living in sunshine

Lady Antebellum – Need You Now

sakurapy — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 20:45:30 +0000

Julia Roberts-Bso " Nothing Hill"

sakurapy — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 07:44:08 +0000

10 Killer DIY Projects for Your Extra Day Off (part 1)

sakurapy — Tue, 26 May 2009 11:18:38 +0000

By Adam Pash from Lifehacker.com

The First-Timer’s Guide to Building a Computer from Scratch

If you’ve never done it before, the idea of building a computer from the ground up can seem very intimidating-but it’s one of the most satisfying projects a tech enthusiast can take on.

Your Fonts Turns Your Handwriting Into a Personlized Font

YourFonts is a web-based service that turns your handwriting into a TrueType font for free. If you have a printer and scanner, nothing can stand between you and the awesomeness of your own script. Update: Unfortunately it appears that YourFonts is no longer free, now costing between $12.50 and $18.50. For a cheaper alternative check out.

Turn a Sharpie into a Liquid Fueled Rocket

We donned our mind-reading helmet here at Lifehacker and have divined the perfect thing for a little Friday Fun: a high altitude rocket made from office supplies.

Top 10 Cheap or Free Home Theater Upgrades

You’ve got a mind-blowing picture, surround sound, and streaming content set up, but it wasn’t cheap. Heal your wallet with ten upgrades, fixes, and setup tips that take your system to 11 on the cheap.

Turn an Old Laptop into a Wall-Mounted Computer

Why settle for a digital picture frame when, in the same wall space, you could mount an entirely functional computer/slideshow player/TV tuner?

From Earth To Moon Redux: How The Next Moonshot Will Happen

sakurapy — Sun, 10 May 2009 10:24:06 +0000

By Kit Eaton, 12:30 PM on Sat May 9 2009

select site advertising consumerist deadspin defamer fleshbot gay fleshbot gawker gizmodo idolator io9 jalopnik jezebel kotaku lifehacker valleywag artists gawkershop

May 2019: Our scheduled return to the moon. There’s plenty of laboring to be done on the Constellation Program before then, but the foundation is set. Here’s how you—as an astronaut—would experience the mission:

Ares V Unmanned Cargo Rocket, EDS and Altair: The Gear Goes Up First
First it’s the turn of the giant unmanned Ares V, carrying most of the real hardware you’ll need on your journey. You and the rest of your astronaut compadres walk around the pad hours ahead of the launch—a metaphorical kicking of Ares’ tires. Man, that thing seems hellish big.

Six hours later you’re watching the countdown from VIP bleachers, and all 360 feet of rocket looks even more ominous. You all have on the "spaceman" face for the news cameras—confident, professional, all smiles. But when the five RS68 engines at the bottom of that rocket light up, followed by the two solid boosters, and that thundering noise finally reaches you, you’re all suddenly kids on Christmas morning. Literally tons of fuel is burned every second, pushing a blunt needle skywards. It makes a heck of a show, and the noise of Ares V racing to space barely covers your whoops. Quickly you remember to use your crappy little digicam to snap the rocket’s launch—there’ll be thousands of official photos, but these will be yours.

Minutes later, you and the crew watch monitors in a nearby viewing room as the rocket makes it to orbit. Everyone’s quiet, as they see the final stage, the Earth Departure Stage, fire its engines. The huge aerodynamic nose cone isn’t needed any more and it pops off, revealing the lunar lander, an Altair. It’s bolted at the top of the EDS, and looks more like a sci-fi fantasy than a real moon ship. Eventually, the instruments aboard the EDS all phone home to NASA with a digital OK, and the spacecraft pauses. It’s waiting for you to join it out in space.

Ares I Crew Rocket, Orion Capsule: Time For You To Hit the Road
Twelve hours later, it’s your turn to go up. All six of you are suited-up and sardined into an Orion capsule, 280 feet above the launch pad at the top of an Ares I rocket. While ticking off mission control’s checklist, you think about the imminent journey. If Ares V is a giant space truck, the smaller Ares I you’re strapped to is a crazy-ass custom-engined dragster—a dragster without a parachute brake, that is.

