If you want to do something more than eat to save the world then we have the product for you. Typically, to save energy while using your computer, you could use either of the Standby or Hibernate modes. They allow you to save the computers current state without leaving the computer to run and waste electricity. Great for most of us, right? But what if you’re a whore for attention, and driving a car with “hybrid” on the side in big letters isn’t enough? The short answer is: Buy an Eco Button. This little waste of space will put your computer to sleep when you slap down on it with an authoritative, “I’m doing my part to save Mother Earth.”
But wait, there’s more! From the article:
The USB-powered button comes with software that tells you how much energy and how many carbon units you’ve saved through its labor-saving practices.
You better use this thing often though, because as it is plastic, it is made using petroleum. And don’t forget the human cost of [probably] being manufactured in China. The upside though is that China’s impeccable environmental record will almost certainly put you ahead.
… from Everything USB
I love the United Kingdom. You can walk around London and see camera after camera watching your every move. You really feel… whats’s the word? Guilty. Safe. Originally a monarchy, London really knows how to be scared of her own citizens. Instead of open dialog and discussion the UK has decided to use closed-ciruit television cameras (CCTV) to make their tiny, unimportant country feel safer. The picture above shows just how safe they’ve made the area surrounding George Orwell’s former home.
Cameras aren’t enough, however. To be truly safe you need a national ID and database system in place and checkpoints with barb wire and dogs and the Brit’s gov’t realizes this. Those communists terrorists over at no2id.net disagree and have put up a leaked government document detailing plans on how London plans to sell the idea to the peasants. I can’t wait until my country, the good ol’ US of A, will take England’s lead and get on the lockdown train. Go Manchester United!
A mirror of the leaked 1.2 MB PDF document with annotations from no2id.net. Don’t look at it or you’re a traitor.
… from Boing Boing
Good thing the FCC is around to protect us from female asses, otherwise all hell might break loose.
The FCC proposed a fine of $27,500 for each of the 51 ABC affiliates — which comes to a total of $1,402,500 — or, $701,250 an ass cheek.
From the article:
“Our action today should serve as a reminder to all broadcasters that Congress and American families continue to be concerned about protecting children from harmful material and that the FCC will enforce the laws of the land vigilantly,” FCC Commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate told the press after the agency made the announcement.
I remember the moment the episode aired well. The second that sexy ass aired it was total anarchy! Looting. Rapes. Murders. Oh wait… I’m confusing that episode of NYPD Blue with Hurricane Katrina.
So just to be clear…
BAD - “Titillates viewers” -FCC
ABC’s NYPD Blue
GOOD - “Quality family viewing” -FCC
Fox’s 24
… from Ars Technica
I know its been a few days since there have been any posts. I am sorry. I take full responsibility.
You see… my internet went down on Thursday night and I immediately called Comcast. After a couple of no shows my internet has just been fixed!
I would just like to take the time to thank Comcast for their great support and the quality service I received. In some countries internet is not even available so it is perfectly acceptable for them to be rude and unavailable to me. Thanks guys.
So, I now have internet again and will continue to post nonsense. Of course… there is still a lingering billing problem I’ve had for the last 5 months that is still unresolved. That’s OK though. I understand. Comcast is a cable and internet company, not an accounting firm!
… from My tortured life
A little while ago the Motion Picture ASSociation of America, or MPAA, went to Washington to have them pass a law. They said illegal downloaders were attracted to university networks like flies on shit. They claimed 44% of all illegal movie downloads originated on college campuses. The real figure is a tad lower.
From the article:
It seems the real figure is closer to 15 per cent and since a lot of students live off campus it means that about five per cent of P2P piracy is done using university networks.
Wrong? Nah. The MPAA might of been a bit over zealous… maybe… but definitely not wrong. Would you call George Washington wrong, for fighting the nazi’s in World War I and ending slavery? No. Would you call Louis Armstrong wrong for flying across the Atlantic — only to have his baby eaten. No. Would you call George Bush Jr. wrong? Of course not. Unless you are a ultra-liberal movie-pirate. And we don’t mean Johnny Depp.
