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When talking about platforms if you want to refer to just the OS (or supporting libraries, specifications etc.) then you would say "software platform" and if you want to talk only about the processor (or other supporting hardware) then you would say "hardware platform". Otherwise, in computing, the word platform is understood to mean a particular combination of hardware and software.

Also be aware that cross platform is not the same thing as platform independent.

If you are still confused you may find the following helpful:

http://www.bellevuelinux.org/cross-platform.html
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/platform
http://www.atis.org/tg2k/_platform.html
http://mtechit.com/concepts/platform.html
http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/dictionary/ DictionaryResults.aspx?refid=1861738674

I think he's talking about power outages - and as for the "Western world" about some brownouts that have occurred in the past few years.

Whilst that might solve that problem, it creates a whole lot more. This article details some of the complications that the physics of zero gravity might bring.
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My habit of ending sentences with prepositions is over.
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Don't underestimate the value of subtle action:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8598304/site/newsweek/

And really, if you don't think that cutting edge medicine is doing all sorts of crazy shit that seems like it shouldn't be possible, you aren't looking hard enough.

People may be stupid, but probably not so much about the fuel-stingy hybrids (Prius and Civic)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11637968/

The original CU numbers were bad - the revised report signals that even if you don't care about your impact on your neighbors, they still make simple economic sense...

Algorithms are designed according to the availability of several functional units not offered by the human brain.

You may want to revise your definition of algorithms. Originally algorithms were simply a problem-solving procedure or noun a process or set of rules used in calculations or other problem-solving operations. Neither of these require a computer or anything else other than the human brain.

The PSX is almost an audiophile quality CD player.

See: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15484873/
And: http://dogbreath.de/PS1/index.html

Hah. The parent basically quoted the main points of an article that hit the front page of digg the other day: 15 ways stores trick you into spending.

here's the debate http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18296908/

I suggest you be the one to start the revolution. Edit the video, remove the rainbow peacock and make a torrent. Your efforts will be heralded by the our future citizens, your name firmly affixed in the pages of history.

Rawr!

Reminds me of the 80's when Stinger SAM's were sold to nowadays terrorist states. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5137264/ "According to intelligence sources, thousands of MANPADS may have been provided to Iraqi security forces or were stolen during hostilities in Iraq immediately following the collapse of the Saddam Hussein regime in 2003," notes the report.

Hilary Rosen, for MSNBC's Hardblogger http://hardblogger.msnbc.msn.com/ site, covering the recent debate, and inserts her "Ode to Jack Valenti" http://hardblogger.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/04/2 6/170130.aspx. "Clown following the lion tamer," indeed.

Hilary Rosen, for MSNBC's Hardblogger http://hardblogger.msnbc.msn.com/ site, covering the recent debate, and inserts her "Ode to Jack Valenti" http://hardblogger.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/04/2 6/170130.aspx. "Clown following the lion tamer," indeed.

-TFA says thet they need 35megabux over five to seven years to say "go or no" on this...
Assuming the standard 300% to 500% cost overrun, it STILL chump change in the greater scheme of BS...
(that is to say, Big Science, in case you were wondering)

Even if the technology doesn't directly lead to commercial fusion power, it is probable that enough physics and engineering will be learned that the amount in question is ... CHUMP CHANGE!* (about what we, that is to say, US flushes down the crapper in Iraq every 16 or so hours (assuming 500% overrun vs estimated costs fo r the z-machine project and 400 Billion butcher-bill over 4 years of ...war

http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com _wrapper&Itemid=182,
  or you may instead prefer http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11880954/))

Engineering research vs. a war... which is likely to yield a superior Return On Investment?

*In the unlikely event that it fails to be completly obvious to some ./'ers who are not native English speakers, the idiom "chump change" means "a quantity of money that, in the context of the present discussion, is utterly trivial".

As to running over the public Internet, been there, done that, too. As a consequence of some unscheduled maintenance, we got dumped onto the public 'net one day. What actually happens is, they decide you're a DOS attack and they block you! Surprise! Bad research project, no record!

