Geekish

Anyone who works as a freelancer these days has to be at least a bit familiar with techie things. But it isn’t just that. When I was a kid and those vaguely SF puppet shows were on the television and all the other kids wanted to be Greg Gogetem or Steve Savetheuniverse, I wanted to be the guy in a white coat and glasses called Doc or Brains. Here are some technology-related feeds I find useful and/or entertaining.

Slashdot » America's Legal System May Be 'Closing In' on Regulating Cryptocurrencies

Sunday 14 April 23:04:00 UTC 2024

A business columnist at the Los Angeles Times notes Sam Bankman-Fried's judge issued another ruling "that may have a more far-reaching effect on the crypto business. U.S. Judge Failla "cleared the Securities and Exchange Commission to proceed with its lawsuit alleging that the giant crypto broker and exchange Coinbase has been dealing in securities without a license." What's important about … [Link]

Slashdot » Struggling Movie Exhibitors Beg Studios For More Movies – and Not Just Blockbusters

Sunday 14 April 22:21:26 UTC 2024

Movie exhibitors still face "serious risks," the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday: Attendance was on the decline even before the pandemic shuttered theaters, thanks to changing consumer habits and competition for people's time and money from other entertainment options. The industry has demonstrated an over-reliance on Imax-friendly studio action tent poles, when theater chains need a deep and diverse roster … [Link]

Slashdot » Will the US-China Competition to Field Military Drone Swarms Spark a Global Arms Race?

Sunday 14 April 21:29:00 UTC 2024

The Associated Press reports: As their rivalry intensifies, U.S. and Chinese military planners are gearing up for a new kind of warfare in which squadrons of air and sea drones equipped with artificial intelligence work together like swarms of bees to overwhelm an enemy. The planners envision a scenario in which hundreds, even thousands of the machines engage in coordinated … [Link]

Slashdot » Axios CEO Believes AI Will 'Eviscerate the Unprepared' Among Media Companies

Sunday 14 April 20:29:00 UTC 2024

In the view of Jim VandeHei, CEO of Axios, artificial intelligence will eviscerate the weak, the ordinary, the unprepared in media," reports the New York Times: VandeHei says the only way for media companies to survive is to focus on delivering journalistic expertise, trusted content and in-person human connection. For Axios, that translates into more live events, a membership program … [Link]

Slashdot » Canonical Says Qualcomm Has Joined Ubuntu's 'Silicon Partner' Program

Sunday 14 April 19:04:00 UTC 2024

Intel, Nvidia, AMD, and Arm are among Canonical's "silicon partners," a program that "ensures maximum Ubuntu compatibility and long-term support with certified hardware," according to Web Pro News. And now Qualcomm is set to be Canonical's next silicon partner, "giving Qualcomm access to optimized versions of Ubuntu for its processors." Companies looking to use Ubuntu on Qualcomm chips will benefit … [Link]

Slashdot » Stop 'Harmful 5G Fast Lanes', Legal Scholar Warns America's FCC

Sunday 14 April 18:28:07 UTC 2024

America's FCC votes on net neutrality April 25th. And the director of Stanford Law School's "Center for Internet and Society" (also a law professor) says mostly there's "much to celebrate" in the draft rules released earlier this month. Mobile carriers like T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon that have been degrading video quality for mobile users will have to stop. The FCC … [Link]

Slashdot » Is PHP Declining In Popularity?

Sunday 14 April 17:34:00 UTC 2024

The PHP programming language has sunk to its lowest position ever on the long-running TIOBE index of programming language popularity. It now ranks #17 — lower than Assembly Language, Ruby, Swift, Scratch, and MATLAB. InfoWorld reports: When the Tiobe index started in 2001, PHP was about to become the standard language for building websites, said Paul Jansen, CEO of software … [Link]

Slashdot » APT Interface 'Revamped' For Ubuntu 24.10 and Debian Trixie with Colors and Columns

Sunday 14 April 16:34:00 UTC 2024

Ubuntu 24.10 [expected this October] and Debian GNU/Linux 13 "Trixie" [expected June-July 2025] "will feature a refined APT command-line interface," reports 9to5Linux: APT developer and Canonical engineer Julian Andres Klode took to LinkedIn to present the revamped APT interface powered by the upcoming APT 3.0 package manager that looks to give users a more concise and well-laid-out command-line output when … [Link]

Slashdot » Windows 11's Beta Testers May Start Seeing Ads for Microsoft Store Apps

Sunday 14 April 15:34:00 UTC 2024

Engadget warns Windows 11 users that Microsoft is "exploring the idea" of putting ads in their Start menu. Sort of… To be specific, it's looking to place advertisements for apps you can find in the Microsoft Store in the menu's recommended section…. At the moment, Microsoft will only show ads in this version if you're in the US and a … [Link]

Slashdot » Two Boeing Whistleblowers Allege Disregarded Worker Concerns, Pressure For Speed

Sunday 14 April 12:34:00 UTC 2024

"Federal regulators are investigating a whistleblower's claims about flaws in the assembly of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner," NPR reported this week: Longtime Boeing engineer Sam Salehpour went public Tuesday with claims that he observed problems with how parts of the plane's fuselage were fastened together. Salehpour warns that production "shortcuts" could significantly shorten the lifespan of the plane, eventually causing the … [Link]

Slashdot » AI Could Explain Why We're Not Meeting Any Aliens, Wild Study Proposes

Sunday 14 April 9:33:00 UTC 2024

An anonymous reader shared this report from ScienceAlert: The Fermi Paradox is the discrepancy between the apparent high likelihood of advanced civilizations existing and the total lack of evidence that they do exist. Many solutions have been proposed for why the discrepancy exists. One of the ideas is the 'Great Filter.' The Great Filter is a hypothesized event or situation … [Link]

Slashdot » Fusion Experiment Demonstrates Cheaper Stellerator Using Creative Magnet Workaround

Sunday 14 April 6:33:00 UTC 2024

Popular Science reports that early last week, researchers at the U.S. Energy Department's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory revealed their new "MUSE" stellarator — "a unique fusion reactor that uses off-the-shelf and 3D-printed materials to contain its superheated plasma." The researchers' announcement says the technique suggests "a simple way to build future devices for less cost and allow researchers to test … [Link]

Slashdot » Could a New Charge Double the Service-life of Li-Ion Batteries?

Sunday 14 April 3:33:00 UTC 2024

"An improved charging protocol might help lithium-ion batteries to last much longer," writes Science Daily: The best commercial lithium-ion batteries…have a service life of up to eight years. Batteries are usually charged with a constant current flow. But is this really the most favorable method? A new study by Prof. Philipp Adelhelm's group at HZB and Humboldt-University Berlin answers this … [Link]

John Gordon Ross

A Man for All Reasons