No, those bright blue, ruggedized devices being used on NFL sidelines aren't iPads. They're Surface Pro 2s. And while they may look like Apple's renowned tablet from afar, at least to some NFL commentators, Microsoft's been trying to help players and...
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23 Dec 03:30
No, those bright blue, ruggedized devices being used on NFL sidelines aren't iPads. They're Surface Pro 2s. And while they may look like Apple's renowned tablet from afar, at least to some NFL commentators, Microsoft's been trying to help players and...
Seahawks QB Russell Wilson on Surface Pro, how he was once an Apple guy
by Edgar Alvarez
No, those bright blue, ruggedized devices being used on NFL sidelines aren't iPads. They're Surface Pro 2s. And while they may look like Apple's renowned tablet from afar, at least to some NFL commentators, Microsoft's been trying to help players and...
23 Dec 00:58
My grandfather still brings this up 20 years later. He laughs while my family looks horrified.
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submitted by Lycangrope [link] [533 comments] |
23 Dec 00:55
Telcos' anti-Net Neutrality argument may let the MPAA destroy DNS
by Cory Doctorow
The telcos' ongoing battle against Net Neutrality have led them to make a lot of silly legalistic arguments, but one in particular has opened the whole Internet to grave danger from a legal attack from the entertainment industry, which may finally realize its longstanding goal of subverting DNS to help it censor sites it dislikes, even if it makes life much easier for thieves and spies who use DNS tricks to rob and surveil.
A leaked MPAA document discloses the studios' lobbyists' plan to force ISPs to give it control over DNS (one of the key goals in SOPA), by using the arguments raised in the decade-old Brand X case, where the ISPs said that they were more than a "telecommunications service" and were, instead, an "information service" because they provided DNS (among other things).
The reason this matters is that "information services" are treated differently from "telecommunications services" in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and if ISPs' DNS responses are "information services," then then DNS is subject to takedown requests, meaning that ISPs could have a legal duty to break their DNS in order to stop users from looking up the addresses of websites once they receive an unsubstantiated complain about those sites.
But this whole line of argument collapses if the FCC uses the preferred tool to enforce Net Neutrality: "Title II classification," which would unambiguously make the ISPs into "telecommunications services," and take DNS out of the line of MPAA fire. But of course, the ISPs have pledged their immortal souls and their last dimes to fighting this classification -- and if they win, we all lose. It also explains why the MPAA hates Net Neutrality so much.
Given that, if the FCC were to reclassify broadband back under Title II, this leg of the MPAA's argument would essentially evaporate. Because it would confirm, absolutely, that broadband providers are telco service providers, and thus clearly protected by the DMCA under 512(a). Thus, for the whole "notice and takedown at the DNS level" plan to be most likely to succeed, the MPAA really needs broadband to remain classified under Title I, so that it can rely on the argument that DNS services are not part of being a telecommunications service, but rather should be classified as a "information location tool" subject to notice and takedown.
I recognize that this may be confusing to follow -- though I've tried to lay out the specifics from both copyright and telco law in a way that's clear. The short version of this is simply that a key part of the MPAA's "site blocking by DNS" plan, actually relies on the fact that broadband providers are not, currently, classified as telco services under Title II. If that changes, it takes away a big part of the MPAA's legal argument. Personally, I think the MPAA's argument, even if broadband is classified under Title I, is incredibly weak already, but having the FCC reclassify broadband providers back under Title II would make the MPAA's attempt to break the internet that much harder, even with the loophole language concerning copyright infringement.
And, of course, all this goes to show just how far former Senator, now MPAA boss, Chris Dodd has gone in selling his soul to Hollywood. Back when he was in Congress, he was a big supporter of net neutrality. Apparently, being principled doesn't pay as good.
