Drink This Show

A French software engineer said on Friday he was claiming a world record for calculating Pi, the constant that has fascinated mathematicians for millennia.

Fabrice Bellard told AFP he used an inexpensive desktop computer — and not a supercomputer used in past records — to calculate Pi to nearly 2.7 trillion decimal places.

That is around 123 billion digits more than the previous record set last August by Japanese professor Daisuke Takahashi, he said.

Takahashi, using a T2K Open Supercomputer, took 29 hours to crunch Pi to 2.577 billion digits.

Bellard took 131 days, comprising 103 for the computation in binary digits, 13 days for verification, 12 days to convert the binary digits to a base of 10 and three final days to check the conversion.

The gear cost “a bit less than 2,000 euros” (3,000 dollars), Bellard, who earns a living as a software consultant in digital television in Paris, said in an email exchange.

“It is a completely standard PC. The only unusual thing is that it has five 1.5-teraoctet hard disks. Mainstream PCs generally have only one 1-teraoctet disk.”

Bellard has placed on his website details of the achievement, including the use of a high-powered mathematical engine called the Chudnovsky algorithm that chewed through the computation.

Extracts of the 2,699,999,990,000-digit outcome have been published so that they can be compared to preceding records in order to gain independent verification, Bellard told AFP.

Files containing the digits are also being offered to any outside organism keen on hosting the record, he said.

Pi, the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, kicks off with 3.14159… in a string whose digits are believed never to repeat or end.

Bellard said he was “not especially interested” in Pi’s digits but more in taking up the gauntlet of writing the software to carry out the arithmetic.

“Optimising these algorithms to get good performance is a difficult programming challenge,” he wrote.

If you like science and comedy, this is the guy for you.

I don’t know if you have heard yet, but Joan Rivers got stranded in Costa Rica recently. The woman at the desk wouldn’t let her board the plane because she had two different names in her passport. Her passport reads, Joan Rosenberg AKA Joan Rivers, Rosenberg was her late husbands name. She was stranded, could not use her credit card, and only had $100. Luckily there was another worker that felt sorry for her and drove her to the main airport.

With stories like this popping up all over the place, it is a wonder as many people fly as they do. Ever since this latest terrorist attempt, airport security has gotten stricter. Many people are being patted down, and do you know who they are? They are just average day Americans with kids that are flying to Disney World, the beach, or to see their families. I don’t mean to be racist, but why must security be as tight for people that check a bag per person, have 5 people traveling, including kids, and heading toward Orlando. In case they haven’t noticed, the latest terrorist attack was suspicious from the beginning. It was one foreign man, traveling by himself, he didn’t check any bags, and barely had any carry-on luggage if any at all, besides the bomb. That is the kind of person that needs to be checked more thoroughly.

When I travel, I carry a laptop, video camera, DSLR camera, and various equipment to go along. When I was going through the San Antonio airport, they had to check my backpack because they thought I had a weapon. I was pulled over to the side and the woman unzipped my bag. She said, “will anything cut me if I stick my hand in there.” What kind of question is that? It turns out they were wondering what my monopod was. They thought it was a bicycle pump. My question was, what the heck would I do with a bicycle pump to blow up a plane?

The point is that born Americans are being treated like terrorists, and yet the terrorists still get through the search. Something needs to change, and it needs to be done now.

Cheating Wife – Watch today’s top amazing videos here

“Shake it up baby!”

We howl as we sing along to the new Beatles Rockband. The story mode of the game starts out in the Cavern Club with Twist and Shout. With each new venue, the music slowly progresses just as it did in real life. When you finish a song you earn pictures. There is a picture for getting three stars on a song and one for five stars, as well as one for finishing the entire venue. Once several pictures are earned, a rare video is unlocked of The Beatles doing whatever they do.

