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Games: Despite New Owner, id Still Lives Or Dies By Their Engines on Saturday July 04, @03:21AM

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday July 04, @03:21AM
from the i-want-to-bunny-hop-in-elder-scrolls-v dept.

fps

The Guardian has an article about id Software's status after being purchased by ZeniMax (Bethesda's parent company) not long ago. While id gained considerable financial stability out of the deal, it's clear that what Bethesda has to gain is access to top-of-the-line engine technology, which they've often needed to license. id's Todd Hollenshead said, "The videogames business is defined by technology, which is why guys like JC [John Carmack] are still so significant. Consumers may not be as in touch with the intricacies as they used to be, but you can still make significant, impactful change. We're confident Rage will be one of them..." He also mentions that "the PC market has receded in terms of significance," a sentiment evidenced by id's aggressive expansion into the iPhone games market.

Generating Power From Ocean Buoys and Kites on Saturday July 04, @02:09AM

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday July 04, @02:09AM
from the i-can-see-my-house-from-here dept.

power

cheezitmike writes "Researchers at Oregon State University are testing a new type of wave-energy converter to generate electricity from ocean waves: 'Even when the ocean seems calm, swells are moving water up and down sufficiently to generate electricity. ... For decades the challenge has been to build a device that can withstand monster waves and gale-force winds, not to mention corrosive saltwater, seaweed, floating debris and curious marine mammals. ... In the most recent prototypes, a thick coil of copper wire is inside the first component, which is anchored to the seafloor. The second component is a magnet attached to a float that moves up and down freely with the waves. As the magnet is heaved by the waves, its magnetic field moves along the stationary coil of copper wire. This motion induces a current in the wire — electricity.'" Meanwhile, researchers at Stanford are working to design "turbine kites" that operate at 30,000 feet, where air currents flow much faster than they do close to the ground. Ken Caldeira, a Standford associate professor, said, "If you tapped into 1% of the power in high-altitude winds, that would be enough to continuously power all civilization."

UK Police Told To Use Wikipedia When Preparing For Court on Saturday July 04, @12:06AM

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday July 04, @12:06AM
from the citation-needed dept.

government

Half-pint HAL tips news of UK prosecution lawyers who are instructing police to study information on Wikipedia when preparing to give expert testimony in court. "Mike Finn, a weaponry specialist and expert witness in more than 100 cases, told industry magazine Police Review: 'There was one case in a Midlands force where police officers asked me to write a report about a martial art weapon. The material they gave me had been printed out from Wikipedia. The officer in charge told me he was advised by the CPS to use the website to find out about the weapon and he was about to present it in court. I looked at the information and some of it had substance and some of it was completely made up.' Mr. Finn, a former Metropolitan Police and City of London officer and Home Office adviser, added that he has heard of at least three other cases where officers from around the country have been advised by the CPS to look up evidence on Wikipedia."

Games: Massive Bank Fraud In EVE Online on Friday July 03, @11:05PM

Posted by Soulskill on Friday July 03, @11:05PM
from the virtual-madoff dept.

djconrad was one of several readers to point out the latest major scandal in EVE Online, the space MMO notable for its large, player-driven economy and the entertaining stories it often generates. A player named Ricdic, chairman of a large in-game bank, decided to embezzle roughly 200 billion ISK (the game's currency). Ricdic exchanged the ISK for about $5,000 to pay off real-life debts. Massively has an in-depth write-up about how the theft affects the game and its players. Since the scandal became public, there's been a run on the virtual bank, and its executives are doing what they can to reassure people that it will continue to exist. Ricdic was banned, not for the embezzlement, but for trading 200 billion ISK for real currency, which is forbidden by EVE's EULA.

