Shane Cory Potter and his many and varied interest.

New BoingBoing 

Current TV axes 80 staffers, cuts shows, changes direction.

CNN ends a web news experiment

Comcast: TV Everywhere, and a possible $30 billion NBC buyout

New Christian Science Monitor 

Want to buy US military wares in Afghanistan? Go to Obama Market.

In Paris, Benjamin Netanyahu finds growing European doubt on Middle East peace

Veterans Day is a teachable moment for many US schools

New ComputerWorld 

How Nortel optical networking sale will change the industry

Judge rejects lawsuit challenging Magic Quadrant

Protect Your PCs from Windows 7's Zero-Day Exploit

New Cool Tools 

Monarch Butterfly Chair

Recipe Aggregators

String Saver

Eagle Creek

Malware issues and site maintenance

New Engadget 

Samsung responds to Symbian claims, says it's still supporting it

Windows Marketplace's newest anti-piracy measures already thwarted

Samsung Behold II hits T-Mobile on November 18th, unboxed today (now with video!)

New GapingVoid Cartoons 

New MAKE Blog 

SoundCloud's CitySounds.fm

QuahogCon: Call for Papers now open!

Introducing O'Reilly Answers

CupCake CNC build, part 3: The electronics

Real imitates virtual - Windows/Mac calculators

New Rolling Stone music videos 

'Glee' Sings Madonna: The Hit Show's Stars Pick Their Favorite Madge Tunes

The Greatest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Moments: 1997-2009

The Greatest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Moments 1993-1995

The Greatest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Moments 1988-1993

The Greatest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Moments 1986-1988

New Music Report: Miranda Lambert

New Scientific American 

Who says love hurts? Romantic partners alter our perception of pain

Heavy Metal: Researchers Try to Get the Lead out of Piezoelectronics

Gadget makers often rely on piezoelectricity --the ability that some solids have to produce voltage when pressure is applied to them--to power tiny embedded systems, such as a BlackBerry Storm 2's touch screen or a car's airbag sensor . Whereas lead-based compounds typically have the greatest piezoelectric potential, the heavy metal has fallen out of favor as device-makers push to eliminate it from all electronics in an attempt to reduce toxic waste . [More]

Next shuttle mission will carry butterflies to space for classroom science experiments

Space shuttle Atlantis, set to lift off November 16 for the International Space Station, will launch with more than just its six-member astronaut crew onboard. Stowed away in a biological payload module will be larvae of two species of butterfly, whose development students on the ground will track from their classrooms. [More]

Engineering the Planet to Dodge Global Warming

Failure to make difficult choices to cut greenhouse gas emissions exposes humanity to an increasingly dire set of climate scenarios. But there is a way to buy time: Geoengineering. [More]

Finding Room for New Memories

We all love getting something new. But then we have to move around our current clutter to find a place for it. Well, looks like things work the same way in the brain. Because according to a study published in the journal Cell , newborn neurons in the brain's memory center make room for new memories by moving out the old ones. [More]

Out of Africa: The Tobacco War's New Battleground

Africa is already beleaguered by infectious diseases, such as AIDS and malaria, but now the continent's residents face growing health threats from preventable illnesses brought on by lifestyle changes, such as from poor diets and smoking. [More]

Fact or Fiction: Generic Drugs Are Bad for You

As we cope with the economic recession, we've all had to make concessions. It's been "good-bye" to European vacations, organic milk and magazine subscriptions. But there are those things we can't give up without risking serious illness or death, one of which is prescription medication. [More]

New world food crisis looms

The U.N. is warning the world is on the brink of another food crisis ahead of a major international summit in Rome.

Shark gives birth after tank tussle

A shark gives birth to 8 pups prematurely from a wound sustained in a fight with another shark.

