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Reading and Calculating With Your Unconscious

lee1 writes “Using special techniques that present information to one eye while hiding the information from the conscious mind (by masking it with more distracting imagery presented to the other eye), researchers have shown two new and very unexpected things: we can read and understand short sentences, and we can perform multi-step arithmetic problems, entirely unconsciously. The results of the reading and calculating are available to and influence the conscious mind, but we remain unaware of their existence. While we have known for some time that a great deal of sensory processing occurs below the surface and affects our deliberative behavior, it was widely believed until now that the subconscious was not able to actually do arithmetic or parse sentences.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Reading and Calculating With Your Unconscious

GOP Study Committee Director Disowns Brief Attacking Current IP Law

cervesaebraciator writes “Saturday an article was featured on Slashdot which expressed some hope, if just a fool’s hope, that a recent Republican Study Committee Brief could be a sign of broader national discussion about the value of current copyright law. When one sees such progress, credit is deservedly given. Unfortunately, others in Washington did not perhaps see this as worthy of praise. The committee’s executive director, Paul Teller, sent a memo today disavowing the earlier pro-copyright reform brief. From the memo: ‘Yesterday you received a Policy Brief or [sic] copyright law that was published without adequate review within the RSC and failed to meet that standard. Copyright reform would have far-reaching impacts, so it is incredibly important that it be approached with all facts and viewpoints in hand.’ People who live in districts such as Ohio’s 4th would do well to send letters of support to those who crafted the original brief. I cannot imagine party leadership will be happy with so radical a suggestion as granting copyright protection for the limited times needed to promote the progress of science and useful arts.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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GOP Study Committee Director Disowns Brief Attacking Current IP Law

GREE Closes OpenFeint, Gives Game Developers a Month to Avoid a Potential “Poor Player Experience”

Before Apple had Game Center it had OpenFeint, a gaming network that brought a cohesive online experience to countless iPhone, iPad and eventually Android games. Some of us may have opted to miss out on its fun features, but for many game developers it was a priceless tool. Come December 14, OpenFeint will be no more. More »

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GREE Closes OpenFeint, Gives Game Developers a Month to Avoid a Potential “Poor Player Experience”

iOS 6 Streaming Bug Sends Data Usage Skyrocketing

MojoKid writes “iOS 6, by all appearances, has a streaming problem. This is separate from the network issues that led Verizon to state that it wouldn’t bill people for overages that were caused by spotty Wi-Fi connectivity. The issue has been detailed at PRX.org with information on how the team saw a huge spike in bandwidth usage after the release of iOS 6, and then carefully tested the behavior of devices and its own app to narrow the possible cause. In one case, the playback of a single 30MB episode caused the transfer of over 100MB of data. It is believed that the issue was solved with the release of iOS 6.0.1, but anecdotal evidence from readers points to continued incidents of high data usage, even after updating. If you own an iPhone 5 or upgraded to iOS 6 on an older device, it is strongly recommend to check your usage over the past two months, update to iOS 6.0.1, and plan for a lengthy discussion with your carrier if it turns out your data use went through the roof.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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iOS 6 Streaming Bug Sends Data Usage Skyrocketing

German City Says OpenOffice Shortcomings Are Forcing It Back To Microsoft

The city of Freiburg, Germany adopted OpenOffice back in 2007, mostly replacing the Microsoft Office software it had been using previously. Now, an anonymous reader tips news that the city council is preparing to abandon OpenOffice and switch back. “‘In the specific case of the use of OpenOffice, the hopes and expectations of the year 2007 are not fulfilled,’ the council wrote, adding that continuing use OpenOffice will lead to performance impairments and aggravation and frustration on the part of employees and external parties. ‘Therefore, a new Microsoft Office license is essential for effective operations,’ they wrote. … ‘The divergence of the development community (LibreOffice on one hand Apache Office on the other) is crippling for the development for OpenOffice,’ the council wrote, adding that the development of Microsoft Office is far more stable. Looking at the options, a one-product strategy with Microsoft Office 2010 is the only viable one, according to the council.” The council was also disappointed that more municipalities haven’t adopted OpenOffice in the meantime. Open source groups and developers criticized the move and encouraged the council to consider at least moving to a more up-to-date version of the office software suite. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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German City Says OpenOffice Shortcomings Are Forcing It Back To Microsoft

The Most Grotesque Fanless CPU Cooler I’ve Ever Seen

Official description: “The Zalman CNPS FX100-Cube is fanless and noiseless CPU cooler, which does not draw dust or generate vibration due to its passive operation.” Unofficial description: LOOK AT THIS FREAKING MONSTER HEATSINK! More »

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The Most Grotesque Fanless CPU Cooler I’ve Ever Seen

Google Engineers Open Source Book Scanner Design

c0lo writes “Engineers from Google’s Books team have released the design plans for a comparatively reasonably priced (about $1500) book scanner on Google Code. Built using a scanner, a vacuum cleaner and various other components, the Linear Book Scanner was developed by engineers during the ’20 percent time’ that Google allocates for personal projects. The license is highly permissive, thus it’s possible the design and building costs can be improved. Any takers?” Adds reader leighklotz: “The Google Tech Talk Video starts with Jeff Breidenbach of the Google Books team, and moves on to Dany Qumsiyeh showing how simple his design is to build. Could it be that the Google Books team has had enough of destroying the library in order to save it? Or maybe the just want to up-stage the Internet Archive’s Scanning Robot. Disclaimer: I worked with Jeff when we were at Xerox (where he did this awesome hack), but this is more awesome because it saves books.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Google Engineers Open Source Book Scanner Design

Open Source Book Scanner Uses a Household Vacuum To Turn the Page

In an effort to streamline the process of scanning hundreds of millions of titles, Google Books engineer Dany Qumsiyeh has designed a $1,500 automated scanner from sheet metal, dissected electronics, and a household vacuum. It can chew through a 1,000 page odyssey in about 90 minutes, and you’re welcome to build your own since Qumsiyeh has made his Linear Book Scanner open source . More »

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Open Source Book Scanner Uses a Household Vacuum To Turn the Page

Google Is Finally Installing Gigabit Fiber In Kansas City Homes

It feels like we’ve been hearing about Google Fiber in Kansas City forever. Though a few people have gotten to use the blazing-fast service, Google has only been accepting applications for the service for most of the city. Well today, the Google Fiber installations begin in earnest . More »

Impatient Lazy People Can Now Track the Progress of Their GrubHub Orders

Following a similar service from Dominoe’s Pizza, GrubHub has a new feature called “Track Your Grub.” As the name implies, you’ll now be able to track your order every step of the way. More »