Hollywood's Secret War On Net Neutrality Is A Key Part Of Its Plan Stop You From Accessing Websites It Doesn't Like [Mike Masnick/Techdirt]
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23 Dec 00:55
Do You Have Cold Symptoms? Don’t Reach For Vitamin C
by Laura Northrup
Our colleagues down the hall at Consumer Reports, armed with actual facts, are out to debunk everything that I do when I think I might be coming down with a cold. First, they explained why taking zinc supplements isn’t a good idea, and now they’ve pointed out that taking Vitamin C supplements isn’t all that helpful either. If they debunk lengthy naps next, my cold-coping strategies are all eliminated.
It’s not that taking extra Vitamin C once you start sniffling is bad for you, exactly. It’s just that it doesn’t really do any good. While some studies do show that zinc shortens colds a little bit, Consumer Reports’ medical adviser says that Vitamin C hasn’t been shown to shorten your cold…if you weren’t already taking a supplement. It does help some if you were taking the supplement regularly before you were exposed to the cold virus, which means that taking supplements once you’re already experiencing cold symptoms doesn’t do any good. Also, the people in the study whose colds were milder if they were already taking Vitamin C were exerting themselves heavily in the outdoors during the winter.
Excess Vitamin C is just eliminated in your urine, and an “excess” amount is more than one might get by eating a cup of fresh fruit. In addition to expensive pee, one long-term study showed that taking Vitamin C regularly makes someone twice as likely to have kidney stones.
5 reasons to skip taking vitamin C for colds [Consumer Reports]
23 Dec 00:51
TX SWAT team beats, deafens nude man in his own home, lies about arrest; judge declines to punish cops or DA
by Cory Doctorow
A well-meaning friend of Chad Chadwick called the Missouri City, TX police to say that he was afraid that Chadwick was having emotional difficulties; the cops lied to a judge to say that they had reason to believe Chadwick was heavily armed, then they sent a SWAT-team to his house (where he was asleep in the tub), beat 11 kinds of shit out of him, gave him permanent hearing loss, held him in solitary confinement, fraudulently accused him of resisting arrest, and tried to have him imprisoned -- he was acquitted, but a judge wouldn't punish the cops or the DA, because "There is no freestanding constitutional right to be free from malicious prosecution."
Chadwick was bankrupted by the process of defending himself against the multiple felonies that the DA and the police manufactured to justify the violence. The jury offered him "comforting hugs" when they acquitted him of all charges. The DA involved is Ft. Bend County District Attorney John Heal, the police were from Missouri City, Sugar Land, Stafford and the Ft. Bend County Sheriff's Department, the judge was Gray H Miller.
Chadwick did own a single shotgun, but had threatened no one, not even himself. Chadwick's firearm possession apparently prompted SWAT to kick in his door, launch a stun grenade into the bathroom and storm in, according to Chadwick, without announcing their identity.
"While I had my hands up naked in the shower they shot me with a 40 millimeter non-lethal round," said Chadwick.
A second stun grenade soon followed.
"I turned away, the explosion went off, I opened my eyes the lights are out and here comes a shield with four or five guys behind it. They pinned me against the wall and proceeded to beat the crap out of me," said Chadwick.
That's when officers shot the unarmed Chadwick in the back of the head with a Taser at point blank range.
"They claimed I drew down with a shampoo bottle and a body wash bottle," said Chadwick.
And it wasn't over.
"They grabbed me by my the one hand that was out of the shower and grabbed me by my testicles slammed me on my face on the floor and proceeded to beat me more," said Chadwick.
Ft. Bend Police, Prosecutors Accused of Abuse in SWAT Incident [Greg Groogan/Fox Houston]
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22 Dec 23:47
Inventions That Need To Be Created Right Away
by noreply@blogger.com (Damn Cool Pics)
Fatbob likes this
22 Dec 23:46
This is actually the best kind of coal you can get in your stocking, because they’re actually tasty chunks of chocolate wrapped up to look like coal. Each package contains three lumps of chocolate wrapped in shiny black foil. This might be a good gift for yourself since the look will keep others from stealing your candy.