Why We Worry (preview)

The young girl wanted to unburden herself about her problem. She told her doctor that she worried excessively and that she felt overwhelmed by these thoughts. One memory that she described to Douglas Mennin, director of the Yale Anxiety and Mood Services at Yale University, was particularly telling. Her grandmother had shared intense feelings about the recent passing of a good friend. As the young girl listened, her mind wandered to thoughts of her grandmother dying. The worry soon spiraled into concerns about the girl's own death. She became so disturbed, she cut short her visit to her grandmother and ran home. Psychologists believe that worry, defined as a person's negative thoughts about a future event, evolved as a constructive problem-solving behavior. But excessive fretting--as happened with the girl--does more harm than good. Chronic worriers operate under the misperception that their overthinking and attempts at controlling every situation allow them to problem-solve and plan for the future. Instead their thought pattern hinders cognitive processing and also causes overstimulation of emotion- and fear-processing areas in the brain. The hypervigilance that is the result can lead to cardiovascular problems, ultimately rendering the body unable to cope properly with stress. [More]

Recommended: A Shadow Falls

A Shadow Falls by Nick Brandt. Abrams, 2009 [More]

Searching for Greener Gadgets: How to Size Up Energy Efficiency in Household Appliances

Dear EarthTalk: I am considering upgrading some older appliances in my home. Where can I find information on which models are the most energy efficient? --Jonathan Duda, Olivebridge, NY [More]

New micro-mapping software lets travelers plot points of interest while they walk

It seems there's an online community or social network for every facet of life these days. One area where this makes a lot of sense is in map-making, given how well locals know their own territory. This might explain why OpenStreetMap --a map of the world that can be edited by anyone with Web access--has expanded from 100,000 contributors in June to more than 180,000 (and claims to be adding 300 new mappers daily). [More]

Saturnian trifecta: The planet, its rings and a moon

[More]

Can Local Governments Solve Global Warming?

BOULDER, Colo. Here's what this affluent Rocky Mountain city of 100,000 does about a revenue shortfall in the darkest economic hour since the Great Depression: [More]

Evolution of a single gene linked to language

[More]

Planets May Affect the Chemistry of Their Stars

Planets are, by and large, at the mercy of their stars. Not only do stars provide a ready energy source of radiated light and heat, but the mass and gravitational pull of stars flat-out dwarfs the summed masses and pulls of any orbiting companions. In our solar system, which has more planets--regardless of where one stands on the Pluto debate--than any other planetary system we know of so far, the sun still makes up more than 99.8 percent of its system's mass. [More]

Study estimates hot air released by the U.S. health care system

What does the U.S. health care system have in common with cattle farms and power plants ? It is responsible for a fair chunk of the nation's greenhouse gas emissions. The system, especially via hospitals and the pharmaceutical industry, contributes 8 percent of those climate-warming gases, according to a study published in the November 10 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association . [More]

Dinosaur discovery in South Africa

A new dinosaur species discovered in South Africa - called Aardonyx or "Earth Claw" - gives scientists a glimpse into the evolution of the Sauropod species.

Intolerable beauty: Plastic garbage kills the albatross

Each year thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway Atoll from starvation, toxicity and choking. The culprit: plastic trash accumulating across a vast area of ocean known as the Pacific Gyre . The nesting babies on the tiny, remote island are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the polluted water collecting what to them looks like food. Chris Jordan, a photographic artist and cultural activist, recently photographed the albatross's fate. He says that in order for people to really become inspired about cleaning up the planet, sometimes we have to stop and grieve about what is being lost every day. [More]

Solar sail concept, like a phoenix, may rise again

It's only fitting that on what would have been Carl Sagan's 75th birthday, an organization started by the astronomer famous for his wondrous and elegant descriptions of the universe announced plans to test a wondrous and elegant way to explore the solar system and well beyond. [More]

Judging a Book by Its Odor

"This book stinks!" is really a bad review. But even a classic work can start to smell when it gets old enough. Now chemists have developed a technique that identifies what kind of degradation process an old book or historical document is going through, based on the odors it gives off. The report appears in the American Chemical Society journal Analytical Chemistry . An old book's familiar musty smell is due to hundreds of different volatile organic compounds gassing out from the paper and other materials, such as the binding. The particular blend of compounds results from specific degradation pathways. Conventional analysis techniques require small samples of the work for testing, further damaging the book. But analyzing the gases coming off of the old books is noninvasive. [More]

Adapting to the Freshwater Crisis

Forward-thinking experts are getting a better handle on the growing global water shortage and coming up with innovative approaches to ensuring the security, safety and sustainability of this resource [More]

Baked Australia: Water Management Lessons for the World from Down Under

Another summer is heating up Down Under, and the forecast looks as worrisome and as potentially deadly as last summer's. A decade of drought is parching landscapes, devastating farmers , killing gum trees, and forcing a new definition of conservation into the continental nation's colorful lexicon. Could Australia see a day when a bottle of water is worth more than a bottle of Shiraz? [More]