Eventually the time ticks down to T-Zero: The booster’s solid fuel is ignited, and acceleration slams you and the crew in the back as "The Stick" races skywards. Holy crap, it’s a wild ride: Pure rocket chemistry, raw chest-squeezing thrust from a giant Roman candle. The booster burns out in just 150 seconds, and detaches with a wrenching noise and a jolt—the external camera view you see of it tumbling away behind you is awesome. Then comes thrust from the liquid-fuel J2X engine—the first taste of Apollo-era tech, updated for the 21st century. The ride is now smoother, a little less like Aliens, a little more like 2001.

Rendezvous in Orbit: The Delicate Mating Dance of Spaceships
Switches are thrown and your ship’s computer matches the Orion’s orbit with the waiting Earth Departure Stage with Altair moon ship. Your skin feels alternately hot and cold, which has nothing to do with the air conditioning or the sunlight stabbing through the capsule window—just excitement. And finally there it is: The EDS, clear in the sunlight, spinning gently as the laser-guided rendezvous process with your capsule begins. At one point the Altair’s given name is visible, hand painted in copperplate by some techie a thousand miles away: Rama. That had given you a shiver. You hear the clunk of mating adapters as Orion joins the EDS, greeted by cheers from Houston over the radio and a bunch of zero-g hand shaking with the rest of the crew.

Moon Shot: Leaving Earth’s Orbit
"The Stick" has become "The Stack," and all is ready to leave earth orbit, and head out toward the moon. The mood is calm: No one aboard will let themselves believe it yet. But twelve hours later, when long checklists are complete, and the magic words, "Go for lunar orbit burn," come over the radio, emotion arrives with a rush. "Want a drink?" comes a request from behind you, and the accompanying wink made you curious. Sipping at the plastic squeeze bag you suddenly weren’t surprised to taste a tiny stab of whiskey: Totally against the rules, but frankly the people who made those rules weren’t riding a flimsy steel, titanium and composite can mated to a couple dozen tons of explosive gases in outer space.

The EDS’s engine fires up again, this time pushing the Altair and the Orion forward and you—tucked inside—into a head-back, eyeballs-out position as you fly, backwards as it were, to your date with history.

When its fuel is gone, the EDS is ejected, leaving you racing to the moon for three days in the combined Altair/Orion moon ship at 25,000 miles per hour. You’re just desperate to take a walk.

The Lunar Landing: Pulling a Neil Armstrong, 50 Years Later
40m… 35m… The counter in the middle of the Altair’s hi-res display screen has simulated LEDs, like an old alarm clock, and it makes you smile. Those numbers are a serious wake up call though: They’re exactly how far above the dusty surface of the moon this little spacecraft hovers. Altair—wasn’t that the name of an old computer? Probably had more CPU power than the original Eagle did, you think. Armstrong landed that old thing on a wing and a prayer. Now it’s your turn, and your mind’s free to wander because computers are largely in control, steering, firing the RL10 rockets and monitoring radar. It’s just a question of checking in case you need to intervene. Your hand hovers over that big red "LANDING ABORT" button, which you hope never to push.

25m… 20m… A lateral shove from a thruster shakes you and your fellow moonwalkers behind you, a minor course correction. 15m… "Kicking up a little dust," you say over the radio, and you know the guys behind are grinning. "Aye captain!" quips back the mission’s chief engineer.

10m… 5m… And here came history. Dust really does stream up in the bright sunlight past the windows as the final meters pass. At least you know the surface you’d be arriving on—the Apollo guys had no idea if they were landing on concrete or cake icing.

