Paul Sheehan has a good write up on the blind eye turned to loony fundies [BugMeNot] in both Australia and abroad, and how that apathy helped create the murderers of Stephen Vincent: To call him a casualty of a war or the victim of terrorists would be a mistake. He was murdered by perverts. “Pervert” does not remotely confer the same aura and power of “terrorist”. This murder was committed in the name of religion but, at its deepest level, was another manifestation of envy, impotence and sexual repression
8:50am – arrive at train station with intention of catching the 8:57 to get to a station which will let me catch the express 9:07, which will get me to work by 10-ish.
9:00am – announcement made telling commuters the 8:57 is running 20 mins late. Go to plan B: wait for 9:14 train.
9:04am – watch express train zoom past.
9:14am – finished coffee and make up application. Look up and see the 9:14 which happens to be a millenium train approaching.
9:16am – look up, train in same spot as 2mins ago approx 500m from the platform. WTF?
9:20am – train hasn’t budged. Boy these signals must be really fucked up!
9:22am – announcement made saying station don’t know WTF is going on.
9:25am – announcement made saying the millenium (mil-lemon) train has broken down. I grab keys and drive to work.
GRRRR!
Education Minister Brendan Nelson — a man whose sole purpose in life appears to be destroying the education system — supports the teaching of creationism [BugMeNot]. Sure, he weaselled out of throwing his full support behind it, but it still stands as proof that he is unfit to serve as Education Minister and that John Howard has surrounded himself with loony fundie toadies — via Terry Frost
Japan has announced plans to deploy a massive broadband satellite operational in 2015. It will provide 100 Mb/s service to mountains, remote islands and bullet trains along with comm for disaster recovery. Its giant 20m diameter dish is supposed to be able to receive even weak mobile phone signals. Of course, the ping times wont be so good
A speeding case has been thrown out in Australia after the Roads and Traffic Authority admitted that it could not prove the integrity of speed-camera photos. The case revolved around the integrity of a mathematical MD5 algorithm published on each picture and used as a security measure to prove pictures have not been doctored after they have been taken
King George II, living proof that man descended from apes and some haven’t quite managed to quite stand upright yet, has started a national debate in the US over the teaching of evolution in school. The retarded monkey boy has suggested that a theory known as intelligent design
— the current PC term for creationism — should be taught in the classroom. His championing of intelligent design will be interpreted as further evidence of the growing influence of the religious right
Google has announced that they will provide RSS and Atom feeds in their news section. Previously the only way to get RSS/Atom feeds from Google news was through third party scrapers. Now, you can get feeds for any of Google’s news areas as well as feeds for a news search. The news search is basically the same concept as Google news alerts, only in RSS
Professor Veena Sahajwalla of the University of New South Wales has won a prestigious Australian science award for developing a technique to use waste plastic in steel making, a process that could have implications for recycling scrap metal that accounts for 40% of steel production
AOL and Microsoft are hitting spammers where it hurts most: They are confiscating their assets and giving them away
Derek Lovley and his colleagues of the University of Massachusetts discovered that the Geobacter bacteria is capable of producing nanowires. The bacteria is normally used to clean up toxic waste. Geobacter does not use oxygen, but metal as its source for power. This probably explains the 3nm to 5nm nanowires it excretes while working. What metal the nanowires are made of is not yet known, but the genetic code responsible for their creation is. This opens up the possibility of modifying the bacteria to create nanowires on chips
Pollycarpus Priyanto, a pilot with Indonesia’s national airline Garuda, is on trial in Jakarta for the murder of Munir Said Thalib, a leading human rights activist, who died from arsenic poisoning on a Garuda flight to Amsterdam last September. The case is being seen as test of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s commitment to law and order
The UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has come up with an interesting way of making sure information about how to handle the buried nuclear waste is left for future generations. Computer technology is notorious for being superceded rather quickly. In the light of this, the UKAEA decided to ditch all the high tech solutions and go for something that has a genuinely proven track record: Papyrus. Or, the closest thing we’ve got that doesn’t involve actual reeds: so-called permanent paper. After all, if it worked for the Ancient Egyptians, it should work for us
Political group GetUp! has become the target of an investigation to force the internet operation, which is bombarding Coalition senators with e-mail, to prove it is not a front for the Labor Party. The online operation, which has the support of union boss Bill Shorten, dotcom millionaire Evan Thornley and former Liberal leader John Hewson to raise $1.5 million, flooded Liberal and Nationals senators with e-mail this week. It’s funny that the pollies get the hump when they get spammed but turn a blind eye to little Johnny Coward paying his son to run a phone spam campaign during the last election. Seems it’s a different matter when it’s their inboxes that are flooded with crap
There’s a rumour doing the rounds that Cisco is considering buying mobile handset maker Nokia in a bid to gain its wireless infrastructure technology
Mug etiquette should be a subject that one is forced to study before entering the work force. One would think that things such as not taking somone elses big purple mug with black cats on it, is commonly understood by all office workers. But no.
I have thusly compiled some rules for the uninformed, or just plain stupid:
- Thou shalt not use other peoples mugs. If you have not brought in your own mug, there’s normally the (scummy) office set specifically bought for the likes of thee.
- Thou shalt not use other peoples mugs, and then keep them on their desk. This is stealing*.
- Don’t lick stirring spoons. Have you seen who you work with? Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
- Don’t steal other people’s coffee and/or tea. Yeah I know your office is cheap and will only spring for some freeze dried grit, but don’t take other people’s decent stash. It’s not nice, and it’s stealing*.
*If your personal hygiene is of a low to troll standard, this technique might help you get a mug/coffee/tea of your choosing for free, as the rightful owner may feel that it is best to cut one’s losses and keep their health.
Charlie Stross just won the Hugo award for best novella for The Concrete Jungle. How can you not love a geek whose response to a Hugo win is a resounding w00t! Congrats Charlie
The EFF is reporting that the Federal Communications Commission issued a release [pdf] announcing its new rule expanding the reach of the Communications Assistance to Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). Practically, what this means is that the government will be asking broadband providers — as well as companies that manufacture devices used for broadband communications — to build insecure backdoors into their networks, imperiling the privacy and security of citizens on the Internet. It also hobbles technical innovation by forcing companies involved in broadband to redesign their products to meet government requirements
There has been a massive identity theft ring uncovered by security software firm Sunbelt. According to one of their employees, Alex Eckelberry, during the course of one of their recent investigations into a particular Spyware application — rumoured to be called CoolWebSearch — they’ve discovered that the personal information of those infected
was being captured and uploaded to a server
Americans don’t seem to get tea. And worse still, what Starbucks tries to pass off as chai is nothing like the chai that any Indian knows and loves. After experimenting in the office and finally perfecting (sort of!) the art of making good clean-livin’ Indian chai with just a mug and a microwave, Hob Gadling wrote this little guide. Enjoy!
By mixing phosphorescent material with the usual white fluorescent material, American Environmental Products has developed a tfluorescent ube that continues to glow when shut off. Originally intended for submarines, and then used in places where terrorists could disrupt services, they are also perfect for power outages, providing some light so you don’t have to thrash around in the dark looking for your candles and flashlights. Since the hack is inside the tube, they can also be removed from their fixtures and carried around, as well as provide light even if they’re shattered
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