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Comment Re:Why isn't the album a single song? (Score 2) 242

IIRC, there's a legal/contractual definition of an LP (versus an EP) and a minimum number of tracks need to feature for it to be properly treated as an album. The prog rock band The Mars Volta had a song on one of their albums which was 30 minutes in total, but the album would only consist of 3 or 4 distinct songs despite the total length being nearly 70 minutes. In the end they had to split the 30 minute track into half a dozen "movements" with separate names, which all flowed together when played (eg. no silence before/after each movement), specifically to get around this issue.

Movies

IMAX Embraces Virtual Reality, To Open Six VR Theaters This Year (theverge.com) 32

An anonymous reader writes: IMAX is getting into the virtual reality business. Tthe company has announced that it is teaming up with Google to build cinema-quality virtual reality video cameras. It is also planning to launch virtual reality "locations." The cinemas will be opened in shopping malls, much like traditional movie theatres. There are six reportedly planned for this year, including in Los Angeles and China. From the Verge report: IMAX chief executive Richard Gelfond told The WSJ that he imagined that the VR content would be tied to existing movie franchises, that they would last around 10 minutes and cost between $7 and $10. The idea, suggests Gelfond, is to create a VR experience that's better than what you can get at home -- the same way that a movie theater is better than your living room TV.

Comment Re:bring back the cane (Score 1) 408

They don't. In modern Britain, the highest earners are people like football players (and their wives), reality TV 'stars', pop stars, etc. If you want to work hard and go to university, you'll be rewarded with thousands of pounds in debt (which you'll probably be paying off when you're 50) and the chance to dive into an economy which is falling headfirst into the toilet. Schools should cut their losses and just teach soccer skills and beauty techniques.

Power

Computers Causing 2nd Hump In Peak Power Demand 375

Hugh Pickens writes "Traditional peak power hours — the time during the day when power demand shoots up — run from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. when air conditioning begins to ramp up and people start heading for malls and home but utilities are now seeing another peak power problem evolve with a second surge that runs from about 8 p.m. to 9 p.m. when people head toward their big screen TVs and home computers. 'It is [not] so much a peak as it is a plateau,' says Andrew Tang, senior director of the smart energy web at Pacific Gas & Electric. '8 p.m. is kind of a recent phenomenon.' Providing power during the peak hours is already a costly proposition because approximately 10 percent of the existing generating capacity only gets used about 50 hours a year: Most of the time, that expensive capital equipment sits idle waiting for a crisis. Efforts to reduce demand are already underway with TV manufacturers working to reduce the power consumption in LCD and plasma while Intel and PC manufacturers are cranking down computer power consumption. 'Without a doubt, there's demand' for green PCs, says Rick Chernick, CEO of HP partner Connecting Point, adding that the need to be green is especially noticeable among medical industry enterprise customers."
The Internet

pizza.com Sold For $2.6m 243

f8d noted a beeb bit on the fact that the pizza.com domain name was sold for a ridiculous 2.6m bucks. Can there be a bubble and a recession at the same time, or do the two cancel each other out like Penn & Teller?
Television

David X. Cohen of Futurama Talks About the Movie 141

Joel Keller writes "I conducted a brief interview with David X. Cohen, EP and show-runner for Futurama, about the release of the new DVD, "Futurama: Bender's Big Score," as well as the return of his show to TV. The interview was posted to TV Squad this morning. In it, Cohen talks about how the movies will be split up into episodes, some of the inside references that they inserted for the die-hards, and a quick preview of what the second Futurama movie is going to be about."
Microsoft

Microsoft's HD Photo to Become JPEG Standard? 369

Mortimer.CA writes "Ars Technica is reporting that Microsoft has submitted their HD Photo to the JPEG committee: 'Microsoft's ongoing attempt to establish its own photo format as a JPEG alternative (and potential successor) took another step forward today when the JPEG standards group agreed to consider HD Photo (originally named Windows Media Photo) as a standard. If successful, the new file standard will be known as JPEG XR.' Microsoft has made a 'commitment to make its patents that are required to implement the specification available without charge.' While JPEG 2000 exists, HD Photo has several advantages (not the least of which is a lot less CPU power is needed). Is this a big of an issue as ODF/OOXML?"
Privacy