0.8m… 0.6m… 0.4m… The Altair’s descent rocket shuts down so very suddenly that the silence is a shock. With less of a jolt than you get when riding on a roller coaster, it’s touchdown. Velcroed to the control panel, the tiny nodding dog trinket—a present from some young fan—had been wobbling broken-necked in zero-gravity, but now it begins to behave properly, and nods its approval of the landing.

You’re on the moon.

Top 10 Money-Saving Guides for Common Purchases(From Lifehacker)

sakurapy — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 23:36:59 +0000

http://lifehacker.com/5216753/top-10-money+saving-guides-for-common-purchases

By Kevin Purdy, 9:00 AM on Sat Apr 18 2009, 54,483 views

The marketplace is an expensive place to get confused. Get more for your money when you buy laptops, air travel, eyeglasses, or other purchases with our roundup of thrifty buyers’ guides for common purchases.

Photo by Unhindered by Talent.

10. Affordable mattress

They really, truly don’t make it easy to buy a mattress these days. The same exact product gets re-branded under multiple names, sometimes for multiple brands, and salesmen can pitch so much shop talk, you’ll feel like you’re buying a BMW. A Slate writer in need of better sleep, however, wrote the book on mattress quality, delving into the basics of coils, padding, "tricking," and revealing the core value. If it supports "the normal curve of your spine" lying down as when you’re standing, for example, then it’s probably a good fit.

9. Eyeglasses (online)

Eyeglasses are a pretty personal thing, being that they sit on some people’s faces all day, every day. But for 95% off the price of a $300 pair that look just like the ones you’re wearing, maybe it’s worth considering the steep online discount. Our weekend editor Jason did, and came out with two seriously cheap eyeglass sets and rules for saving bundles by buying them online. The keys to the big-savings kingdom lie in knowing your prescription (which you’re legally entitled to), measuring your pupillary distance, and knowing how thick your frames should be. After that, it’s up to you how picky you want to get, but you’ll still spend less than waiting for your lenses to grind down at the mall.

8. Domain names and web hosts

Securing the rights to your personal or small business web name and renting some basic web space isn’t all that expensive these days. But finding a reliable, accessible, and easy-to-handle domain registrar and host isn’t just a matter of picking the lowest price. After more than 200 comment threads on the topic, our readers wiki-compiled a list of reliable and affordable web hosts. The Essential Keystrokes blog makes switching from one host to another an easy six-step process. And if you’re shocked—absolutely shocked!—that johnsmith.com is already bought up (and parked with "Free classified ads!"), head over to Bust A Name and find another name that works for what you’re selling/promoting/posting.

7. Apple products

They don’t tell you what’s coming in the next version of anything—desktops, laptops, iPods, phones—and when it drops, it costs the same as the old generation you just bought and you feel like a sucker, right? Doesn’t have to be that way. The folks at iLounge, whose jobs depend on watching and anticipating Apple release cycles, provide the skinny on what to expect from Apple. The short version: If an Apple product’s just been released, and it’s not the first version of it, and you’re happy with th features compared to the competition, buy it and enjoy it. Otherwise, discount all the rumors you hear about what’s coming, and look for the six-month change-up cycle.

6. Netbooks

They’re all over the news, they easily fit in a backpack or briefcase, and everybody and their brother think they’re the future of personal computing. They’re netbooks, and, well, a lot of them seem the same. How to pick? Our own Gina Trapani compiled the pros and cons of popular models at her Smarterware site. GigaOM details the brand differences, and NotebookReview.com has a seriously comprehensive guide for anyone who’s obsessing over, say, the five different Asus models out there.

5. Any car, new or used

We’ve featured this clip in a few other features and Top 10s, and for good reason—it’s chock-full of little bits of advice, and most people could learn at least a few of them. Whether you’re buying new or used, take Rob Gruhl’s advice: Don’t trade in to the dealer, don’t get options installed at buying time, and don’t be pressured into buying anything by fake deadlines or closed-door office tactics. Hit the play button for the full 101 course.

