caitsith01 asks: "Like many of you I recently downloaded and watched the full-length Matrix Reloaded trailer . The glorious special effects contained therein caused me to reflect on how, up until very recently, it would have been impossible to effectively realize many great science fiction novels on film. In many instances, the sheer grandeur of what is described and the inherent difficulty in representing complex future technologies realistically would be nearly impossible to overcome without using computer-aided special effects. A case in point are the novels of William Gibson: apart from the lamentable Johnny Mnemonic and the little known New Rose Hotel (both based on Gibson short stories rather than novels) there have been no major films based on his work. With today's computer generated effects Gibson's descriptions of cyberspace and future technologies in Neuromancer and Count Zero could finally be presented in visual form. What other sci-fi novels would you like to see turned into movies with the benefit of modern special effects? Before the flaming about how plot and characters are more important than eye candy starts, perhaps you should take some time to reflect on how far we've come."

KamehamehaWarrior writes "Peter B. Lloyd, author of Taking The Red Pill: Science, Philosophy, and Religion in The Matrix, believes that many of the plot developments in "The Matrix" that seem to contradict the laws of physics, biology, etc. can actually be explained with a closer look at the science. He addresses issues such as "Can humans really be an energy source? How does the Matrix know what fried chicken taste like? Why do the rebels have to enter and exit the Matrix via a telephone system (that doesn't actually exist)?""

peterwayner writes "If you're a bit tired of programming books, API descriptions, tables of keywords, and arguments about which data structure is buzzword compliant, super-mega-efficient and intuitively easy to grasp, turn to Developing Online Games , a book that seems to have very little interest in many of the traditional challenges for programmers. The authors spend four lines discussing the best computer language for the job (C/C++), conclude that objects give "far more flexibility in design" and then move on to fun questions like how to make a online game compelling for achievers, socializers, killers and explorers. This book is a wonderful psychoanalysis of the gamer's mind and it should be the first and last book read by game developers about to start a quest to capture the hearts, minds and subscription fees of people on the Internet." Read on for the rest of Peter's review.

phreak404 writes "The full theatrical trailer for The Matrix Reloaded was released today. Its in Quicktime, 1000px by 540px, and weighs in at about 100MB. Looks awesome and unlike the previous teasers, actually has some of the plot." As soon as someone puts up a bitorrent we'll post it here. Update: 04/11 00:40 GMT by J : And here it is, http://f.scarywater.net/ (includes links to client download, stats, old torrents, fun stuff like that).

BenTheDewpendent writes "I just read Steve Silberman's article on the Matrix Reloaded over at wired. I was only slightly anxious to see it previous to reading the article but what they are able to do technicaly now will put bullet time to shame."

Cyberroach has pictures from last week's Classic Gaming Weekend in Seattle. The pictures include an "Obsolete Media Festival" with a guy who makes music with an Atari 2600, Commodore C64, and a dot-matrix printer; old hardware from the NorthWest Classic Gaming Enthusiasts' Meeting; and the 6th Annual Atari Championship.

deglr6328 writes "The final barriers to OLED commercialization have been falling fast lately with Kodak's first product shipping soon, Samsung demoing a 256 color OLED wristwatch phone and now Chi Mei Optoelectronics announcing a 20 inch full color active matrix OLED display. The new display was made possible by a breakthrough using amorphous silicon for the TFT. The new technique is said to allow conventional TFT LCD manufacturers to convert their facilities over to OLED with relative ease."

An anonymous reader writes "According to The Digital Bits, the recently announced Matrix Special Edition has been cancelled. Rumor is that it was cancelled by the Wachowski brothers in hopes of coming out with a Super Collectors Special Edition later."

shiroi_kami writes "What does Information Security mean to you? To many, it means firewalls and encryption. To some, it means intrusion detection systems. Chances are the words "file servers" weren't high on your list, but they probably should be. After all, information security is about information, and when it's not flying across the network it's got to be stored somewhere, right? In fact, the security of the storage mechanism is often overlooked, which makes it an attractive target for attackers. In their new book, Storage Security, the authors take a comprehensive look at this often-ignored subject. Update: 03/26 05:44 GMT by T : Please note, this review was written by David Bianco under the handle shiroi_kami as an Amazon.com review, and also appears at InfosecBooks.com. Apologies to David for the misplaced and delayed attribution.