In any case, some tuning has to be forgiven: the bandwidth-delay product on these runs is on the order of a gigabit, and, well, your stack isn't tuned for that, out of the box.

Voter turnout in 2004 (60%) was the highest since 1968.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6399980/

it's a great political trick. Constantly lag a decade or so behind the country, and you have the full support of whatever idiots you can currently convince the country is going the wrong way.

continuing on with my naivety. i am, as of yet, not convinced that bush/cheny intentionally lied or if they were just mis-informed or seeing what they wanted to see. if my mechanic tells me i need a muffler belt and that sounds good and i want to protect my car, it doesnt mean i lied when i tell my wife why we need one, just clueless. after i am sold blinker fluid and get laughed at i should reconsider my stance on automotive maintenance... not sure if stupidity is a crime.

P.S. Did I just read that China is going to alter the weather to insure it doesn't rain during the Olympics?

Yes, you did. It's been planned for a while now...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13107271/site/newsweek /

From http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/refpages/RefArticle. aspx?refid=1741500821&pn=14
"About half of the nation's lumber and all of its fir plywood come from the forests of the Pacific states, an area dominated by softwoods. In addition to the Douglas fir forests in Washington and Oregon, this area includes the famous California redwoods and the Sitka spruce along the coast of Alaska."

Far more wood is used for lumber than for paper, so I think that is more relevant to the discussion. And this lumber comes from forests with varied and interesting ecosystems. I'm not saying we shouldn't use trees at all, but we should keep in mind that we really do affect the environment when we do so. These pacific forests are huge carbon sinks, and regrowing them to their original state isn't so easy.

Whilst it's laudable that companies are investing in robotics at all, it seems to me that the time has come for investment on a commercial scale in robotics for specific applications. These 'hobby' type robots are all well and good (and no doubt particularly appealing to many around here) but they don't actually DO very much of any use, and the average member of the public is not going to be all that excited by them.

Hey, something like 60% of Roomba owners name the things, and those things rate slightly above wind-up toys and below a Furby in smarts. There's a market for those things. Of course, there's a market for the Ionic Breeze air cleaner, which doesn't even clean air.

What this new effort sounds like is an alternative to FIRST robotics, but at a lower price point.

The real action starts around $1000. Check out Robots-Dreams.org, which covers Japanese and other hobbyist humanoid robots. There are four or five makers of those things now, and they're very impressive.

Hobbyist robotics tends to be weak on sensors and terrible on sensor fusion, but once anyone can get working hardware, that should improve. There's been enormous progress in vision processing in the last five years, but it hasn't filtered down to the hobbyists yet, even though the hardware isn't the problem there.

Every decade we have stories like this about other countries that are going to surpass the United States because of how much better they can cough up answers on tests (the stories have been happening since AT LEAST the early 70s in my memory). And yet, it never seems to happen.

Depending on what "other countries" are supposed to "surpass" the United States at, it may have already happened. For example, let's talk Information Technology. Isn't Denmark the current leader (with the US at number 7)? Another example: it was recently announced that the US is down to #3 in exports too.

The link in the blog seems to be broken. There is some more information about the planet (Gliese 581 c) on Wikipedia, MSN, and Space.com.

How did this get modded insightful?

Employment still low? How is it then that the national unemployment rate is the lowest it's been in 5 years right now and getting close to being the lowest in well over 10 years. http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServle t?request_action=wh&graph_name=LN_cpsbref3

Stock still down? How do you equate stock down = the dow just hitting a new record today? http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3683270/

Yes, gas is expensive but how is that and indicator of the economy? It's a negative influence on the economy, not the other way around. Appearantly in Soviet Russia Gas pays for you.

finally, how is the battle with terrorism an indicator of the economy? Right wrong or otherwise?

I'm not trying to support Bush, I will be as happy to see him go as most the rest of us. I'm just pointing out some serious flaws in the statement and logic here.

Nice try!

According to this:
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761558916/Milk y_Way.html

Milky way:
~100,000 light years in diameter.
We are 25,000l.y. from the center of our Milky Way.
And rotating once in 200 million years around center of milky way.
(Moving with speed ~220 km/sec)

So.. where is 65million years from ?