Science: Hawking Says Humans Have Entered a New Stage of Evolution on Friday July 03, @10:03PM

Posted by Soulskill on Friday July 03, @10:03PM
from the already-banned-in-kansas dept.

biotech

movesguy sends us to The Daily Galaxy for comments by Stephen Hawking about how humans are evolving in a different way than any species before us. Quoting: "'At first, evolution proceeded by natural selection, from random mutations. This Darwinian phase, lasted about three and a half billion years, and produced us, beings who developed language, to exchange information. I think it is legitimate to take a broader view, and include externally transmitted information, as well as DNA, in the evolution of the human race,' Hawking said. In the last ten thousand years the human species has been in what Hawking calls, 'an external transmission phase,' where the internal record of information, handed down to succeeding generations in DNA, has not changed significantly. 'But the external record, in books, and other long lasting forms of storage,' Hawking says, 'has grown enormously. Some people would use the term evolution only for the internally transmitted genetic material, and would object to it being applied to information handed down externally. But I think that is too narrow a view. We are more than just our genes.'"

Your Rights Online: Amazon Wants Patent For Inserting Ads Into Books on Friday July 03, @08:02PM

Posted by Soulskill on Friday July 03, @08:02PM
from the it-was-the-best-of-times,-it-was-comcastic dept.

books

theodp writes "Three Amazon inventors set out to correct what they felt was a real problem: that 'out-of-print or rare books ... typically do not include advertisements ... the content is fixed and, therefore, has not been adapted to modern marketing.' Their solution is spelled out in newly-disclosed Amazon patent applications for On-Demand Generating E-Book Content with Advertising and Incorporating Advertising in On-Demand Generated Content. From the patent apps, here's what the future of reading may look like: 'For instance, if a restaurant is described on page 12, [then the advertising page], either on page 11 or page 13, may include advertisements about restaurants, wine, food, etc., which are related to restaurants and dining.' So, what would a delightfully-tacky-yet-unrefined Hooters ad do for your Hemingway experience?"

IT: Fake Tamiflu "Out-Spams Viagra On Web" on Friday July 03, @07:11PM

Posted by Soulskill on Friday July 03, @07:11PM
from the stiff-competition dept.

spam

cin62 writes "The number of Internet scammers offering fake versions of the anti-swine flu drug Tamiflu has surpassed those selling counterfeit Viagra, reports CNN. Since the H1N1 virus, also known as swine flu, was declared a global pandemic last month, there has been an increase in the number of Web sites and junk emails offering Tamiflu for sale. 'Every Web site that used to sell Viagra is now selling Tamiflu. We are pretty sure that the same people are making the Tamiflu as are making the Viagra,' said Director of Policy for the UK's Royal Pharmaceutical Society." This news fits in nicely with a report Wired ran a couple weeks ago about the hysteria behind H1N1.

Technology: Source Code of Several Atari 7800 Games Released on Friday July 03, @06:22PM

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday July 03, @06:22PM
from the good-way-to-start-an-education dept.

jadoon88 writes to share a series of old Atari 7800 games that have been unofficially open sourced. "Remember Dig Dug or Centipede or Robotron? They used to be favorites when Atari's 7800 series was still around. Since the era of those consoles is over, and a different world of interactive reality gaming has taken over, Atari has unofficially released source code of over 15 games for the coders and enthusiasts to admire the state-of-the-art (because this is what it was back then). During those times, nobody would have imagined in their wildest dreams the games that Atari's developers floated into the gaming thirsty market and instantly swept across continental boundaries. But things changed soon after that and a company once regarded as one of the most successful gaming console manufacturers and developers faded away in the pages of our technology's hall-of-fame."

