Icelandic Company Designs Human Pylons 142

Posted by samzenpus on Tuesday August 17, 2010 @01:12PM from the anthropomorphic-power dept.

Lanxon writes "An architecture and design firm called Choi+Shine has submitted a design for the Icelandic High-Voltage Electrical Pylon International Design Competition which proposes giant human-shaped pylons carrying electricity cables across the country's landscape, reports Wired. The enormous figures would only require slight alterations to existing pylon designs, says the firm, which was awarded an Honorable mention for its design by the competition's judging board. It also won an award from the Boston Society of Architects Unbuilt Architecture competition."

Need a Friend? Rent One Online 134

Posted by samzenpus on Monday June 28, 2010 @10:19AM from the you-get-what-you-pay-for dept.

crimeandpunishment writes "Housewives, college students, and others are working for a website that charges users an hourly rate for their companionship. No, it's not an escort service — at least it's not one 'with benefits.' It's a site called rentafriend.com, that's trying to carve out a niche in the 'everything's available online' business world. The seven-month-old site, patterned after hugely successful sites in Asia, has nearly 2,000 members who pay either a monthly or yearly fee to check out the pictures and profiles of more than 160,000 potential pals." I thought Craigslist had already cornered the market on renting a friend for an hour or two.

Comment Re:So have that juror explain to us (Score 4, Insightful) 537

by evan1l38 on Thursday April 29, 2010 @03:00PM (#32034994) Attached to: Juror Explains Guilty Vote In Terry Childs Case

I think it's more like you're the commanding officer of a silo who gets replaced, locks everything down and refuses to let your successor into the silo. Your successor would like to come in, perform maintenance, and prevent the thing from degrading and exploding, and you refuse to let them in.

As for competence ... well, Childs gave different passwords to these same managers the week before when he wasn't getting fired, so he clearly didn't have THAT many reservations about handing them over. The juror actually referred to that quite specifically if you read the article, saying that was what convinced him that Childs was not really worried about password security but about causing problems (my words there, not the jurors.)

And honestly ... if I worked for you, and locked you out of your own network, locked down all the machines and walked out saying you weren't competent enough to have the passwords ... would you really defend me and be pleased no one could access your network hardware? If you hired a replacement for me that you liked, and I refused to give HIM the passwords saying he wasn't competent either, how happy would you be that I was protecting you by preventing you from accessing your own hardware? And when I started withdrawing money and getting ready to flee to Mexico ... you'd still be defending me?

Comment Re:Habeas Corpus (Score 1) 537

by evan1l38 on Thursday April 29, 2010 @02:50PM (#32034826) Attached to: Juror Explains Guilty Vote In Terry Childs Case

I dunno. Remember that shoe bomber, Richard Reid? His bomb didn't go off. So ... who, if anyone, was harmed by HIS actions? It's not really a useful question to ask I think.

I think I'd have felt worse for Childs except that he just so clearly brought this on himself ... two seconds of him not being a dick would have resolved everything nicely.

Woman Tells State Judiciary Committee, "DoD Implanted A Microchip Inside Me" 222

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday April 21, 2010 @12:30PM from the out-of-the-woodwork dept.

The Georgia House Judiciary Committee took up a bill that would "prohibit requiring a person to be implanted with a microchip," and would make violating the ban a misdemeanor. Things started to get weird at the hearing when a woman who described herself as a resident of DeKalb County told the committee, "I'm also one of the people in Georgia who has a microchip." Not sure of what she was trying to say, she was allowed to continue and added, "Microchips are like little beepers. Just imagine, if you will, having a beeper in your rectum or genital area, the most sensitive area of your body. And your beeper numbers displayed on billboards throughout the city. All done without your permission." Further prodding revealed that the woman's co-workers would torture her by activating the chips with their cell phones and that the chips were implanted by "researchers with the federal government." The committee thanked the woman for her input, and later approved the bill.

Steampunk Con Mixes In More Maker Fun 50

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Monday February 15, 2010 @06:15PM from the rebuttal-of-disposable-culture dept.

California has once again been blessed with another steampunk convention, this time to be held in Emeryville, CA on March 12-14 as the "Nova Albion Steampunk Exhibition." This year's event promises to mix in much more of the DIY/maker flavor for a greater hands-on feel. Steampunk has been gaining much broader appeal in recent months with the continued growth of maker communities, and the many delightful varieties of music and literature. The con will feature, among other things, a 2 day track of 2-hour how-to, hands-on, and interactive workshops gear towards makers, DIY-ers, mad scientists, and evil geniuses. Of course, if you are an evil genius you probably don't need a workshop except as a gathering for potential test subjects.

Political Affiliation Can Be Differentiated By Appearance 262

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday January 27, 2010 @02:06PM from the if-it-looks-like-a-liberal-and-quacks-like-a-liberal dept.

quaith writes "It's not the way they dress, but the appearance of their face. A study published in PLoS One by Nicholas O. Rule and Nalini Ambady of Tufts University used closely cropped greyscale photos of people's faces, standardized for size. Undergrads were asked to categorize each person as either a Democrat or Republican. In the first study, students were able to differentiate Republican from Democrat senate candidates. In the second, students were able to differentiate the political affiliation of other college students. Accuracy in both studies was about 60% — not perfect, but way better than chance."

Scientists To Breed the Auroch From Extinction 277

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday January 21, 2010 @12:18AM from the back-by-popular-demand dept.

