Tag: technology

Restaurateur Loses Copyright Suit To BMI

Frosty P writes: BMI claims Amici III in Linden, New York didn’t have a license when it played four tunes in its eatery one night last year, including the beloved “Bennie and the Jets” and “Brown Sugar, ” winning $24, 000 earlier this year, and over $8, 200 in attorney’s fees. Giovanni Lavorato, who has been in business for 25 years, says the disc DJ brought into the eatery paid a fee to play tunes. “It’s ridiculous for me to pay somebody also, ” he said. “This is not a nightclub. This is not a disco joint . . . How many times do they want to get paid for the stupid music?” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Restaurateur Loses Copyright Suit To BMI

Why Mathematicians Are Hoarding This Special Type of Japanese Chalk

This spring, an 80-year-old Japanese chalk company went out of business . Nobody, perhaps, was as sad to see the company go as mathematicians who had become obsessed with Hagoromo Fulltouch Chalk, the so-called “Rolls Royce of chalk.” Read more…

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Why Mathematicians Are Hoarding This Special Type of Japanese Chalk

Google’s Masterplan to Make Chrome Suck Less

Google Chrome has this slight problem where it hoards RAM and battery like Smaug hoards shiny things. It sucks, and it completely ruins an otherwise perfect browser. Apparently, Google is aware of Chrome’s problems, and it has a 12-step program to fix things. Read more…

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Google’s Masterplan to Make Chrome Suck Less

‘Warm Neptune’ Exoplanets May Have Lots of Helium

An anonymous reader writes: Phil Plait reports on new research into exoplanets that came to an unexpected and non-obvious conclusion. Throughout the galaxy, astronomers have been finding exoplanets they call “warm Neptunes” — bodies about the size of Neptune, but which orbit their parent star more closely than Mercury orbits the Sun. When astronomers looked at spectra for these planets, they found something surprising: no methane signature (PDF). Methane is made of carbon and hydrogen, and it’s generally assumed that most large, gaseous planets will have a lot of hydrogen. But this class of exoplanet, being significantly smaller than, say, Jupiter, may not have the mass (and thus the gravity) to hold on to its hydrogen when it’s heated by the close proximity to the star. The result is that the atmosphere may be largely made up of helium instead. If so, the planet would look oddly colorless to our eyes, very unlike the planets in our solar system. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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‘Warm Neptune’ Exoplanets May Have Lots of Helium

Everybody copies everyone: iOS 9 features inspired by Android

Apple announced iOS 9 on Monday, and while watching the keynote, I had just a little bit of déjà vu. Most of iOS 9’s new features seem to be squarely aimed at Apple’s biggest rival in mobile: Android. Specifically, they were about  catching up  to Android. Search improvements, proactive assistance, split screen, and transit directions? It’s been done, but the differences are the fun part, so we chased down the new iOS 9 screenshots and compared them to their Android counterparts. It’s not just about who copied whom; it’s also a chance to look at the different designs of the two operating systems. And hey, Apple isn’t the only one taking ideas from a competitor. Android M’s selectable app permissions are an exact copy of the iOS model. Siri and Search are chasing Google Now but hitting Google where it hurts The iOS 9 Search and Google Now screens. 8 more images in gallery iOS 9 adds a lot of “proactive assistant” and search features that were first seen on Android. The main search screen now looks a lot like Google Now, with cards showing various bits of information. Search differs from Google Now in that it shows suggested people and apps at the top, but the News and Nearby places are all Google Now. iOS search shows categories for Nearby places, while Google Now shows individual places with ratings and pictures. Read 19 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Everybody copies everyone: iOS 9 features inspired by Android

Fake Mobile Phone Towers Found To Be "Actively Listening In" On Calls In UK

New submitter nickweller writes: More than 20 Stingray fake phone towers which can collect data from passing devices and listen in on calls have been discovered operating in the UK. The Metropolitan Police have refused to say who is controlling the IMSI catchers, also known as Stingrays, or what is being done with the information they are gathering. Met Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said: “If people imagine that we’ve got the resources to do as much intrusion as they worry about, I would reassure them that it’s impossible.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Fake Mobile Phone Towers Found To Be "Actively Listening In" On Calls In UK

Samsung’s Mirrored and Clear OLED Screens Are Straight From the Future

Samsung has announced a new series of prototype OLED displays in Hong Kong that, with their mirrored and transparent surfaces, are like something from a sci-fi film. Read more…

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Samsung’s Mirrored and Clear OLED Screens Are Straight From the Future

5G Is On Its Way, But Approaching Slowly

New submitter CarlottaHapsburg writes: Ericsson and Nokia are leading the pack when it comes to developing 5G, but there are some major complicating factors: flexible architecture, functioning key standards, the U.S.’s lethargy in expanding mmWave, and even the definition of what 5G is and can do. It’ll get here, but not soon: “5G networks are widely expected to start to roll out by 2020, with a few early debuts at such global events as the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. It is an ambitious deadline given what is expected from 5G — no less than the disruption of the communications market in general, and telecom in particular, as well as related sectors such as test equipment.” The FCC’s Tom Wheeler says 5G is different for every manufacturer, like a Picasso painting. It should be an exciting five years of further developments and definitions — and, hopefully, American preparedness. Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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5G Is On Its Way, But Approaching Slowly

Technology Won’t Fix America’s Neediest Schools — It Makes Bad Education Worse

theodp writes: In an adapted excerpt from Geek Heresy: Rescuing Social Change from the Cult of Technology, Univ. of Michigan prof Kentaro Toyama begins: “‘Technology is a game-changer in the field of education, ‘” Education Secretary Arne Duncan once said, and there was a time when I would have agreed. Over the last decade, I’ve built, used, and studied educational technology in countries around the world. As a computer scientist and former Microsoft employee, I wanted nothing more than to see innovation triumph in the classroom. But no matter how good the design, and despite rigorous tests of impact, I have never seen technology systematically overcome the socio-economic divides that exist in education. Children who are behind need high-quality adult guidance more than anything else. Many people believe that technology ‘levels the playing field’ of learning, but what I’ve discovered is that it does no such thing.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Technology Won’t Fix America’s Neediest Schools — It Makes Bad Education Worse