Ask Slashdot: How To Get Your Program Professionally Marketed? on Friday July 03, @05:30PM

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday July 03, @05:30PM
from the doesn't-twitter-solve-all-problems-everywhere-now? dept.

business

one-man orchestra writes "I'm the sole programmer of a small, multi-platform, commercial audio program (a spectrogram editor). After over 6 months on the market, I realized that the program would never just sell itself, and that I need some real marketing done for it. Being a one-man orchestra is becoming increasingly difficult; I only can devote so much time to marketing, my skills in that department are lacking, and I'd much rather spend more time coding. Despite my lackluster part-time marketing effort, I still manage to make a modest living out of the sales. My logical assumption is that with someone competent taking care of that part, revenue could greatly scale up. But what's the right way to go about doing this? What type of people/company do I need to contact? What to expect? What to look out for?"

Your Rights Online: Professor Gets 4 Years in Prison for Sharing Drone Plans With Students on Friday July 03, @04:38PM

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Friday July 03, @04:38PM
from the read-before-you-sign dept.

court

Hugh Pickens writes "Retired University of Tennessee Professor Dr. John Reece Roth has been sentenced to four years in prison after he allowed a Chinese graduate student to see sensitive information on Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs), also known as drones. In 2004, the company Roth helped found, Atmospheric Glow Technologies, won a US Air Force contract to develop a plasma actuator that could help reduce drag on the wings of drones, such as the ones the military uses. Under the contract, for which Roth was reportedly paid $6,000, he was prohibited from sharing sensitive data with foreign nationals. Despite warnings from his university's Export Control Officer, in 2006, Roth took a laptop containing sensitive plans with him on a lecture tour in China and also allowed graduate students Xin Dai of China and Sirous Nourgostar of Iran to work on the project. 'The illegal export of restricted military data represents a serious threat to national security,' says David Kris of the US Department of Justice. 'We know that foreign governments are actively seeking this information for their own military development. Today's sentence should serve as a warning to anyone who knowingly discloses restricted military data in violation of our laws.' During his trial, Roth testified that he was unaware that hiring the graduate students was a violation of his contract. 'This whole thing has not helped me, it has not helped the university,' said Roth. 'And it has probably not helped this country, either.'"

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Games: Despite New Owner, id Still Lives Or Dies By Their Engines on Saturday July 04, @03:21AM

Generating Power From Ocean Buoys and Kites on Saturday July 04, @02:09AM

UK Police Told To Use Wikipedia When Preparing For Court on Saturday July 04, @12:06AM

Games: Massive Bank Fraud In EVE Online on Friday July 03, @11:05PM

Science: Hawking Says Humans Have Entered a New Stage of Evolution on Friday July 03, @10:03PM

Your Rights Online: Amazon Wants Patent For Inserting Ads Into Books on Friday July 03, @08:02PM

IT: Fake Tamiflu "Out-Spams Viagra On Web" on Friday July 03, @07:11PM

Technology: Source Code of Several Atari 7800 Games Released on Friday July 03, @06:22PM

Ask Slashdot: How To Get Your Program Professionally Marketed? on Friday July 03, @05:30PM

Your Rights Online: Professor Gets 4 Years in Prison for Sharing Drone Plans With Students on Friday July 03, @04:38PM

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Games: Despite New Owner, id Still Lives Or Dies By Their Engines on Saturday July 04, @03:21AM

Generating Power From Ocean Buoys and Kites on Saturday July 04, @02:09AM

UK Police Told To Use Wikipedia When Preparing For Court on Saturday July 04, @12:06AM

Games: Massive Bank Fraud In EVE Online on Friday July 03, @11:05PM

Science: Hawking Says Humans Have Entered a New Stage of Evolution on Friday July 03, @10:03PM

Your Rights Online: Amazon Wants Patent For Inserting Ads Into Books on Friday July 03, @08:02PM

IT: Fake Tamiflu "Out-Spams Viagra On Web" on Friday July 03, @07:11PM

Technology: Source Code of Several Atari 7800 Games Released on Friday July 03, @06:22PM

Ask Slashdot: How To Get Your Program Professionally Marketed? on Friday July 03, @05:30PM

Your Rights Online: Professor Gets 4 Years in Prison for Sharing Drone Plans With Students on Friday July 03, @04:38PM

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