Sourdough - Slashdot User

Comment I've been expecting this. No big deal. (Score 1) 722

by Sourdough on Thursday July 14, 2011 @03:21PM (#36766600) Attached to: Netflix Deflects Rage Over Price Increase

I started as a Netflix DVD customer about six years ago. Then I was paying $20/mo for the 3-at-a-time service. At some point, they informed me they were dropping the price down to $17 a month. Cool. Then they added a streaming service for free. There wasn't much on it, there was no Mac support, quality was so-so, but I used it sometimes. Cool. Progressively, the quality of the streaming improved, support was added for tons of set-to boxes and Macs, and the amount of content has been continuously growing. At some point in there the price went back up to the $20/mo I was paying when I first signed up. Oh well. Now I watch far more on instant than on DVD. When I got the email about the latest price increases, I changed my subscription from 3-at-a-time to 2-at-a-time DVDs, and now I'm still paying $20 a month.

I've got better service now than I did six years ago and I'm still paying the same price. I'm not complaining.

Man Put On "No-Fly List" While In Air To NYC 300

Posted by samzenpus on Friday April 23, 2010 @03:24PM from the beware-the-list-refresh dept.

An unnamed man flying from Nigeria to New York City found out he was added to a no-fly list somewhere above the Atlantic Ocean, when the plane stopped to refuel in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Officials won't say what he did or why he was added to the list after he had already boarded a flight. He was not immediately charged with a crime and Customs and Border Protection will only say that he is a "potential person of interest." From the article: "The man, a citizen of Gambia, was not on the no-fly list when he boarded the aircraft in Dakar, Senegal, said a US official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the issue publicly."

OpenSSL 1.0.0 Released 105

Posted by Soulskill on Monday March 29, 2010 @04:31PM from the sweet-when-is-2.0 dept.

hardaker writes "After over 11 years of development since the start of the OpenSSL Project (1998-12-23), OpenSSL version 1.0.0 has finally hit the shelves of the free-for-all store."

The 1-Second Linux Boot 156

Posted by timothy on Friday February 26, 2010 @10:53PM from the unexamined-boot-is-not-worth-booting dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Less than one second Linux boot! This video shows an OMAP3530 capturing video data from a camera and rendering it to an LCD display — the video appears on the LCD display in less than a second from reset."

Apple Patches Massive Holes In OS X 246

Posted by timothy on Wednesday January 20, 2010 @05:23PM from the well-it-wouldn't-be-polite-to-patch-windows dept.

Trailrunner7 writes with this snippet from ThreatPost: "Apple's first Mac OS X security update for 2010 is out, providing cover for at least 12 serious vulnerabilities. The update, rated critical, plugs security holes that could lead to code execution vulnerabilities if a Mac user is tricked into opening audio files or surfing to a rigged Web site." Hit the link for a list of the highlights among these fixes.

Machines Almost Pass Mass Turing Test 580

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday October 13, 2008 @11:28AM

dewilso4 writes "Of the five computer finalists at this year's Loebner prize Turing Test, at least three managed to fool humans into thinking they were human conversationalists. Ready to speak about subjects ranging from Eminem to Slaughterhouse Five and everything in between, these machines are showing they we're merely a clock cycle away from true AI. '... I was fooled. I mistook Eugene for a real human being. In fact, and perhaps this is worse, he was so convincing that I assumed that the human being with whom I was simultaneously conversing was a computer.' Another of the entrants, Jabberwacky, can apparently even woo the ladies: 'Some of its conversational partners confide in it every day; one conversation, with a teenaged girl, lasted 11 hours.' The winning submission this year, Elbot, fooled 25% of judges into thinking he was human. The threshold for the $100K prize is 30%. Maybe next year ..."

Study Links Personal Music Players To Hearing Loss 405

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday October 13, 2008 @10:45AM from the time-for-this-again dept.

fprintf writes "A recent NY Times article discusses links between personal music players and hearing loss. This is not anything new; personally, I have hearing loss from listening to my Sony Walkman cassette player many years ago. However, given the widespread use of the personal music players, I see people using earbuds everywhere; is there a technical solution to the potential danger?"

New MacBook Case Leak Rumors 243

Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday October 13, 2008 @10:01AM from the dear-god-i-need-a-new-machine dept.

Someone noted that there are more macbook case leaks which look to all but confirm a new MacBook and possibly a MacBook Pro expected to be announced for later this week. There seem to be fewer ports, and no leaks of a 17" aircraft carrier laptop.

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