Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Playstation, CueCat, Games
Maybe a bad day at the factory? An anonymous reader submits: "I'm not sure where the other fellow got his WAP11, but mine don't show the dirty output his does." See this diagram for a much more desireable outcome, if you care to play with (a little bit of) fire.
First application should be a GPL'd AIBO obedience school. gonz writes: "An update to the previous reported linux on ps2 kit has been submitted by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) to the people previously registering interest on their technology sites. The update consist of that it will be released in May on both SCEA (us) and SCEE (pal areas, including Europe and Australia) territories. A website has been set up at this place. On a side note, registering for notification when pre-ordering can apparently be done too: 'Finally, although sales haven't yet started, if you send an e-mail with the message "subscribe" to ps2linux-request@technology.scee.net we'll let you know when pre-ordering starts.'"
Lessons in obviousness. John Kozubik writes: "I have written an article describing, in a manner I have not yet seen, why the court decision by the U.S. appeals court in SF that claimed in-line linking was not fair use was inherently flawed. It is a short piece written for both the technical and the non-technical, and I think it raises a strong point concerning the arbitrary nature of browser behavior."
If they'd launch some pigs, perhaps global phones would be affordable. Guppy06 writes: "Many of you may be surprised to learn that Iridium (famous for trying to compete with cell phones and failing miserably) is still throwing up satellites (I sure was). The article on CNN tells of the technical woes of getting this particular Delta II off the pad in Vandenberg as Iridium tries to put five more spares into orbit."
Couldn't they have spayed or neutered them instead? Speaking of old hardware, Anonymous Radio Shack Employee writes: "RadioShack has sent a notice to all of its employees to destroy all CueCats (preferably with a hammer). Apparently the CueCat is among a couple of dozen items that RadioShack has given up on, and wants destroyed. The memo says that store employee's can not benefit from the items on the list. Which sucks because my store has over a hundred of these things just sitting in the back room." This week's Linux Weekly News has a great, detailed followup to the recent flap over relative OS security sparked by a post in Windows Informant.
i will have the first webserver running on a cue cat.
Alright! I'm deffinately ready for the "101 ways to destroy a Cuecat" video craze. :)
I dance a jig on their grave. See where empty-headed threats and intellectual property rhetoric lead?
Another proud carrier of the $rtbl flag
Somebody call the humane society!
Oh... they're not *real*?
Use the Preview Button! Check those URLs! Don't forget the http://!
Cue::Cats are only to be destroyed with the special Cue::Hammer.
The Cue::Hammer, when connected to your computer's serial port, will digitally scan any object it is used upon and automatically take you to a website featuring...
oh, never mind.
They probably don't want to have to support the customers that would get one - "my cue:cat doesn't understand the barcode on my baked beans .. whine whine whine"
They may well want to sever their relationship with the digital:convergence to, and smashing the things to bits is a great way to send that message.
Wow! Something from Radio Scrap that actually needs help in falling apart! :]
Having to post this anonymously (as a Former Radio Shack Employee Who Does Not Wish To Cause Trouble Even Though His Boss Has No Idea What Slashdot Is) - I was working for RS when the memo came out that all Cats were to be given away IMMEDAITELY. Our boss made us push them on every customer, showing us the memo that said that each store would be charged $0.05 for each Cat remaining in the store past X date. I don't know who submitted the article, but perhaps his boss doesn't read his memos. Anyway, we dumped our stock shortly thereafter in a matter of a few days. Also, the bit about "employees not benefitting from these items" or whatever is somewhat bogus - it's not like RS corporate makes you send them pictures of numbered piles of destroyed Cats. If his/her boss has half a heart he'd let his employees take home whatever.
Well, I won't be using Radio Shack ever again. I don't see any reason to patronize a business that would rather destroy an item it no longer wants or can sell, especially something they were just handing out for free in the first place... rather than give the items away to those who need/want them. It's a waste of resources that could have been better used instead of destroyed. It's this sort of action that defines what the deepest, darkest depths that greed and ignorance can reach.
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
The last non tech job I had was working in a warehouse for a retailer. We got orders popping out from time to time that instructed us to destroy items. Probably not an uncommon thing.
Maybe it's for some kind of wacky accounting purposes??? I don't know.
Has anyone been able to get their Cue:Cat to scan something they've printed with a bar code font? My cat will scan every UPC bar code I've found, but if I try to make my own, it almost never works.
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Iridium was bought by a company no one had ever heard of, for a bargain price -- after "securing" a long term contract from the US Government that basically pays for their operating costs. Any additional commercial subscribers is just gravy.
Common speculation is that this company is really a front for one or more of the many three-letter agencies in Washington that saw an opportunity to establish a secure means of global communication.
What is even more interesting is the fact that Digital Convergence is still alive!
It looks like they changed their business plan (of course) and are now *selling* the CueCat reader and books (this last one is a ROFL site. Look at the titles: Online Weight Loss Assistant, WAR ON TERROR (PHASE ONE: AFGHANISTAN & USAMA BIN LADIN), and so on...)
Now that would be cool.
I'll post this as AC because no self respecting slashdotter would ever admit to working at RadioShack.
