Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
Check out the new SourceForge HTML5 internet speed test! No Flash necessary and runs on all devices. ×
Hardware Hacking

Submission + - iPhone Now Hacks Itself (iphonefaq.org) 2

Submitted by
hackshack
hackshack writes: "Unlocking an iPhone to add third party apps and themes used to be a tedious, risky process. A team of hackers have released a utility called AppSnapp, which makes it simple enough for Grandma to use. Simply visit the AppSnapp homepage on your iPhone- the software automatically "jailbreaks" the phone and installs the Installer.app package manager, in about a minute. It even patches the iPhone TIFF vulnerability while it's at it."
Worms

Submission + - The making of a gay worm (theglobeandmail.com)

Submitted by
MarvinTm
MarvinTm writes: "The making of a gay worm JULIE STEENHUYSEN Reuters October 25, 2007 at 9:47 PM EDT CHICAGO — Altering a gene in the brain of female worms changed their sexual orientation, U.S. researchers said on Thursday, making female worms attracted to other females. The study reinforces the notion that sexual orientation is hard-wired in the brain, said Erik Jorgensen, scientific director of the Brain Institute at the University of Utah. "They look like girls, but act and think like boys," Utah researcher Jamie White, who worked on the study published in the journal Current Biology, said in a statement. Researchers in Dr. Jorgensen's lab switched on a gene in female worms that makes the body develop male structures, but they only activated the gene in the brain. As a result, the female worms still had female bodies, but they behaved like males."
Security

Submission + - Jailbreak your iPhone Online (jailbreakme.com)

Submitted by
nsingapu
nsingapu writes: "jailbreakme uses the Safari Tiff exploit to provide a one click Jailbreak and application installer for your iPhone / iPod Touch. Its a study in usability worthy of Jobs himself.
From the iPod Observer: If February is just too darn long to wait for official third-party iPhone and iPod touch applications, jailbreakme.com can help fill your hacker needs today. A group of iPhone coders has developed a one-touch jailbreak method for both of Apple's handheld devices directly from Mobile Safari."
Media (Apple)

Submission + - iPhone jailbreak for the masses released

Submitted by Sean Desley
Sean Desley writes: Third-party applications for the iPhone won't be released until early next year, but there's an easy-to-install new jailbreaking application out this week if you can't wait. The AppSnapp installer, which bypasses Apple's OS X 1.1.1 update in order to let iPhone and iPod Touch users put third-party applications on their devices. This appears to be one of the simplest jailbreak applications yet released for the 1.1.1 update; the others involved lots of complicated steps or additional scripts to open up the iPhone.
The Almighty Buck

Submission + - Apple makes $831 on each iPhone 3

Submitted by
Ponca City, We Love You
Ponca City, We Love You writes: "The New York Times reports that Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, has studied Apple's financial statement and come to the conclusion that AT&T appears to be paying Apple $18 a month, on average, for each iPhone activated on its network or up to $432 over a two year contract. This shows how much incentive Apple has to maintain its exclusive deal with AT&T rather than to sell unlocked phones or cut deals with multiple carriers. Last week Apple disclosed that 250,000 iPhones had been purchased but not registered with ATT that Apple thinks are being unlocked so Apple has now taken action to curb unauthorized resellers by limiting sales of the iPhone to two per customer and requiring that purchases must now be made with a credit or debit card — cash will not be accepted. The original story on what was happening to the unlocked phones was discussed on Slashdot."
Security

German Police Arrest Admin of Tor Anonymity Server 428

Posted by Zonk from the good-guys-never-win dept.
An anonymous reader writes "In a recent blog posting, a German operator of a Tor anonymous proxy server revealed that he was arrested by German police officers at the end of July. Showing up at his house at midnight on a Sunday night, police cuffed and arrested him in front of his wife and seized his equipment. In a display of both bitter irony and incompetence, the police did not take or shut-down the Tor server responsible for the traffic they were interested in, which was located in a data center, over 500km away. In the last year, Germany has passed a draconian new anti-security research law and raided seven different data centers to seize Tor servers. While back in 2003, A German court ordered the developers of a different anonymity network to build a back-door into their system."
Businesses

Submission + - Can open source games make money? 2

Submitted by rucs_hack
rucs_hack writes: I'm trying to code a multi platform online game, and I've been involved in discussions on the viability of open source as a model for a games development house. I'm unconvinced as to its viability, after all, I'm thinking business here. I want to make money, but I'm also well aware of the power of the open source community. I'm a fan of open source, but I see no examples of profitable businesses emerging in the gaming sphere. I don't have many people around with good understanding of game development and open source business models, so I throw the question open to the slashdot crowd, can a commercially viable game company be founded on the principles and practice of open source?
The Almighty Buck

Submission + - The World's Most Polluted Sites

Submitted by
Hugh Pickens
Hugh Pickens writes: "Blacksmith Institute has just published their annual list of the world's most polluted sites. Sumqayit in Azerbaijan leads the list with its toxic legacy of heavy metal, oil and chemical contamination from its days as a center of chemical production with local Azeris suffering cancer rates 22 to 51 percent higher than their countrymen "As much as 120,000 tons of harmful emissions were released [in Sumqayit] on an annual basis, including mercury," says Richard Fuller, founder of Blacksmith. "There are huge untreated dumps of industrial sludge." Blacksmith compiles their list by comparing the toxicity of the contamination, the likelihood of it getting into humans and the number of people affected. An article from Scientific American says that despite the massive pollution, it would be relatively easy and cheap to clean up the most dangerous hazards at these contaminated sites. For example, it would cost just $15,000 to save an estimated 350 lives by simply digging up radioactive contaminated soil from the Mayak plutonium facility that had been deposited on the shore of the Techa River in the Russian town of Muslyomova. Similar cost-effective efforts are underway across the globe. "For about $200, the cost of a refrigerator, we are able to save someone's life," Fuller says."
Editorial

Submission + - When Was The Exact Day Slashdot Jumped The Shark? (oreillynet.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: by Noah Gift in Opinion from O'Reilly OnLamp Blog: "I remember in the early 2000's, Slashdot was THE geek website, but something has changed and it appears they have lost the magic. ...I find their stories trite, boring and dare I say, irrelevant to IT? What is your best bet to the cause of their demise?

Slashdot Top Deals

"The Avis WIZARD decides if you get to drive a car. Your head won't touch the pillow of a Sheraton unless their computer says it's okay." -- Arthur Miller

Close