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Enjoy today as the world could end tomorrow – LHC goes online on the 10th!
I'm with those big fancy science types when they say they're generally fairly certian that no Earth and/or Universe destroying forces will be generated when the LHC goes online in less than 24 hours. I mean, these folks are usually right, right?
Continue reading...How EA and Spore are causing piracy, the DasmX86Dll issues, removing SecuRom and some great DRM free alternatives
9. September 2008
Speaking of SecuRom - I'm not quite sure why software companies continue to insist that DRM of this type (or any type) is worth it. I wonder how much money EA stuck into this? The game was available on the torrents before it's official launch and yet here's EA and far to many other companies shoveling money down the DRM hole. And it's doubly a problem because of their refusal to see this as an issue. If the game sells well, EA says "See! DRM isn't that big a deal, people don't care and we're still selling games." If the game's sales are hurt by DRM they fall back on "Pirates are killing our bottom line!" Seriously? Games will get pirated, sure. But you're much more likely to sell copies if they're not crippled in the first place by software that does nothing to stop the pirates and everything to annoy legitimate users.
Continue reading...How to get a cool, ray-traced animated screen saver for your Ubuntu Linux box
8. September 2008
I stumbled on a beautiful screen saver for my Ubuntu box today called Eternity which features several flavors of Ubuntu plus a default animation as well. The screen saver is called Eternity and the flavors are plain old vanilla Ubuntu, Ubuntu Studio and oddly enough, the Ubuntu Satanic release.
Continue reading...Linux and Flash – cut the crap already!
4. September 2008
Look, Adobe, can we please get with the times and start making a product that works on Linux? Please? It's getting closer to 2010 and we're still missing flying cars, meals in pills and a flash player that actually works most of the time. You see that? I'd even settle for most of the time right now. The sad truth is, Flash locks up on my current Ubuntu install, with the latest Flash release and it happens all the time.
Continue reading...Things you should never EVER type in Linux. Ever!
28. August 2008
I feel that I need to put a warning at the top of this post because try as I might in the subject to be clear about what I mean, I know that someone will go and type/execute one of these things into their production server at work and then be horribly distraught and/or cause some sort of power grid catastrophe across the Pacific Northwest or something. So DO NOT, DON'T, NEVER EVER EVER EVER run these commands in a terminal session. If you do you will render your system anything from useless without a forced reboot to devoid of any useful purpose ever.
Continue reading...Can I interest you in a 120mm terminally guided top attack mortar projectile? It’s by SAAB!
28. August 2008
Here's a quick video essay to introduce you to the Strix - a 120mm, terminally guided, top attack mortar projectile. This thing will happily find and destroy it's target, even main battle tanks (MBTs) day or night from up to 7 klicks away. All you need is a standard 120mm mortar!
Continue reading...Book Review: You Call This the Future? by Nick Sagan
27. August 2008
The new book by Nick Sagan (son of Carl Sagan), You Call This the Future?: The Greatest Inventions Sci-Fi Imagined and Science Promised, is characterized by explanations of some of the fascinating technologies envisioned in classic science fiction along with explorations of the progress modern science has made towards achieving those visions. Classic science fiction references appear side-by-side with summaries of state of the art scientific research.
Continue reading...Ubuntu security notice – kernel vulnerabilities found in all supported releases
26. August 2008
There's an important security notice from the Ubuntu folks. A kernel vulnerability was found. It's pretty much only vulnerable to local attacks but it's always a good idea to update your boxes to the latest versions of the kernel (as noted in the below announcement) so that you reduce your vulnerability to threats.
Continue reading...The Invasion Has Begun: Death Star Spotted Above San Francisco
25. August 2008
Initial reports are beginning to leak out of San Francisco that a mysterious object has been seen in the sky, blotting out the stars and staring down ominously at the peaceful inhabitants of The Golden Gate City. An intrepid amateur videographer has posted footage of the mysterious object on Youtube. Star Wars aficionados may recognize the massive moon-like invader as none other than a Death Star - a space station and weapon capable of destroying an entire planet - previously thought to be mere fiction.
Continue reading...Mach Dice is the iPhone RPG die rolling app you’ve been waiting for
25. August 2008
Finally! The die app you role players (or lovers of multi-facted dice) have been waiting for has arrived, from MachWerx. It's Mach Dice and it's beautiful. The premise is simple. You choose the dice, you make the roll. You can select any type of die you want, up to 100 of them - multiple dice of different sides are available as well.
Continue reading...Designing the Singularity: Intel receives the Overreaching Statement Award.
22. August 2008
"We're making steady progress toward Ray Kurtzweil's singularity," says Justin Rattner, CTO of Intel. THE Singularity, that's what he's talking about. You know, the point where machine intelligence jogs past human intelligence and brings us to a new era where combined computer cognition is the equivalent of a minor deity.
Continue reading...The planet Mars enters the ’90s with it’s new web cam
22. August 2008
That's right, the ESA has gotten into the web cam business with a simple little camera pointed at none other than Mars! While I feel the whole "look at my webcam" thing has blown over some time ago, this one is worth a gander.
Continue reading...Songbird enters Beta! Go and get it!
21. August 2008
Songbird, the long in developement ultimate media system for cross platform audio/visual joy has entered Beta! The new release features a new UI, faster media scanning, drag and drop goodness, a first run wizard (with EULA - is that really a feature?), smart playlists and album art. Wee!
Continue reading...How to get updated world weather maps as your desktop background in Ubuntu
20. August 2008
I also like to see what's going on with the world, particularly the weather but often find myself not in orbit so I'm unable to track worldwide weather patterns like I want to. Then a though occurred to me - what if I set up one of my Ubuntu boxes to have a map of the world with clouds overlayed, updated every hour? Neat! I now have a map of the world with cloud overlays updated hourly for my background.
Continue reading...Nuclear Fusion… In Your Garage? (Image Gallery)
20. August 2008
Yeah, it sounds crazy, but according to This article from the Wall Street Journal there are at least 42 functioning home-built fusion reactors worldwide. Mind you, they suck down quite a bit more energy than they produce; like expensive research reactors, they don't produce self-sustaining fusion.
Continue reading...
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9. September 2008
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