Pollution's Toll on the Brain

In these days of hybrid cars and carbon credits, it is common knowledge that substances exhaled by autos and coal plants are harmful to our respiratory system. What may be surprising is the degree to which they may harm the brain--in some instances, as much as exposure to lead. A recent string of studies from all over the world suggests that common air pollutants such as black carbon, particulate matter and ozone can negatively affect vocabulary, reaction times and even overall intelligence. The most recent of these studies found that New York City five-year-olds who were exposed to higher levels of urban air pollutants known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) while in the womb exhibited an IQ four points lower than those subjected to less PAH. Alarmingly, "the drop was similar to that seen in exposure to low levels of lead," says epidemiologist Frederica Perera, director of the Columbia Center for Children's Environ­mental Health and head author of the study, in which mothers wore personal air monitors during their pregnancy. The IQ change was enough of a dip to affect school per­formance and scores on standardized tests. [More]

New Culprits in Chronic Pain (preview)

Helen's left foot slipped off the clutch on impact, twisting her ankle against the car's floorboard. It felt like a minor sprain at the time, she recalls, but the pain never subsided. Instead it intensified. Eventually, the slightest touch, even the gentle brush of bed linen, shot electric flames up her leg. "I was in so much pain I could not speak, yet inside I was screaming," wrote the young Englishwoman in an online journal of the mysterious condi-tion that would torment her for the next three years. The chronic pain suffered by people like Helen is different from the warning slap of acute pain. Acute pain is the body's most alarming, intense sensation, whose purpose is to stop us from further injuring ourselves. This type of pain is also called pathological pain because an external cause, such as tissue damage, produces the signals that travel the nervous system to the brain, where they are perceived as pain. But imagine if the gut-wrenching agony of a real injury never stopped, even after the wound healed, or if everyday sensations became excruciating: "I was unable to shower ... the water felt like daggers," Helen remembers. "The vibrations in a car, someone walking across floorboards, people talking, a gentle breeze … would set off the uncontrollable pain. Common painkillers ... even morphine had no effect. It was like my mind was playing tricks on me." [More]

A Plastic Albatross

With awful beauty, photographer Chris Jordan reveals how garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean is killing albatross chicks by the thousands

How Hard Has the Recession Hit Environmental Activist Groups?

Dear EarthTalk: Is it true that environmental non-profits have been hit hard by the economic downturn, and has this had an impact on their effectiveness? -- Bridget W., Bainbridge Island, WA [More]

What Would Failure at Copenhagen Mean for Climate Change?

This is the consequence of failure at Copenhagen: A marked shift in scientific effort from solving global warming to adapting to its consequences, a hodge-podge of uncoordinated local efforts to trim emissions - none of which deliver the necessary cuts - and an altered climate. [More]

Boost Your Creativity with Eye Movement

[More]

New Slashdot 

Synthetic Stone DVD Claimed To Last 1,000 Years

Lucas123 writes "A start-up launched a new DVD archive product this week: a disc that it says will hold its data for 1,000 years. The company, Cranberry, says its DiamonDisc product, which can be used in any standard DVD player, is not subject to deterioration from heat, UV rays or material rot due to humidity or other elements because it has no dyes, adhesives or reflective materials like standard DVD discs, and its discs are made from a vastly more durable synthetic stone. Data is laid down on the platter much in the same way as a standard DVD disc, but with DiamonDisc the burner etches much deeper pits. Cranberry said it is also working on producing a Blu-ray version of its 1,000-year disc." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Flash Vulnerability Found, Adobe Says No Fix Forthcoming

An anonymous reader writes "Security researchers at Foreground Security have found an issue with Adobe Flash. Any site that allows files to be uploaded could be vulnerable to this issue (whether they serve Flash or not!). Adobe has said that no easy fix exists and no patch is forthcoming. Adobe puts the responsibility on the website administrators themselves to fix this problem, but they themselves seem to be vulnerable to these problems. Every user with Flash installed is vulnerable to this new type of attack and — until IT administrators fix their sites — will continue to be." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Recovering the Slums of the Internet?

