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Comment Re:I use them quite a lot (Score 1) 266

Exactly right. Google something, right-click-open-in-new-tab a bunch of interesting looking sites, then easily close them all down when you're finished. I use these very useful features multiple times every day. Please don't kill them.

That is exactly what I do, several times a day, so I would miss that feature. What is the motivation for the change?

Actually, if somebody writes an extension to put them back, it would be the best of both worlds. Those of us who use the feature will have it available, while those who don't use it will be running a leaner browser. (not sure how much leaner, though. ;^)
Earth

10 Percent of the World's Wilderness Has Been Lost Since 1990s (livescience.com) 150

Posted by BeauHD from the human-impact dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Live Science: Wilderness areas around the world have experienced catastrophic declines over the last two decades, with one-tenth of global wilderness lost since the 1990s, according to a new study. Since 1993, researchers found that a cumulative wilderness area twice the size of Alaska and half the size of the Amazon has been stripped and destroyed. The shrinking wilderness is due, in part, to human activity such as mining, logging, agriculture, and oil and gas exploration. The researchers said their findings underscore the need for international policies to recognize the value of wilderness and to protect wilderness areas from the threats they face. Central Africa and the Amazon saw the most wilderness decline, the researchers found. Of the roughly 1.27 million square miles (3.3 million square kilometers) of global wilderness lost, the Amazon accounted for nearly one-third, and 14 percent of the world's wilderness was lost from Central Africa, according to the study. The researchers determined that only 11.6 million square miles (30.1 million square km) of wilderness is left, which equates to just 20 percent of the Earth's total land mass. The study was published online in the journal Current Biology.

Submission + - Memory alloy bounces back into shape 10 million times (bbc.com)

Submitted by wrp103
wrp103 writes: Engineers have produced an alloy that springs back into shape even after it is bent more than 10 million times.
"Memory shape alloys" like this have many potential uses, but present incarnations are prone to wearing out.
The new material — made from nickel, titanium and copper — shatters previous records and is so resilient it could be useful in artificial heart valves, aircraft components or a new generation of solid-state refrigerators.
The work appears in Science Magazine.

Submission + - LA building's lights interfere with cellular network, FCC says (networkworld.com) 5

Submitted by alphadogg
alphadogg writes: When a certain Los Angeles office building lights up, it's a dark day for nearby cellphone users, according to the Federal Communications Commission. Fluorescent lights at Ernst & Young Plaza, a 41-story tower near the heart of downtown, emit frequencies that interfere with the Verizon Wireless 700MHz network, the agency said in a citation issued against the building owner. The FCC's message comes through loud and clear in the filing: the building owner could be fined up to $16,000 a day if it keeps using the interfering lights, up to a total of $112,500. The alleged violation could also lead to "criminal sanctions, including imprisonment," the citation says.

Comment Re:It's pretty simple (Score 4, Insightful) 371

by wrp103 (#45731701) Attached to: How a MacBook Camera Can Spy Without Lighting Up

It's pretty simple: if you have a device with a camera, just cover the camera with a little black tape and tada, no more spying

I use a Post-It, with the non-sticky part over the camera hole.

That way, when I actually do want to use the camera, I simply bend the paper back and expose the camera. When I am done, I fold it back. Replacements are pretty simple. One pad should last you a long time. ;^)

Supercomputing

National Weather Service Upgrades Storm-Tracking Supercomputers 34

Posted by Soulskill from the maybe-the-weatherman-will-stop-lying-to-me-now dept.
Nerval's Lobster writes "Just in time for hurricane season, the National Weather Service has finished upgrading the supercomputers it uses to track and model super-storms. 'These improvements are just the beginning and build on our previous success. They lay the foundation for further computing enhancements and more accurate forecast models that are within reach,' National Weather Service director Louis W. Uccellini wrote in a statement. The National Weather Service's 'Tide' supercomputer — along with its 'Gyre' backup — are capable of operating at a combined 213 teraflops. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which runs the Service, has asked for funding that would increase that supercomputing power even more, to 1,950 teraflops. The National Weather Service uses that hardware for projects such as the Hurricane Weather Research and Forecasting (HWRF) model, a complex bit of forecasting that allows the organization to more accurately predict storms' intensity and movement. The HWRF can leverage real-time data taken from Doppler radar installed in the NOAA's P3 hurricane hunter aircraft."
Science

Biological Computer Created at Stanford 89

Posted by samzenpus from the meat-machine dept.
sciencehabit writes "For the first time, synthetic biologists have created a genetic device that mimics one of the widgets on which all of modern electronics is based, the three-terminal transistor. Like standard electronic transistors, the new biological transistor is expected to work in many different biological circuit designs. This should make it easier for scientists to program cells to do everything from monitor pollutants and the progression of disease to turning on the output of medicines and biofuels."
Security

Did the Spamhaus DDoS Really Slow Down Global Internet Access? 70

Posted by samzenpus from the what's-to-blame dept.
CowboyRobot writes "Despite the headlines, the big denial of service attack may not have slowed the Internet after all. The argument against the original claim include the fact that reports of Internet users seeing slowdowns came not from service providers, but the DDoS mitigation service CloudFlare, which signed up Spamhaus as a customer last week. Also, multiple service providers and Internet watchers have now publicly stated that while the DDoS attacks against Spamhaus could theoretically have led to slowdowns, they've seen no evidence that this occurred for general Internet users. And while some users may have noticed a slowdown, the undersea cable cuts discovered by Egyptian sailors had more of an impact than the DDoS."
Power

Solar Impulse Airplane To Launch First Sun-Powered Flight Across America 89

Posted by samzenpus from the guided-by-the-light dept.
First time accepted submitter markboyer writes "The Solar Impulse just landed at Moffett Field in Mountain View, California to announce a journey that will take it from San Francisco to New York without using a single drop of fuel. The 'Across America' tour will kick off this May when founders Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg take off from San Francisco. From there the plane will visit four cities across the states before landing in New York."
Google

Google Releases Street View Images From Fukushima Ghost Town 63

Posted by samzenpus from the new-fallout-map dept.
mdsolar writes in with news that Goolge has released Street View pictures from inside the zone that was evacuated after the Fukushima disaster. "Google Inc. (GOOG) today released images taken by its Street View service from the town of Namie, Japan, inside the zone that was evacuated after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in March 2011. Google, operator of the world's biggest Web search engine, entered Namie this month at the invitation of the town's mayor, Tamotsu Baba, and produced the 360-degree imagery for the Google Maps and Google Earth services, it said in an e-mailed statement. All of Namie's 21,000 residents were forced to flee after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant, about 8 kilometers (5 miles) from the town, causing the world's worst nuclear accident after Chernobyl. Baba asked Mountain View, California-based Google to map the town to create a permanent record of its state two years after the evacuation, he said in a Google blog post."

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