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Slashback: Nerves, Unis, Subtitles

Slashback tonight brings updates and amplifications on file-swapper hunting in Australia, Blender's progress since going open source, the badly subtitled LotR rips mentioned a few weeks ago, and more. Read on for the details.

Yes, does that come with insurance? An anonymous reader writes "Channel 4 news has a small report on the way that financial institutions are moving their computer systems and data backup out of central London to establishments such as The Bunker and Sealand."

Suddenly, those places seem a bit like less of a novelty and more good plain sense.

Copyright vs. Presumptive Scanning, part VXIIIXIX AnElder writes "The SMH (Sydney Morning Herald) now reports that 'Recording companies have asked the Federal Court to allow their computer experts to scan all computers at the University of Melbourne for sound files and email accounts, so they can gather evidence of claimed widespread breaches of copyright.' Are libraries next? "Counsel for the companies, Mr Tony Bannon SC, said industry studies of piracy had found public institutions such as universities and libraries were the biggest repositories of unlawful sound recordings."

Speaking of brand integrity. increment writes "The Engrish TTT Captions Site that was mentioned earlier here has apparently received a cease and desist order from AOL/Warner Bros and taken down their hilarious bootleg screenshots of The Two Towers. You did know that AOL is the parent company of New Line Cinema, right? AOL probably contends that humorous captions 'degrade their brand integrity,' though they should be grateful for such a vivid illustration of the poor quality of bootlegs. A few mirrors of the site can still be found around the net."

What about robotic juicers for the home? CallNElvis writes "Here's another interesting (translate that to "Cool! I want one") site lazydrinker.com showing a tabletop automatic drink pouring machine. It seems to be a little more polished than the last one posted here. The site includes a pretty cool mpeg of it in action."

Blend it into Knoppix, please :) 3-D modeling program Blender was converted from a proprietary license to the GPL last October. What's been going on since then? An anonymous reader writes "A couple of days ago, Blender 2.26 was released. This is the first open source version, and has all the features of the previous proprietary version, except physics support in the gamekit, which was not owned by NaN, and could thus not be opened.

Blender is 'the vi of 3d-modeling,' and was Freed by the community, when NaN (the company creating blender) went broke. It is platform independent (with roots in Unix), scriptable, has a steep but rewarding learning curve, ingenious but nonstandard user interface, and can be used to make games, 3d-web-thingies (there exists a browser plugin) and of course images, animations and models (which among others, can be exported to POV-ray)."

Mandrake keeps moving -- give it a whirl. An anonymous reader writes "The Mandrake 9.1 testing cycle is coming to an end. I haven't noticed any big fan-fare for testing this version, but I noticed that RC-1 is now on many of the ftp mirrors found here.

If you like the distro, don't forget to join MandrakeClub where you can help the company and have a say in what packages they include in their user-friendly distro."

17 of 210 comments (clear)

  1. Blender's user interface by PD · · Score: 3, Funny

    I've heard some people say that Blender was hard to use. They don't know what hard to use means. They should try this version.

    Looks like Blender is going multi-lingual! cool.

  2. robotic juicers? by kingofnopants · · Score: 5, Funny

    May I be the first to point you to this penny arcade strip on the topic: Penny Arcade

    --
    Disco Stu was talkin' to you.
    1. Re:robotic juicers? by unicron · · Score: 4, Funny

      It is a comic strip. Gabe and Tycho have reiterated dozens of times they are NOT journalists. It is designed to give gamers and the like a good laugh. The Juicer comic is funny. If you read it thinking it didn't have the quite the journalistic merit that CNN does, then you completely missed the point, and more likely than not, you suffer from some advanced form of mental retardation.

      --
      Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
    2. Re:robotic juicers? by unicron · · Score: 3, Funny

      Try to act like real gamers? What the fuck are you talking about? Oh, I get this, they're posers and you're straight atari 2600 OG playa, huh? I guarantee you they play more games that you and I combined + all our collective friends. That's ALL they do.

      --
      Finally, math books without any of that base 6 crap in them.
  3. Futurama Professor censored on Cartoon Network! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Moderators, I'll save you the trouble of reading this, this post is just way off topic.

    Has anybody been following futurama on the Cartoon Network lately? In two separate episodes, Professor Rupert Farnsworth (sp?) was censored while saying "Sweet Zombie Jesus!" - arguably one of the funniest expletives in the show. Specifically, the word "Jesus" was removed (replaced with silence).

    I am shocked and outraged! Who's responsible for this, damnit!!