… from The INQUIRER
Those bastard writers are still on strike so the folks over at SciFi’s DVICE have compiled an easy to follow and understand list of activities you can do instead of watch TiVo. Why is the list about things you can do instead of watching TiVo and not things to do instead of watch TV? Ahh… covert sponsorship at work. Gotta love it.
Anyways… getting back to the story. WTF are those writers doing? I mean seriously guys, I’m starting to think about my life, the economy, and the fact that we’re involved in an ongoing war-without-an-end.
3. Share your home movies
Want to share the video of your latest family vacation but don’t want a house full of people eating your snacks? One of the newest features of TiVo is the ability to share your home movies via One True Media. Simply create an account, upload your video, and send the 16-digit passcode to friends and family. It’s like having your own private YouTube.
Oh phew… that will take my mind off of things. I just wish I could find the affiliate link to buy a TiVo…
As more and more people begin to use Microsoft’s Vista operating system more and more people are realizing that it sucks, and they want to move back. Web magazine, InfoWorld, agrees and has started the Save Windows XP petition.
I myself run Vista and have found that it is a pain in my ass. Doing simple things, that were perfected in 1992 — like moving files — are slow and painful.
Vista’s SP1 is in beta now and should be coming soon… any day now… any time guys. SP1 should fix most of the annoyances (we hope). According to Vista SP1’s details it will increase performance when copying and extracing files and get rid of that annoying 10 second delay when pressing Ctrl+Alt+Del to logon.
We don’t understand what the big deal is though. Windows XP was just becoming a secure, stable operating system — naturally it was time to move forward. If we didn’t we’d stagnate as a people. Anyways, everyone needs to just stop their bitching. Vista is a great OS once you disable those stupid User Account Controls (UAC), disable the Desktop Window Manager (DWM — the “wow”), and pretty much everything else that makes Vista act like Vista.
… from The INQUIRER
Okay so this article has nothing to do with the fact that TSA officials are underpaid and undertrained but search for “tsa underpaid” and “tsa undertrained” but that is important to keep in mind when you read this.
The TSA has just purchased 12 of these units — with the option to buy more — that are capable of passively scanning foot traffic for weaponry. We don’t know how accurate the image above is but if that is true then these things are really impressive. We’re also very impressed these units passed some kind of public health screening, assuming there was one.
I mean really… if cell phones cause cancer, wtf do these things do? We’re guessing either alter our DNA to turn us all into super soldiers to one day fight the Russians or give us cancer. We are pretty sure its one of the two, maybe even both, but our money is on cancer.
We’re just happy all this homeland security has made us more secure. You can’t argue with the fact that there hasn’t been another terrorist attack. Suck it.
… from DVICE
The Recording Association Industry of America (RIAA) has sued a lot of people in their time. You could even say they’ve sued more people than that guy you see on TV who helps people who have slipped and fallen. Why are they so so-happy? It turns out some people like music and share it with others on the intarwebs. Ya… the heathens, we know.
What makes this current case special is the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has been trying to kill the RIAA’s “making available” case. Making available means that Jeffrey and Pamela Howell had turned some of their CDs into MP3s and placed them in their KaZaA share folder. The RIAA’s investigative arm, SafeNet (formely MediaSentry), found this songs and downloaded them.
You have a CD. You tell your friend that you will burn him a copy. You get sued, even before you give the copy to your friend. You see, the RIAA has no proof that any copies were actually downloaded by anyone and therefore no proof that any copyright infringement actually occurred. At least, that is the claim that EFF makes.
From the article:
Because the law specifically gives copyright owners the ability to control copies distributed “to the public,” the music labels need to show that such distribution took place. The EFF points out that the copyright holder itself can hardly be considered “the public,” and goes on to claim that “an authorized agent acting on behalf of the copyright owner also cannot infringe any rights held by that owner.” Their conclusion is therefore that ”where the only evidence of infringing distribution consists of distributions to authorized agents of the copyright owner, that evidence cannot, by itself, establish that other, unauthorized distributions have taken place.”
Pretty crafty are those EFF attorneys. It seems the money we donated is being well spent. As you can tell there was no sex in this article, but let’s be real here, why else would you read something like this? You’d rather watch a gopher fart on YouTube or something.
For any stupid lawsuit:
… from ars technica
