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Science: A Traffic Control System For Molecules

Posted by Zonk on Monday May 15, @01:51AM
from the turn-right-at-the-corpuscle dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "Our cells contain small protein factories which have to deliver materials inside the cell via a network of microtubules. And the transportation is carried out by biomolecular motors. Now, researchers from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands have built a traffic control system able to force individual molecules to choose between 'roads' by applying strong electrical fields locally at Y-junctions. This traffic control system can potentially lead to new nano-fabrication techniques. Read more for additional references and pictures showing how this traffic system works."

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Your Rights Online: The Future of Digital Books

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @11:29PM
from the new-library-at-alexandia dept.

Tabercil writes "The New York Times has an article about the mass scanning of books, which argues that actions such as Google's Book Search project are an inevitable outgrowth of the internet." From the article: "Scanning technology has been around for decades, but digitized books didn't make much sense until recently, when search engines like Google, Yahoo, Ask and MSN came along. When millions of books have been scanned and their texts are made available in a single database, search technology will enable us to grab and read any book ever written. Ideally, in such a complete library we should also be able to read any article ever written in any newspaper, magazine or journal. And why stop there?"

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HD Video Could 'Choke the Internet'?

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @09:10PM
from the i-like-the-internet-breathing dept.

richdun writes "Yahoo! is carrying an AP story explaining how ISPs are worried large streaming videos could 'choke the Internet.' This is used as a yet another reason for tiered pricing for access to content providers." From the article: "Most home Internet use is in brief bursts -- an e-mail here, a Web page there. If people start watching streaming video like they watch TV -- for hours at a time -- that puts a strain on the Internet that it wasn't designed for, ISPs say, and beefing up the Internet's capacity to prevent that will be expensive. To offset that cost, ISPs want to start charging content providers to ensure delivery of large video files, for example."

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Linux: Kororaa Accused of Violating GPL

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @05:19PM
from the penguin-is-confused dept.

AlanS2002 writes "The Kororaa Project, a pre-configured binary install method for Gentoo Linux which bundles nVidia's and ATI binary drivers in its Kororaa Xgl Live CD , has put its Live CD on hold after being accused of violating the GPL. The issue appears to be the distribution of the Linux Kernel and nVidia's/ATI binary drivers together. When the binary drivers are built the GPL'ed code is included in the binary result, which is a violation."

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Apple: Google's Love For Small Businesses

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @02:21PM
from the no-one-is-small-on-the-internet dept.

bariswheel writes "The Fearless Frog is at it again: In his latest post, Cringely aims to slap some sense into Microsoft, Apple, and IBM altogether. From the article: 'What counts is that for Microsoft the platform is the PC while for Google the platform is the Internet and nobody can hope to control the Internet -- not Microsoft OR Google. Google is making a ton of money from people [small/medium sized businesses] who never were even in business before. This is not only a fundamental change in how advertising is done; it is a fundamental change in how BUSINESS is done.'"

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Firefox 2 Alpha 2 Reviewed

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday May 14, @12:32PM
from the guess-what's-coming dept.

pcabello writes "Firefox 2 Alpha 2 was released yesterday. Check what's new in this review at mozillalinks.org with screenshots."

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Developers: What's the Secret Sauce in Ruby on Rails?

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday May 14, @11:25AM
from the having-a-hard-time-caring dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Ruby on Rails seems to be a lightning rod for controversy. At the heart of most of the controversy lies amazing productivity claims. Rails isn't a better hammer; it's a different kind of tool. This article explores the compromises and design decisions that went into making Rails so productive within its niche."

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Hardware: The Treo 700p Confirmed

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday May 14, @10:09AM
from the thank-god-we-can-sleep-easy dept.

Tam Hanna writes "People have been rumoring about the Treo 700p for quite some time, Now, HandMark has "officially" confirmed the Treo 700p's existance on their home page. While developers have had access to the machine for quite some time; this is the first "real" sighting""

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Politics: Chinese Scientist Admits To Stealing Chip Research

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @09:25AM
from the do-you-want-to-make-money-sure-we-all-do dept.

An anonymous reader writes "A prominent Chinese scientist, one of the founders of the chip manufacturing industry in the country, has admitted to stealing his research." From the article: "Chen Jin, a dean of Shanghai's prestigious Jiaotong University and the leader of a government-funded high-tech research project, was dismissed from his university posts this week and stripped of other government titles and perks. The government also said that Chen had been permanently banned from taking part in any government-funded science projects. In a statement Friday, Jiaotong University--one of the nation's elite schools--said, 'Chen Jin has breached the trust of being a scientist and educator. His behavior is despicable.'"

