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They look for people ready and willing to die (even if it is for science and furthering the human race), humiliate them, and take their money. Some people should be sent to Mars, but it's not the finalists.

I think that's the conclusion most folks have made.
The media is just waiting till the right time to report how the common folk were scammed, which is funny because it seems like the inverse of the truth. What's maddening about the whole thing is what's maddening about any con, they seem to be immune to the pressure and lie to the end.

Oh yea, and FIRST!

Hans Reiser did nothing wrong.

+1 there should be no refuge for such men.

Absolutely.

When opensource was young it would be a bad idea, but now that we have so many people contributing we can start to weed out these types.

While I do agree with you in theory, I'm fairly confident that GMail is just about the last service they would shut down (after search and adsense). Everyone, and I mean _everyone_ in their 20's in the US uses it.

Imagine the public backlash* that would be directed at Google if they took everyone's favorite toy away. That aspect alone is enough to keep it going ad infinitum.

Until it becomes glaringly obvious that Google is hemorrhaging money by shutting down maps, drive or books, I will consider my gmail account long-lived.

*spread by the most social media-savvy generation no less

They could. So could runbox or anybody else. Business run only as long as they make profit or have potential to make profit.

Us paying for a service does not guarantee that it won't shut down. The only way to be sure that a service won't shut down is to run it yourself.

But Google could shut down it down tomorrow because: GMail is not making money (search), is not a strategic investment (Android) and is not breaking new ground (self-driving cars).

You paying for it does not mean anything in terms of the business shutting down.

And, not trying to defend google but gmail, for example is also safe, secure, cheap (free) and reliable.

Now all we need is inflatable astronaughts. Good news: the porn industry is years ahead and ready to serve.. errr... help

This is why I pay runbox for email. Safe. Secure. Cheap. Reliable.

When will people stop relying on these guys?

So many projects fled SourceForge (for valid reasons) and ended up on Google Code. Now what will they do? And LESS than 6 months to hope everybody gets the word and moves their stuff? This sounds TERRIBLE.

For a company of Google's breadth and scope, a 5 month warning seems very stingy, more the kind of act of a company bleeding cash.

I never used Google Reader, but I sympathize with those who got burned by it (and the other various Google orphan dead).

And yet... people still look at me funny when I explain how I set up my own mail server so I don't have to rely on a free service like GMail. Sheesh.

Yeah because Microsoft can be trusted for security. It's not like the pitiful security model windows utilizes is their fault or anything. It's almost like trusting the virus industry to provide antivirus products.

For me, it wasn't the electrical pins that broke, but the small rectangular "key" pin (the thing in the middle made of plastic) that would shear off and stay stuck in the motherboard's connector. This had the unfortunate effect of screwing up the motherboard port (expensive) instead of the mouse or keyboard port (cheap).

Afterwards, the "hack" to use the screwy motherboard with a different mouse was to break off the perfectly good plastic pin of the new mouse so that you could insert the connector all the way.

Wow, I had never heard of the "Our Incredible Journey" tumblr page until now. Reading some of those entries makes me sad. I've personally used some of those sites and was surprised to see some of the recent ones (like the Zite app) in the list.

I think "inexplicably" is not the right word here: Google Code is not making money (search), is not a strategic investment (Android) and is not breaking new ground (self-driving cars). The only reason to keep it around would be loyalty to its users, but that doesn't seem to be high on their list of priorities.

Relying on the continued availability of a third party service is a risk, no matter whether the service provider is a startup (see Our Incredible Journey) or a large established company like Google. At least in the case of project hosting, it is relatively easy to migrate to a different service, which is not always the case when other services or APIs get shut down.

the best part of USB was getting away from PS/2 ports. Those stupid pins kept breaking off.

I've never broken a PS2 pin, though I've seen it happen a couple times over a decade. PS2 supplied more power than USB, and even now, you can hit a key on a PS2 keyboard to wake-up a computer, while I've still never seen that working with USB keyboards.

USB offers more flexibility than PS2 did (monitors and keyboards with built-in USB hubs are convenient), but some good features were lost in the process, too.

