Author: Robin Edgar
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Dutch government will store fingerprints in central database
Because we all know how safe centralised government databases are, the Dutch are now preparing to store all fingerprints the get. At first this will happen per region and later all the databases will be linked and centralised. Dutch privacy organisations have protested at the EU, but they have declined the protest as the European…
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Mapping gravitational corridors
Between the planets and moons are gravitational corridors, tubes that intersect at lagrange points, which can be used to travel between celestial bodies using hardly any fuel, only for course correctional purposes. These corridors can be likened to ocean currents. The trade-off is now between speed and fuel consumption: you can use almost zero fuel…
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Dutch JSF buy based on unreal figures
The Dutch ministry of defence has apparently known since 2005 that the budget reserved for the JSF buy (to replace the KLu F-16 fleet) was in nowhere near enough for the planned 85 F-35s they needed. The Dutch MOD has answered parliamentary questions about this with the statement that they expected a budget increase and…
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Inhabitat » New Envion Facility Turns Plastic Waste into $10/Barrel Fuel
What if we could turn all the plastic waste we create on a daily basis into fuel to power our cars? A Washington, DC-based company called Envion claims it can do just that with a process that turns plastic into an oil-like fuel for just $10 per barrel. According to Envion, the resulting fuel can…
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Know about North
This is an interesting article about someone who wore a North Paw (available as kit or with DIY instructions here for a while. The North Paw is an ankle bracelet that continuously signals where North is by vibrating in that direction. Apparently this leads to some interesting results. via My New Sense Organ | h+…
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Haiku R1/Alpha 1 announced
The Haiku Project is proud to announce the availability of Haiku R1/Alpha 1, the first official development release of Haiku, an open source operating system that specifically targets personal computing. Haiku is a continuation of BeOS in open source form. Should be good! via Haiku Project Announces Availability of Haiku R1/Alpha 1 | Haiku Project.
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Getting an edge at the coin flip
The odds of a coin coming down heads or tails are not 50/50: they’re actually 51/49! A great precis of an article explaining why, and how to leverage it. The Coin Flip: A Fundamentally Unfair Proposition? – Coding the Wheel.
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Alcohol tests
If you get breathalised, make sure the cop isn’t covering the exit port for the air when you blow, or the purported alcohol consumption will go up! Breath tests – Bing Video.
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Iphone and Itouch paper stand / dock
This thing is beautiful You can download a template on the site to print and cut it out. Dessine moi un objet » Blog Archive » Iphone and Itouch paper stand / dock.
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Belkin Home Base
The Belkin Home Base plugs into your (wifi) network, and allows you to share USB peripherals with all the computers in your network. It has automatic backup to external HDs as well as Flickr / Picasa sharing. At $129,- not too bad. Print, Share, and Back Up Files Wirelessly with Belkin Home Base.
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Mission One electric bike breaks speed record
This, the production version of the Mission One Electric Superbike managed to do 150 mph average over at Bonneville over two runs of 1 mile. It has a range of 150 miles on a charge. Mission One: Now Offically the Fastest-Ever (Production) Electric Motorcycle | Design & Innovation | Fast Company.
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Right-to-repair bill
Massachusets, USA, is doing something that should have been done a long time ago: Car manufacturers are computerising their cars to a greater and greater degree. This is great – more power, more control, more safety, more fun. Unfortunately, the software and interfaces for these computers are closed – repairmen are not given access to…
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Measure power consumption by device
This device has several settings allowing you to see kw/hr, view the cumulative useage and displays Volts, Amps, Watts, Hz, VA. It’s the only device I’ve found you can plug any device into and see how much power it’s really drawing. There are 3 versions of the product. P3 – Kill A Watt.
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XP no longer being patched by MS
Even though they keep supporting Internet Explorer 6, they’re not going to support XP? Microsoft had stated the reason for continuing support for IE6 was that it came with Windows XP and so they had to keep supporting it. Now it turns out that they’re not supporting XP either. Not exactly their road map, but…
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Japan has train groping
As an organised activity: websites tell you which lines are particularly good for groping fellow passengers on. Travellers warned of Tokyo train gropers | Travel News | News.com.au.
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Apple screws iphone customers… some more
It turns out that the 3.1 patch for the iphone removes tethering for any carrier that isn’t a partner of Apple. This means that if you own an officially unlocked iphone and run it on another network, you can’t use the iphone as a modem for your laptop any more. Well done, Jobs – keep…
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Natural breast enlargement
This one is so obvious, it’s incredible it hasn’t been done before: take the fat from a woman’s arse and insert into tits. Voila! Completely natural bigger breasts! The Press Association: Unwanted fat for breast enlargement.
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DIY Space photography
For under $150,- you can start your own satellite programme – you need: a weather balloon, a digital camera and a GPS enabled phone. Some hand warmers and a styrofoam cup keeps everything warm. Hardware « 1337arts.
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Search Google in Near Real Time
By changing the qdr:nXX parameter after enabling the time parameter in ‘Search Options’, you can get Google to refresh every second and show you the new indexes. Realtime Googelen met url-hack | Webwereld.
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South Africa’s Telkom: faster internet via carrier pigeon
A South African IT firm sent a carrier pigeon 50 miles with a datacard attached to it’s leg. The pigeon was faster than the internet, which after 2 hours had only completed 4% of the transfer. This was in protest at the sucky internet connection available through Telkom. Pigeon transfers data faster than South Africa’s…
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Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle
Japan has an automated logistics supply vehicle for the International Space Station, which has been launched today for the first time. It’s composed of pressurised and upressurised areas and will be stopped at 10 m from the ISS. Using the robo hand, astronauts can dock it. It’ll stay there as a kind of larder for…
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TechPosters
All those crib sheets with quick command references for shell programming, using Linux or vim, etc. have been collected here for your printing pleasure! TechPosters: Technical Posters and Cheats for IT Guys.
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Turning birds into music
Looking at birds on a powerline and turning that into a musical score is one thing. The fact that it’s quite attractive music is fairly amazing! Birds on the Wires from Jarbas Agnelli on Vimeo. This Clip is Proof That Birds Are Secretly Composers – Musical birds – Gizmodo.
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German power plant swarm
The Germans want to create a swarm power plant by putting gas fired fridge sized units in people’s basements. They should release less CO2 than other power methods and they want to roll out 100,000 in the coming year, which will create the same amount of power as 2 nuclear plants. They’re calling it SchwarmStrom…
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