Slashdot Mirror
Why Robot Trucks Could Be Headed To Afghanistan (And Everywhere Else)
malachiorion writes "I'm surprised I haven't seen more coverage of Lockheed Martin's autonomous truck convoy demonstration — they sent a group of robotified vehicles through urban and rural environments at Fort Hood, without teleoperation or human intervention. It's an interesting milestone, and sort of a tragic one, since troops could have used robotic vehicles in Iraq and Afghanistan. What's fascinating, though, is that Lockheed is hoping to get into Afghanistan just before the U.S. withdraws, to help ferry gear. Plus, they have their sights set on what would be the defense contractor's first real commercial product—kits that turn tractor trailers into autonomous vehicles. Here's my post for Popular Science."
I’ve been lurking Slashdot for over 10 years and never posted before. It’s a bit sad that my first post is going to sound like a eulogy
I don’t like the beta-look, I think it is going to break the community and I’ll join in on the boycott next week.
Just in the case nobody comes back, I wanted to thank you, Slashdot.
Thanks for showing me there’s more people “like me” and thanks for making me proud to call myself a nerd.
I remember the Good Times. When we could still Slashdot a site, when Rob proposed, when we called the ipod lame, when ‘we’ fought scientology (before it was cool to fight ‘m) and when we heard Firefly was made into a movie :)
And the tough times, when the community really showed it’s good side, 9/11 comes to mind as well as the deaths of several pioneers in tech.
Although Slashdot always has news 3 days after every other blog, it’s still months before my friends know any of it. If only I had set up a beowulf cluster of bitcoin miners when Slashdot first started posting about it :)
But the best part remains the commenting. I was and am still amazed by the depth some people go to post their comments. The relatable stories of the new guy, or the insights of the old guy (shout out to all you get-off-my-lawn-ers / low-id). And I remember being touched on a deep level by some very personal comments; a comment of struggling just with being who you are — and then getting a reply by multiple people who had the same experience.
Thanks also for always showing the other side of things. I never RTFA’d (something to be proud of, I guess), I new better what was going on than anybody else through the comments.
By posting, you show part of your thoughts, and seeing many people’s thoughts also makes opinions more moderate. I have a better understanding now of things I would otherwise strongly oppose. It sounds cheesy, but I know I’m a better person because of it.
Slashdot has been my home for a long time, eventhough it changed through the years. I hope it’ll stay, but I’ve grown pessimistic.
So, so long and thanks for all the fish!
I’ll see y’all lurking somewhere else :) (XKCD-forum, most likely)
Please post this to new articles if it hasn't been posted yet. (Copy-paste the html from here so links don't get mangled!)
On February 5, 2014, Slashdot announced through a javascript popup that they are starting to "move in to" the new Slashdot Beta design. Slashdot Beta is a trend-following attempt to give Slashdot a fresh look, an approach that has led to less space for text and an abandonment of the traditional Slashdot look. Much worse than that, Slashdot Beta fundamentally breaks the classic Slashdot discussion and moderation system.
If you haven't seen Slashdot Beta already, open this in a new tab. After seeing that, click here to return to classic Slashdot.
We should boycott stories and only discuss the abomination that is Slashdot Beta until Dice abandons the project.
We should boycott slashdot entirely during the week of Feb 10 to Feb 17 as part of the wider slashcott
Moderators - only spend mod points on comments that discuss Beta
Commentors - only discuss Beta
http://slashdot.org/recent - Vote up the Fuck Beta stories
Keep this up for a few days and we may finally get the PHBs attention.
-----=====##### LINKS #####=====-----
Discussion of Beta: http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&id=56395415
Discussion of where to go if Beta goes live: http://slashdot.org/firehose.pl?op=view&type=submission&id=3321441
Alternative Slashdot: http://altslashdot.org (thanks Okian Warrior (537106))
Burn it with fire, sprinkle the ashes with holy water and rock salt and bury them in the Love Canal.
I don't know what DICE was thinking (perhaps they weren't) but it doesn't take a genius to figure out they need to stop the beta site and stop it now. Unlike every other news aggregator, the majority of the people are here FOR the discussion forums. We also submit the news, vote on what should be published, comment on the news, moderate the comments, and moderate the moderators. DICE you don't do a damn thing compared to what the community gives to you in exchange for access to the site.
Pull your collective heads out of your various orifices and fix this while you have time. Without the community you have NOTHING to sell. Want proof? Look at comments on stories from a week ago versus comments today... with the community protesting you have nothing of value to sell other than a niche already covered by CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, Fox, and God knows how many other sites that now aggregate the news. Slashdot will NEVER be a mainstream site... Fix this NOW or the community will fix it for you.