A Sphero. They are extra cool, programmable, and there is a platform for people to make and share educational content

Chess as a game also teaches people how to be compete and be competitive and be good losers and good winners, and how to learn from their mistakes, and how teach others, and how to have fun, play games and learn at the same time. And it builds self confidence. I'm sure there is an algorithm for that, but I pity the person who needs to spend the time to derive it. (though i don't pity the person who chooses to figure it out, just not one who needs to/) You are suggesting chess as a means to a certain end, but chess is a process and an end and means all in one. You simple minded coders. So funny with your programs and such. We appreciate your efforts and achievements but not everything has to be done in code, not everything has to be programmable, not everything has to be networked.

I could be one how does one do so?

I am a full-time chess coach for K-5 kids. I have over 200 students that I see every week. At first I though this article was going to address the very real demand for more skilled coaches in K-5 schools. Instead, the article is trying to push a software/hardware solution that would make it "easier" to adjudicate games and tournaments. This solution is addressing a problem that doesn't actually exist.

Here is the problem they present as an example: an 'argument' between two students about whether a position is checkmate. The presented solution: a variety of software/hardware that will make it easier to 'referee' the position. This is ridiculous. When two students are having an argument, figuring out whether there is checkmate on the board is usually the easiest problem to solve. Getting the students to calm down and be good sports is the hard part.

In addition, there is no shortage of adjudication at tournaments. One or two coaches can easily handle the problems of 300+ students in a tournament. We don't need legions of people equipped with apps to go watch children's games. To make the article even more irrelevant, most tournaments across the world are run with a "non-interference" rule. This means that the tournament staff cannot actually comment on whether a position is checkmate. It is up to the students to come to a decision on their own, agree and report. The coaches with let them report an incorrect result if that is what they agree on. It is part of the game. So the coach doesn't actually need to know whether the position is really checkmate.

The only time an actual ruling needs to be passed is if the students can't come to an agreement. This is very rare and will usually only happen 1 in 2000 games or so. We don't need to RDIF tag all of our 16000+ tournament pieces just so that 1 in 2000 games someone who knows nothing about chess can make an accurate ruling. We'll just bring over an expert in those cases.

A quick aside to those questioning the benefits of K-5 chess, it is hugely beneficial to students. Sure, it would be great if they spent the time they did on chess on other things, like algorithms or biology. However, most students don't get super worked up about algorithms. They aren't going to willingly spend 15 hours a week on algorithms. They will happily spend that time on chess however, and chess is teaching them a lot of the same skills. Critical thinking, carefulness, perseverance, recovering from mistakes, cause and effect, and on, and on.

The most important skill that students learn is how much effort you have to put into something in order to really become an expert. Nothing else a child does in their K-12 years really teaches them that in order to be an expert, you need to spend years and years working on it. Chess is very good at driving this point home.

Anyone saying things like "every minute playing chess would be better spent learning about algorithms, computer programming, or biology." has clearly never sat a kindergartener down and try to teach them algorithms. Every day. For a year. Teach them chess. They will grasp it. They will want to learn. It is fun. They will gain skills that you wouldn't be able to impart in other ways.

But you don't need to take my word on it. The benefits of chess have been have been well studied. Scholastic chess is one of the few things that has been proven to consistently increase academic performance, collage success and future income.

"Google, Dropbox, and Others Forge Patent 'Arms Control Pact' " How dare they fake a patent in order to control who gets to make treaties concerning armaments!! I feel like any nation-state or people should have a right to make such agreements when ever they choose to, with whomever they wish. This is just another grab by greedy corporations. Or are they seriously announcing the presence in international warfarehttp://tech.slashdot.org/story/14/07/11/0138219/google-dropbox-and-others-forge-patent-arms-control-pact# and politics?

Maybe we should realize that not everything needs to be computerized and networked and the like. Not everything needs to be "smart".

Net Gun would only work for low flying, slow speed ones (unless you have a huge net.) Same problem one would have with birdshot. Other anti-drone/UAV tech is needed. But how does one encourage the development of anti-drone technology. I assume various militaries are either trying to develop or have developed some technologies/strategies to combat drones (but are keeping them closely held until they need them (or I am over-estimating their foresight and intelligence.) But also, in the case of drones being used by police states or just by public/commercial entities (invading privacy, etc) I would appreciate the development of defense methods accessible to the common person. I can only guess based on theory and sci-fi, but I can't think of too many different avenues for defense against drones. One is just stealth/camouflage, but I assume it is hard to hide from infrared or just an over abundance of cameras (especially if those cameras are hard to detect.) .So like while roofs would prevent basic cameras, thermal shielding of some sort would be needed for infrared or heat detecting ones. Plus, in the case of say a guerrilla war/rebellion/protest/revolution/etc mobility is an issue and big, roofed buildings are obvious to other means of detection. One could target the control signal for controlled drones (hack the signal, disrupt it, replace it with your own) and either take over the drone or at least cause its failure. For autonomous ones, one would have to interfere with the signal transmitting the camera/detector feed, perhaps replace it with a false one. But I assume with the right precautions and encryption, these methods can be thwarted. Physically targeting drones would be the most likely solution, and at first would probably be some sort of seeking missile or counter-drone, but there are plenty of problems with this. High flying drones, if they are even detected, would be hard targets. Furthermore, drone vs missile combat would probably resemble current anti-aircraft/SAM combat, and would require both a means of drone detection/targeting and high number of anti-drone weapons. And as the technology improves, drones and their cameras are getting smaller and cheaper, and then it becomes a problem of numbers. If someone can deploy hundreds of cheap cameras, they only need one or a few to survive any counter-measures. Or they can become so small as to be virtually undetectable, or so numerous as to be ubiquitous, or taking the form of natural entities (birds, insects, etc.) and they can operate individual or as bot-swarms (each providing unique problems.) In this case, its becomes an arms race as measures and counter-measures and counter-counter-measures are developed. Perhaps the best countermeasure on both large scale and the small/personal scale will be drones themselves. Eventually, large areas (countries, cities, estates) would be protected by a "dome" of numerous, replaceable, small defense drones (similar to the ones in Stephenson's The Diamond Age.) And then personal defense drones shadowing and protecting individuals or perhaps even clouds of defensive nano-tech. (like in plenty of sci-fi stories,) But the development of countermeasures needs to be spurred on by necessity and needs both funding and technical means. So I would suggest just constantly invading the privacy of the rich. Hovering over their pools and outdoor parties, peering in their windows. Either they will get lopsided laws written that only prevent poor, citizens from using drones (which is entirely a possibility,) or a market will appear spurring the development of measures to thwart drones. Of course this could spiral out of control in many, many ways, from just private, semi-sanctioned police/security forces "protecting" their clients, to a robot vs human war (where maybe EMPs would be helpful.)

Dice claim they know what the audience wants too. The audience begs to differ

They have not yet made an acceptable response. therefore, f*** Beta. On my last few days here unless there is a total and unequivocal reversal of course on Dice' behalf

...the anally-inserted chilli-soaked cactus of haemorrhoid remedies

Move to Turkey. It'll be banned there. Rightfully. Fuck beta.

The internet is not like a series of trucks. However if robot trucks can take the people who designed Beta to Afghanistan,that would be nice.

Bookmarked, thanks. I'm in. 10 years on this site and they stab us in the front, I'm off.

Windows NT was supported on ARM. As well as Alpha. I've still got a copy of it somewhere...

I did consider that but I have fileservers on my home network so I dont really want to add an AP with an older encryption scheme. NSA may or may not be peering thru' my firewall device but I'd rather not have any neighbourhood loon with AirCrack getting free internet and/or file access as well