4. Used laptops

Manufacturer-certified refurbished laptops can be a great value, but if you’re not an Apple buyer, it can be hard to track them down. So when you’re looking into the Craigslist/eBay/store-sold markets, it’s important to have an eye for quality. The Sustainablog gives us a 10-step guide to buying a used laptop, including a salient point on testing all the ports:

Many of these are attached to the motherboard, which is costly to replace. If one USB port is broken and you can live with the other three, then do it. If the headphone jack is broken but you have Bluetooth headphones anyway, then rejoice.

3. HDTVs

HDTVs are everywhere, and every one of them has about 15 numbers, statistics, and Ultra/Enhanced/Super features they’d like you to consider. Walk right past the big yellow stickers and get the setup you actually want with Gizmodo’s guide to buying an HDTV like a pro. It jumps right past all the confusing contrast "ratios" and the like and tells you how to use your eyes, and a pair of cupped hands, to figure out if the set on the showroom floor will actually work in your living room. Speaking of living rooms, you’ll need an ideal size for your setup based on eye distance, not vanity—CNET’s HDTV setup chart and some measuring tape should get you there.

2. Plane tickets

Some flights can cost as much as some of the other items that need their own buying guides, but you don’t get to bring them home with you. Save more money for when you get to where you’re going by buying on a Wednesday, and finding your tickets between two and eight weeks in advance. For the hard dollars and cents of saving, try using one of our readers’ favorite non-airline-sponsored deal finders and ticket predictors: Kayak, Yapta, or Live Search Farecast (okay, that last one is owned by Microsoft, which also books through Expedia, but, still, it’s not exactly an airline price pusher). For a bit of surprising logic, also try booking with a hotel to, oddly enough, pay less.

1. Digital cameras, amateur and pro

It’s harder to say exactly what kind of camera any one person needs, so we lack for an easy, cover-it-all buying guide link here. One site, however, does try to figure out what kind of camera you want, and then the camera that fits those needs according to outspoken camera geeks: BestInClass. Another place that’s full up of picky, if not necessarily thrifty, photography nuts is, of course, Flickr, and the site gathers the EXIF data from millions of photos to compile the Flickr Camera Guide. If you know there’s more to a good photo rig than just megapixels, you’re right—head over to Wired’s wiki for buying a digital camera to get the lowdown on what you should be looking for in sensors, lenses, zoom numbers, and much more.

The Civil Heretic

sakurapy — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 00:00:15 +0000

from site http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/magazine/29Dyson-t.html?pagewanted=1

Eugene Richards for The New York Times

The Whimsical Gaze Dyson still travels widely, giving talks at churches and colleges, reminding people how dangerous nuclear weapons are.

By NICHOLAS DAWIDOFF

Published: March 25, 2009

FOR MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY the eminent physicist Freeman Dyson has quietly resided in Princeton, N.J., on the wooded former farmland that is home to his employer, the Institute for Advanced Study, this country’s most rarefied community of scholars. Lately, however, since coming “out of the closet as far as global warming is concerned,” as Dyson sometimes puts it, there has been noise all around him. Chat rooms, Web threads, editors’ letter boxes and Dyson’s own e-mail queue resonate with a thermal current of invective in which Dyson has discovered himself variously described as “a pompous twit,” “a blowhard,” “a cesspool of misinformation,” “an old coot riding into the sunset” and, perhaps inevitably, “a mad scientist.” Dyson had proposed that whatever inflammations the climate was experiencing might be a good thing because carbon dioxide helps plants of all kinds grow. Then he added the caveat that if CO2 levels soared too high, they could be soothed by the mass cultivation of specially bred “carbon-eating trees,” whereupon the University of Chicago law professor Eric Posner looked through the thick grove of honorary degrees Dyson has been awarded — there are 21 from universities like Georgetown, Princeton and Oxford — and suggested that “perhaps trees can also be designed so that they can give directions to lost hikers.” Dyson’s son, George, a technology historian, says his father’s views have cooled friendships, while many others have concluded that time has cost Dyson something else. There is the suspicion that, at age 85, a great scientist of the 20th century is no longer just far out, he is far gone — out of his beautiful mind.

more…

sakurapy — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:25:00 +0000

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www.theonion.com
Rep. David Whittle (D-VA) speaks passionately about how his son, who died in Iraq, would have loved to see this appropriations bill passed.

