Veteran Judge Posner says “animals” like Apple are just exploiting the weapons an ineffectual gov’t has created
From Lifehacker: iFixit for Android and iPhone Puts Repair Guides and Troubleshooting Help in Your Pocket
iOS/Android/WebOS: We’ve long been big fans of iFixit’s useful repair guides and teardown manuals, and now you can easily access the site’s content on the go. The free mobile apps allow offline browsing of the thousands of how-to repair guides. More »
from Lifehacker
From Gizmodo: This Slit-Scan Video Will Break Your Brain
From Ars Technica: Judge who threw out Apple/Moto case calls patent litigants “animals”
Judge Richard Posner, who recently threw out an entire patent lawsuit involving Apple and Motorola, has been nothing if not outspoken on the wildly busy US patent litigation system. In an interview published today by Reuters, he calls patent litigants animals struggling for survival and suggests that some industries—perhaps including software—shouldn’t have patent protection at all.
“It’s a constant struggle for survival,” Posner told Reuters in his chambers at the US Court of Appeals in Chicago. “As in any jungle, the animals will use all the means at their disposal, all their teeth and claws that are permitted by the ecosystem.”
While Posner said the pharmaceutical industry has a decent claim to patents because of the huge investment it takes to create drugs, he added that advances in software and other industries are less costly. The benefit companies get from being first to market would exist even if software patents didn’t. Smartphones are particularly problematic because they have thousands of patented components and features, he said.
from Ars Technica
From MAKE: Time to Bone up on the Chemistry of Fireworks
In honor of Independence Day in the United States, here’s John A. Conkling, adjunct professor and fireworks expert to show us the chemistry behind fireworks. Watch this video and learn the science so that you can impress all your friends and family tonight with your incredible knowledge. [via Adafruit]
from MAKE
From Engadget: Double amputee Oscar Pistorius will race in the London Olympic games
Four years ago, double amputee Oscar Pistorius — aka the Blade Runner — was battling bureaucracy (and his own ability) for the chance to compete in the Beijing Olympics. He might not have made the cut for China, but this time around he’s secured his ticket to London. The South African athlete was already penned in for the 4 x 400 meters relay, and will now also compete in the singles 400 meters — said to be his favorite distance. The South African Olympic committee made a last-minute decision to include Pisterous in the team, making him the first amputee track athlete to compete in the full Olympic games. An amazing achievement in its own right, but a race victory on top of the bureaucratic one would surely be the ultimate finish.
from Engadget
From Engadget: Carnegie Mellon smart headlight prototype blacks out raindrops for clearer view of the road
Researchers from Carnegie Mellon have developed a prototype smart headlight which blots out individual drops of rain or snow — improving vision by up to 90 percent. Made with an off-the-shelf Viewsonic DLP projector, a quad-core Intel Core-i7 PC and a GigE Point Grey Flea3 camera, the Rube Goldberg-esque process starts by first imaging raindrops arriving at the top of its view. After this, the signal goes to a processing unit, which uses a predictive theory developed by the team to guess the drops’ path to the road. Finally, the projector — found in the same place as the camera — uses a beamsplitter like modern digital 3D rigs. Used in tandem with calculations, it transmits a beam with light voids matching the predicted path. The result? It all stops light from hitting the falling particles, with the cumulative process resulting in the illusion of a nearly precipitation-free road view — at least in the lab. So far, the whole process takes about a hundredth of a second (13 ms) but scientists said that in an actual car and with many more drops, the speed would have to be about ten times quicker. That would allow 90 percent of the light located 13 feet in front of the headlights to pass through, but even at just triple the speed, it would give drivers a 70 percent better view. To see if this tech might have a snowflake’s chance of making it out of the lab, go past the break for all the videos.
from Engadget