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AMD

Submission + - ARM To Keynote at AMD Fusion Developer Conference (hothardware.com)

MojoKid writes: "AMD is hosting its first AMD Fusion Developer Summit (AFDS) this summer, from June 13-16. The conference will focus on OpenCL and
upcoming AMD Llano performance capabilities under various related usage models. One interesting twist is that the keynote address will be given by Jem Davies, currently ARM's VP of technology. To date, AMD's efforts to push OpenCL as a programming environment have been limited, particularly compared to the work NV has sunk into CUDA. With its profit margins and sales figures improving, AMD is apparently turning back to address the situation—and ARM's a natural ally. The attraction of OpenCL is that it can potentially be used to improve handheld device performance. AMD's explicit mention of ARM hints that there might be more than meets the eye to this conference as well."

The Courts

Submission + - Amazon responds to "App Store" Lawsuit from Apple (tekgoblin.com)

tekgoblin writes: "Apple had filed a lawsuit in March against Amazon's use of "App Store" in their newly launched Amazon AppStore. Apple had informed Amazon that using the term "App Store" was unlawful because they owned the rights to the term itself. In the lawsuit Amazon indicates that the term "App Store" is too generic for Apple to lay claim to the name itself."
Medicine

Submission + - Merck's Drug Propecia Causing Sexual Dysfunction 2

zaxios writes: "Merck — the pharmaceutical giant previously featured on Slashdot for drawing up a 'hit list' of doctors that criticized its drug Vioxx, and creating a fake medical journal to endorse its products — is embroiled in a new scandal. USA Today is reporting on two new studies that show that Propecia, Merck's $250 million prescription medication for baldness, can make men irreversibly impotent. Lawsuits have been filed in the United States and Canada from men claiming to have permanently lost their sexual function after taking the drug. All this is reminiscent of Merck's difficulties with Vioxx, a once $2.5 billion a year drug withdrawn from the market in 2004, after a study showed it doubled the risk of heart attack and stroke in users. That led to a $4.85 billion settlement by Merck for personal injury claims."
Software

Submission + - Free DARPA software lets gamers hunt submarines (networkworld.com)

coondoggie writes: If you have ever wanted to go torpedo-to-torpedo with a submariner, now is your chance. The crowdsource-minded folks at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency rolled out an online game that lets players try to catch elusive, quiet enemy submarines.

According to DARPA the Sonalysts Combat Simulations Dangerous Waters software was been written to simulate actual evasion techniques used by submarines, challenging each player to track them successfully. "Your tracking vessel is not the only ship at sea, so you'll need to safely navigate among commercial shipping traffic as you attempt to track the submarine, whose driver has some tricks up his sleeve. You will earn points as you complete mission objectives, and will have the opportunity to see how you rank against the competition."

Comment Re:The Pursestrings tell the story... (Score 1) 978

At no point is it financially rewarding.

Wrong.
It is financially rewarding after one gets declared "disabled" and begins collecting SSI (http://www.ssa.gov/disability/). This is a pervasive problem. I'm surprised how no attention is given to this problem in the media.

get people into real nutritionist and trainers

This is pie in the sky stuff, utter nonsense, and you have no clue what is going on in the real world if you believe what you wrote. Medicaid and the disability system make losing weight actually disadvantageous. Your unicorn-riding nutritionists and trainers are going to (and do) have a hard time getting anyone to lose weight, because losing weight by decreasing food intake and/or increasing activity takes willpower and motivation. There's no pill for that.
 

Comment The Pursestrings tell the story... (Score 1) 978

Remember this is the governor's attempt to save money on state Medicaid expenses. Anyone who has any involvement in this population knows that it is predominated by the obese, at a rate much higher than in the general population.

An all too common scenario is a follows:

Obesity --> chronic pain of back, knees, etc. from weight overloading --> "disability" designation --> continued obesity, now financially rewarded and self-perpetuating.

Please translate into "??? profit" format if the above doesn't make sense.

The assumption that many are making in their comments is that this sort of fee would apply to the general population of privately insured individuals. The Medicaid vs. privately insured populations are very different. The Medicaid population has incentive to stay within that group and in fact in situations like I outlined above, even gain or maintain weight. The privately insured population has disincentives already--more difficult to work, pay their bills, etc. I would imagine that the actuaries at the heath insurers have already calculated and continue to monitor how weight corresponds to their profit/loss statements and uses that information to increase premiums.

Now as to the specifics of the plan, a $50 surcharge will do nothing to reduce obesity. Suspending benefits entirely (perhaps with some grace period) would be very effective though in getting people to lose weight and reduce their need for surgery and medications.

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