MSE is possibly the one exception I would make to "no free antivirus". But I'd leave Symantec on, if they had it. Its not as bad as it used to be with resources. If they have it and maintain a subscription to it, that's fine by me.

I would try to remove McAfee, however unlikely the success of that particular operation may be...

It will look like this. ;-)

Yes, the best part of USB was getting away from PS/2 ports. Those stupid pins kept breaking off. I lost many a good mouse to broken pins. USB is much sturdier of a connection,

A good indicator to determine your physical age..

This is not new. They tripped over the edge of sanity years ago. Next question.

Same

Ancient history beyond my ken?

Yeah, 4G is hardly enough to boot.

If you want to do video editing, game playing, or heavy development, you may also want a computer that weighs more than 2lbs.

If all you want to do is email, surf, edit documents, etc, then this might kick all kinds of ass.

A toy laptop that costs 10x the Acer C720.

Does it also come in patent Apple bling like the $17,000 iWatch?

The new MacBook Air has the (lousy) RAM and storage the OP was talking about. You're talking about the new MacBook Pro.

OP is right, MacBook Air RAM and storage specs are a joke.

OP links tell about at least 8 GB of LPDDR3 and 256/512 GB of SSD storage.

4 GB of RAM? 128 GB of storage? Party like it's 2005!

I bet you could almost run Mail.app and Safari with 2 whole tabs before it starts swapping!

Any friend/relative's windows computer I get any access to get MS:SE
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security-essentials-download

And then I remove anything else from Symantec, McAfee, etc.

I mostly use an older laptop with two docking stations, one at home and one at work. It is awesome, dual monitor setups in both places, wired ethernet, headphones, etc. All I have to do is clip in and out when I sit down in either place.

I suppose the theory here is that one USB-C will function like the docking interface, so what I will need is a usb-C to multi-port interface. It's an intriguing possibility, especially if it means third-party docks can work across multiple laptops/computers. That would actually improve my life quite a lot as I currently work with multiple laptops and operating systems, especially if other family members are included in the use case. It would be very cool to be able to sit down at a single desktop workstation setup with an arbitrary laptop and operating system and have a single plug to hook in to the whole setup of monitors, network, headphones, cameras, MIDI keyboards, etc.... quite interesting really...

Better yet, anyone remember early notebook docking ports? Nearly always expensive and vendor-specific. Many required you to turn off the computer before connecting or disconnecting the dock. Current notebooks, instead of a dock, you just plug in the power cord + a monitor cord + a USB keyboard/mouse cord + maybe a network cord. I can see the allure of using just one cable to do it all.

What is more worrying is that USB is so powerful, that it can do potentially damaging things to you unknowingly. Is that free thumb drive really just a thumb drive? Or does it have some nefarious keyboard controller on it as well, ready to spawn an xterm and wget a binary from the net as soon as you plug it in.

Anybody remember computers in the late 90's?

2 9-pin RS-232 serial ports (older mice, modems, etc)
2 PS/2 ports (keyboard/mouse)
1 25-pin IEEE 1284 Parallel port (printers, storage devices, even ethernet adapters)
Often a SCSI-1 port (scanners, external drives)
Game ports (controllers)
Sometimes even MIDI ports
Often firewire ports.
etc.

And then a couple USB (v1.1) ports, which was the most useless of all... Nothing made for it, except maybe your new mouse using an adapter. Slower than parallel ports, lots of CPU-saping overhead. Couldn't boot off of it (for many years). etc.

The article is written by Emisoft, a producer of a antivirus/antimalware suit. Through this article they want to look better than competitors. Some clean free antivirus solutions were omitted from this article because then it would not drive people to Emisoft.

So that giant hinge connecting the top display with the bottom base is a technically a "moving part" as is the limited travel of the individual keyboard keys, but at least there is no tiny spinning fan that sounds like a hairdryer under load and gets clogged with pet hair the moment you place it on your carpet floor.

I think "theoretically wanted program" makes more sense to me. In theory, someone at some point thought that some one would want the program. Although in the case of superfish, I really have to bend reality to come up with some potential use of that crap.

You just shouldn't use free anti virus programs.

Then what does that make the IBM 2260?

Old?