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In-Flight VOIP Coming Soon

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @07:23AM
from the i-am-talking-to-you-from-the-skies dept.

hdtv writes "U.S. airline customers are likely to be thrilled with an opportunity to sit next to someone constantly chatting on the phone. Information Week magazine is reporting that government auction is opening a way for telecoms to introduce voice-over-IP links on in-flight communication systems." From the article: "Airfone already offers phone service on many flights, but its high cost has limited its use. JetBlue has declined to say what its LiveTV LCC unit would do with a winning frequency. Although many frequent flyers and airline attendants favor a ban on the phone chatter, Connexion by Boeing, whose Internet service is already offered on nearly 200 international flights a day, notes that there have been no complaints of in-cabin incidents about the technology. The Connexion service is regularly used by passengers to make VoIP calls. "

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Your Rights Online: London 2006, Meet London 1984

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @05:31AM
from the what-is-the-newspeak-for-change-the-channel dept.

Draape writes "Shoreditch TV is an experiment TV channel beaming live footage from the street into people's homes. According to the Telegraph U.K. television will broadcast from 400 surveillance cameras on the streets, into people's homes. For now they are only showing it to 22,000 homes, but next year they plan on going national with the 'show'. They fly under the flag 'fighting crime from the sofa'."

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Your Rights Online: Australians Allowed to Format Shift Media

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @03:28AM
from the yay-for-rights dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Australian Federal law will now allow format shifting of media (ie:Ripping CDs to MP3s). Something long allowed under US copyright legislation, but only now coming to the Land Down Under." From the article: "Once the new laws are passed, 'format shifting' of music, newspapers and books from personal collections onto MP3 players will become legal. The new laws will also make it legal for people to tape television and radio programs for playback later, a practice currently prohibited although millions of people regularly do it. Under the current regime, millions of households a day are breaking the law when they tape a show and watch it at another time."

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Examining Tokyo's Media Immersion Pods

Posted by Zonk on Sunday May 14, @01:23AM
from the import-this-concept-please dept.

the terminal of geoff goodfellow writes "The New York Times has an article on the Bagus Gran Cyber Café in Tokyo, where customers rent so-called media immersion pods. From the article: 'At first glance the spread looks officelike, but be warned: these places are drug dens for Internet addicts outfitted with VHS and DVD players, satellite and regular television on a Toshiba set, PlayStation 2, Lineage II and a Compaq computer loaded with software, all the relevant downloads and hyperspeedy Internet. In the nearby library were thousands of comic books, magazines and novels.'"

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Science: First Ever Wild Grizzly/Polar Hybrid Shot 147 of 176 comments

Science: Ready to Test a 'SmartShirt'?

Posted by Zonk on Saturday May 13, @11:32PM
from the wear-one-for-that-harsh-deathmatch-session dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "In a very brief article, Health Data Management reports that Sensatex Inc. is looking for beta testers for its SmartShirt system. These fully washable shirts are using nanotechnology to weave a conductive fiber grid into the cotton fabric to monitor your movements or your heart rate and transmitted wirelessly to a central computer. If the tests are successful, these shirts could be used to remotely check old people living alone, but also soldiers in the field or athletes. Read more for additional details and pictures of these 'smart' shirts."

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IT: The Economy of Online Crime

Posted by Zonk on Saturday May 13, @09:36PM
from the honor-among-thieves dept.

hdtv writes "You might call the thugs or thieves, but on their own closed forums and referral-only Web sites, they value honesty and reputation. Fortune magazine looks into the black market for stolen credit card numbers and identities. What's interesting is that so few of the criminals retrieve their information via breaking into online stores." From the article: "Gaffan says these credit card numbers and data are almost never obtained by criminals as a result of legitimate online card use. More often the fraudsters get them through offline credit card number thefts in places like restaurants, when computer tapes are stolen or lost, or using 'pharming' sites, which mimic a genuine bank site and dupe cardholders into entering precious private information. Another source of credit card data are the very common 'phishing' scams, in which an e-mail that looks like it's from a bank prompts someone to hand over personal data."

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Ask Slashdot: Biometric Thumb Drives? 43 of 47 comments

Ask Slashdot: Budgeting for Layoffs? 114 of 136 comments

Your Rights Online: Telecoms Facing $50 Billion Lawsuit for Wiretaps

Posted by Zonk on Saturday May 13, @07:22PM
from the answer-to-the-people dept.

hdtv writes "According to a MarketWatch article, BellSouth Corp and Verizon Telecommunications are facing lawsuits seeking billions of dollars in damages for the decision to turn over calling records to the government. The damages amount to $1,000 per person, whose records were turned over to Feds. According to the article, 'consumers could sue the phone service providers under communications privacy legislation that dates back to the 1930s. Relevant laws include the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, and a variety of provisions of the Electronic Communications and Privacy Act, including the Stored Communications Act, passed in 1986.'"

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Star Wreck Creators Announce Iron Sky

Posted by Zonk on Saturday May 13, @06:32PM
from the more-from-those-guys dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The makers of the Star Trek and Babylon 5 cross-over spoof Star Wreck: In the Pirkinning have announced their upcoming movie Iron Sky. It's apparently another sci-fi comedy with its own universe. Says Director Timo Vuorensola: 'It is still an open question whether it will be distributed also for free. We would very much like it, but it will depend a lot on the financiers.'"

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Science: A Traffic Control System For Molecules