Why Web Pirates Can't Be Touched 402

gwoodrow writes "Forbes has a brief article about, essentially, the ultimate futility of fighting online pirates. From the article: 'As the world's largest repository of BitTorrent files, ThePirateBay.org helps millions of users around the world share copyrighted movies, music and other files — without paying for them ... That's illegal, of course — at least it is in the U.S. But when Time Warner's (nyse: TWX — news — people ) Warner Bros. studio accused them of breaking U.S. copyright law in 2005, the pirates gleefully reminded the movie company that they didn't live in America, but rather in the land of vikings, reindeer, Aurora Borealis and cute blond girls.' The article also touches on the many YouTube clones and AllofMP3.com."
Slashback

Slashback: Net Neutrality, Bugged Coins, and Pawns 102

Slashback tonight brings some clarifications and updates to previous Slashdot stories, including: anti-Net-neutrality article modified; no bugged Canadian coins; a tech program for women in Silicon Valley; Pirate Bay and Sealand; and Microsoft evangelist apologizes for "pawns" comment. Read on for details.

Miyamoto on Wiimakes, Dead-End Design 81

GameDaily is reporting on an interview that Nintendo Dream scored with legendary designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Mr. Miyamoto spoke about the future of design and Wii gaming during the interview, touching on several interesting topics. Older Gamecube titles, for example, may be remade for the Wii at some point in the future to take advantage of the console's unique control scheme. There are no announcements of which titles might see this treatment, but he seemed confident that if it does happen the pricepoint would be rather low. In some more high-level comments, Mr. Miyamoto stated that game designers have come to a dead-end as regards gaming today. Not sparing his own company, the designer thinks that future titles will have to come at gaming from a very different perspective if they are to succeed.

Microsoft in Talks To Acquire Ebay 235

thatedeguy writes "The NY Post is reporting that Microsoft and Ebay are in talks for the online auction house to join the Microsoft family." That said, the talks aren't going that well at the moment. From the article: " Sources indicate that the talks, while still active, have cooled somewhat in the last two weeks as executives considered antitrust issues. It is unclear what the full impact of yesterday's advertising and search alliance between Yahoo! and eBay will be for talks between MSN and eBay. One source close to the matter suggested the Yahoo-eBay tie-up would not stop Microsoft from pursuing the online auctioneer."

Google Opens Sydney Office, Internship Program 110

An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet is reporting that Google has kicked off an internship program that will see Australian university students work in projects in the company's Sydney office. Google's local head of engineering, Lars Rasmussen, said 5-10 spots would be made available, with both technical and non-technical positions on offer. ZDNet Australia also has pictures of the official opening of Google's Sydney office."

Nintendo Promises 3rd Party Support 130

Eurogamer reports on claims by George Harrison (NoA's Senior VP for Marketing) that the Revolution will feature extensive third-party support in the coming years. From the article: "'One of the lessons we tried to learn from GameCube was that we kept things too close. And so as we got ready to launch, we had some of our own great games but third parties were kind of behind the eight ball in terms of being able to have games ready,' Harrison stated. In terms of early support for the Revolution, which launches this year alongside Sony's PS3, third party software ought to be available in abundance, Harrison confirming 'We've got more than 1,000 developer kits including the controller kits, out, so there should be plenty there.'"

The Simpson's Movie Confirmed 334

bagsc writes "BBC News reports Twentieth Centruy Fox confirms The Simpsons are going to the movies! Should hit theatres in 2007." From the article: "A 25-second trailer for the film has been shown to US audiences at screenings of Ice Age: The Meltdown, promising to introduce 'the greatest hero in American history'. It then cut to Homer Simpson, wearing only his underwear, who admitted: 'I forgot what I was supposed to say.'"

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