smzala - Slashdot User

The Economist Weighs In For Shorter Copyright Terms 386

Posted by timothy on Friday April 09, 2010 @01:38AM from the and-that-guy-ought-to-know dept.

lxmota writes "The Economist says that long copyright terms are hindering creativity, and that shortening them is the way to go: 'Largely thanks to the entertainment industry's lawyers and lobbyists, copyright's scope and duration have vastly increased. In America, copyright holders get 95 years' protection as a result of an extension granted in 1998, derided by critics as the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act." They are now calling for even greater protection, and there have been efforts to introduce similar terms in Europe. Such arguments should be resisted: it is time to tip the balance back.'"

xkcd, Devotion To Duty 167

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday February 22, 2010 @12:39PM from the a-different-breed dept.

xkcd really hit the nail on the head today.

Submission + - Google Buys iPhone Search App, Kills it

Submitted by

Hugh Pickens

on Thursday February 18, 2010 @11:42PM

Hugh Pickens writes: "PC World reports that Google has acquired a popular iPhone application called reMail that provides "lightning fast" full-text search of your Gmail and IMAP e-mail accounts. The app downloads copies of all your e-mail which can then be searched with various Boolean options. reMail has only been in the application store for about six months — with a free version limited to one Gmail account and a premium version which can connect to multiple accounts. "Google and reMail have decided to discontinue reMail's iPhone application, and we have removed it from the App Store," writes company founder Gabor Cselle, who will be returning to Google as a Product Manager on the Gmail team. Google isn't saying what the fate of reMail might be. Some are suggesting reMail could be integrated into Gmail search or live on in some form as a part of Android, Google's mobile platform. Another possibility is that Google may have snapped up reMail just to kill it, not because reMail was a competitor to anything Google had, but because reMail made the iPhone better or the acquisition may have more to do with keeping good search technology away from the competition, as opposed to an attempt to undercut the iPhone. "Perhaps Google is just planning to buy up all the iPhone developers, one at a time, until Android is the only game in town," writes Bill Ray at the Register."

Brain Scans Used In Murder Sentencing 328

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday November 24, 2009 @08:09PM from the innocent-as-a-dead-salmon dept.

sciencehabit writes "For what may be the first time, fMRI scans of brain activity have been used as evidence in the sentencing phase of a murder trial. Defense lawyers for an Illinois man convicted of raping and killing a 10-year-old girl used the scans to argue that their client should be spared the death penalty because he has a brain disorder. Some experts say the scans are irrelevant because they were taken 20+ years after the crimes were committed. Others point out that the scans are only being considered because the sentencing phase of a trial has less stringent standards about evidence than those used to establish a defendant's innocence or guilt." In the Illinois case, the fMRI defense didn't help the defendant, whom a jury sentenced to death.

Scientists Say a Dirty Child Is a Healthy Child 331

Posted by samzenpus on Tuesday November 24, 2009 @07:07PM from the snack-is-going-to-be-on-the-floor-today dept.

Researchers from the School of Medicine at the University of California have shown that the more germs a child is exposed to, the better their immune system in later life. Their study found that keeping a child's skin too clean impaired the skin's ability to heal itself. From the article: "'These germs are actually good for us,' said Professor Richard Gallo, who led the research. Common bacterial species, known as staphylococci, which can cause inflammation when under the skin, are 'good bacteria' when on the surface, where they can reduce inflammation."

Comment Thought about it. in 2004! (Score 1) 160

by smzala on Tuesday January 31, 2006 @06:00AM (#14605586) Attached to: X Prizes for DNA, Nanotech, Autos, Education

I wrote this back in June 2004, on a prompt, after the fiasco of the first DARPA grand challenge. Good that its happening.

The purpose of DARPA grand challenge is "to leverage American ingenuity to accelerate the development of autonomous vehicle technologies that can be applied to military requirements."

The last two words make all the difference. It requires the entrants to disclose their technology to the military and public, and the criteria of the race is to cross a stretch of rough terrain (very much military requirement), The output of this challenge will aid some parts of transportation industry, but not the most important, road vehicles that everyone drives.

I guess, If some X-Prize kind of competition comes up for the purpose, then auto manufacturers will rush to beat each other in innovation. Today no competition exists for the innovation in vehicle technologies. Formula 1, Nascar etc. are tightly controlled with rules to make it competitive, knowingly restricting the use of new innovations.

X-Prize for innovations in vehicle technologies
Monday, June 07, 2004

Disclaimer: link going to my rarely updated blog.

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