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Submission + - Surge Pricing on Groceries (npr.org)

loveandpeace writes: In what is clearly a dystopian capitalistâ(TM)s dream, Wal-Mart is installing electronic shelf labels to be able to change the prices on products in response to demand, possibly while they are in your cart. From the article: âoeIf itâ(TM)s hot outside, we can raise the price of water and ice cream.â

Releasing this during a national heat wave in the US is just saying the quiet part out loud. Theyâ(TM)ll call it surge pricing, but itâ(TM)s actually price gouging. Itâ(TM)s not hard to imagine another Ticketmaster fiasco scenario, but this time for water.

Submission + - Surge Pricing on Groceries (npr.org)

loveandpeace writes: Straight out of 1984, Firebreak, and every other dystopian capitalism novel ever, Wal-mart is adopting electronic shelf labels to allow store-wide price changes in response to demand.

From the article:
âoeIf itâ(TM)s hot outside, we can raise the price of water and ice cream. If there's something thatâ(TM)s close to the expiration date, we can lower the price â" thatâ(TM)s the good news,â said Phil Lempert, a grocery industry analyst

Security

RDS Protocol Bug Creates a Linux Kernel Hole, Now Fixed 89

Trailrunner7 writes "The open-source Linux operating system contains a serious security flaw that can be exploited to gain superuser rights on a target system. The vulnerability, in the Linux implementation of the Reliable Datagram Sockets (RDS) protocol, affects unpatched versions of the Linux kernel, starting from 2.6.30, where the RDS protocol was first included." The article goes on to say, though, that "Linux installations are only vulnerable if the CONFIG_RDS kernel configuration option is set, and if there are no restrictions on unprivileged users loading packet family modules, as is the case on most stock distributions," and that Linus Torvalds has committed a fix.

Comment Re:yeah right (Score 1) 581

> Don't ever judge a console's power by its first gen games.

Certainly!
I realize that Gundam game is probably a poorly programmed piece of crap. And you can say current Windows games are not taking advantage of hyperthreading or dual cores, much less quad cores ... But! Developers will add more and more detail and complexity. As much as optimization and programming tricks can help, there's only so much they can do. Eventually they'll squeeze out everything they can out of fixed platform consoles.

And seriously the RAM specs alone say devs can hit that ceiling quick:
* 256MB XDR Main RAM @3.2GHz
* 256MB GDDR3 VRAM @700MHz

Comment Re:only winner (Score 4, Insightful) 1194

Many thanks for pointing out that when the environment wins, so does everyone else.

While it might not be the cheapest technology out there, even the article that allegedly "debunk" the cost effectiveness of hybrid technology goes a long way to show that environmental options are not the money-draining nightmare they have been presented to be.

Comment Did you RTFM? (Score 2, Informative) 87

I've heard the wxPython bindings are nice for the GUI bits, so I downloaded those,

Did you install wxPython before BoaConstructor? I have installed BoaConstructor successfully. BoaConstructor has prerequisites that don't come in the install package. Look at the install docs agains and figure it out. Once you figure it out write an installer helper program for BoaConstructor in Python and open source it.

User Journal

Journal Journal: smart bandages detect bacteria on contact

another pending rejection:
M.I.T.'s Technology Review is carrying a story on smart bandages. The bandage, applied directly to a wound, changes color when bacteria are identified, with the color indicating the type of bacteria present -- red for e coli, for example. The technology is poised to make its way to places other than triage and emergency rooms and first a
User Journal

Journal Journal: wtf??

i was watching a story, headlined: MS to release its own DVD format, and waiting for the commetn functions to be enabled when the thing disappeared. the whole freakin story.
User Journal

Journal Journal: another pending rejection

i submitted a story on jessamyn's technically legal signs for libraries. i really enjoyed her twist on it being illegal to tell patrons when the FBI snoops into patron records (the signs only tell you they haven't been there). bully for jessamyn and all librarians (in any profession) for helping resist the Patriot Act.
User Journal

Journal Journal: movies

off to see the two towers this afternoon with my geek friends. and yes, the good news is that i have cable modem in the new place: what it would take to get me to downgrade is beyond my imagining.
User Journal

Journal Journal: feeling dumb

okay. where do i find the "make someone a friend" link? update: i copied the link from someone's comment: http://slashdot.org/zoo.pl?op=check&type=friend&uid=628741 and put in the correct user id. i found the correct user id by going to the frend's journals link under my journal and searching for the nickname of a friend. so, while it's sort of cheating and is a bit roundabout, it works.

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