What this article so nobly doesn't mention is that it's Microsoft who's stirring up all of these lobbyist groups. Snatching a link off of Google (ahem), we find:

DoubleClick: Microsoft Loses, Then Whines - http://www.247wallst.com/2007/04/doubleclick_mic.h tml

Google buys DoubleClick, Microsoft protests - http://techreport.com/onearticle.x/12270

Google rivals urge scrutiny of DoubleClick deal - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18132983/

So, um, don't panic. The community hasn't decided Google is the antichrist; this is all astroturfing, and Yahoo and Microsoft were trying to buy DoubleClick too. ;)

Boris Yeltsin is dead. Someone find a decent article on it to toss at Taco. If he had any power still left, he don't now and likely some changes coming.

Posted under Warez comment cause of some memorable Russian Warez providers.

Intel isn't alone. There is too much inventory nearly everywhere, as Fred Hickey recently noted in his High Tech Strategist subscription newsletter: "We have excess PC inventories, excess cell phone inventories, excess auto inventories, excess networking inventories (the Cisco 'Lean' initiative), excess telecom inventories (carrier consolidation), excess PS3 and Xbox game consoles (disappointing sales), excess iPod inventories, excess computer server parts, excess disk drive inventories, excess DRAM inventories, excess microprocessor inventories -- and it will all be cleared during the housing and credit bust, and the first consumer cutbacks in 16 years."

'Eyes in the sky' for homeland security. (Date: Aug. 27, 2005) From blimps to do-it-yourself unmanned vehicles, a trend takes flight.

(...)That's okay, a lot of people do, says George Spyrou, president of Airship Management Services, whose blimps are leased to the likes of Fuji Film and have been used as air surveillance and security platforms by the New York Police Department, the U.S. Secret Service and the Athens police during last year's summer Olympic Games.

Fuji Blimp Helps With Convention Security (Date: Aug. 30, 2004), on CNN also.

(...)At the closely guarded Republican National Convention, even the Fujifilm Blimp has a role in security. Fuji Photo Film USA Inc., the Valhalla, N.Y.-based U.S. arm of the Japanese film maker, is allowing the New York Police Department use of the blimp to bolster aerial patrols above Madison Square Garden.

from TFA: "The shooting on the Virginia Tech campus was only hours old, police hadn't even identified the gunman, and yet already the perpetrator had been fingered and was in the midst of being skewered in the media.

Video games. They were to blame for the dozens dead and wounded. They were behind the bloodiest massacre in U.S. history.

Or so Jack Thompson told Fox News and, in the days that followed, would continue to tell anyone who'd listen.

dictionary.reference.com knows misspelt

Encarta knows misspelt

Meriam-Webster does not understand misspelt but suggestes the root word "misspell" (and "misspelled")

So, you misspelt "misspelt".

There is absolutely no excuse for waiting until the last minute to file.

It's widely recognized that being lost in the gigantic mass of filers who put their returns in at the last minute reduces your chances of being selected for an audit. Unless you're getting a fat refund check (in which case you're a different class of idiot), anyone who sends their return in even a day before the deadline is being foolish.

For example, a random web search quickly finds "5 ways to avoid an audit": if you are concerned about a potential audit, never file until the last minute. It won't hurt and can only decrease your chances of being selected.. You'll find similar advice in most tax recommendations if you read up on the subject a bit.

While the Red Square nebula may well include dust and cooler material, many nebulae are observed to contain matter in the plasma state [Ref], and the material is moving through interstellar space which also contain significant amounts of plasma (ionized material).

Partially ionized plasmas, even less than 1% ionized, and containing dust and smaller grains will behave as a plasma, and will still be highly electrically conductive. For example, the F-ring of Saturn has been suggested to carry a "dust ring current"[Ref]

Dust and gas does not rule out a current through the plasma in a nebula, which is further supported by its morphology (hourglass shape), any observed synchrotron radiation (due to the acceleration of charged particles by electric fields through magnetic fields), and filamentation (pinched currents).