Whenever an item is written off at RadioShack...say for example, you give replace someone's radio under a service plan...you are supposed to destroy the item. This is done for a couple reasons that I can think of. As an employee, you could take the item, send it to get serviced on the store's tab (Radioshack...We Service What We Sell), resell it, and the void / backout the transaction and pocket the cash while avoiding discrepencies in the inventory. Also, prevents you from other such mischief... sending it to get repaired, and keeping it for yourself.
Since they're being written off, the procedure is therefore the procedure of all written off goods -- destruction by the almighty hammer.
I still can't see how people would profit off them, except maybe selling them as some sort of bizarre techno-geek sex toy / butt plug. I think if you use it to scan your butt, it automatically brings up a link to goatse.
I saw some cheap used oscilloscopes in a local electronics surplus store at the weekend. If I got my hands on one, how would I go about measuring the frequencies like those guys did with their Linksys? Does one have to buy an antenna, or can it be made? Do all oscilloscopes have the necessary inputs for this. Are there any other considerations? Is this directional (depending on antenna, I guess)?
:)
The instrument used to make those screen shots is a spectrum analyzer, not an oscilloscope. Both instruments display amplitude on a vertical scale, but an oscilloscope displays amplitude versus time while a spectrum analyzer displays amplitude versus frequency. They are very different tools, and any serious RF hacker will own both.
In general, an analyzer is much more sensitive (they normally display RF signal power on a log10 scale, so their dynamic range in voltage terms can exceed 100,000,000:1.) If you had a fast-enough/fancy-enough oscilloscope, you could run an FFT on its display and get the same basic information, but the SA is still the tool of choice for most RF work above 500 MHz. The insanely-fast scopes that can do microwave FFT analysis come with Ferrari-size price tags (literally), and they still don't have the dynamic range of a $3,000 spectrum analyzer. Different horses for different courses.
Sorry for the rather basic questions, but I'm not an EE, and I've only used an oscilloscope very briefly about 12 years ago. I really want to find out where the interference for my 2.4GHz phone is coming from, and how moving the base station helps. I also want to put an FM transmitter on my sound card, and so I want to see how that works too.
For both of those purposes, a spectrum analyzer would be the right way to go. An analyzer capable of 2.4 GHz coverage can be had for under $2K on eBay, but not much less. Some 802.11 hardware can give you reasonably-decent pictures of the 2.4 GHz spectrum, so I'd investigate that possibility first.
Dahlmann tightly grips the knife, which he may have no idea how to use, and steps out into the plain.
Talk to anyone that works in a bagel or donut shop and they will tell you that they throw away hundreds/thousands of units a week. Basically what isn't purchased is discarded. Surely we can think to give the units to the homeless/hungry/needy-cause, but there is apparently a legal reason not to do so. Perhaps fear of a lawsuit or maybe fear of propagating freeloading?
that every product is a liability forever. This was/is a big problem for small aircraft manufacturers...their planes easily last 50 years or more. 60 years later, the 8th owner crashes it because the fuel filter got clogged, and guess who get's sued?
And did you ever see the Simpsons episode where Homer bought the trampoline?
No lawyer would ever advise a company to give away overstock when they could be destroyed instead.
Evil is the money of root.
I fully agree that any material placed on publically accessible web servers should be referencable under the "fair use" doctrine. However, I think the court's descision is correct in light of this. Mr. Kozubik's main complaint seems to be that the behavior of browsers as regards linking are entirely arbitrary. He is correct. However, fair use is by its very nature a doctrine which will be interpreted on a case by case basis, respecting precedent.
Rather than fearing, as he does, that the court will constantly have to "revise" the decision as technology changes, I think courts will be able to read the intent and wisely apply it to many other decisions. After all, a court decision is not a law, defined by the precise wordings, but rather a carefully considered opinion on the burden of evidence. Future courts should be able to apply the same fundamental distinction--linking that is designed to automatically reproduce the work vs linking that is designed only to show the location of the work--irregardless of the precise technology involved.
The picture of the modulated signal from the WAP11 on the HP8565a should be rated PG due to explicit content :-)
I mean, what does the 1st one look like to you?
Follow me
I worked a consulting job that sent me to a big toy company's offices in NYC. We once spent the day destroying a room full of toy centipedes, hammer to plastic. They just didn't want them resold through unofficial outlets. Evidently the government holds them responsible for them even if they get thrown out. Ie. if someone chokes on a piece of a toy they picked out the garbage, they are can still be sued. Destroying them saves them that liability.
By and by a fun gig, they had an unlimited IT budget, so they had things like $12,000 plasma video screens thoughtout the office, and IBM Intellistations as office computers.
The coolest thing was building Half Pipe, full size, to do a presentation on the X-games toys.
My friend works at blockbuster, and he says that periodically they'll be told to destroy videos or games that are no longer being sold.
It's worth mentioning that not one thing is ever *actually* destroyed-- that's one of the few perks of a minimum wage behind-the-counter job.
