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Comment e.g. Lior Pachter's latest blog posts (Score 1) 136

by maubp (#46218675) Attached to: How Blogs Are Changing the Scientific Discourse

Lior didn't think much of two recent articles in Nature Biotechnology and attempted the traditional reply route, but the journal declined to publish it - so he blogged it:

http://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2014/02/10/the-network-nonsense-of-albert-laszlo-barabasi/
http://liorpachter.wordpress.com/2014/02/11/the-network-nonsense-of-manolis-kellis/
Space

Soyuz 4/5 Made History 40 Years Ago Today 166

Posted by kdawson from the probably-wearing-dockers dept.
dj writes in with a reminder that forty years ago, on January 16, 1969, the two Russian spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 carried out the first docking between two manned spacecraft and transfer of crew between the craft. Wired's piece gives a gripping account of "one of the roughest re-entries in the history of space flight": "Soyuz 5's service module failed to detach at retrofire, causing the vehicle to assume an aerodynamic position that left the heat shield pointed the wrong way as it re-entered the atmosphere. The only thing standing between Volynov and a fiery death was the command module's thin hatch cover. The interior of Volynov's capsule filled with noxious fumes as the gaskets sealing the hatch started to burn, and it got very hot in there (which, a short time later was something he probably missed). ... But wait. There's more."
Space

Astronomers Locate Solar System Very Similar To Our Own 101

Posted by Zonk from the i-think-it-is-awfully-pretty-out-there dept.
Smivs writes "Astronomers from St Andrews University in the UK have discovered a planetary system which looks much like our own. Dr Martin Dominik told BBC news: 'We found a system with two planets that take the roles of Jupiter and Saturn in our Solar System. These two planets have a similar mass ratio and similar orbital radius and a similar orbital period. The newfound planetary system, which orbits the star OGLE-2006-BLG-109L, is more compact than our own and is about five thousand light-years away. The OGLE planets were found using a technique called gravitational micro-lensing, in which light from the faraway planets is bent and magnified by the gravity of a foreground object, in this case a another star.'" Update: 04/08 12:26 GMT by Z : This story is talking about a subject we have already discussed.
Privacy

EU Recommends Slashing Search Data Retention 93

Posted by Zonk from the tracks-in-the-snow dept.
Wayland writes "The European Union's Article 29 Working Group has completed its PDF report on data protection and search engines. The group recommends that search engines only be allowed to hold onto search data for six months. 'To hang onto data for longer, search engine operators will need to show that such data is "strictly necessary" to offer the service. Google and others have long said that they need to retain data in order to refine search results, prevent click fraud, and launch new services like spell check (which, in Google's case, was built from user search data). In addition, the data that is kept will need to be guarded more closely. The working group concluded that IP addresses could be used to identify individuals; if not by the search engine itself, then by law enforcement or after a subpoena.'"
Censorship

Belgium May Prosecute the Church of Scientology 755

Posted by kdawson from the who-you-callin'-a-cult dept.
sheean.nl writes "A Belgian prosecutor recommended after a 10-year investigation that the government prosecute the church of Scientology. The church is accused of being a criminal organization involved in extortion, fraud, unfair trading, violation of privacy laws, and unlawfully practicing medicine. Both the Belgian and the European branches of the church should be brought to court, according to the authorities. The investigation was started in 1997 after former Scientologists complained about intimidation and extortion by the church. Other European countries such as Germany have problems with Scientology, but in the US it is officially recognized as a religion. Scientology has 10 million members including high-profile followers such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta." Scientology has long used heavy-handed legal and other tactics to suppress opposition on the Net.
Education

Scientist Must Pay to Read His Own Paper 289

Posted by samzenpus from the who-own-paper-town dept.
Glyn Moody writes "Peter Murray Rust, a chemist at Cambridge University, was lost for words when he found Oxford University Press's website demanded $48 from him to access his own scientific paper, in which he holds copyright and which he released under a Creative Commons license. As he writes, the journal in question was "selling my intellectual property, without my permission, against the terms of the license (no commercial use)." In the light of this kind of copyright abuse and of the PRISM Coalition, a new FUD group set up by scientific publishers to discredit open access, isn't it time to say enough is enough, and demand free access to the research we pay for through our taxes?"
The Courts

The Privacy of Email 133

Posted by samzenpus from the stop-reading-that dept.
An Anonymous Coward writes "A U.S. appeals court in Ohio has ruled that e-mail messages stored on Internet servers are protected by the Constitution as are telephone conversations and that a federal law permitting warrantless secret searches of e-mail violates the Fourth Amendment. 'The Stored Communications Act is very important,' former federal prosecutor and counter-terrorism specialist Andrew McCarthy told United Press International. But the future of the law now hangs in the balance."
Security

Submission + - DHS acknowledges own computer break-ins (yahoo.com)

Submitted by WrongSizeGlass
WrongSizeGlass writes: Yahoo is reporting about the computer security nightmare going on at the Department of Homeland Security. Senior DHS officials admitted to Congress that over a two year period there were 800 hacker break-ins, virus outbreaks and in one instance, hacker tools for stealing passwords and other files were found on two internal Homeland Security computer systems. I guess it's true what they say ... a mechanic's car is always the last to get fixed.

Feed Open Rights Group recounts e-voting horror story (theregister.com)

From feed by registerfeed
Lovers of democracy, turn away now

The Open Rights Group (ORG) has condemned the May 2007 pilots of e-voting and electronic vote counting in the English and Scottish local elections, saying the technology involved is simply not suitable for use in statutory elections.

Feed Ubuntu's "Gutsy Gibon" features finalized, coming to a handheld near you (engadget.com)

From feed by engfeed

Filed under: Cellphones, Desktops, Handhelds

Those of you disappointed by the "top secret" features of Leopard might want to cast your hopeful, wayward glances in the direction of Ubuntu. Here comes "Gutsy Gibbon," otherwise known as Ubuntu 7.10 whose feature-set now appears finalized with a planned October release just like Apple's big cat. Pumping the 2.6.22 Linux kernel at its core, Gutsy G will be the first Ubuntu release to include new Mobile and Embedded editions "targeted at hand-held devices and other mobile/embedded form factors." It will integrate the Hildon UI components developed by Nokia and already on display in their N800 tablet. In other words, that Sony Ericsson P990i we saw running Ubuntu likely wasn't a hoax after all. We also expect this to be the first distribution to feature the recently merged, Compiz/Beryl windows manager for desktop users. Mmmm, eye candy. So prepare your houses and disk allocations -- October 18th is the scheduled release.

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Technology (Apple)

iPhone Gets Better Battery, Scratch Resistant Glass 527

Posted by CmdrTaco from the clean-off-your-pants dept.
Dekortage writes "Prior to its much-hyped launch on June 29, Apple has announced upgrades to its battery life (almost 40% more than originally announced) and scratch resistance (using "optical quality glass" rather than plastics). The announcement also includes a comparison chart pitting the iPhone against smartphones from Nokia, Samsung, Palm, and Blackberry."

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