markz0r - Slashdot User

Comment US *Govt Looks For Input On "The Next Big Things" (Score 1) 309

by markz0r on Thursday October 11, 2012 @01:39AM (#41616145) Attached to: US Looks For Input On "The Next Big Things"

I am definitely not against gov't intervention in cases of market failure. I don't, in this case, understand how the heavy overhead of gov't intervention in this case is efficient. The Gov't is using tax payer money to review and possibly fund ideas from tax payers. It is the reallocation of resources based on the opinions of a small number of people who are not directly (financially) responsible for their decisions. Maybe they will hit home runs but I would content that the iterative process of the private sectors has a better track record (I probably should find something to support that...)

Comment Finding signs of life? (Score 1) 172

by markz0r on Friday April 13, 2012 @09:03AM (#39672157) Attached to: New Study Suggests Mars Viking Robots Found Life

I think there is a big difference between finding life and finding signs of life.

Open Source Transcription Software? 221

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday July 20, 2010 @06:49PM from the what-he-said dept.

sshirley writes "I am beginning to do some interviews with family members and will do some audio journals for genealogy purposes. I would really love to be able to run the resulting MP3 or WAV files through some software a get a text file out. I know that software like this exists commercially. But does this exist in the open source world?"

The Search For the Mount Everest of Caves 233

Posted by kdawson on Sunday July 11, 2010 @07:40PM from the drop-a-rock-and-it-goes-spee-lunk dept.

NoMeansYes writes "An interview with James Tabor, author of the new best-selling book Blind Descent, introduces a pair of accomplished scientists — American Bill Stone and Ukranian geologist Alexander Klimchouk — who are the two most prominent figures in extreme caving. Both have figured prominently in the ongoing quest to discover the deepest cave on earth. Tabor describes what conditions are like inside supercaves like Cheve (-4,869 feet) and Krubera (-7,188 feet), before discussing Stone and his far-reaching technological innovations. These include the Posideon Discovery Rebreather and NASA's ENDURANCE. Extreme caving probably won't remain underground (so to speak) much longer, however. The article notes that James Cameron is planning to release a 3D film next year about extreme cave divers."

Comment markz0r (Score 1) 6

by markz0r on Friday January 29, 2010 @12:42AM (#30945672) Attached to: Why can't I (how can I) have an EmacsPad?

I doubt the market for such a product would allow for its development, tooling, production and distribution for anywhere near 'around $50 dollars'

US DOJ Says Kindle In Classroom Hurts Blind Students 492

Posted by timothy on Wednesday January 13, 2010 @07:20PM from the harrison-bergeron-please-report-to-the-front-office dept.

angry tapir writes "Three US universities will stop promoting the use of Amazon.com's Kindle DX e-book reader in classrooms after complaints that the device doesn't give blind students equal access to information. Settlements with Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Pace University in New York City and Reed College in Portland, Oregon, were announced Wednesday by the US Department of Justice. The National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind had complained that use of the Kindle devices discriminates against students with vision problems."

Gmail Moves To HTTPS By Default 275

Posted by timothy on Wednesday January 13, 2010 @06:34PM from the you-mean-I-gotta-log-in-again? dept.

clone53421 writes "Although Gmail has long supported HTTPS as an option, Gmail announced their decision yesterday to switch everyone to HTTPS by default: 'We initially left the choice of using it up to you because there's a downside: https can make your mail slower since encrypted data doesn't travel across the web as quickly as unencrypted data. Over the last few months, we've been researching the security/latency tradeoff and decided that turning https on for everyone was the right thing to do.' I wonder if this has anything to do with the reports of Chinese users having their accounts hacked? 'Only two Gmail accounts appear to have been accessed, and that activity was limited to account information (such as the date the account was created) and subject line, rather than the content of emails themselves,' said David Drummond in that blog update. That does sound like it perhaps could be a result of insecure HTTP traffic being intercepted in transit between the users and Gmail's servers."

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