My guess on why this happens is that the original distributer (who sold the videos to Blockbuster or CueCat's to Radio Shack) made Blockbuster or Radio Shack sign a contract saying explicitly that they couldn't give extras of these items to their employees. If Radio Shack is in effect giving away CueCats to all their employees, then none of the employees are going to go out and buy new CueCats. The decision isn't in the hands of Radio Shack's management at all, but in the contract with Radio Shack's distributor.
In other words, Radio Shack doesn't care if they're destroyed or not, but they tell the employees to destroy them in order to avoid legal trouble.
Hope that helps
I think everyone needs to check their numbers. While many of these updates are being labeled Linux vulnerablities, most of them are vulnerabilites in software that comes with Linux.
Take a look at the LWN article again. It includes mailman (a mailing list manager), openssh (secure access to the box), proftpd (an ftp server), (l|m)icq, sendmail (a mail server), and an IMAP/POP server, just to name a few. When is the last time you saw Windows (including NT) come with utilities like those?
Let's reduce this down to a common denominator: if you only include the packages that would be required to "duplicate" windows functionality, we have:
1) the kernel
2) KDE (for "network transparent" FTP browsing, etc [FYI no bias against gnome, just picking examples])
3) XWindows for the GUI
4)Apache (if we are talking NT with IIS, or 9x with PWS, which has security issues of its own
5) a dhcp client, most likely
6) Maybe a few others
Now how many vulnerabilities do you have? Granted, Linux servers run other things, like POP/IMAP, FTP, etc, but if we're going to compare apples to apples, then let's include the security problems in POP/IMAP servers on Windows, and FTP, and DNS, and, and, and. The comparison is not fair in the least, as Linux is taking a hit for all the problems generated by auxillury packeges. On the other hand, Microsoft is only having to update (and only getting hit) for problems in Windows proper, and not for all the extra programs that you need to make Windows a fully functioning server!
Joshua J. Kugler
Thank the tax system - it punishes you for not doign this kind of thing. Nor alas is it just a US problem.
Whats sad is the tax system ought to encourage radio shack to take the box down the local school or college and throw them into the "fun stuff for electronics lessons" bucket
When stuff is imported via cargo ship from Japan, a certain number of damaged units are expected, and so they ship extra ones in order to make up for this. On paper, it all works out in the insurance, and so everybody is happy.
However, when a shipment arrives with no damage, these 'extra' items must now be paid for by the receiver. Since some of these items are sometimes worth tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, when you suddenly have to pay for more than you bargained for, it hurts the balance sheet.
A friend of mine described how a government tax agent and several company officers had to witness the destruction of a perfectly working, hand-crafted, grand piano. Warehouse workers raised and dropped the two ton monster fifteen times from a forklift before it was destroyed to the point where the tax agent would allow it to be written off.
Spend a month hand crafting a top of the line musical instrument, ship it overseas, and then have it destroyed. All just to satisfy the red tape. This is so Muggle/Douglas Adams, it makes my head spin!
I almost look forward to the day when society is decimated by a comet!
-Fantastic Lad
This makes *far* more sense than what you have described your Radioshack does.
Two words.. Labor costs. A portable CD player that sells for $50 costs less than that to manufacture. If the laser or spindle motor or such goes out, you have at least an hour troubleshooting, ordering parts, looking up part numbers, keeping inventory of unique parts, replacing the part, aligning and warrenting the repair. You break even with techs at $20 per hour how?? Short answer.. replace it. Very little sold in radio shack sells for over a $100.00. I used to fix VCR's when they were a 600 to 1200 dollar item. Now that they are a 60 dollar item, I found other work.
The truth shall set you free!
-- ;-)
Kuro5hin.org: where the good times never end.
In the US, food doesn't *have* to be tossed. There's a national organization, Second Harvest, that arranges for surplus food donations. I think their programs vary depending on location, but in Atlanta, they have trucks that come to restaurants and grocery stores to pick up, and regular drop off points. The food goes from the restaurants to soup kitchens and food assistance pantries, where it is used or handed out in an organized fashion. They also do larger scale projects like getting surpus produce from one region in the country to another.
As far as I'm aware, in some places restauranteurs are misinformed about local rules for food donation. Second Harvest and similar organizations work to provide correct information as well as the go-betweens to organize and monitor such donations.
A quick survey on the net for "surpus food" or "food rescue" (a common term for this) turned up several meta-lists of organizations, including this one which has listings for the US and Canada. It seems like there's more a misperception of legal reason that actual restrictions.
It's too late, they already are selling them on eBay!
& item=2002127196
& item=2002287424
& item=2002160653
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem
http://cgi.ebay.com/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem
"I have not failed. I've simply found 10,000 ways that won't work." --Thomas Edison
"Apparently, in the book trade, tearing the cover off a book and throwing it in the dumpster counts as destroyed."
Actually, it's: the bookstore gets refunded for all returned books, but postage to return them would be ridiculous, so the torn covers are sent instead as proof of non-sale.
Many a publisher has gone under due to returnable policies. Publisher pays for print run in advance, 1 year later gets a bunch o' torn covers plus a refund request for 60% cover price for each. No books and no pay = big loss for publisher.
A.
Since policy states that something no longer useful, serviceable or sellable should be destroyed...
Uh... what does it say in their fine print about a 'retirement plan' again???