I have first hand hacking experience with the drive by wire throttle because my Grand Challenge team automated a Toyota Prius for the last Grand Challenge. There are 2 completely independent signals that go from 2 independent sensors on the pedal to the computer throttle component. The signals have to move in lock step with each other or the computer will detect a fault. If a fault is detected the throttle goes completely off and the car has to be turned off and turned back on to recover.

So for the throttle to stick down both pedal sensors have to fail in the same way at the same time, which seems highly unlikely to me. Or there could be a bug in the computer control section, bus as a software engineer I can assure you that that would be impossible. ;-)

Comment The real reason (Score 5, Informative) 210

I remember this coming up a number of years ago when they first put this clause in the ticket sale license. It was discussed to death back then and so it's kind of funny to me that it has suddenly come up again. The (possibly apocryphal) reason that my more in-the-know burner campmates told me way back when:

The year before a bunch of guys went around with a video camera and tried to release a "Girls of Burning Man" video in the style of "Girls Gone Wild". This was widely viewed as poor form. So the organizers put the clause in specifically to nip that kind of behavior in the bud. They didn't want people (women in particular) to have to worry about unwittingly becoming part of some cheesy softcore porn video.

Comment Here's something worse (Score 4, Interesting) 543

When I tried to sign up for Verizon's wireless data service they wouldn't let me pass the credit check without a land line. I tried to tell them I didn't have a land line but they couldn't cope with that. Eventually the girl at the counter gave her sister's apartment number to the credit check guys (she didn't have a land line either). Got to love unbending bureaucracy.

Software

Steam Cloud Launches This Week 69

Valve announced yesterday that their extension of Steam, called Steam Cloud, will launch later this week with the Left 4 Dead demo. Steam Cloud is "a set of services for Steam that stores application data online and allows user experiences to be consistent from any PC." We discussed an early announcement for it back in May. Valve adds that "Steam Cloud will be available to all publishers and developers using Steam, free of charge, and Valve will add Cloud support to its back catalog of Steam games. Cloud services are compatible with games purchased via Steam, at retail, and other digital outlets."

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