Naughty or Nice, Give Them Lumps of Chocolate Coal
by Conner Flynn
Do you know a kid who has been bad this year? Well, you could always teach them a lesson and give them some coal in their stocking. Have your camera ready because they will probably cry – and the internet lives for children’s tears on Christmas morning.
This is actually the best kind of coal you can get in your stocking, because they’re actually tasty chunks of chocolate wrapped up to look like coal. Each package contains three lumps of chocolate wrapped in shiny black foil. This might be a good gift for yourself since the look will keep others from stealing your candy.
You can get them here for $8(USD).
[via This Is Why I’m Broke via OhGizmo!]
22 Dec 23:46
Reacting to killing
by Bill S (Diary)
I hate Twitter, mostly for politics. I use it for work, for which it is quite useful. But for discourse about controversial topics, it is a horrid medium. And with the deaths of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, Twitter and other outlets such as blog comments have again shown themselves to be atrocious places to converse about such events.
There has been a great deal of angst and anger on the Right about how some have responded to the NYPD police officer murders. I don’t think it needs to be pointed out that there has been a not-insignificant drumbeat from “law and order” conservatives that Brown and Garner deserved it, etc. And I think at least some of the offensiveness from the Left in this situation is a direct response to that. They see the outraged response on the Right as verification that whites only care about murders when it happens to someone who’s not black. Is it all a cause/effect to the Right’s attitude? Probably not. But I’m quite certain that there is some component there.
The knee-jerk response to all of this is “People like Sharpton and Jackson and DeBlasio are responsible for the officers’ deaths because they are fostering an anti-cop mentality”. Ben Domenech addressed this in his newsletter “The Transom” this morning:
Are politicians supposed to refrain from criticizing the actions of specific cops because it could contribute to a culture of disrespect for officers of the law? Of course not, any more than someone should refrain from criticizing any government official because it could create a climate of disrespect for such officials. Saying a military leader is bad at his job and ought to be fired for incompetence does not mean that all military leaders everywhere are incompetent or ought to be fired. But in a climate where the social viewpoint is increasingly collectivist, where tribal loyalties to class or creed or memetic affiliation are the most important definitional aspect of life, it’s to be expected that people make the mistake of exaggerating and overextending the actions of one member of a class to a whole. I distrust police officers generally, but I know that #NotAllCops are racist or corrupt, even in Washington, D.C. It would be unhealthy to think otherwise.
Criticism of something we disagree with isn’t a bad thing. People DO that. But, there is a need for all of us to think about what we say sounds like to those in “the other side” and stop saying stupid stuff just to fan the flames, and this is true on the Right and the Left. Twitter not only enables it but encourages it, and a lot of the time people do it just to piss off someone else. And that is just wrong, no matter what part of the political spectrum you live in.
All of these events were unnecessary losses of life and as humans we should have sympathy for the families and friends of the victims and not try to score points because of what has happened.
Me? I’m just tired of the always-on anger. Take 3 steps back, take a deep breath, read some Scripture, calm yourself down and think about how the other person feels.
The post Reacting to killing appeared first on RedState.
22 Dec 23:41
Google Will Finally Make It Really Easy To Look Up Song Lyrics
by Jillian D'Onfro
Google is now displaying song lyrics directly at the top of its search results with links to the Google Play store, as first noticed by SeroundTable. If you search for the name of the song plus the word "lyrics," there's a chance the first several verses will pop up automatically.
Here's what it looks like:
This move makes sense for Google. The has been steadily increasing the amount of information it lets users see on its page without having to click a third-party link. If you search for a proper noun, like, for example, Pink Floyd, Google pulls a bunch of information from Wikipedia, the World CIA Factbook, and other sites to give you some basic information about it.
For Google, this will drive traffic to the Play Store, where users can buy their searched song, and it will make finding information as quick and seamless as possible (one of Google's self-professed goals).