Obama starts climate change forum for big economies Sat Mar 28, 2009 8:49pm EDT

sakurapy — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 03:03:00 +0000

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1 of 1Full Size

By Jeff Mason

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama on Saturday invited 16 "major economies" including the European Union and the United Nations to take part in a forum on climate change to facilitate a U.N. pact on global warming.

Obama, a Democrat who has taken a more aggressive stance on climate change than his predecessor, Republican George W. Bush, invited the group to a preparatory session on April 27 and 28 in Washington.

The White House made clear that Obama’s new initiative would aim to augment U.N. talks that are meant to culminate in an agreement in Copenhagen in December.

"Our goal is to use this forum very much as a key part in how we reach an overall agreement," a senior administration official told Reuters, adding the review was "an important piece of the puzzle of how we get from here to Copenhagen."

The "Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate" has echoes of a similar set of meetings organized by the previous administration.

Bush’s "major economies" initiative drew skepticism from participants, who were wary the process was his administration’s way of circumventing broader U.N. talks to forge an international deal.

The U.S. official said countries around the world had expressed interest in restarting the major economies process because of Obama’s differences from Bush on climate change.

The president, who took office in January, has said he wants the United States to take the lead in global warming talks.

The April meeting, to be hosted at the State Department, would likely touch on a range of issues including technology, financing, and emissions trading, the official said.

POLITICAL WILL

In a statement, the White House said the forum would "help generate the political leadership necessary" to achieve an international pact to cut greenhouse gas emissions later this year.

It said the meeting would spur dialogue among developed and developing countries about the issue, "and advance the exploration of concrete initiatives and joint ventures that increase the supply of clean energy while cutting greenhouse gas emissions."

The major economies include: Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, China, the European Union, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Russia, South Africa and the United States.

Denmark, which is hosting the U.N. meeting in December to forge a pact that would take over from the Kyoto Protocol, was also invited.

The group’s preparatory sessions are to culminate with a major meeting on the subject in La Maddalena, Italy, in July, hosted by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

The Group of Eight rich nations also meets at the same location in Italy in July, and the senior official said the climate summit would take place on the margins of the G8.

The U.S. official said he expected other meetings would take place before July, probably outside of the United States.

Obama’s announcement comes shortly before a fresh round of U.N. climate talks on Sunday. Up to 190 nations are to meet in Bonn, Germany, to work on plugging huge gaps in the international pact, which is slated to be agreed to in Denmark in December.

Obama wants to cut U.S. emissions by roughly 15 percent back to 1990 levels by 2020 — tougher than Bush, who saw U.S. emissions peaking as late as 2025.

I’m yours— by Jason Mraz

sakurapy — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 01:05:00 +0000

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RIAA, MPAA Copyright Warnings: Facts and Fiction

sakurapy — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 23:00:40 +0000

Written by Ernesto on March 28, 2009

This week several scary stories surfaced about how the MPAA and RIAA are negotiating with ISPs on how to deal with copyright infringers. Even though it was often presented as news, those who look deeper will realize that this is nothing new at all, just the same old threats dressed up in a new jacket.

It’s has been a good week for the entertainment industry lobbyists. Hundreds of news outlets wrote in detail about how the RIAA and MPAA are negotiating with Internet service providers to warn alleged copyright infringers. No one seemed to notice that this isn’t really news as they’ve been working together for years, with ISPs passing on warnings to their customers on behalf of the studios.

