buzzinglikeafridge - Slashdot User

Comment Re:I Left Out The Best Part (Score 2, Informative) 341

by buzzinglikeafridge on Friday October 08, 2010 @09:20AM (#33834998) Attached to: Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli's AGW Witch Hunt Continues

Here's a link to an AP article on local News Radio site: http://wtop.com/?sid=1949669&nid=25 This is not going to lower the cost of education in Virginia. State funded schools could use the money being wasted on this posturing to teach kids instead of helping the deluded SUV drivers of the world to have a clear conscience.

Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli's AGW Witch Hunt Continues 341

Posted by Soulskill on Friday October 08, 2010 @08:49AM from the time-to-mann-up dept.

eldavojohn writes "A letter from Representative Edward Markey outlines Ken Cuccinelli's latest civil investigative demand targeting 39 people instead of just Michael Mann. You may recall that the original investigation was quashed by a judge, but the latest request demands records from people seemingly unrelated to Mann, including an Indian glaciologist. The Bad Astronomer calls Cuccinelli out in a similar manner and lists Cuccinelli's doubts about Mann's papers, including, 'Specifically, but without limitation, some of the conclusions of the papers demonstrate a complete lack of rigor regarding the statistical analysis of the alleged data, meaning that the result reported lacked statistical significance without a specific statement to that effect.' The school that hosted the research announced the new investigation, and the Union of Concerned Scientists accuses him of harassing scientists."

Submission + - Sequoia Disclosing Voting System Source to D.C. (washingtonpost.com)

Submitted by buzzinglikeafridge on Saturday June 06, 2009 @11:03PM

buzzinglikeafridge writes: After Sequoia voting machines registered more votes than there were voters in D.C.'s primaries last September and the city threatened a lawsuit as a result, the company agreed to disclose technical details of the system (including source code) to the city. Although this isn't the first time the company has disclosed the source code of its' machines, it is the first time the machine's blueprints will be handed over as well.

Colbert Wins Space Station Name Contest 471

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Monday March 23, 2009 @07:25PM from the unintended-consequences dept.

As we speculated a couple of weeks back, it has come to pass. Reader mknewman writes to tell us that comedian Stephen Colbert has won the vote to have his name immortalized (or at least until it crashes) as the moniker on NASA's newest addition to the International Space Station. We can but wonder what NASA will do now. "NASA's mistake was allowing write-ins. Colbert urged viewers of his Comedy Central show, 'The Colbert Report' to write in his name. And they complied, with 230,539 votes. That clobbered Serenity, one of the NASA choices, by more than 40,000 votes. Nearly 1.2 million votes were cast by the time the contest ended Friday."

How Do Militaries Treat Their Nerds? 426

Posted by kdawson on Friday March 13, 2009 @11:56AM from the permission-to-sudo-sir dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Cyber Warfare is a hot topic these days. A major reorganization may be looming, but a critical component is a culture where technologists can thrive. Two recent articles address this subject. Lieutenant Colonel Greg Conti and Colonel Buck Surdu recently published an article in the latest DoD IA Newsletter stating that 'The Army, Navy, and Air Force all maintain cyberwarfare components, but these organizations exist as ill-fitting appendages (PDF, pg. 14) that attempt to operate in inhospitable cultures where technical expertise is not recognized, cultivated, or completely understood.' In his TaoSecurity Blog Richard Bejtlich added 'When I left the Air Force in early 2001, I was the 31st of the last 32 eligible company grade officers in the Air Force Information Warfare Center to separate from the Air Force rather than take a new nontechnical assignment.' So, Slashdot, how has the military treated you and your technical friends? What changes are needed?"

Comment They just don't want you to watch on your TV (Score 1) 575

by buzzinglikeafridge on Monday March 02, 2009 @01:16PM (#27041663) Attached to: Uproar Over Netflix's New Instant Viewer

I have used both the Silverlight and WMP based players and haven't noticed that much of a difference. I do most of my viewing on a 14" screen however which doesn't lend itself to resolution critiques. I do have my desktop hooked to my TV (analog) and have watched netflix on that, but I literally had to fool my video card into thinking I had a VGA monitor attached (VGA Dummy), that's how intrusive the viewer is.

It seems like if they were limiting bandwidth with the new player it would be another way to discourage this practice of viewing on your TV, as well as save their servers some work.

I'm currently waiting to try Boxee on my desktop (dual boot ubuntu/XP), but don't know if a 1.3Ghz P4 will handle it. That is one thing I have to hand to the netflix player as it will run on computers that can't even handle hulu.

Uproar Over Netflix's New Instant Viewer 575

Posted by kdawson on Sunday March 01, 2009 @09:14PM from the one-way-beta dept.

almechist writes "Many Netflix customers are up in arms over the new instant-watch player powered by Microsoft's Silverlight. The official Netflix blog is full of complaints from users who decry not only the new player's quality but also the way it's being distributed, with many claiming they were deceived into downloading it. Once you opt for the new player, the old Windows Media based player won't function, not on any computer associated with the account. The new player is supposedly still beta, but NF members are strongly encouraged (some say tricked) by NF into the so-called 'upgrade,' which is permanent — there is no way to opt out. The marked decrease in video quality seen by those who have switched is perhaps not surprising, since the old player could utilize bit streams up to twice as fast as the new one, but this information is nowhere given out by NF. So far NF has been answering all complaints with variations on 'tough luck pal, you're stuck with it,' but many customers are so disgusted they're ready to cancel their NF membership. This could be a public relations disaster in the making for Netflix."

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