An anonymous reader writes "Researchers have found conclusive evidence for the first time that humans have been making cheese since the 6th millennium BC."

eldavojohn writes "Mojang's Marcus Persson (better known as 'Notch') has answered quite a few questions in an interview with PC Gamer about his new game 0x10c. Since its announcement, there's been very few details about game play aside from the DCPU-16 and art tests. But in this interview, Notch has revealed quite a bit about how the game will function and non-final ideas he has for either a monthly fee to play in a 'multiverse' or micropayments. He talks about a custom OS people are working on to load into the game's CPU as well as a an in-game 3D printer that will allow you to make virtual objects. When asked about Kickstarter and his Oculus dev kit, Notch said 'Definitely going to make it work in 0x10c no matter what' and his account of using the Oculus Rift sounds more than promising for the VR Device. When asked about Linux he said, '[Linux] is wonderful. I think we need to have it, and it's a shame that more people, including myself, don't use it. It's gotten easier and friendlier.' When asked about Microsoft he said, 'I use their OS – Windows 7 is an amazing operating system in my opinion and of course there's the Xbox, which I love. I'm sure Bing is going to take off and save them. [Editor's note: Notch is smiling mischievously as he says this.]'"

teleyinex writes "ForestWatchers.net is a citizen project with the goal of making it possible for anyone (locals, volunteers, NGOs, governments, etc), anywhere in the world, to monitor selected patches of forest across the globe, almost in real-time, using a computer connected to the Internet. The project has recently released a first alpha web application (built using the open source crowdsourcing PyBossa framework) where volunteers can participate by classifying satellite images of one area of the Amazon basin."

New submitter inotrollyou writes "Drones are getting more sophisticated, and will soon carry 'soft' biometrics and facial recognition software. In other news, sales of hats, tinfoil, and laser pointers go up 150%. Obviously there are major privacy concerns and not everyone is down for this." It's not just drones, either: In my old neighborhood in Philadelphia the Orwellian police cameras were everywhere, and they're being touted as a solution for crime in my Texas neighborhood, too. The report itself is more predictive than proscriptive; under U.S. law, as the Register points out, you can expect less legal as well as practical privacy protection the further you are on the continuum between home and public space.

An anonymous reader writes "Saudi Aramco, the world's biggest oil producer, has resumed operating its main internal computer networks after a virus infected about 30,000 of its workstations in mid-August. The group, calling itself the 'Cutting Sword of Justice,' claimed to have hacked Aramco systems in several countries before sending a virus across 30,000 computers, achieving a 75 percent infection rate of all the company's systems. It refuted suggestions that a nation state was behind the attack."

RocketAcademy writes "Weather has delayed two NASA launches which were scheduled for today: an Atlas launch from Cape Canaveral carrying two Radiation Belt Storm Probe satellites and a Terrier-Improved Malemute sounding-rocket launch from Wallops Island, Virginia carrying four student experiments. The susceptibility to weather delays is a problem for current launch systems."

New submitter Mackadoodledoo sends this quote from the BBC: "A South Korean court has ruled that Apple and Samsung both infringed each other's patents on mobile devices. The court imposed a limited ban on national sales of products by both companies covered by the ruling. It ruled that U.S.-based Apple had infringed two patents held by Samsung, while the Korean firm had violated one of Apple's patents. The sales ban will apply to Apple's iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4 and its tablets the iPad and iPad 2. Samsung products affected by the ban include its smartphone models Galaxy SI and SII and its Galaxy Tab and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet PCs."

schliz writes "Australia's parliament has passed a bill that will allow law enforcement agencies to force internet service providers to store data on subscribers while an official warrant is sought. The changes move Australia closer to its two-year-old proposal to accede to the 2004 Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime, designed to assist with international cybercrime investigations through sharing of information on persons of interest, among other avenues."

zwei2stein writes "My team of about 10 men (IT guys) is expecting a new colleague: a female one. It is guaranteed that there will be remarks, double entendres and innuendos with huge potential of getting worse. We already have women in teams who can somehow handle this (and deliver apropriate verbal slaps). How would you deal with this? We talked about some simple, fun ways — anyone who [acts inappropriately] will have to wear an embarassing tie, etc. — instead of swear jar, having a sexual innuendo jar and even fairly harsh punishments (like people losing their bonuses for the month or their extra vaccation days). I'd like to figure out a solution that would be effective, not call much attention to itself, and not be quickly abandoned." What has your workplace done to create a good culture on this front? And what hasn't worked?