It could also wreak havoc for song lyrics sites like Genius (formerly RapGenius), the well-funded lyrics and document annotation startup, as well as a bunch of long-standing lyrics sites like AZLyrics.com and SongLyrics.com.
A lot of these older lyrics sites are plagued with really intrusive pop-ups and other kinds of ads, so it's a win for users as well.
It's unclear how broad this rollout is and how much content Google has managed to license, though. For example, we couldn't find lyrics for Michelle Branch, Bright Eyes, or Van Morrison (at first we couldn't find lyrics for Britney Spears, either, but former VentureBeat writer Sean Ludwig pointed out that if you search the song name and the artist name — like "Britney Spears Toxic lyrics" — you'll find some). We did find lyrics to a few Fleetwood Mac songs.
Tom Lehman, Genius cofounder, told Business Insider via email that he thinks Google is ranking its own product above one that's better for the user though, since Genius has more in-depth information and analysis. However, he concedes, it's nice that Google's page is free of advertisements.
"Overall we're happy to see Google take an interest in improving lyrics online," he writes, "And we'd love to collaborate with them to create the best lyric experience the Internet has ever seen."
Business Insider reached out to Google for more information, and got the following response from a Google spokesperson, a nod to the lyrics of "Stairway to Heaven," one of the songs Google provides lyrics for:
"There's a feeling you get when you turn to a song and you know that the words have two meanings. Well it's whispered that now if you go search the tune, maybe Google will lead you to reason. Ooh, it makes you wonder"
SEE ALSO: Google Has Buried Some Little-Known Tricks In Hangouts That Will Liven Up Your Chats
Join the conversation about this story »
22 Dec 23:40
What Your Face Looks Like At 150 Miles Per Hour
by Raphael Orlove
This squid took his motorcycle up to 150 mph without a helmet or goggles or any kind of protection from the wind. Let's learn from his stupidity.
22 Dec 23:36
to each their own beer. but c'mon man if i wanted bud light i would've bought bud light
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submitted by failedlogic [link] [394 comments] |
22 Dec 23:34
This is a commercial for LG's new 4K television featuring a bunch of pets reacting to other animals on the screen. It all looked pretty suspect to me. Fake, the shadows are all wrong, you can tell it's fake because it's a commercial and all commercials were designed to trick the viewer into thinking something works better than it actually does (I'm looking at you, Oxy-Clean!). Per the video's description:
Pets Reacting To Other Animals On 4K Television
This is a commercial for LG's new 4K television featuring a bunch of pets reacting to other animals on the screen. It all looked pretty suspect to me. Fake, the shadows are all wrong, you can tell it's fake because it's a commercial and all commercials were designed to trick the viewer into thinking something works better than it actually does (I'm looking at you, Oxy-Clean!). Per the video's description:
Funny cats and dogs video watching LG 4K TV. With 4X the resolution, even animals can't tell the difference watching a LG 4K TV. How do your pets react to TV?Well thanks for asking, LG. My pets don't react to TV. I thought my cat cared once, but it turned out she was just interested in a fly that was NEAR the TV. She does react to the sound of me opening cans though. She always thinks it's tuna or cat food. Then she gets really sassy with me when it's just Spaghetti Oh's or garbanzo beans. Keep going for the video.
21 Dec 23:54
When you shouldn't be wearing a thong...
by ghettoredhot
D Gback ladder
The post When you shouldn't be wearing a thong... appeared first on Ghetto Red Hot.
21 Dec 23:46
Brandeis University student leader
by J.P. Travis
D Gfuture politician
Brandeis University student leader:
i have no sympathy for the nypd officers who were murdered today.
lmao, all i just really dont have sympathy for the cops who were shot. i hate this racist fucking country.
![[link]](http://i.imgur.com/i2qp5lt.jpg){kind=link}
![[link]](http://www.imgur.com/5mi4sH8.jpeg){kind=link}