    1. Re:Futurama Professor censored on Cartoon Network! by Isle · · Score: 2, Funny

      What about us who finds political correctness and censorship offensive?

      Doesnt our taking offense count somewhere???

  4. Re:Another robotic dealie... by RatBastard · · Score: 4, Funny

    When I'm to lazy to do THAT myself, kill me.

    --
    Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
  5. (Correctly formatted, sorry) by rasafras · · Score: 2, Funny

    Site: Someone set up us the lawsuit!
    AOL: How are you hobbitses
    AOL: All your base are belong to us
    AOL: You are on the way to destruction
    Site: What you say !!
    AOL: You have no chance to survive make your time
    Site: Take off every 'precious'

  6. SELECT from users WHERE type='mistaken' by MySQL+Troll · · Score: 2, Funny

    Clearly you misread the article. It's about Blender, not Bender.

    In any event, I noticed that too and found it odd and crappy. I don't watch anything else on that network so I don't know how thick their censoring usually is, but I would guess that since it is first and foremost a children's cartoon network, it's probably thicker than Fox's.

    --
    "Linux is for geeks, beos is for nobody, Mac OS is for actors, XP is for people" - Anonymous Coward
  7. Taking laziness too far by ObviousGuy · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's a well known adage that engineers are supposed to be lazy. Larry Wall enumerates it as one of the traits of good programmers and the impetus behind Perl. What they mean is that engineers should strive to automate repetitive tasks instead of performing them manually each time.

    Lazy Drinker has clearly misunderstood the concept. The device they show is not automated in any way. The user still has to move the cup(!) under the spout and type(!!) commands into an attached computer to begin pouring the drink. Frankly, pouring the drink is the easiest part of the process. Any fast food restaurant has for ages had machines that have been doing this kind thing.

    Lazy Drinker has arguably made pouring drinks *more difficult* by way of this device. It's kind of sad that Slashdot is reduced to running such a non-story.

    --
    I have been pwned because my /. password was too easy to guess.
  8. PRAISE JESUS! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Good. We should respect Christ's name. Isn't it amazing that after so many years we're still talking about Jesus Christ, even those who don't believe slander Him as they curse His glorious name.

    Praise be the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ!

  9. Re:Australia by seb249 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Tis amazing and really kind of sad what a couple of anally retentive politicians can do to a country. Our minister for imformation technology is most likely still trying to work out why computers come with cup holders.

  10. Re:Another robotic dealie... by OneEyedApe · · Score: 2, Funny

    This actually reminds me of a story (or series thereof), where some guy would get really drunk, invent strange things, and forget about it once he was sober again. One time he invented an extremely vain robot with 14 senses and a clear exterior, whose only purpose was to open beer cans. Then they stopped making beer cans.

    And no, I don't remember who the hell wrote this.

    --
    Life sucks, but death doesn't put out at all....
    --Thomas J. Kopp
  11. Man oh man. Combine this with a Real Doll by kfg · · Score: 2, Funny

    and no one has to be there at all.

    KFG

  12. Don't worry by willpost · · Score: 4, Funny

    All they'll require is for everyone to be fitted with a tiny ear implant which bills a simple rate for all kilosounds per hour heard.

    The following billing schedule is applicable for single-channel and stereophonic royalty service from single-eardrum consumers to double-eardrum consumers as metered by RIAA.

    Sound Charge:
    BASELINE (TIER I) QUANTITIES
    per kiloSoundhour per Month

    Radio/XM Satellite Transmission $0.00403
    Internet Distribution $0.03485
    Rock Star Drug Rehab Programs $0.00231
    Power Ballad Generation $0.04542
    Glam Rock Decommissioning $0.00045
    PFRA (Price Fixing Record Amounts) $0.00962
    CD Copy-Protection Reliability Services $0.00384
    Total Rate $0.10052

    MINIMUM CHARGE (per eardrum per sound per day) $0.12345

    In the summer of 2XXX, wholesale spot prices for sounds began to escalate to levels unanticipated by the RIAA. The rising prices translated into dramatically increased sound royalty costs and revenue undercollections for the recording studios. The royalty costs of the sounds heard during the crisis, along with the costs of forward purchase obligations incurred by RIAA, must now be recovered.

  13. Re:What about student privacy? by Elwood+P+Dowd · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yeah. I was an ITA too. Once spent a few hours getting paid to help some guy figure out how to better organize his porn collection.

    --

    There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
  14. Can't find the Two Towers engrish caption mirror by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Since AOL forced the removal of the pix I suppose I'll have to buy the pirate DVD to see them.