Google launched a new beta version of its desktop search tool on Monday that features updated Web navigation software and an innovative tool-bar. The move puts Google in direct competition with Yahoo, Lycos and AOL, as well as Microsoft’s new search engine. The search giant may be hoping that the beta version of Google Desktop Version 2 will be better received than the first version, which was criticised by analysts at Gartner who advised firms to steer clear of it
An allegedly legal rave in Utah last Saturday was broken up by a heavily armed SWAT team who reportedly teargassed hundreds of peaceful dancers and then set attack dogs on them. Some of the attendees had video cameras with them, and the footage that has begun to appear on the Internet is very disturbing, showing brutal assaults by the officers — via BoingBoing
With off-the-shelf components, scientists have managed to speed up light beyond the universal
constant of c, or roughly 300 million m/s. This, and the previous ability to slow light down could shake up the telecom world
Recently, Mark Cuban of Icerocket made the accusation that Blogger is by far the worst offender when it comes to Spam Blogs. Now Google Blogger is introducing Word Verification for user comments to prevent comment spam and another feature called Flag As Objectionable where users can report blogs with questionable content. Google appears to be listening
The owner of a CCTV surveillance shop which was robbed by a hooded thief has said the incident was the biggest boost to business imaginable
. The suspect was caught stealing a £700 laptop on eight separate cameras at CCTV Surveillance Solutions — via Feòrag
A Qantas engineer has found a way to help small aircraft avoid stalling [BugMeNot] at low speeds: pumping sound through the wings. He found that music also works, having tested Spiderbait and Radiohead. Spiderbait apparently works better
British soldiers will be getting germ-fighting underwear. The antimicrobial underpants have been introduced by the Ministry of Defence as part of a new desert uniform for soldiers. They are the first undergarments issued to British troops, who traditionally have had to supply their own. Military officials said Thursday the unisex trunks were made from artificial fibres for comfort, with silver particles woven into the material to prevent sweating. According to Colonel Silas Suchanek: It is coated to prevent bacterial infection, and we have tried to arrange the seams so that they don’t chafe
Thanks to the Kansas School Board, the idea that the universe was created by a Flying Spaghetti Monster is really taking off. There’s a good guide to the cult at Wikipedia. The joke, of course, is that it’s arguably more rational than Intelligent Design
— via Guardian Unlimited: Onlineblog
San Francisco is about to embark on a Free (or low cost) WiFi campaign with the mayor holding the reins, of course, in hopes of offering more low-income residents easier access to the Internet. Since San Francisco, unlike Philadelphia, is only 127km², will this work here and can this be accomplished in a year as promised or is this just another political plot to get the Mayor re-elected?
Robert Hare, creator of the Psychopathy Checklist, has recently been applying his test Is your boss a psychopath
to businessmen and has found some disturbing results. From the article: Why wouldn’t we want to screen them? We screen police officers, teachers. Why not people who are going to handle billions of dollars?
Citing Enron and Worldcom management as an example, it seems a reasonable argument. The same source also has a quiz which allows you to test your own boss
The Federal Opposition says students will be left stranded because the Federal Government has withheld TAFE funding for state and terrorities
Had an interesting trip home on the train yesterday.
Few things annoy me more than wankers holding really loud conversations on their mobile phones, but yesterday’s moron at least managed entertainment value.
Not content with sharing his conversation with the top floor of the carriage, he headed down to the doorway where he could be properly heard by the entire carriage. In less than six seconds I’ve guessed that this guy is either a compulsive liar or the world’s dumbest undercover cop.
I once spent a rather enjoyable lunch hour with a compulsive liar. It helped that I had been forewarned ahead of time for the novelty aspect of watching a wingnut in full swing. Train Guy
was much the same, but his insanity revolved around law enforcement instead of the music industry.
Train Guy
was loudly whinging to Sarge
that his nine month undercover drug operation had been screwed up by Constable Kay Campbell (who may or may not be two different people) and he now had to deal with a million dollar legal bill.
There were lots of drug references thrown in, a carefully spelled out Lebanese name and mention that the parents of the owner of said Lebanese name had been unwittingly driving about for a week with a large quantity of heroin hidden in the boot of their car.
It seems that the arrival of Constable Campbell (added to the mix at Sarge’s
request against the loud protests of Train Guy
) tipped the drug guys off and the heroin got flushed.
There were a couple of highlights to the phone conversation.
One being that Dumb Teenager
, sitting a couple of seats in front of me, had a panic attack and departed the train early. He wasn’t much smarter than Train Guy
, as he left in quite a fluster. He could have taken the exit at the other end of the carriage, but Dumb Teenager
insisted on walking past Train Guy
and yelling Fucking cops
at the top of his voice from the platform.
The other gem was Train Guy
trying to explain to Sarge
that he’d had a tip off that just might bail his worthless arse out of this mess and it involved something going down at: the docks… You know, the wharves. Where the containers ships come in.
I’m really hoping he’s a compulsive liar, because I’d hate to think there were cops out there who were this mind-numbingly stupid.
The Genetiate‘s people claim that with over 500,000 collisions between cars and deer every year, the cost in lives and money is staggering. While insurers pay over a billion dollars in claims annually, over 200 people are killed. Countless other drivers and passengers suffer injuries and other serious medical complications. Many deer and their young suffer the same fate. By implanting the gene of a special jellyfish into deer, the transgenic NightSave deer produced by Genetiate (patent pending) have fluorescing hair and skin when illuminated by car headlights. The implanted gene has no other effect on the deer, who appear normal in daylight. The NightSave project aims to reduce the number of night time deer/auto collisions, saving the lives of both deer and people — via Improbable Research
Xirrus’ XS-3900 Wireless LAN Array consists of 16 Integrated Access Points and a wireless switch all in one device. According to their web site, Xirrus can achieve 800+ Mbps of bandwidth and handle 1000+ users
Telstra announced a trial of the technology back in January, saying it would allow DSL to be connected to people who were up to 20km from a central exchange. DSL Extenders work by splitting an existing copper phone line into eight separate ADSL lines using a tiny, ruggedised remote DSLAM. The drawback is that it will not be able to handle ADSL2
Using human fetal cells, Swiss scientists have developed a new type of biological bandage for severe burns that appears to dramatically speed and improve the healing process and may well prove an effective treatment for other serious skin wounds. But the novel type of therapy is likely to generate some controversy in countries like the United States and Italy, which restrict the use of human embryos in scientific research, since the bandages are derived from the skin cells of aborted foetuses
Fluidlens is a new type of camera lens made of liquid that is no bigger than a contact lens, but can still achieve up to ten times optical zoom by changing its shape similar to the human eye
In an ongoing effort to stop the spread of HIV, scientists in Australia have discovered that crocodiles can fight off HIV and kill the virus. This is a major boon to medicine because the crocodile serum can also fight things that are penicillin resistant such as staphylococcus aureus
Scientists are proposing reintroducing large mammals such as elephants, lions, cheetahs and wild horses to North America to replace populations lost 13,000 years ago. The scientists say that not only could large tracts of North America act as breeding sanctuaries for species of large wild animals under threat in Africa and Asia, but that such ecological history parks could be major tourist attractions
The Encyclomædia is a casemod that puts a PC into what appears to be a set of encyclopædia volumes — via BoingBoing
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