It all started with rumors about two US ISPs, Comcast and AT&T, who were said to be doing a three-strikes deal with the RIAA. It soon became known that this rumor was completely fabricated, but not before hundreds of other news oulets reproduced the story. At the end of the week it turned out that there was no news at all.

Yes, the RIAA, MPAA and other outfits do plan to send copyright infringement warnings to ISPs, but they’ve been doing so for at least half a decade. Every other month these Hollywood lobbyists pitch their anti-piracy efforts to the public, and that’s exactly what they are paid for. This doesn’t mean, however, that something is about to change.

The anti-piracy outfits are happy with all the free publicity of course, that is exactly what they are after. Their purpose is to scare people. In this post we hope to clear up some of the misunderstandings, as we show that the scary stories published this week have no substance at all.

Copyright infringement warnings?

For years, content owners such as record labels or movie studios have been sending copyright infringement notices to ISPs, who are legally obliged to forward these to their customers. Some ISPs simply ignore them, while others faithfully forward the emails to the customer account associated with the infringing IP-address. Many ISPs don’t keep records of these events.

So, is my ISP spying on me?

No. This is a common misunderstanding. ISPs don’t look into your specific downloading behavior, they never have and there is no indication that this will change anytime in the near future. All the ‘evidence’ comes from organizations that work for the copyright holders.

What do they know about me?

If you receive a warning, all copyright holders know about you at this stage is your IP-address and what files were (partially) shared via your account, or more accurately – the bill payer’s account. The MPAA, RIAA and others don’t know your name and they never will unless they get a court order forcing your ISP to hand over the information. In the bigger picture, this is very rare.

Information provided in a typical copyright warning.

How did they track me down?

The copyright holders hire companies such as BayTSP and DtecNet to track down people who share certain titles on BitTorrent and other file-sharing networks. They join the swarm and request files from others. When someone shares a piece of the file with them they log the IP-address, look up the ISP and send out a copyright infringement notice automatically. Unlike the file-sharers, these companies are authorized to download these files, so they are not infringing copyright themselves.

Will I get sued if I receive a warning through my ISP?

No. These copyright infringement warnings are not related to any legal action. Copyright holders do go after people who share their work on file-sharing networks, but this has nothing to do with the warnings they send out via ISPs.

Will they take my Internet away?

No. Although there is a lot of talk about “three strikes” policies, no ISP has agreed (or was forced) to disconnect users after they receive their third warning. In New Zealand they came close to implementing a law that would require ISPs to do this, but this proposal was pulled.

In France they are also considering three strikes legislation, but this has not passed into action yet. In Ireland the largest ISP Eircom said it would disconnect repeated infringers only if they receive a court order.

It is worth mentioning though that ISPs may cut off people whenever they think it’s necessary. Cox does this in the US for example, without an agreement with the MPAA or RIAA. ISPs have terms and conditions and most forbid copyright infringement, but really this is just to cover their own backs under the law.

Do I have to be worried?

Receiving a regular infringement notice is nothing to be worried about. However, if you download copyrighted files without authorization from the copyright holder you are breaking the law in some countries. If you receive a warning without having shared anything yourself (which happens quite often) then there’s nothing to worry about.

Can I protect (hide) myself?

If you don’t want to be spied on when using BitTorrent the best option is to hide your IP-address. You can do so by subscribing to a VPN service or by using software such as TorrentPrivacy. Blocklist software such as PeerGuardian is often recommended, but it is also highly ineffective as the lists are never fully up-to date or accurate.

What’s the point in all this?

The MPAA and RIAA don’t want their products on file-sharing networks and they use these warning emails to deter people from sharing these files with others. Since it’s much cheaper (and effective) than suing people, this is now their strategy of choice. Using news outlets to spread their doom and gloom scenarios is just part of their operation.

In the future the amount of warnings they send out to alleged infringers will increase and the studios and ISPs will work together to keep the associated operating costs down, if that’s not what they’ve already been doing in their recent meetings. It’s just the old model, scaled up with a rumor or two on top.

Let’s move on already.