170178154
submission
wonkavader writes:
This is an interesting home-brew project which seems like it might someday make a pleasant, expected feature in kits. Many circuit boards include a grounded plane as a layer. This doesn't have to be a big unbroken expanse of copper — it can be a long snake to reduce the copper used. Well, if you run 9 volts through that long snake, it acts as a resistor and heat up the board enough to melt solder paste. Carl Bugeja has made a board which controls the 9 volt input to keep the temperature on the desired curve for the solder.
94827711
submission
wonkavader writes:
Billy West, Maurice LaMarche, and Phil LaMarr from the Futurama cast are working on a kickstarter campaign to animate the Goblins web-comic. Also involved are Matt King, Jim Cummings, Matthew Mercer, Steve Blum, and Jennifer Hale from World of Warcraft, Resident Evil, Cowboy Bebop, Mass Effect, Powerpuff Girls, and other stuff. It's surprising to see so many well-known voice people on this kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/pr...
The writing for the show will be done by Matt King and Phil LaMarr along with the original Goblins creator, Tarol Hunt. They have an initial teaser trailer (or rather the 'animatic') which is definitely aimed at people who have already been following the comic: http://www.youtube.com/watch?...
61031767
submission
wonkavader writes:
Lawrence Lessig's MAYDAY.US Super PAC to end all Super PACs (and more) is now on it's second round of funding. The PAC has been reported on here before, but now the numbers are bigger. They hit their $1 million first goal easily, but now they aim to get another $5 million in the same time period. Lessig says that he's arranged for matching, again. It seems like the goals will be even higher in 2016: "For 2014, our goal is to raise $12 million and use it to make fundamental reform the key issue in five congressional races. And we’ll apply what we learn then to 2016." While his initial funding campaign got some reporting in the mainstream media, there seems to be general silence this time around.
5842257
submission
wonkavader writes:
Tuesday was a good day for smartbook news. News articles from Sep 8 tell us that both Foxconn and Hon Hai are developing ARM-based smartbooks.
PC World reports that Foxconn's devices "use a few different Linux operating systems, including one similar to the Intel-backed Moblin OS and one developed by Foxconn. The company is currently looking into Google's Android mobile OS for possible use as well."
Reuters reports that Hon Hai is also developing them. Hon Hai makes the iPhone and the Wii.
5557087
submission
wonkavader writes:
According to the Article: "In an effort to expand its Linux offerings, Dell is researching new netbook-type devices and will soon offer netbook Linux OS upgrades, a company official said on Wednesday. ... The company is researching the possibility of offering new Linux-based mobile devices called smartbooks, said Todd Finch, senior product marketing manager for Linux clients, at the OpenSourceWorld conference in San Francisco. ... Smartbooks are netbook-type devices that are powered by chips designed by Arm."
I don't think Finch said "ARM" but he apparently did say "SmartBook". Then again, he also said "researching the possibility".
7508
submission
wonkavader writes:
The New York Times [UR:http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/18/technology/1 8chip.html?ref=technology] reports today that "Researchers plan to announce on Monday that they have created a silicon-based chip that can produce laser beams. The advance will make it possible to use laser light rather than wires to send data between chips, removing the most significant bottleneck in computer design." The work is from Intel and the University of California, Santa Barbara. This suggests breakthroughs in both computing performance and networking.