Regards,
Ian Tresman
plasma-universe.com

Hammond, who fired on Talovic, is being credited with drawing the gunman's attention until other officers could reach the scene. Talovic was killed, although it was unclear which officer fired the fatal shot, police said.

Talovic had a backpack full of ammunition, a shotgun and a .38-caliber pistol, police said.

The person who did the shooting was just upset that Sanjaya might actually win American Idol

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18136712/

I mean after all that dude sucks!

Have some friends in the area, so our usual gang was trying to figure out what was up.

From what I heard they put all schools in the county into lockdown when the attack was detected - not just college campuses. The gunman is apparently dead, but obviously everyone is extremely nervous.

Apparently the campus had had bomb threats in the last two weeks. No idea if they're connected:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18134671/

My thoughts are with the lost and their loved ones.

Good thing I use http://www.msn.com/

*puke*

Observant space enthusiasts will notice the excessively large number of hourglass morphologies that continue to appear in NASA's press releases. These hourglass morphologies can only be awkwardly called the result of gravitation. A cursory familiarity with laboratory plasma physics will help people to recognize that the most likely explanation is that these are in fact z-pinches wich result from Birkeland Currents. In a zoomed image, you can see the filamentary Birkeland Currents on two opposing sides of the red "square" being pinched down to a central point. These same filaments are also observable, but in cross-section, in the 1987A supernova remnant. Which components are visible varies from image to image, but the general morphology of the hourglass remains discernible.

Here are some additional hourglass morphologies with pictures that have been observed:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4953165/
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0510 05eta-carinae.htm
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0504 26bug-nebula.htm
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0504 15milkyway.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Supernova-1987a .jpg

Since hourglass morphologies are somewhat disconfirming to traditional mainstream cosmologies (ie, the Big Bang), the fact that they continue to be observed all over the universe escapes the notice of professional astrophysicists, whose primary concern is to prove the Big Bang Theory and Stellar Evolution Theories. Objectively interpreting these shapes for what they most likely represent means dropping complicated, mainstream astrophysical explanations, and accepting the notion that electricity flows through space over plasma as we know it does within the laboratory. In these particular instances, at least, it is clear that the electrical force is dominant to gravity. We can opt to devise all sorts of gravitation-centric explanations for hourglass morphologies, but in doing so, we consciously opt to violate Occam's Razor.

The implications of such strong evidence of electricity in space are overwhelming -- which provides all of the explanation necessary for avoiding abandonment of the traditional, more popular gravity-centric theories. When astrophysicists eventually accept that plasma in space has electrical resistance just like the plasma we observe in the laboratory, then they will begin to re-interpret all of our observations in terms of Maxwell's Equations rather than fluid and gas laws. And the enigmas of dark matter and dark energy will forever disappear, as this substitution can provide the exact forces necessary to explain things like how spiral galaxies can spin as if they are solid plates and how matter might repel other matter. The fact that we as a culture currently prefer to consider imaginary forces and particles to explain these "anomalies" rather than forces that we already understand will forever paint us to future generations as people who decided to favor the mathematicians and theories over our observational data and decades of experimental laboratory physics work.

The evidence for electricity in space is not a sparse patchwork here and there. It is a flood of data that is only allowed to escape the notice of the public with the help of overconfident astrophysicists and a mob mentality within the space enthusiast community. Anybody who is intellectually curious about the universe and less concerned with what the people around them believe than what in fact appears to be true should consider learning more about plasma physics and the electric universe we live in. Don Scott

For the most part, you are correct. However, most of those phone "taxes" actually go to the phone company. There was a lawsuit just a couple of years ago because of the phone companies mixrepresenting as tax what is really just a fee the phone company charges.

Telecom Firms Pile on Extra Fees Under Official-Sounding Names.

For example, the phone company is required to pay money to the federal universal service fund. The FUSF Cost Recovery Fee is money that you pay to the phone company. The claim is made that this is to defray the amount that they pay to the FUSF, which may be true, but it is disingenuous to call this a tax; the government is not charging you a fee, and the phone company is not required to collect the fee from consumers, nor is it required to collect it as an add-on.

