The Navy’s Newest Warship Is Powered by Linux
October 18th, 2013Via: Ars Technica:
The USS Zumwalt will be a floating data center—armed with missiles and robot guns.
When the USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000) puts to sea later this year, it will be different from any other ship in the Navy’s fleet in many ways. The $3.5 billon ship is designed for stealth, survivability, and firepower, and it’s packed with advanced technology. And at the heart of its operations is a virtual data center powered by off-the-shelf server hardware, various flavors of Linux, and over 6 million lines of software code.
A Penny Saved: Psychological Pricing
October 18th, 2013The is very old, but I’m surprised by how few people actually know about it.
Via: Gumroad:
Across the board, prices ending in .99 have higher conversion rates than prices ending in one cent higher, and in one case, the conversion rate is twice as high.
Next Homeland Security Chief Held Pentagon Post
October 18th, 2013Via: USA Today:
President Obama plans to nominate former Pentagon attorney Jeh Johnson as the next secretary of Homeland Security, a White House official said Thursday.
Johnson, general counsel for the Defense Department during Obama’s first term, will be introduced by the president at a ceremony on Friday.
If confirmed by the Senate, Johnson would replace Janet Napolitano, who left the administration to run the University of California education system.
“The president is selecting Johnson because he is one of the most highly qualified and respected national security leaders, having served as the senior lawyer for the largest government agency in the world,” the official said.
The Science-Is-Self-Correcting Myth
October 17th, 2013The scientific method sounds great on paper. Mix in grant swindling, incompetence and fraud and the “science” you get out the other side can turn into a bunch of bullshit.
But don’t worry, science is self correcting!
Via: The Economist:
Academic scientists readily acknowledge that they often get things wrong. But they also hold fast to the idea that these errors get corrected over time as other scientists try to take the work further. Evidence that many more dodgy results are published than are subsequently corrected or withdrawn calls that much-vaunted capacity for self-correction into question. There are errors in a lot more of the scientific papers being published, written about and acted on than anyone would normally suppose, or like to think.
Various factors contribute to the problem. Statistical mistakes are widespread. The peer reviewers who evaluate papers before journals commit to publishing them are much worse at spotting mistakes than they or others appreciate. Professional pressure, competition and ambition push scientists to publish more quickly than would be wise. A career structure which lays great stress on publishing copious papers exacerbates all these problems. “There is no cost to getting things wrong,” says Brian Nosek, a psychologist at the University of Virginia who has taken an interest in his discipline’s persistent errors. “The cost is not getting them published.”
…
Fraud is very likely second to incompetence in generating erroneous results, though it is hard to tell for certain. Dr Fanelli has looked at 21 different surveys of academics (mostly in the biomedical sciences but also in civil engineering, chemistry and economics) carried out between 1987 and 2008. Only 2% of respondents admitted falsifying or fabricating data, but 28% of respondents claimed to know of colleagues who engaged in questionable research practices.
Senate Leader Announces Bipartisan Deal to Avoid Default, End Government Shutdown
October 16th, 2013Mmm hmm.
Via: AP:
Democratic leader Harry Reid says Senate leaders have reached a bipartisan deal to avoid default and end the government shutdown, now in its 16th day.
…
The deal would reopen the government through Jan. 15 and increase the nation’s borrowing authority through Feb. 7.
Cockroach Farming
October 16th, 2013Via: Los Angeles Times:
This squat concrete building was once a chicken coop, but now it’s part of a farm with an entirely different kind of livestock — millions of cockroaches.
Inside, squirming masses of the reddish-brown insects dart between sheets of corrugated metal and egg cartons that have been tied together to provide the kind of dark hiding places they favor.
Wang Fuming kneels down and pulls out one of the nests. Unaccustomed to the light, the roaches scurry about, a few heading straight up his arm toward his short-sleeve shirt.
“Nothing to be afraid of,” Wang counsels visitors who are shrinking back into the hallway, where stray cockroaches cling to a ceiling that’s perilously close overhead.
Although cockroaches evoke a visceral dread for most people, Wang looks at them fondly as his fortune — and his future.
The 43-year-old businessman is the largest cockroach producer in China (and thus probably in the world), with six farms populated by an estimated 10 million cockroaches. He sells them to producers of Asian medicine and to cosmetic companies that value the insects as a cheap source of protein as well as for the cellulose-like substance on their wings.
The favored breed for this purpose is the Periplaneta americana, or American cockroach, a reddish-brown insect that grows to about 1.6 inches long and, when mature, can fly, as opposed to the smaller, darker, wingless German cockroach.
Since Wang got into the business in 2010, the price of dried cockroaches has increased tenfold, from about $2 a pound to as much as $20, as manufacturers of traditional medicine stockpile pulverized cockroach powder.
“I thought about raising pigs, but with traditional farming, the profit margins are very low,” Wang said. “With cockroaches, you can invest 20 yuan and get back 150 yuan,” or $3.25 for a return of $11.
Bitcoin As a Law Enforcement/Natsec Honeypot?
October 16th, 2013Via: Easy Questions Are Boring:
Paranoia appears to be the order of the day, given what we know about the NSA and GCHQ thanks to Edward Snowden. Absent from the stories so far is any mention of Bitcoin. I find this odd – Bitcoin is the most cypherpunky of all crypto technologies, after all.
I want to make the case, without necessarily endorsing it, that we should be much more suspicious of Bitcoin than we are at present.
Smart Shelves Will Identify Grocery Shoppers, Deliver Custom Advertisements
October 15th, 2013Via: Technology Advice:
According to an interview with the Wall Street Journal, snack company Mondelez International will introduce so-called “smart shelves” into grocery stores starting in 2015. The shelves, which will be concentrated at the checkout line, will use a variety of tools to identify a shopper’s sex and age. The machine will then use that info to choose an ad custom tailored for the shopper’s demographic.
The shelves should also be able to track individual engagement, and monitor how long each ad is watched. Weight sensors under the product holders will let the machine know when a customer has picked up an item, or is considering a purchase. Custom coupons can be displayed, in order to boost conversion rates.
GCHQ Accused of Monitoring Privileged Emails Between Lawyers and Clients
October 15th, 2013Via: Guardian:
GCHQ is probably intercepting legally privileged communications between lawyers and their clients, according to a detailed claim filed on behalf of eight Libyans involved in politically sensitive compensation battles with the UK.
The accusation has been lodged with Britain’s most secret court, the investigatory powers tribunal (IPT), which examines complaints about the intelligence services and government use of covert surveillance. Most of its hearings are in private.
The allegation has emerged in the wake of the Guardian’s revelations about extensive monitoring by GCHQ of the internet and telephone calls, chiefly through its Tempora programme.
The system taps directly into fibre optic cables carrying the bulk of online exchanges transiting the UK and enables intelligence officials to screen vast quantities of data.
France to Increase Troops in Central African Republic
October 15th, 2013Via: Reuters:
France will boost its troop presence in the Central African Republic by the end of the year under a forthcoming U.N. resolution to help prevent the country from spiralling out of control, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on Sunday.
Fabius and the European Union aid chief, Kristalina Georgieva, are in the country to drum up support and international interest for a largely forgotten crisis.
The Central African Republic has descended into chaos since mostly Muslim Seleka rebels ousted President Francois Bozize in March, the latest coup in the country that remains one of the world’s poorest despite resources ranging from gold to uranium.
Geographically at the centre of what some strategists have called an “arc of insecurity” involving Islamist fighters from Kenya and Somalia in east Africa to Mauritania in the west, a power vacuum could pave the way for militants to seize control.
