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Google

Submission + - Google Selects City for Fiber Network (google.com)

Turbine2k5 writes: After much deliberation, Google has chosen Kansas City to receive a fiber optic upgrade by 2012. Development is planned to start by the end of the year, although they have not released any specifics on their plan. Google says that this is "not the end of the project" and that they'll "be looking closely at ways to bring ultra high-speed Internet to other cities across the country."
Games

Submission + - Linux 3D games run faster on PC-BSD (phoronix.com)

koinu writes: Phoronix has published benchmarks comparing 3D games on Ubuntu Linux 11.04 and the FreeBSD Linux ABI emulation on the 8.2 release of PC-BSD, which is a desktop variant of FreeBSD. Most results show that the emulated Linux layer on FreeBSD performs better than Linux natively. It is pretty interesting, because most people would expect that an additional abstraction layer would generally slow down the execution of binaries.
Google

Submission + - Google To Discontinue Blogger & Picasa Brands (digitizor.com) 1

dkd903 writes: Google plans to discontinue it’s Photo sharing platform Picasa and the blogging platform Blogger and will re-introduce them as Google Photos and Google Blogs. All this forms a part of the massive feature addition to Google’s new social network – Google+
Idle

Submission + - Chocolate 3D Printer (bbc.co.uk)

BoxRec writes: "Scientists in England have developed a 3D chocolate printer. "Now we have an opportunity to combine chocolate with digital technology, including the design, digital manufacturing and social networking. Chocolate has a lot of social purpose, so our intention is to develop a community and share the designs, ideas and experience about it.""
Piracy

Submission + - Indie Film Premieres on BitTorrent Before Cinema (vodo.net)

An anonymous reader writes: The first part of A Lonely Place For Dying is available on VODO while the filmmakers are getting ready for a theatrical run in early 2012. Viewers are asked to donate if they like what they see and if enough cash is raised theywill be able to watch the film again on the big screen. In return for their contributions donors are receiving digital downloads or credits in the upcoming release, you can even become an Executive Producer and get your name listed on imdb. This is a brave move challenging Hollywood and their traditional "release windows", download now and check it out!

Submission + - iPad Account 'Hacker' Pleads Guilty (google.com)

WrongSizeGlass writes: Daniel Spitler, a member of Goatse Security, pleaded guilty today to writing the code used to steal email addresses and personal information belonging to 120,000 Apple iPad subscribers from AT&T computer servers. Spitler, who surrendered to the authorities in January, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to computers connected to the Internet and one count of identity theft. Each charge carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

"Computer hackers are exacting an increasing toll on our society, damaging individuals and organizations to gain notoriety for themselves," US attorney Paul Fishman said. "In the wake of other recent hacking attacks by loose-knit organizations like Anonymous and LulzSec, Daniel Spitler's guilty plea is a timely reminder of the consequences of treating criminal activity as a competitive sport," he said.

The Courts

Submission + - GPL in German court over routers (fsfe.org)

ciaran_o_riordan writes: "Tomorrow, a German court will hear the case of AVM, a distributor of Linux-based routers, which seeks to block Cybits from distributing software that modifies the routers' software to add content filtering functionality. FSFE explains: "AVM justified its position using three arguments. First, they stated that their whole product software must be regarded as an entity under AVM copyright, and that this entity must not be modified. The position Mr Welte took was that the whole product software would in that case be a derivative work according to the GPL, and thus the whole product software should be licensed under the GNU GPL. AVM then switched to a second argument: that the software embedded on its DSL terminals consisted of several parts. According to Mr Welte, AVM could then not prohibit anyone from modifying or distributing the GPL licensed software parts. The final argument by AVM was that the software on their DSL terminals is a composition of several different programs, which, due to the creative process, would be a protected compilation and thus under the copyright of AVM and not affected by the copyleft of the GPL.""
China

Submission + - The End of Cheap Labor in China (time.com) 3

hackingbear writes: The Time magazine reports, in what is supposed to be a land of unlimited cheap labor — a nation of 1.3 billion people, whose extraordinary 20-year economic rise has been built first and foremost on the backs of low-priced workers — the game has changed. In the past decade, real wages for manufacturing workers in China have grown nearly 12% per year. The hourly cost advantage, while still significant [comparing to the West], is shrinking rapidly. The changing economics of Made in China will benefit both the rich and poor world. Countries like Cambodia, Laos, India and Vietnam are picking up some of the cheapest labor manufacturing left by the Chinese. And there is already evidence of at least the beginning of a shift in manufacturing operations returning to the U.S. Perhaps we will soon stop picking at "Made in China" but instead complaining "Made in Vietnam/Cambodia", while serving the flood of Chinese tourists stocking up brand-name merchandises on US tours and Chinese students paying high tuitions to our cash-strapped universities.
Medicine

Submission + - High Tech Elder Care May Be Mixed Blessing

Hugh Pickens writes writes: "Gerontologists say aging in place vastly improves the quality of life for seniors and is a lot cheaper for society than group homes and institutions.The trick is to do so without jeopardizing the health and safety of older people, which is why480 people taking part in pilot programs in Portland, Oregon that outfit homes with technology so elderly people can be monitored for illness or infirmity.With the first wave of baby boomers turning 65 this year, corporations such as Intel see lucrative new business opportunities tending to a generation of people accustomed to doing things their own way."This is a race to see who's going to invent 21st century care services for boomers," said Eric Dishman, health policy director at Intel-GE Care Innovations, a joint venture that Intel formed this year with General Electric Co. "Worldwide, there's this enormous market opportunity." As part of the test, DorothyRutherford's two-bedroom condominium has been outfitted with an array of electronic monitoring gear that might eventually find its way to retail shelves.Motion sensors along hallways and ceilings record her gait and walking speed. A monitor on her back door observes when she leaves the house, and another one on the refrigerator keeps tabs on how often she's eating. Aspecial bed laced with sensors can assess breathing patterns, heart rate and general sleep quality, a pill box fitted with electronic switches records when medication is taken, and a Wii video game system has been rejiggered so that players stand on a platform that measures their weight and balance. Butthere is the downside, as some experts on the aging population worry that making it easier for elderly people to stay in their homes could reduce the incentive for children to visit or could create a false sense that technology can foresee every problem and address every need."This technology has the potential to isolate people as well as connect people because it has the potential to replace [human] contact," says senior researcher Tamara Hayes."
Medicine

Submission + - New Imaging Technique Explains Unconsciousness (manchester.ac.uk)

smitty777 writes: A new imaging technique called fEITER (for functional Electrical Impedance Tomography by Evoked Response) attempts to explain the process of slipping into unconsciousness. The fEITER is a portable device that creates 3D imagery based on evoked potentials measured hundreds of times a second.

The interesting finding from these studies is that unconsciousness appears to result from a buildup of inhibitor neurons. From the article: “Our findings suggest that unconsciousness may be the increase of inhibitory assemblies across the brain’s cortex. These findings lend support to Greenfield’s hypothesis of neural assemblies forming consciousness.”

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