The phone companies CHOOSE to collect the Federal Universal Service Fund CRF as an add-on so that they can fraudulently advertise low teaser rates that are substantially lower than your actual cost. By any reasonable ethical standards, this practice is wrong. However, it is, sadly, legal.

[quote]That the U.S. had goodwill before 9/11 and then threw it away with the invasion of Iraq is a myth. [/quote]

You are the one reciting a myth. After 9-11, Le Monde proclaimed, "We are all Americans". The band outside Buckingham palace played the Star-Spangled Banner. All around the world, vigils were held, marches were held, and US embassies were plastered with flowers. Have you forgotten so soon? Well, perhaps polls will help remind you.

In some countries, positive opinions of America have more than halved.

It is trivial to break in to a laptop when one has unrestricted physical access.

It is usually non-trivial to break into a server that is in a data-center behind firewalls given zero-knowledge.

Fortunately for the bad-guys, laptops have been proven over and over to contain network information, passwords, and raw protected data:

Chicago Public Schools
FBI
Boeing
Starbucks
Towers Perrin
US Commerce Department
US Department of Transportation and Sovereign Bank, et al.
US Navy
US Department of Veteran Affairs
Federal Trade Commission
Equifax
Ernst & Young (many times)

Unless "Get competent administrators" is software that prevents users from putting data on their laptops, this suggestion is meaningless.

"Get competent administrators" is a finger-waving nebulous non-solution from those that have no idea what competent administration looks like.

Competent adminstrators recognize that security problems are not simple and they are only solved by tangible, disciplined, and rigorous solutions, rather than dismissive statements of "be smarter."

It is trivial to break in to a laptop when one has unrestricted physical access.

It is usually non-trivial to break into a server that is in a data-center behind firewalls given zero-knowledge.

Fortunately for the bad-guys, laptops have been proven over and over to contain network information, passwords, and raw protected data:

Chicago Public Schools
FBI
Boeing
Starbucks
Towers Perrin
US Commerce Department
US Department of Transportation and Sovereign Bank, et al.
US Navy
US Department of Veteran Affairs
Federal Trade Commission
Equifax
Ernst & Young (many times)

Unless "Get competent administrators" is software that prevents users from putting data on their laptops, this suggestion is meaningless.

"Get competent administrators" is a finger-waving nebulous non-solution from those that have no idea what competent administration looks like.

Competent adminstrators recognize that security problems are not simple and they are only solved by tangible, disciplined, and rigorous solutions, rather than dismissive statements of "be smarter."

"[W]hat can a company do to boost its share price? Besides stopping to burn money and come up with a working business model, I mean."

Well, how about a reverse stock split? [...]

There's a substitute teacher who will disagree with you about 98 not being broken.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17134607/

I suggest we put the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce in charge of developing a REAL moonbase.

Coincidentally, Bigelow Aerospace (a company based in Las Vegas) has recently announced their business plans for privately-operated space bases. The initial outposts will be in orbit, but Bigelow has also discussed his future plans for lunar bases.

Have you heard of WGA Notifications? Every time you boot your computer it phones home to Microsoft and sends information about your computer. Every time you install Microsoft updates it phones home to Microsoft and sends information about your computer. If you Windows Update it sends information about your computer and forces you to install the wgatray spyware.

This is why I no longer use Windows Update. I use AutoPatcher (for existing installs) or RyanVM Update Packs (integrates into the cd, I use this for new installs. "RyanVM WGA Addon" contains the wga spyware).

Also, you should block the following domains at your router:

genuine.microsoft.com
mpa.one.microsoft.com
wpa.one.microsoft.com
wustats.microsoft.com

If you're using SquidGuard or similar, you should block or rewrite the following URLs:

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=74005
http://runonce.msn.com/runonce2.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/

If you have this spyware installed, XP AntiSpy can remove it.

The first Zune boasted Wifi too. Misleading as hell.