Instruments

The game includes Paul’s Hofner base, Ringo’s Ludwig drums, mic, and mic stand. The base is one of the most realistic video game controllers I have held. It has the length, the look, and the curves of a real Hofner base. When I started banging on the drums, they felt a little different, quieter, but different. After the first awkward song , I was getting the feel of the new drums and I was loving it. Unlike the first Rockband game, the base pedal in this one feels a lot sturdier. You might be saying, “What is so special about the microphone in this game?”. Well if you are just that far out of the loop, I’ll tell you. YOU CAN HAVE THREE PEOPLE SING AT THE SAME TIME! No! I did not stutter, you heard me right. It allows you to plug in three mics, all used with one controller. Anybody can sing any part they want. That way, certain people can be designated to sing different songs. The great thing about having the mic stand is that if you only have three people but want the have a full band, that one special person can sing and play an instrument at the same time!

Rating

I give it a 4 out of 5. It is a great game and The Beatles are amazing, but it won’t let you play other songs that you have downloaded for other Rockband games. You also can’t play songs you download on Beatles Rockband on other Rockband games.

Other than that, it is a definite buy.

Quote

Were no strangers to love
You know the rules and so do i
A full commitments what Im thinking of
You wouldnt get this from any other guy

I just wanna tell you how Im feeling
Gotta make you understand

* never gonna give you up
Never gonna let you down
Never gonna run around and desert you
Never gonna make you cry
Never gonna say goodbye
Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you

Weve know each other for so long
Your hearts been aching
But youre too shy to say it
Inside we both know whats been going on
We know the game and were gonna play it

And if you ask me how Im feeling
Dont tell me youre too blind to see

(* repeat)

Give you up. give you up
Give you up, give you up
Never gonna give
Never gonna give, give you up
Never gonna give
Never gonna give, five you up

I just wanna tell you how Im feeling
Gotta make you understand

I got inspired to do the 20Q thing from watching this video. It took 28 questions before it guessed John Green. Obviously I don’t know him as good as Hank so that may be why it took so long. You can tell what I don’t know by looking at the questions below that I apparently got wrong. I’m sorry John but I guess your fans think you are fat.

You won, but 20Q guessed it eventually

Play Again

You are John Green.
Are you an actor? You said Sometimes, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Are you a recurring character? You said Probably, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Are you involved in politics? You said Sometimes, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Are you a news reporter? You said Sometimes, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Are you skinny? You said Yes, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Are you a relatively young actor? You said Yes, 20Q was taught by other players that the answer is No.
Contradictions Detected
The opinions of the 20Q A.I. are its own, and are based on the input of players. 20Q’s answers reflect common knowledge. If you feel that 20Q is in error, the only way to correct it is to play again!

They found these unidentified life forms in a sewer in North Carolina.(Creepy) They look like brains that have just grown and latched onto the walls.

I believe that it is a bunch of bacteria that has grown together with poop and other stuff(female bi-products) to form the organism. It could really be anything. But I have no idea what it could be. I really hope they do testing to figure out what it is. :<

Image via CrunchBase

I don’t know if you know but there is this site called Fluther.com.

Basically what you do is ask questions and get answers. You may think, “Well can’t I just go to Yahoo Answers?”. Well the Fluther community is way better. If you spend a few days using it you will start seeing the same people asking questions and answering them. You can also add certain people to your own Fluther so it is basically like a friends list.

They also have this thing called Lurve. It is just a number you get for participating in the community. You get 1 point for each consecutive day you visit the site. For the rest of the points you have to depend on other users. If you ask a really good question or give a very good answer and another user thinks the same then they can mark it as being good and you get 5 more Lurve points.

When setting up your account it asks you for your hobbies and other things you know about. It will use that information to find questions that are perfect for you. Then if you run out of questions you can alternatively view all questions. Once you answer a question it will follow that question and each time it gets a reply you will be given an alert.

I started last year but didn’t get into it. I went back a few days ago and I am now addicted. You should definitely go check it out. If i missed anything please comment and I will add it.