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Topics - alibaboolal
61
« on: April 29, 2010, 02:15:28 PM »
http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20100429/sc_space/hugenasascienceballooncrashesinaustralianoutbackA huge NASA balloon loaded with a telescope painstakingly built to scan the sky at wavelengths invisible to the human eye crashed in the Australian outback Thursday, destroying the astronomy experiment and just missing nearby onlookers, according to Australian media reports.
In dramatic video released by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), the giant 400-foot (121-meter) balloon is seen just beginning to lift its payload, then the telescope gondola appears to unexpectedly come loose from its carriage. The telescope crashes through a fence and overturn a nearby parked sport utility vehicle before finally stopping.
The attempted balloon telescope launch took place at the Alice Springs Balloon Launching Centre, near the town of Alice Springs, in the northern territory of Australia.
The wayward balloon overturned one car, but missed another parked nearby with local Alice Springs couple Stan and Betty Davies, who had come to watch the launch, still inside.
"We were sitting in our car and preparing to move it out of the way and we were actually about a foot of being wiped out," ABC quoted Davies as saying.
The balloon was carrying the Nuclear Compton Telescope (NCT), a gamma-ray telescope built by astronomer Steven Boggs and his colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley, California to study astrophysical sources in space.
"Today was a terrible day for a lot of people," wrote Eric Bellm, a graduate astronomy student at the UC Berkeley, in a blog chronicling the science mission. "For the NCT team, we've poured our hearts into this instrument for years. It was an almost unfathomable shock to find ourselves cleaning up the wreckage of our gondola rather than watching it lift off towards space."
The unmanned research balloon was built by NASA's Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Palestine, Texas and expected to haul its two-telescope payload up to an altitude of about 120,000 feet (36,576 meters). That's about 23 miles (37 km), though smaller home-built balloons have been built to reach high altitudes as well.
In his account of the crash, Bellm said an investigation into the balloon's launch failure will be performed, though a first glance found that at least some of the components for the Nuclear Compton Telescope appear to have survived relatively intact. The science team has cleaned up the wreckage and returned it to a staging hangar, he added.
Ravi Sood, director of the Alice Springs Balloon Launching Centre and a professor at Australia's University of New South Wales, said no one was hurt in the incident, but sometimes balloon launches can go awry.
"Ballooning, that's the way it happens on occasions but it is very, very disappointing. Gut-wrenching actually," he told ABC.
The failed balloon launch in Australia marked NASA's second balloon science campaign this month at the remote site. On April 15, NASA's balloon science program launched Tracking and Imaging Gamma Ray Experiment (TIGRE), a gamma-ray telescope, to search the galactic center of the sky for emissions from radioactive materials, NASA officials said.
That launch, which sent the telescope and its balloon to an altitude of 127,000 feet (38,709 meters), went according to plan, the space agency said.
The balloon's next payload to fly, an X-ray telescope called HERO aimed at mapping the galactic center for NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, was targeted for May, Australian officials added.
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« on: April 27, 2010, 08:55:48 PM »
http://videogames.yahoo.com/events/plugged-in/superheroes-square-off-in-highly-anticipated-marvel-vs-capcom-3-/1397067Ten years might seem like a long time to wait for a video game, but when it's the sequel to one of the most beloved competitive fighting games ever created, you can’t just rush it out the door. After all, with great power comes great responsibility...to make a great game.
That's exactly what game publisher Capcom is aiming to do with Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Pitting a collection of Marvel's finest against a hodgepodge of characters from the video game giant's storied past, it's a fighting game fan's dream come true.
And if the character lineup is any indication, comic-book fans will be in for a treat, too. Though Capcom is still dialing in the total number of combatants (around 30 are confirmed so far), Capcom greats like Street Fighter's Ryu and Resident Evil's Chris Redfield will be joined by a virtual who's-who of Marvel heroes and villains, headlined by big screen stars Iron Man, The Hulk and Wolverine. Hints for a few others can be found in the game's first official trailer.
Capcom is calling the new game a "living comic book," which they hope to convey via a much deeper Marvel integration than the last game. Characters will spout signature catch phrases, in-game events will change the nature of each fight, and each fighter will enjoy a specific ending that ties into a grander tale about how exactly this odd mesh of fighters came to do battle in the first place.
But other than a handful of features (the game will, for instance, include the 3-on-3 tag-team fighting system from the last game), the ins and outs of Marvel vs. Capcom 3 are still up in the air. Will Spidey make an appearance? Will any of the actors from the recent crop of Marvel superhero films lend their voice chops? Will we be able to fight as a Dead Rising zombie? With a Spring 2011 release date for the Xbox 360 and PS3, expect to hear more about this hero's origin story soon enough. Stay tuned.
