Rings around an Astroid, Klingon Subtitles, Facebook goes virtual and Our experiences with alt phone carriers Net10, Ting, and Kitty Wireless.
We may not have Saurian Brandy or Romulan Ale, but we’ll soon have Klingon Beer.
Netflix has decided to remove access to Star Trek III: The Search for Spock due to a defect in the streaming version of the film.
More specifically, there are incorrect — or at least overly simplified — English subtitle translations during scenes where characters exchange dialog exclusively in their semi-fictitious languages of Vulcan and Klingon. (Note: Fans have actually created their own dictionary of Klingon words, so it’s kind of a real language now, even if it’s rooted in sci-fi TV and movies.)
And don’t forget, you have not experienced Shakespeare until you have read it in the original Klingon.
This is a great podcast that covers each episode in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Ben listens to it at 1.5 speed.
Facebook says it will will acquire virtual-reality technology company Oculus VR for $2 billion in a deal expected to close in the second quarter of 2014.
Oculus makes the Oculus Rift, which is a virtual-reality headset that was originally funded on Kickstarter.
The Facebook and Oculus Rift event reminded us of Ready Play One, by Ernest Cline.
Astronomers have discovered rings around an asteroid-like body whose orbit is between those of Saturn and Uranus. At just 250 kilometres across, Chariklo is the smallest body so far found to have rings. Previously, only the giant planets — Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune — have been seen sporting them.
As soon as bitcoin started to appreciate in value, the IRS took notice. In order to collect taxes from bitcoin gains this season, it needed to quickly decide whether to tax it as a currency, or a commodity, or an asset.
I tried net10 for a while, and though it worked and was much cheeper, due to Google Glass integration I switched away from it. If you want a cheeper solution and still be on AT&T’s network you could switch to net10. If you travel out of the US beware, as net10 does not support out of US.
Lindsey ponders leaving Verizon for Kitty Wireless. Update to follow after some experimentation.
Ben uses Ting as his phone carrier, and has been very happy since he switched. His Ting bill is ~40% the amount of his previous Sprint bill.
Cell phone use is now estimated to be involved in 26 percent of all motor vehicle crashes – up from the previous year
An estimated 5 percent of crashes involve texting, while 21 percent involve drivers talking on handheld or hands-free cell phones
Last Friday, Goodyear unveiled its new state-of-the-art blimp to the media. It was built in partnership with the Zeppelin company and will replace the 45-year old GZ-20 blimp fleet.
As part of the airships commissioning, Goodyear is running a “Name the Blimp” contest, which is open to residents of the United States and runs until April 4.
Google today announced Google Now is being pushed to the Chrome stable channel for Windows and Mac “starting today and rolling out over the next few weeks.” This means Google Now notifications will finally be available to desktop and laptop Chrome users, in addition to Android and iOS users.
He’s created a fully functional tape measure which is 3D printed as a single assembly, to follow up on his 3D printed dial calipers. This is a pretty novel design, with a lot of moving parts that come out of the printer completely assembled!"
Doctors in the Netherlands report that they have for the first time successfully replaced most of a human’s skull with a 3-D printed plastic one.