turtleshadow writes "Brian Krebs of Security Fix Blog analyzed the McColo Spamming one year later and asks an interesting question: 'How does one renovate and recoup the lost trust to the slums of the Internet and reclaim back all the domains and IP's that have been blacklisted?' Indeed, the economic benefits abound when a huge swath of illegal and annoying activity ceases — but given the basic design of the Internet, what happens over the long run to IP space and DNS when hosting companies come and go and vary in their trustworthiness? So too, now Geocities is dead [as a business], but does that still live in your filter list? It still appears in OpenDNS under several policy categories. How, in a few years, will I tell if some Hosting/Colo sold me Whitechapel Road/Ventura Avenue for Mayfair/Boardwalk prices, and no one is going to accept my mail from a former slum? When do you, if ever, roll back the blacklists and filters for 'dead' threats and spammers?" Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Keeping Pacemakers Safe From Hackers

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and the French National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control have now developed a scheme for protecting implantable medical devices against wireless attacks. The approach relies on using ultrasound waves to determine the exact distance between a medical device and the wireless reader attempting to communicate with it." I had no idea that things have gotten so bad that hearts are being hacked. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Verizon Doubles Early Termination Fee and More

An anonymous reader writes "If you buy a smartphone through Verizon, be prepared for an increase in the early termination fee. Verizon is doubling the phone-subsidy to $350. What's more, is that Verizon also actively charges customers for accidental data transmissions of as little as 0.02kb. 'They configure the phones to have multiple easily hit keystrokes to launch 'Get it now' or 'Mobile Web'—usually a single key like an arrow key. [...] The instant you call the function, they charge you the data fee. We cancel these unintended requests as fast as we can hit the End key, but it doesn't matter; they've told me that ANY data--even one kilobyte--is billed as 1MB. The damage is done.'" Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MPAA Shuts Down Town's Municipal WiFi Over 1 Download

nam37 writes with this BoingBoing snippet "The MPAA has successfully shut down an entire town's municipal WiFi because a single user was found to be downloading a copyrighted movie. Rather than being embarrassed by this gross example of collective punishment (a practice outlawed in the Geneva conventions) against Coshocton, OH, the MPAA's spokeslizard took the opportunity to cry poor (even though the studios are bringing in record box-office and aftermarket receipts)." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

HTTP Intermediary Layer From Google Could Dramatically Speed Up the Web

grmoc writes "As part of the 'Let's make the web faster' initiative, we (a few engineers — including me! — at Google, and hopefully people all across the community soon!) are experimenting with alternative protocols to help reduce the latency of Web pages. One of these experiments is SPDY (pronounced 'SPeeDY'), an application-layer protocol (essentially a shim between HTTP and the bits on the wire) for transporting content over the web, designed specifically for minimal latency. In addition to a rough specification for the protocol, we have hacked SPDY into the Google Chrome browser (because it's what we're familiar with) and a simple server testbed. Using these hacked up bits, we compared the performance of many of the top 25 and top 300 websites over both HTTP and SPDY, and have observed those pages load, on average, about twice as fast using SPDY. Thats not bad! We hope to engage the open source community to contribute ideas, feedback, code (we've open sourced the protocol, etc!), and test results." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

How To DDoS a Federal Wiretap

alphadogg writes "Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania say they've discovered a way to circumvent the networking technology used by law enforcement to tap phone lines in the US. The flaws they've found 'represent a serious threat to the accuracy and completeness of wiretap records used for both criminal investigation and as evidence in trial,' the researchers say in their paper, set to be presented Thursday at a computer security conference in Chicago. Following up on earlier work on evading analog wiretap devices called loop extenders, the Penn researchers took a deep look at the newer technical standards used to enable wiretapping on telecommunication switches. They found that while these newer devices probably don't suffer from many of the bugs they'd found in the loop extender world, they do introduce new flaws. In fact, wiretaps could probably be rendered useless if the connection between the switches and law enforcement are overwhelmed with useless data, something known as a denial of service (DOS) attack." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

