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Linus Switches From KDE To Gnome 869

Posted by timothy on Saturday January 24, 2009 @03:21PM from the seldon-plan dept.

An anonymous reader writes "In a recent Computerworld interview, Linus revealed that he's switched to Gnome — this despite launching a heavily critical broadside against Gnome just a few years ago. His reason? He thinks KDE 4 is a 'disaster.' Although it's improved recently, he'll find many who agree with this prognosis, and KDE 4 can be painful to use." There's quite a bit of interesting stuff in this interview, besides, regarding the current state of Linux development.

FCC Commissioner Lauds DRM, ISP Filtering 217

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday December 09, 2008 @10:10PM from the by-some-definition-of-"effective" dept.

snydeq writes "Ars Technica's Nate Anderson and InfoWorld's Paul Venezia provide worthwhile commentary on a recent speech by FCC Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate (PDF), in which she praised DRM as 'very effective' and raised a flag in favor of ISP filtering. Anderson: 'Having commissioners who feel that the government has a duty to partner with and back educational classroom content from the RIAA; who really believe that ISP filtering is so unproblematic we can stop considering objections; and who think that universities worry about file-swapping because tuition might be raised to pay for the needed "expansion of storage capabilities" (huh?) isn't good for the FCC and isn't good for America.' Venezia: 'Leave the ISPs out of it — it's not their job to protect a failing business model, and a movement toward a tiered and filtered Internet will do nothing to stem the tide of piracy, but will result in great restrictions on innovation, freedoms, and the general use of the Internet. There's nothing to be gained down that path other than possibly to expand the wallets of a few companies.'"

Comment Re:To Be, or not To Be... (Score 1) 337

by viscus on Wednesday November 19, 2008 @02:11AM (#25813829) Attached to: Ted Stevens Loses Senate Re-Election Bid

Democrat != socialist. Democrats are really center-right, when you get down to it.

Another Way the LHC Could Self-Destruct 367

Posted by kdawson on Monday September 29, 2008 @07:58PM from the no-physics-whatsoever dept.

KentuckyFC writes "Just when you thought it was safe to switch on the LHC (though it won't be for a while yet), another nightmare scenario has emerged that some critics worry could cause the particle accelerator to explode. The culprit this time is not an Earth-swallowing black hole but a 'Bose supernova' in the accelerator's superfluid helium bath. Physicists have been playing with Bose Einstein Condensate (BECs) for over 10 years now. But in 2001, one group discovered that placing them in a powerful magnetic field could cause the attractive forces between atoms to become repulsive. That caused their BEC to explode in a Bose supernova — which they called a 'Bosenova,' a name that fortunately did not catch on. This was little more than a curiosity when only a microscopic blob of cold matter was involved. But superfluid liquid helium is also BEC. And physicists have suddenly remembered that the LHC is swimming in 700,000 liters of the stuff while being zapped by some of the most powerful magnetic fields on the planet. So is the LHC a Bose supernova waiting to go off? Not according to the CERN theory division, which has published its calculations that show the LHC is safe (abstract). They also point out that no other superfluid helium handling facility has mysteriously blown itself to pieces."

Keeping Older Drivers Behind the Wheel 260

Posted by timothy on Saturday September 20, 2008 @06:50PM from the my-dad-should-just-not-drive-ever dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "A new study shows the key role technology can play in extending the age at which people can drive safely and highlights the important psychological role that driving plays in older people's lives in contributing to feelings of independence and freedom and maintaining their quality of life. The study identified ideas for in-car information systems to help compensate for the reduction in reaction time that affects many older drivers. Specific recommendations included a head-up display on the windshield that displays road sign information based on GPS position so the driver doesn't have to keep watching the road side for information and a system to provide the driver with audible feedback on their current speed so the driver doesn't have to look at the dashboard so often. 'Our research highlights issues that have been overlooked by car designers and those advising older people on lifestyles,' says Dr Charles Musselwhite, who led the study. 'The current emphasis on developing technologies which take over part of the driving task may actually end up deterring older drivers. By contrast, better in-car information systems could help them drive safely and ensure they want to keep driving.'"

Microsoft Working On "Post-Windows" Cloud Computing OS 208

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday August 04, 2008 @10:44AM from the it's-all-up-there-in-the-clouds-or-something dept.

Barence writes "Microsoft is working on a web-based operating system called Midori, as it looks to life beyond Windows. Midori is expected to be a cloud-computing service, and so not as dependent on hardware as current generations of Windows. It's also expected to run with a virtualization layer between the hardware and the OS, and is expected to be a commercial offshoot of the Singularity research project which Microsoft has been working on since 2003." If this story sounds familiar to you, it probably is.

Dial-Up Users "Don't Want Broadband" 593

Posted by timothy on Thursday July 03, 2008 @01:58PM from the get-spied-on-at-lower-speeds dept.

Barence writes "The majority of dial-up Internet users say they don't want to upgrade their connection to broadband, according to a new study in the US. The Pew Internet & American Life research found that 62% of dial-up users had no interest in upgrading to a high-speed connection." (CNN is carrying the AP's story on the study, too.)

Submission + - De Icaza regrets Novell/Microsoft pact (thestandard.com)

Submitted by

Ian Lamont

on Thursday March 06, 2008 @06:40PM

Ian Lamont writes: "Novell Vice President and GNOME architect Miguel de Icaza sounded off at a MIX 08 panel on a number of topics. First, he claimed that he was 'not happy' with Novell's cross-patent licensing agreement with Microsoft, saying that if he had his way, the company would have stayed with the open-source community. He also said that neither Windows nor Linux are relevant in the long term, thanks to Web 2.0 business models:

'They might be fantastic products ... but Google has shown itself to be a cash cow. There is a feature beyond selling corporate [software] and patents ... it's going to be owning end users."
He also tangled with Mike Schroepfer, a Mozilla engineering executive, about extending patent protection for Moonlight to third parties. However, de Icaza did say that Novell has done the best it could to balance open-source interests with patent indemnification."

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