ImNotARealPerson writes "Scientists in Italy are hoping to breed back from extinction the mighty auroch, a bovine species which has been extinct since 1627. The auroch weighed 2,200 pounds (1000kg) and its shoulders stood at 6'6". The beasts once roamed most of Asia and northern Africa. The animal was depicted in cave paintings and Julius Caesar described it as being a little less in size than an elephant. A member of the Consortium for Experimental Biotechnology suggests that 99% of the auroch's DNA can be recreated from genetic material found in surviving bone material. Wikipedia mentions that researchers in Poland are working on the same problem."

Wii Hardware Upgrade Won't Happen Soon 325

Posted by Soulskill on Friday January 15, 2010 @03:52AM from the can't-show-ugly-mario-in-hd dept.

As high-definition graphics become more and more entrenched in this generation of game consoles, Nintendo has had to deal with constant speculation about a new version of the Wii that would increase its capabilities. Today, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime bluntly denied that a hardware revision was imminent, saying, "We are confident the Wii home entertainment console has a very long life in front of it." He added, "In terms of what the future holds, we've gone on record to say that the next step for Nintendo in home consoles will not be to simply make it HD, but to add more and more capability, and we'll do that when we've totally tapped out all of the experiences for the existing Wii. And we're nowhere near doing that yet."

3D Blu-ray Spec Finalized, PS3 Supported 157

Posted by Soulskill on Friday December 18, 2009 @03:06AM from the but-at-least-one-dimension-will-have-drm dept.

Lucas123 writes "The Blu-ray Disc Association announced today that it has finalized the specification for Blu-ray 3-D discs. The market for 3-D, which includes 3-D enabled televisions, is expected to be $15.8 billion by 2015. Blu-ray 3-D will create a full 1080p resolution image for both eyes using MPEG4-MVC format. Even though two hi-def images are produced, the overhead is typically only 50% compared to equivalent 2D content. The spec also allows PS3 game consoles to play Blu-ray 3-D content. 'The specification also incorporates enhanced graphic features for 3D. These features provide a new experience for users, enabling navigation using 3D graphic menus and displaying 3D subtitles positioned in 3D video.'"

Are Complex Games Doomed To Have Buggy Releases? 362

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday December 16, 2009 @05:40AM from the where-did-my-face-go dept.

An anonymous reader points out a recent article at Gamesradar discussing the frequency of major bugs and technical issues in freshly-released video games. While such issues are often fixed with updates, questions remain about the legality and ethics of rushing a game to launch. Quoting: "As angry as you may be about getting a buggy title, would you want the law to get involved? Meglena Kuneva, EU Consumer Affairs Commissioner, is putting forward legislation that would legally oblige digital game distributors to give refunds for games, putting games in the same category in consumer law as household appliances. ... This call to arms has been praised by tech expert Andy Tanenbaum, author of books like Operating Systems: Design and Implementation. 'I think the idea that commercial software be judged by the same standards as other commercial products is not so crazy,' he says. 'Cars, TVs, and telephones are all expected to work, and they are full of software. Why not standalone software? I think such legislation would put software makers under pressure to first make sure their software works, then worry about more bells and whistles.'"

Games Workshop Goes After Fan Site 174

Posted by Soulskill on Tuesday December 01, 2009 @05:03AM from the don't-anger-your-base dept.

mark.leaman writes "BoingBoing has a recent post regarding Games Workshop's aggressive posturing against fan sites featuring derivative work of their game products. 'Game publisher and miniature manufacturer Games Workshop just sent a cease and desist letter to boardgamegeek.com, telling them to remove all fan-made players' aids. This includes scenarios, rules summaries, inventory manifests, scans to help replace worn pieces — many of these created for long out of print, well-loved games...' As a lifelong hobby gamer of table, board, card and miniature games, I view this as pure heresy. It made me reject the idea of buying any Games Workshop (read Warhammer) products for my son this Christmas. Their fate was sealed, in terms of my wallet, after I Googled their shenanigans. In 2007 they forbid Warhammer fan films, this year they shut down Vassal Modules, and a while back they went after retailers as well. What ever happened to fair use?"

First Black Hole For Light Created On Earth 244

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday October 15, 2009 @08:42AM from the better-wear-a-hard-hat dept.

An anonymous reader writes "An electromagnetic 'black hole' that sucks in surrounding light has been built for the first time. The device, which works at microwave frequencies, may soon be extended to trap visible light, leading to an entirely new way of harvesting solar energy to generate electricity. A theoretical design for a table-top black hole to trap light was proposed in a paper published earlier this year by Evgenii Narimanov and Alexander Kildishev of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Their idea was to mimic the properties of a cosmological black hole, whose intense gravity bends the surrounding space-time, causing any nearby matter or radiation to follow the warped space-time and spiral inwards."

World's Biggest Alarm Clock Shakes You Out of Bed 100

Posted by samzenpus on Thursday July 09, 2009 @01:33AM from the up-and-at-them dept.

tugfoigel writes "Built by "Kevin" for a contest, this computer-controlled alarm clock is touted as the world's largest. To be more specific, he 'mounted a large air cylinder to the head of [his] bed and a valve, controlled by a computer, which [he programmed] to wake [him] up in the morning.'"

Comment Re:Why are you defending him? (Score 1) 498

by evan1l38 on Wednesday February 25, 2009 @02:29PM (#26984523) Attached to: Terry Childs Case Puts All Admins In Danger

To use your analogy, though, this is a soldier on guard that made up his own password and won't let anyone know what it is. Which is not particularly helpful when you have legitimate traffic that would like to pass through but can't because no one knows the password.

But frankly I don't think it's a particularly valid analogy. ;-)