The latest definitions file for Microsoft’s Anti-Spyware beta flags Symantec’s Norton Antivirus products as a password-stealing trojan and prompts users to delete portions of the programme. Users who follow the instructions lose their installation of Norton, requiring delicate Windows registry edits and a complete removal/reinstall of Norton. Microsoft’s support forum is quickly filling up with complaints about this problem, many from businesses that have been pretty hard hit. This should be a cautionary tale about deploying beta products in production environments
Yorick Sample I Felted originally uploaded by Red Wolf
This is the first Yorick sample. It’s done in a New Zealand yarn: Naturally Woodland 12 Ply (77% mohair, 14% acrylic 5% nylon)
The mohair felts nicely. The acrylic/nylon coloured bits come through well. It’s still really fuzzy, so it may need a bit more felting to get proper definition on the eyes. The fuzz makes it difficult to see the row of holes that define the top of the skull.
I think this really needs to be done in a less hairy yarn.
A blind UC Berkeley student is suing Target, saying the retailer is violating the civil rights of those who cannot see because its web site is inaccessible to them — via digg
The Firefox memory leak is not a bug. It’s a feature. The feature
is how the pages are cached in a tabbed environment. To improve performance when navigating (studies show that 39% of all page navigations are renavigations to pages visited less than 10 pages ago, usually using the back button), Firefox 1.5 implements a Back-Forward cache that retains the rendered document for the last five session history entries for each tab. This is a lot of data. If you have a lot of tabs, Firefox’s memory usage can climb dramatically. It’s a trade-off. What you get out of it is faster performance as you navigate the web
Children at a Florida elementary school refused to sell lollies to raise money for a field trip, having just completed an educational unit on health and well-being. The widow of Dr Atkins was so moved by their commonsense that she donated $16,000 to their school so they could afford the trip without selling junk-food — Boing Boing
Harry Whittington, 78, was alert and doing fine
after US Vice President Dick Cheney sprayed Whittington with shotgun pellets on Saturday at the Armstrong Ranch in south Texas. Does this mean it’s open season on lawyers? — via Boing Boing
Several companies are developing electronically controlled lenses to provide enhanced vision. Thanks to technologies created for astronomical telescopes and spy satellites, aberrometers can map a person’s eye with extreme accuracy. Lasers bounce off the back of the eyeball, and structures in the eye scatter the resulting beam of light
A Staffordshire, England woman’s garden drain was clogged with what may be a small dead octopus. Vicky Springitt thought it was an old banana skin until her 9-year-old son Isaac pulled it out with a pair of tongs. Nobody seems to know where the creature came from — Boing Boing
A team of New York physicists has confirmed that a tabletop contraption made at UCLA does in fact generate nuclear fusion at room temperatures, using pairs of crystals and a small tank of deuterium. But unlike less reliable reports back in the 1980s, there’s no talk this time of producing endless supplies of power. Rather, the technology could lead to ultra-portable x-ray machines and even a wearable device that could provide safe, continuous cancer treatment — via Science Blog
A former Australian city councillor has been charged with assault for shushing a woman who wouldn’t stop talking on her phone at a screening of Brokeback Mountain. Pauline Clayton was on holidays in Texas, catching the movie in Texas cinema, when the woman’s phone rang. After she ignored a shushing gesture, Clayton touched her lightly on the shoulder. After Clayton touched her a second time, the woman went berserk, screamed obscenities, and got two cops and swore out an assault complaint — via Boing Boing
It appears that Eddie, the retarded UFO navigator, wasn’t allowed to play with the big boys. While his mates were off creating a rather nifty crop circle (KMZ) in Billingley, Yorkshire, Eddie was booted a couple of fields over and left to his own devices (KMZ). Feel free to make up your own wacky explanation
Two antibodies that enabled the severed spinal nerves of rats to be regenerated are to be tested in humans. The antibodies have helped rats with damaged spinal cords to walk again, by blocking the action of Nogo, a protein that stops nerve cells sprouting new connections. But there were concerns about whether blocking Nogo would lead to uncontrolled neuronal rewiring in the brain or spinal cord and it was also unclear how such a therapy could be given to humans
The French courts have ruled that using peer-to-peer networks (P2P), providing you are doing so for personal rather than commercial reasons, is legal. The decision comes just as the French Parliament meets to discuss whether internet users should pay a voluntary tax or surcharge of €5 a month to use P2P networks. The decision was actually made back in December but has only just been made public
Authorities are seeking a burglar who allegedly took the time to make coffee, cook and eat meals, take showers, pick out a change of clothes, watch television and check his e-mail while inside three rural Washington County homes this month
Australian researchers are developing a new surface coating which has the potential to realise the utopian dream of a self-cleaning bathroom. Researchers at the University of NSW are currently testing out a number of properties that might help to create the new coating with the goal of rolling out test products within the next year or so. Their research is based on nanoparticles already being incorporated into self-cleaning glass which comprise a tiny coating of titanium dioxide. When the particles interact with natural light the electrons become activated and oxidate the surface, effectively cleaning it
George Deutsch, the loony fundie who tried to muzzle top NASA climate scientist James Hansen and ordered NASA web designers to add the word theory
to every mention of the Big Bang, has resigned. NASA has declined to discuss the reasons for his resignation, but it came the same day that Texas A&M University, from which Deutsch claimed on his resume to have graduated, revealed that he had attended the university but did not complete his degree
Egyptian authorities gave a peek Friday into the first tomb uncovered in the Valley of the Kings since 1922. US archaeologists said they discovered the tomb by accident while working on a nearby site. The tomb, believed to be some 3,000 years old and dating to the 18th Dynasty, does not appear to be that of a pharaoh
The US Justice Department asked a judge to approve Patriot Act e-mail monitoring without any evidence of criminal behaviour and now e-mail surveillance has been approved
Last month, Johannas Pope, 61, was found dead, wearing a white gown, and propped up in her chair in front of the television. She had been placed there way back in 2004 by her caretaker. After a long investigation, the coroner announced yesterday that Johannas had died naturally of heart disease. Pope told her caretaker, Kathy Painter, she didn’t want to be buried because she believed she would come back to life — via Boing Boing
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts said Friday the Bush administration’s domestic spying is within the retarded monkey boy‘s inherent power under the Constitution
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