63
« on: April 22, 2010, 03:58:36 PM »
http://www.neoseeker.com/news/13669-assassins-creed-ii-cracked-finally-completely/
Skidrow on the scene, verifies site hack was fake
To our recollection and to this day, Ubisoft's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory was the PC game which took the longest to be cracked (read: had its protection scheme subverted) -- that one went months, and word is the eventual crack was more or less chance. Assassin's Creed II -- also by Ubisoft -- appears to be taking the number two spot, now, with its first complete crack just showing up on torrent networks, about six weeks after launch.
Previously other forms of the crack were available which made the game "playable", but evidently is not comparable to this work, which "does not construct any program deviation or host file paradox solutions." It comes from scene group Skidrow, who personally thank Ubisoft for the challenge, but say the DRM (which requires a constant Internet connection) was "probably horrible for all legit users" and encourage them to just "focus on the game" next time.
Ironically, Skidrow is protecting their protection, saying they don't want to be an "open book for competitors" who release "cheap imitations" anymore.
On a related note, they confirm the Ubisoft website hack we wrote about was fake, saying they discourage such actions and remarking "new medias post anything these days." Well, that's us, so here's our explanation: normally we wouldn't have posted about such a shady story, but our source indicated they had in fact seen the hack in question, despite some claiming it was fake. We do our best to maintain integrity here, so we'll be (and have been) more skeptical going forward.
64
« on: April 18, 2010, 09:53:13 AM »
Microsoft Office 2010 has reached RTM (Release to Manufacturing) milestone on Apirl 15, 2010 as build version 14.0.4763.1000, and within days, both 32-bit (x86) and 64-bit (x64) Office 2010 ISO images have been leaked for download via BitTorrent network, days before MSDN and TechNet subscribers can download the ISO officially on April 22, and beats Volume License customers with active Software Assurance (SA) who can only download the 2010 set of products in the English via Volume Licensing Service Center starting April 27. Note that although the main RTM assembly build of Office 2010 has version number of 14.0.4763.1000, its individual applications inside the package may have different build numbers as their final RTM version. In fast, in About dialog, MSO has is version 14.0.4760.0, while Word 2010 is version 14.0.4762.0, Excel 2010 and Visio 2010 are version 14.0.4756.0, Project 2010 is version 14.0.4751.0, PowerPoint 2010 is version 14.0.4754.0, Outlook 2010 is version 14.0.4760.0, and Access 2010 is version 14.0.4750.0. Only OneNote 2010 has build version of 14.0.4763.0. And even the Office 2010 suite setup.exe has the build version of 14.0.4755.0.  The leaked Official 2010 RTM ISO images are from Select volume licensing channel, which means the leak includes Office 2010 Professional Plus edition, which is essential for KMS activation.
65
« on: April 10, 2010, 02:20:50 PM »
Yay  Modern Warfare 3 In Development
Countersuit says third title is in "pre-production."
by Jim Reilly
US, April 9, 2010 - Perhaps the biggest news from Activision's countersuit filed this morning against former Infinity Ward executives Jason West and Vince Zampella is the mention of Modern Warfare 3.
According to the countersuit, West and Zampella entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), an agreement between two parties, with Activision and Infinity Ward in connection with Modern Warfare 2 and "any subsequent Infinity Ward projects" back in March 2008. This MOU apparently included certain rights for Modern Warfare 3, which Activision says in its countersuit that development for the third title was delayed intentionally by West and Zampella in order to leverage their rights under the MOU to "obtain further advantages for themselves and concessions" from Activision.
"West and Zampella contend that, pursuant to the MOU, so long as they were employed at IW, their written consent was required for certain decisions related to the Modern Warfare brand," the countersuit says. "As a result of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, West and Zampella were prohibited from withholding such consent unreasonably or in bad faith."
"Nevertheless, prior to the termination of their employment with Activision, West and Zampella unreasonably and/or in bad faith refused to provide this consent in an effort to gain an unfair advantage in negotiations with Activision and in an improper attempt to gain an advantage for themselves in connection with their plan to leave Activision and establish their own company," the suit states.
"Among other things, they delayed pre-production of Modern Warfare 3 and attempted to improperly leverage their rights under the MOU to obtain further advantages for themselves and concessions from Activision."
The countersuit continues on to say Activision has had to spend additional development costs for the project due to Zampella and West breaching the MOU.
"As a direct and proximate result of this breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, Activision has been forced to commit additional resources to Modern Warfare 3, institute litigation to seek a declaration of rights, and incur costs and attorneys' fees, and will incur additional expenses in connection with securing the benefits of the MOU."
"Accordingly, Activision has been damaged as a result of West and Zampella's actions in an amount to be proven at trial."
An Activision representative told IGN the company has no additional comments
66
« on: November 22, 2009, 09:27:35 PM »
out of my collection of 70+ (600gb) games i have there's only one game i ever bought and that's halo2. i paid US $20 for it and the rest of games i download from a certain website. so i am just curious on how much money you guys on this forum spend on games
67
« on: November 22, 2009, 01:22:11 AM »
i have a psp and i also have high speed wireless internet but i dont know how to set up the internet. can anyone help? please
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