StarCraft AI Competition Announced

bgweber writes "The 2010 conference on Artificial Intelligence and Interactive Digital Entertainment (AIIDE 2010) will be hosting a StarCraft AI competition as part of the conference program. This competition enables academic researchers to evaluate their AI systems in a robust, commercial RTS environment. The competition will be held in the weeks leading up to the conference. The final matches will be held live at the conference with commentary. Exhibition matches will also be held between skilled human players and the top-performing bots." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

openSUSE 11.2 Released

An anonymous reader tips news that openSUSE 11.2 has reached its official release. You can get it from their download page, or just grab the torrents (32-bit, 64-bit). "openSUSE 11.2 will come with the latest version 2.6.31 of the Linux kernel, the beating heart of every openSUSE system. The default file system of openSUSE will be switched to the new Ext4 as well. Of course, openSUSE will continue to support Ext3 and other filesystems — but on install, new partitions will automatically be designated Ext4. ... Desktops and servers can use the same kernel, but it's better to tune the kernel for the job at hand. That's why openSUSE now includes a desktop kernel specially tuned for desktop users. ... In addition to the work of the openSUSE Project in the desktop, openSUSE 11.2 includes the latest versions of the two desktop environments, KDE 4.3 and GNOME 2.28. KDE users will enjoy the new Firefox KDE integration, OpenOffice.org KDE4 integration, consistent KDE artwork and all standard applications being ported to KDE4 including KNetworkManager, Amarok, Digikam, k3b, Konversation and more." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Easing the Job of Family Tech Support?

DarkDevil writes "Ever since I was introduced to computers at a very young age, I've been the resident tech support for a household of 7 users. I've been in a cycle for the last ~8 years where something happens to my parents' computer, I spend a week or two trying to non-destructively fix the problem (and try to explain to the users what caused it and how to avoid it), and then if it's not easily fixed I'll reformat and start from scratch. Most often, the level of infection warrants a reformat, which usually ends up taking even more time to get the computer back to how my parents know how to use it. 4-8 months later, it happens again. Recently, I found ~380 instances of malware and 6 viruses. I only realized something was wrong with their computer after it slowed down the entire network whenever anyone used it. My question for Slashdot is: are there any resources out there that explain computer viruses, malware, adware, and general safe computer practices to non-technical people in an easy-to-digest format? The security flaws in my house are 9, 26, and ~50 years old, with no technical background aside from surfing the internet. Something in video format would be ideal as they are perfectly happy with our current arrangement and so it'll be hard to get them reading pages and pages of technical papers." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MPAA Asks Again For Control Of TV Analog Ports

suraj.sun passes along this excerpt from the Consumerist: "The Motion Picture Association of American wants to rent movies to TV viewers earlier in the release window, but they don't want anyone potentially streaming that video out to other appliances. That's why last week they went back to the FCC to once again ask for the power to disable analog ports on consumer television sets. This capability is called selectable output control or SOC, and the FCC banned it back in 2003. SOC would allow 'service operators, such as cable companies, to turn off analog outputs on consumer electronics devices, only allowing digital plugs' such as HDMI. The MPAA is arguing that if they could directly turn those plugs on and off, they could offer more goods to consumers." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

NASA, European Space Agency Want To Go To Mars

coondoggie writes "NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are aiming to cooperate on all manner of robotic orbiters, landers and exploration devices for a future trip to Mars. Specifically, NASA and ESA recently agreed to consider the establishment of a new joint initiative to define and implement their scientific, programmatic, and technological goals for the exploration of Mars. The program would focus on several launch opportunities with landers and orbiters conducting astrobiological, geological, geophysical, climatological, and other high-priority investigations and aiming at returning samples from Mars in the mid-2020s." Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Intel and AMD Settle Antitrust, Patent Lawsuits

Kohenkatz writes "Intel has agreed to pay $1.25 billion to AMD. In return, AMD will drop its lawsuits about patent and antitrust complaints. The two companies released this joint statement: 'While the relationship between the two companies has been difficult in the past, this agreement ends the legal disputes and enables the companies to focus all of our efforts on product innovation and development.' The press release also says, 'Under terms of the agreement, AMD and Intel obtain patent rights from a new 5-year cross license agreement,' and that 'Intel and AMD will give up any claims of breach from the previous license agreement.'" Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Your Opinion Counts At CNN — But Should It?

theodp writes "Some people love how CNN employs Twitter to engage its audience. Not Steve Dahl. 'I am not interested in the take of @stinky on the Fort Hood shootings or any other current events,' complains Dahl of the access the media gives to Internet know-it-alls. 'I am watching CNN because I expect them to gather the news, not act as a clearinghouse for any bonehead with a computer, a cable modem and a half-baked opinion.'" Read more of this story at Slashdot.

New SquidooCool Blog 

The $2000 Lens Challenge

#1 Most Important Thing… About Guestbooks

Pinging Your Lenses

New Squidoo Job – More Money For Lensmasters $

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