Devistater writes "The official Matrix page has word of the first officially released widescreen Anime episode of the Animatrix for download (in quicktime format). This is the first of 4 free episodes that will be released on the web. A total of 9 episodes will be availible for purchase on DVD within the next few months. The feature-quality anime shorts range in length from 6 minutes to 16 minutes. There's a trailer availible if you want to get a taste for what they will be like."

Kartik3 writes "IGN.com is reporting that Warner Bros. is releasing a 2-disc special edition DVD of The Matrix (loaded with extras) on April 29th and The Animatrix (An Anime series set in the world of the Matrix) DVD on June 3rd." If Animatrix is half as cool as the promo comic that was given out at the Matrix opening, I'll like it.

So, if you're a good, patriotic American, you're certainly watching the Superbowl right about now. The dot-com ads should be pretty much absent this year, but perhaps there will be something more interesting than ads for recycled movies. Maybe even the game will be worth watching. :) Update: 01/27 17:02 GMT by T : Chardish writes "If you didn't catch the trailer for The Matrix: Reloaded on the Superbowl last night, it's now available for download."

Yes folks some sort of sporting event is occuring later today. Super something or other. And while I don't know what teams are playing, I believe that trailers for X-Men 2, and the first Matrix sequel are both supposed to air during the 2 million dollar 30 second ad spots. So this time around, you can tivo in reverse!

An anonymous reader writes "The Bar-Monkey is a bar built around a 486 running linux that can dispense an 8 ounce mixed drink in under 10 seconds. It uses a Matrix Orbital Serial LCD panel with a keypad built into the bar surface for user input. Three Harvey Mudd College students built the bar in their spare time last semester. The bar holds 16 ingredients with which it can currently mix 188 drinks stored in its drink database. Total project cost: $235."

QuietKarma writes "Consider this the first of next year's ads for Matrixx Reloaded and Matrixx Revolutions releases. Here's some semi-official poop from MSNBC with some spoilers. Or you can do what I did and read about halfway through without learning how Reloaded will end. Either that or wait until Harry at Ain't It Cool News comes out with his list of spoilers."

ChrisGoodwin asks: "Why do geeks support MPAA and RIAA? Here on Slashdot, the talk is all about how evil the film and record companies are. But when the next Star Wars or Matrix or Lord of the Rings comes out, it's all about camping out to get tickets. According to RIAA's web site, member companies distribute 90% of the legitimate sound recordings in the United States; chances are, if you've ever bought music, you've given them money. (Take a look at their list of members.) Heck, most of the film companies own, are owned by, or share a corporate parent with a record company, and many of us get our internet access from part of the MPAA/RIAA conglomerate. So why is it? Why do we continue to buy their product? Why are we giving them money so that they can harass us? Why hasn't there been a call for a boycott of the record and film industries?" This is in the FAQ, but this is certainly a discussion worth having. With the pervasiveness of media in our society, for some it is not as easy as "boycott" or "no boycott", and it may be unfair to the artists we like for us to do so, and as Big Media diversifies, a boycott on movies and music may still not be enough. So do you feel a boycott of mass media will help matters, or would such be counter-productive in some way?

mikvo asks: "I work for my state Department of Transportation, and we have a reasonably advanced traffic monitoring system, currently with almost 300 cameras (and expanding). However, our matrix (300x200) video switch is running out of life, and we have to replace it. The primary consultant on the project is recommending we move entirely to digital video, using VBrick encoders and decoders. It's a private network, though we know there are still security issues around that. However, the primary question is, are there viable open source alternatives for both encoding and decoding the live video streams, rather than relying on proprietary (read expensive) decoding hardware?"

The_Hiro writes ""Farenheit 451 - meets - Brave New World - meets - Matrix" (minus the overdone wire work). Created on a limited budget, Equilibrium combines the best of sci-fi with the action genre. Unfortunately, the marketing droids at Dimension have neglected to promote the film (release date: Dec. 6th). Chud.com has a glowing review of the film and some pretty pictures. Check out the trailer also."

gnat writes "Two New Zealand computer scientists have a paper accepted for OOPSLA called Notes on Postmodern Programming, which identifies shortcomings in traditional views of computer science. With a section on the difference between "The Matrix" and the net, a bulleted list of new approaches called "We're All Devo", and a section called "Messy is Good" consisting of nothing but a scan of a hand-drawn diagram, this is not your father's computer science paper. It's thought-provoking stuff, though. And you know they did their homework--they cite Larry Wall's Postmodern Perl talk."

Okay, former DrinkOrDie member and convicted warez dude Chris Tresco got his answers to your questions back to us, so here they are. (Note: Chris does not advise you to follow in his footsteps.)