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Comment Void the Warranty? (Score 5, Interesting) 248

by mercurized (#35185750) Attached to: Microsoft To Work With Windows Phone 7 Jailbreakers
Why would a switch in software like that that void the Warranty? If you buy a PC, you can install any OS you like. The warranty that covers your PC is covering the hardware. If you buy a PC, have no clue what you are doing and end up trashing your windows installation, there is nothing your PC dealer's warranty will ever do for you. At least not for free. If the software is broken you reinstall it or get it serviced somewhere. If the hardware breaks down, you'll be heading up to your dealer for a warranty replacement. Why would a phone be that much different? I even find it ashaming and harsh to realize that most people really buy that crap of "warranty is only void if you do not touch the software", like there was any warranty on the software part at all. Imagine a PC dealership trying to enforce such harsh software usability limitations like "never ever install any other software than the one you got it with, or forget the warranty". Would that actually be possible selling stuff like that? Not here in Europe at least. Imagine a car dealership that denies you your warranty on the engine after a few weeks just because you changed the seat covers. Its nothing different. This entire "Other software voids your warranty" FUD is sparked by the providers and manufacturers that very much like to keep you trapped with them and their software, and sometimes even hold you, your device or your data hostage against yourself, pretty much neglecting the fact that you actually bought the device you are acting with, and still not wanting to give you any space to decide what you actually want to do with it. And the even worst part is, people accept it just like that. Today's Smartphones are more like small PCs than like the old brick phones that couldnt do much. Most of these newer handsets are technically able to run many different operating systems. One can customize the systems as well, far beyond the possibilities the vendor envisioned. It sometimes feels like your PC Vendor tries telling you that you cant put any background image on your windows desktop which you did not buy from him. If you however use your own images, or god beware, remove the logo of said Vendor from the starting screen of the OS that that would be a change that possibly damaged your hardware which in turn would be void then.. Think about it.

Comment Bonus Points for Creativity (Score 2) 13

by mercurized (#35086098) Attached to: Immigration Officer Puts Wife on No-Fly List
Nice try though, definately something that doesnt come to mind at first. But didnt he get caught just because he applied for that promotion himself? He could have figured that there could be a background scan somewhere, and that it might raise an eyebrow or two not only that his wife is on the list, but that she had been put there by him..

Submission + - Statistician Cracks Code for Lottery Tickets (lotterypost.com)

Submitted by Hugh Pickens writes
Hugh Pickens writes writes: Lottery Post has an interesting story about Mohan Srivastava, an MIT educated statistician who became intrigued by a particular type of scratch-off lottery ticket called an extended-play game — sometimes referred to as a baited hook — that has a tic-tac-toe grid of visible numbers that looks like a miniature spreadsheet. Srivastava discovered a defect in the game: The visible numbers turned out to reveal essential information about the digits hidden under the latex coating. Nothing needed to be scratched off — the ticket could be cracked if you figured out the secret code. Srivastava's fundamental insight was that the apparent randomness of the scratch ticket was just a facade, a mathematical lie because the software that generates the tickets has to precisely control the number of winners while still appearing random. "It wasn't that hard," says Srivastava. "I do the same kind of math all day long."
Cellphones

Submission + - Woman caught smuggling 44 iPhones into Israel (networkworld.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A woman in her 60s was recently apprehended by Israeli airport security when she tried to smuggle 44 iPhone 4s into Israel by hiding them in her stockings under traditional Georgian garb.

Submission + - X Particle Might Explain Dark Matter & Antimat (wired.com) 1

Submitted by cold fjord
cold fjord writes: Wired Science has a story on a new theory that tries to explain dark matter, and the balance of regular matter with antimatter. This theory may even be testable.

A new hypothetical particle could solve two cosmic mysteries at once: what dark matter is made of, and why there's enough matter for us to exist at all. ...Together with physicists Hooman Davoudiasl at Brookhaven National Lab and David Morrissey of TRIUMF, Tulin and Sigurdson suggest a way to solve the problem of missing antimatter: Hide it away as dark matter. The details are published in the Nov. 19 Physical Review Letters.

Submission + - Pac-Man's Ghost Behavior Algorithms (gameinternals.com) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A very interesting description of the algorithms behind the ghosts in Pac-Man. I had no idea about most of this information, but that's probably because it's difficult to study the ghosts when I die every 30 seconds.
Transportation

Submission + - Google Secretly Tests Autonomous Cars in Traffic (nytimes.com)

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens
Hugh Pickens writes: "Autonomous cars are years from mass production, but technologists who have long dreamed of them believe that they can transform society as profoundly as the Internet has. Now the NY Times reports that Google has been working in secret on vehicles that can drive themselves, using artificial-intelligence software that can sense anything near the car and mimic the decisions made by a human driver. With someone behind the wheel to take control if something went awry and a technician in the passenger seat to monitor the navigation system, seven test cars have driven 1,000 miles without human intervention and more than 140,000 miles with only occasional human control. One even drove itself down Lombard Street in San Francisco, one of the steepest and curviest streets in the nation. The only accident, engineers said, was when one Google car was rear-ended while stopped at a traffic light."

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