Emsisoft is an anti-virus supplier -- they offer a 30 day free trial, but no free-forever version.

3270 is considered to be the original "terminal"

Oh? Then what does that make the IBM 2260?

Have a look at the permissions granted to default apps preloaded with the phone that can not be uninstalled.

App name: S Memo
App function: Notepad for android
App Permissions:

• read phone status and identity
• edit your text messages
• read your text messages
• record audio
• precise location
• modify your contacts
• read your contacts
• add or modify calendar events and send emails to guests without host's knowledge
• read calendar events plus confidential information
• modify or delete the contents of your USB storage
• add or remove accounts
• create accounts and set passwords
• find accounts on the device
• use accounts on the device
• modify secure system settings
• control near field communication
• full network access
• view network connections
• view wi-fi connections
• close other apps
• reorder running apps
• retrieve running apps
• run at startup
• prevent phone from sleeping
• read sync settings
• read sync statistics
• toggle sync on and off
• modify system settings
• test access to protected storage

Seriously, WTF? This is an application to write notes and save the results as a file. Why would hackers bother trying to crack the operating system when they just need to find a flaw in S Memo?
Why does a note taking application require all of these permissions?
Why can't I, as the device owner, disable this application from using these permissions?

Yes. I feel like others have rooted my phone before I even used it. Perhaps a law should be passed compelling hardware and software manufactures to give users root access to all hardware and software when purchased.

Reminds me of what they have done to prevent users from accessing the computers in their car.

I was just about to post Missing option: mainframe emulator
3270 is considered to be the original "terminal" :-)

Also recall that the FCC passed net neutrality rules in 2010, only to have them overturned by a Verizon legal challenge.

Republicans are also trying to overturn the new rules, though they don't have large enough of a majority to override a presidential veto:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/02/despite-fcc-vote-republicans-in-congress-not-conceding-on-net-neutrality/

And I think it's important to remember the widespread outcry over Wheeler's appointment as FCC chairman. With his history as a lobbyist for the cable and wireless industry, previous President of the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) and CEO of the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association (CTIA), a huge number of outspoken voices were SURE he was a cynical choice, which would do the bidding of the industry.

What I'm referring to is how much KDE 4.x started to look and act like Windows 7, after Windows 7 came out. There's actually a ton of copying on both sides through the years (Vista took obvious cues from KDE 3.x), but every time I've tried a new version of KDE it's more "Windows like". Either way, I've just never really liked KDE, and unlike on Windows, on *nix I actually have a choice and can choose not to use it. With Windows I'm stuck with their interface unless I want to try some hacked-up thing like Litestep or other conversion that breaks the workflow instead of fixing it.

You could make it work like XFCE, if you wanted as well.

Not really...I mean it could approximate Xfce, but it's not going to work the same because QT is not GTK. It's like saying you can learn to speak Portuguese by learning Spanish and French instead; it's just not going to work the way you think it would, and is more effort than just taking the straightforward path.

Turn Off, isn't good enough, IMHO. I don't want the code path to even exist. Would you be okay with a government backdoor in your computer, that was shipped on your computer but "turned off" ?

Doesn't Blackphone let you turn that stuff off?

Way to go Slashdot: you are a year too late.

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/15/03/06/021240/robocops-being-used-as-traffic-police-in-democratic-republic-of-congo

Obligatory video clip.

But they were both out before windows 7. KDE can be configured to be a os x clone, but that speaks more to its configurability than anything else. You could make it work like XFCE, if you wanted as well.

I still haven't decided if I like Mate better than Xfce, but I have a feeling I'll like what Xfce 4.12 has to offer. I used Gnome a good bit back in the 2.x days, then it was cut out of Slackware and I switched between Xfce, Fluxbox, and Window Maker for a while. I don't need fancy effects and such in GNU/Linux, I just need a sensible menu and proper window management (thank the gods for Xfce's focus-stealing prevention).

I kind of liked Gnome 3 around 3.6, but since then it seems to have regressed rather than innovated. I've never liked KDE, though I'll acknowledge they have made some striking improvements lately. Still, it comes off as a Windows 7/OS X hybrid clone more than anything.

Neat idea, but optically I don't think it's really the same.