Secession Fever Breaks Out; Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers?

Don't miss a single issue of Slashback. Add slashdot@newsletters.slashdot.org to your address book. Secession Fever Breaks Out Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers? Microsoft's Hidden Windows 8 Feature: Ads IT Disaster Destroyed GOP's Get-Out-The-Vote Effort Man Arrested for Burning Poppy Photo on Facebook Hot Comment: Just to be clear, these are statistics. From the Vault: L.A. County Bans Use of 'Master/Slave' Term Watch It: Review: World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria Poll Booth: My relationship to military service Secession Fever Breaks Out Petitions to secede from the Union have inundated the White House website, We The People. Texas and Louisiana led the pack early in the game. Although none of the petitions explicitly cite Obama's reelection as their motivation, all were created a week after the election. Sound Off>> Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers? Voters in some states have legalized marijuana for recreational use, though the drug remains illegal under federal law. This brings up the long-standing debate among programmers as to whether recreational drugs, including pot and hallucinogens like LSD, can actually help programmers code. Sound Off>> Microsoft's Hidden Windows 8 Feature: Ads The discovery that some Microsoft apps on Windows 8 contained ads has caused outrage among some pundits. The feeling is that while seeing ads inside free apps is almost to be expected, software that you pay for should be ad-free. Sound Off>> IT Disaster Destroyed GOP's Get-Out-The-Vote Effort Reports from campaign volunteers suggest that Project Orca, a Republican, tech-based voter monitoring effort with 37,000 volunteers in swing states, turned out to be an epic failure due to dismal IT. Problems ranged from state-wide incorrect PINs to a server outage and missing redirection of secure URLs. Sound Off>> Man Arrested for Burning Poppy Photo on Facebook A British man has been arrested "on suspicion of malicious telecommunications" for posting a picture of a burning poppy on Facebook. The poppy is a symbol of remembrance for those who died in war, and the arrest was made on Remembrance Sunday. Not surprisingly, the arrest has been criticized by legal experts. Sound Off>> Just to be clear, these are statistics. "You can't really prove a probability wrong (unless it's 0% or 100%). While his most likely outcomes played out, it doesn't mean that he would have been wrong if a few of them hadn't." --by mosb1000 Read More>> L.A. County Bans Use of 'Master/Slave' Term Nine years ago, L.A. County banned the use of the terms "Master/Slave" (commonly used to denote hard drive arrangements.) According to a report, "someone within the County bureaucracy... had taken offense at 'master/slave' references and complained to the board." Read More>> Review: World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria We review the newest expansion to World of Warcraft, titled Mists of Pandaria. This is the fourth expansion to Blizzard's successful MMORPG, and while the quality of the content remains high, it's becoming increasingly apparent that they're basing it on a game that's been under development for over a decade. Watch the Video>> My relationship to military service: I've been in the U.S. military, no longer am. I am currently in the U.S. military. I've been in the (non-U.S.) military, but no longer am. I am currently in the (non-U.S.) military I have never been in the military. I am an army of one. Cast Your Vote>> Follow Slashdot on Twitter and Facebook. To unsubscribe, click here or send an email to: unsubscribe-213087@elabs10.com To ensure delivery of this newsletter to your inbox and to enable images, please add slashdot@newsletters.slashdot.org to your e-mail address book or safe senders list. Slashdot | 594 Howard Street, Suite 300 | San Francisco, CA 94105 To view our Privacy Policy click here.