patrick687 - Slashdot User

Lord British Claims He Owns the Moon 144

Posted by Soulskill on Monday March 29, 2010 @05:14PM from the enjoy-the-property-tax dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Following the recent discovery of Richard Garriott's old moon rover, the man known as Lord British has laid claim to his own lunar territory. Moon dwellers, all hail your new overlord!"

China To Tap Combustible Ice As New Energy Source 185

Posted by timothy on Friday March 12, 2010 @06:00AM from the undra-the-tundra dept.

lilbridge writes "Huge reserves of "combustible ice" — frozen methane and water — have been discovered in the tundra of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in China. Estimates show that there is enough combustible ice to provide 90 years worth of energy for China. Burning the combustible ice may be a far better alternative than letting it just melt, releasing tons of methane into the air."

Final Fantasy I and II Are Coming To the iPhone and iPod Touch 142

Posted by Soulskill on Thursday January 21, 2010 @11:57AM from the go-red-wings dept.

jonasvdc tips an announcement by Square Enix that Final Fantasy I and Final Fantasy II are being developed for the iPhone and the iPod touch. The graphics and UI have been modified to look and run better on the touchscreen devices, but everything from Cecil to the classic Black Mage is clearly recognizable. The announcement did not include any information on a price or release date.

Disney Releases 3D Texture Mapper Source Code 83

Posted by timothy on Wednesday January 20, 2010 @03:52PM from the nice-of-them dept.

dsavi writes "Ptex, Walt Disney Animation Studio's cutting-edge 3D texture mapping library which was first used on nearly every surface in the 2008 animated feature Bolt, was released under the BSD license on Friday. Quoting the announcement on monophyl.com: 'We expect to follow Ptex with other open source projects that we hope the community will find beneficial. We will soon be launching a new Walt Disney Animation Studios Technology page under disneyanimation.com. It will include links to our open source projects as will as a library of recent publications.' This looks good for open source 3D graphics."

NASA Uses AI Customer Service Robot In Second Life 45

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday July 08, 2009 @12:13PM from the get-a-first-artificial-life dept.

Linguo writes "Fusing human psychology with an advanced artificial intelligence engine, MyCyberTwin's virtual humans are being used by organizations like NASA and National Australia Bank to improve their customer support levels. MyCyberTwin technology is designed to allow almost anyone to build a virtual, artificial human — called a CyberTwin — which can handle such tasks as personalized customer support, client sales or even entertainment and companionship. CyberTwins can take the form of a clone of yourself, or a representative of your company, and they can live in almost any digital environment, including Web sites, virtual worlds, blogs, social network pages and mobile phones."

Comment Re:Good argument for government intervention... (Score 1) 318

by patrick687 on Tuesday April 09, 2002 @08:57AM (#3309029) Attached to: A DSL Co-op in Your Neighborhood?

I agree with you. It's that way down here in Stafford too. DSL is shitty down here, and the cable service (Adelphia)is mediocre at best. As far as fining the companies, that doesn't do shit. I remember reading somewhere that Verizon incorporates fines into their operating costs. It's more profitable for them to pay the fines then to correct the violation. That sickens me. I'm not normally for government regulation of anything, but I would definitely agree that government regulation is in order here (NOT Tauzin-Dingell). If someone were to propose a bill that regulated the companies and didn't dick over the end user, I'd be all for it. Just my .02

Comment Chuck Jones (Score 1) 342

by onyxeyed on Saturday February 23, 2002 @11:10PM (#3059407) Attached to: That's All Folks: Chuck Jones RIP

My childhood is slowly fading with each passing of these icons. Shultz, Blanc, Henson and now Jones. Most of us grew up with them, and now we're adults, we can always take a trip back to the days of shrinky dinks and etch a sketch through reading those comics or watching those cartoons. Thank goodness we have a part of the that will stay with us forever. Long live ACME.

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