Category: reader

Popcorn Time reinvents the seedy process of torrenting

We are used to illegal activities looking and feeling far more illegal than this. A new BitTorrent-powered video app has been released that beautifies the torrenting process to the point that TorrentFreak describes it as “Netflix for pirates.” The app, which is available for OS X, Windows, and Linux, shows a catalog of movies and loads them up on a computer in an interface as seamless as that of most legit streaming services, but using means that are generally less than legal. Typically, torrenting a movie (illegally, if it’s copyrighted property) involves seeking out a sketchy torrent website littered with porn ads to download a .torrent file that users hope will actually result in a movie and not, say, a virus. The process’s pitfalls and risks are many, not to mention the potential for getting called out by one’s ISP and, in rare instances, being fined or sued. Popcorn Time eliminates the seedier aspects of torrent location in a slick app that doesn’t involve dealing with files, download speeds, or seeding—at least on the front end. The app began as a Github project that now has over 50 contributors. It is free, open-source, and has no ads or other money-making schemes. The app works by using an API provided by torrent service YTS to stream the file, which is then shared from the user’s computer after the download is completed. Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Popcorn Time reinvents the seedy process of torrenting

Visualizing How Sorting Algorithms Work Is as Good as Any Art

We don’t need to tell you that data can be beautiful—but the process of putting it in order can look pretty darn good, too. A new site called SORTING aims to make people aware of just how elegant some of computer science’s most fundamental algorithms can be. Read more…        

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Visualizing How Sorting Algorithms Work Is as Good as Any Art

Court Denies NSA Request To Hold Phone Records Beyond 5 Years

itwbennett writes “As Slashdot readers will remember, last month the U.S government ‘petitioned the court system’ to let the NSA retain phone call metadata for more than 5 years, ironically ‘because it needs to preserve it as evidence for the various privacy lawsuits filed against the government.’ Well, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has ruled against that request. The FISC’s Presiding Judge Reggie B. Walton ruled Friday (PDF) that the proposed amended procedures would further infringe on the privacy interests of U.S. persons whose ‘telephone records were acquired in vast numbers and retained by the government for five years to aid in national security investigation.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Court Denies NSA Request To Hold Phone Records Beyond 5 Years

The Proper Reading Order for the Star Trek Novels in a Handy Flowchart

Have you been wanting to dive into the world of Star Trek novels, but aren’t sure where to start? Check out the Almighty Star Trek Lit-verse Reading Order Flowchart , which lays out which books should come earliest on your reading list. Read more…        

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The Proper Reading Order for the Star Trek Novels in a Handy Flowchart

There’s no difference in buying a large beer vs a small beer at a game

Sometimes when you go a stadium to watch a game or an arena to watch a concert, you’ll have the option of buying an overpriced large beer or a slightly less overpriced small beer. Go small to save a few dollars because the small cup holds just as much beer as the large cup. More beer for your buck! Read more…        

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There’s no difference in buying a large beer vs a small beer at a game

A graph showing all the languages whose words invaded English

Languages are evolving, living things, a fact that this graphic that charts just which languages English has been taking its loanwords from over time makes clear. Read more…        

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A graph showing all the languages whose words invaded English

Americans Are Riding Public Transit In Record-Breaking Numbers

Visit any major U.S. city and you’ll likely see the anecdotal evidence that use of public transit is steadily growing in popularity. Last year, however, Americans reached an important milestone: according to a new study by the American Public Transit Association , U.S. residents took almost 10.7 billion trips on transit, the highest number since 1956. Read more…        

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Americans Are Riding Public Transit In Record-Breaking Numbers

Intel’s 800Gbps cables headed to cloud data centers and supercomputers

Intel’s pitch for Silicon Photonics. Intel and several of its partners said they will make 800Gbps cables available in the second half of this year, bringing big speed increases to supercomputers and data centers. The new cables are based on Intel’s Silicon Photonics technology that pushes 25Gbps across each fiber. Last year, Intel demonstrated speeds of 100Gbps in each direction, using eight fibers. A new connector that goes by the name “MXC” holds up to 64 fibers (32 for transmitting and 32 for receiving), enabling a jump to 800Gbps in one direction and 800Gbps in the other, or an aggregate of “1.6Tbps” as Intel prefers to call it. (In case you’re wondering, MXC is not an acronym for anything.) That’s a huge increase over the 10Gbps cables commonly used to connect switches and other equipment in data centers today. The fiber technology also maintains its maximum speed over much greater distances than copper, sending 800Gbps at lengths up to 300 meters, Intel photonics technology lab director Mario Paniccia told Ars. Eventually, the industry could boost the per-line rate from 25Gbps to 50Gbps, doubling the overall throughput without adding fibers, he said. Read 13 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Intel’s 800Gbps cables headed to cloud data centers and supercomputers

Shuttle runs a Haswell Core i7 in a case barely bigger than a disk drive

The Intel NUC proves just how small a desktop-class, 4K-capable Haswell PC can go. What the NUC doesn’t do, though, is let us switch out the processor – it comes with either a Core i3 or i5 soldered to the mainboard. Now, Shuttle ‘s DS81 is slightly bigger than the NUC, but it’s still tiny (19 x 16.5 x 4.3cm) and its H81 chipset supports user-upgradeable processors up to a Haswell Core i7. Like the DS61 before it, the DS81 comes with serious cooling to let it function in environments up to 50 degrees, such as in digital signage situations. It’s also deceptively big in terms of connectivity, with two PCIe Mini slots (one half-size and one full-size), two slots for RAM (up to 16GB), six USB ports (two of which are 3.0), three displays outputs (1x HDMI and 2x DisplayPort), dual Gigabit Ethernet ports and even a card reader. A Shuttle rep we met at CeBIT told us the DS81 should start to become available from next week, starting at 178 euros ($250) for a barebones unit – although some retailers are already offering pre-built systems for upwards of $800 with a two- or three-week shipping delay. Filed under: Desktops Comments

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Shuttle runs a Haswell Core i7 in a case barely bigger than a disk drive

Nanomaterial May Be Future of Hard Drives

sciencehabit writes “Most magnets shrug off tiny temperature tweaks. But now physicists have created a new nanomaterial–an ultrathin 10-nanometer layer of nickel grafted onto a 100-nanometer-thick wafer of a substance called vanadium oxide–that dramatically changes how easily it flips its magnetic orientation when heated or cooled only slightly. The effect, never before seen in any material, could eventually lead to new types of computer memory.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Nanomaterial May Be Future of Hard Drives