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Technolotics - An antique show about technology
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Inhalt bereitgestellt von Gareth Stack. Alle Podcast-Inhalte, einschließlich Episoden, Grafiken und Podcast-Beschreibungen, werden direkt von Gareth Stack oder seinem Podcast-Plattformpartner hochgeladen und bereitgestellt. Wenn Sie glauben, dass jemand Ihr urheberrechtlich geschütztes Werk ohne Ihre Erlaubnis nutzt, können Sie dem hier beschriebenen Verfahren folgen https://de.player.fm/legal.
Technolotics was an irreverent look at technology, politics and the media; from a ragtag bunch of Irish students. The show was the first regularly updated Irish vidcast, and ran from August 2005 – August 2006.
…
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47 Episoden
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Manage series 61097
Inhalt bereitgestellt von Gareth Stack. Alle Podcast-Inhalte, einschließlich Episoden, Grafiken und Podcast-Beschreibungen, werden direkt von Gareth Stack oder seinem Podcast-Plattformpartner hochgeladen und bereitgestellt. Wenn Sie glauben, dass jemand Ihr urheberrechtlich geschütztes Werk ohne Ihre Erlaubnis nutzt, können Sie dem hier beschriebenen Verfahren folgen https://de.player.fm/legal.
Technolotics was an irreverent look at technology, politics and the media; from a ragtag bunch of Irish students. The show was the first regularly updated Irish vidcast, and ran from August 2005 – August 2006.
…
continue reading
47 Episoden
Tous les épisodes
×audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/45_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 45 Watch: Youtube Notes A cure for depression? If you’re a mutant mouse that is Scientists breed mice without gene related to serotonin transmission. Serotonin important on mood, sleep and sexuality. Mice found to act if they had been treated with antidepressants. First time genetic ‘cure’ for depression found. Links Science Blog story Amazing New VOIP Offerings Jajah Free phone 2 phone calls, initiated via website Complicated pricing plan Your phone rings – there phone rings – free for most landlines Hullo. Practially free VOIP calls on your home phone or computer Also offers conference calls, call transfers to other phones and call forwarding. US only VOIPDiscount Offers free calls to landlines and computers in certain countries including Ireland. Involves a download and buying credit which expires after 120 days. Limited number of free test calls Links Techcrunch comparison Voip Discount Jajah Fox shows for free online ‘Full Throttle’ streams Fox shows over the internet using downloadable player. Shows available include Prison Break, Bones, American Dad, The Loop and Stacked Ads included at bottom of viewer and will be included and unskippable within the streaming shows. Links Techcrunch article Is war a disease? Study of the effects of the affects of being in a warzone on soldiers. Soldiers examined before and after tour of duty in Iraq. Compromized ability in tasks of sustained attention, verbal learning and visual-spatial memory. Also soldiers were more confused and tense it seems. Only upside was an improvement in simple reaction time. Links AMA Journal How to rig an election Gerrymandering exists in the USA, with representatives deciding electoral districts rather than independent commissions. District boundaries are altered to favour one party over another with both parties guilty of the practice. Both parties created safe districts where current party has unchallenged dominance leaving a few districts which are tightly contested.# Leads to apathy in safe districts and states and the concerns of a small group in a hotly contested state deciding the balance of the legislature. Links Economist Article Gerrymandering definition in wikipedia Iraq’s invaders may install dictator US government could be considering giving up on democracy in Iraq and instead installing a dictator. Comes as the situation continues to deteriorate in Iraq. Conservative like Donald Rumsfeld wanted a to simply go in, remove Saddam and destroy the country in a show of might and then leave the damage behind. He may get his way. Problems in Iraq has turned support against Bush and costs him every day troops remain in Iraq. Links Times Article The shit on wastes All peers – the new bittorrent based firefox extention has launched All peers allows you to effectively, reliably and quickly share documents with trusted friends Works via Bittorrent Links Techcrunch anouncement Media Pimp Gareth Play Multiplayer Monopoly, Scrabble etc for Free Techpolitics.us does blog radio Sweet gestural interface Francis Track me Not BlackBox Search Gratis Gaming…
https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/44_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 44 Watch: Youtube Notes News from the world of Yaaar Owner-Free File System takes aim at copyright What was the name of the previous effort at this? – we covered this in an early technolotics show System creates situation (using encryption) whereby copyrighted data can be claimed by two copyright owners. Since two copyright owners is not allowed, neither owns the data. Legal validity of approach untested and unlikely to hold water. Pirate Party launches darknet A heavily encrypted commerical Virtual Private Network at a cost of €5 per month. Purports to offer, secure and most importantly anonymous communications. BPI show how wonderful they are by banning a 12 year old from the charts merely for signing to a label that doesn’t support sueing file-sharers. Links Arstechnica Pirate Party Commercial Darknet Wired article 12 year old singer songwriter screwed by British Phonographic Industry NSA Wiretapping Unconstitutional Judge rules government’s warrantless wiretapping program violates the rights to free speech and privacy. Appeal to Supreme court almost certain. Experts believe Supreme Court likely to rule that state secrets privilege overrules the Constitution as they have done in the past. Links CNN Story Expert interpretations on Wired Iranian Presidents Blog is real broken and entertaining engrish first post is a lengthy and heavily propagandist autobiography ‘The last year of my high school, I prepared myself for university admission test-conquer. And later on that year, I took the test. Although I had nose bleeding during the test, but I became 132nd student among over 400 thousand participants.’ Seems part of a campaign (including recent BBC interview ) to reach a wider international audience. Iran uses one of the most sophisticated internet censorship systems in the world making the blog one of the few websites an Iranian can legally read. Amusingly Ahmadinejad also refers to the ‘unecessary’ referendum which ensured a democratic rise to the theotratic Mullahcracy The Iranian presidents power is limited in the extreme – with all bills passed by the Majles parliament are open to veto by a a variety of bodies composed primarily or exclusively of religious leaders – as are electoral candidates Links BBC News Story English translaton US Planned Lebanon attack with Israel Journalist Seymour Hersh (the first to write about abuses in Abu Ghraib) alledges in the New Yorker that the two nations planned the attack as long ago as spring These were not merely strategic talks – but Israels obtaining official permission to attack The aim of the attack may have been to reduce the threat posed by Hezbolla in the wake of an American attack on Iran The NSA and Pentagon deny the allegations Links Guardian Story How copyright screws up education Anyone whose attended 3rd level education in recent years will likely have had run ins with problems related to onorous copyright restrictions in my case it was clas notes for advanced neuroscience courses – which lacked all illustrations – making them meaningless! A year long study by Berkman Center for Internet and Society – has found problems unclear rules, DRM locking up content, difficulties obtaining rights, undue caution by publishers Links Boing Boing Story Pretty soon we’ll have to fly naked How airport security has become an irrational nightmare End of a week of false alarms and overblown threats and growing skepticism as to the legitimacy of these threats. Evidence non-existent or tenuous for UK bomb threat, 1 year of surveillance had turned up nothing, torture of prisoner produces “a plan by terrorists to cause untold death and destruction.” Only solution is to send luggage in an unmanned plane and strip and drug passengers during flights so that can’t get up to mischief. Links Toronto Star Story False security threats extracted during torture British aviation bans all hand-luggage Craig Murray; The UK Terror plot: what’s really going on? Media Pimp Gareth America in Colour Francis Bill Biggarts final exposure…
https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/43_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 43 Watch: Youtube Notes Scanning Your Email Update Update to the email scanning story from #41 One of our viewers was so concearned by the encroachment on privacy represented by website blocking at the ISP / email scanning MP responds stating that there is no reason to change this policy Nothing wrong with the Internet Watch Foundation Quango (technically a charity) deciding what is and is not unacceptable – i.e.: Potentially illegal content This unaccountable ‘voluntary’ censorship by ISPs will continue unless / until ISPs object – at which point it will become mandatory! Reminder: While the IWF focus on the ‘potentially illegal child abuse’ element of their remind – they also monitor – and now how have the power to block – any ‘potentially illegal content’ Interesting to look at the IWF’s annual report from last year – and compare the number or ‘reported websites’ and the number of cases where illegal content was actually found 2003 – 2004 the amount of ‘illegal content’ found doubled, while reported images only increased by 28% approx (check this) Over 2,000 – non child related ‘adult obscene content’ sites were reported last year His MP’s response to email traffic scanning – ‘We have noted’ no further comment DRI take Data Retention to court DRI has written to Min. for Justice, Communications and Garda Commissioner asking for them to cease breaching the Constitutional, statutory and European rights of the citizens of Ireland. Failing that, their solictors McGarr Solicitors will undertake legal action. April 2002: Mary O’Rourke tells telecoms providers to retain data generated by their customers supposedly under Section 110 (1) of the Postal and Telecommunications Services Act 1983. December 2002: Data Protection Commissioner deems previous direction as inadequate, constitutionally invalid and was in breach of the Data Protection Act and Data Retention Directive. Telecoms traffic explicitly protected under European law. only for a limited period and only where necessary, appropriate and proportionate in a democratic society. Irish Government in 2005 gave the Garda Commissoner the power to request a service provider to retain, for a period of 3 years, traffic data or location data or both. Again in breach of European law, Ireland pressed for alteration of European laws Result Directive 2006/24/EC. DRI believes Directive was not adopted in accordance with European Law, a view shared by current Minister for Justice Michael McDowell. Proceedings undertaken my Min. for Justice to declare directive invalid by European Court of Justice. DRI believe proceedings may be discontinued, meaning unconstitutional laws and directions will remain unchallenged. They have requested relevant parties in writing to withdraw the directions to the telecoms providers and not apply the unconstitutional laws. Failing to get a positive response they will prepare for legal proceedings. Links DRI to Challenge Data Retention Irish Eyes on Data Retention Tuppenceworth review the legalities of Video Sharing Sites Simon McGarr looks at the Terms and conditions of Youtube, blip.tv, Google video and more. Finds that these sites try and grab any rights you have not explicitly stated you want to retain. Only way to retain total control is to host the video yourself which costs. The Heros Video Egg They only have a licence to the content until you remove it. Licence only allows them a non-exclusive rights to “reproduce, modify, adapt and publish such Content solely for the purpose of providing the Service.” Best licence as licence only provides them the rights needed to host and display the video and only as long as you want them to. The Villans Includes Youtube, Grouper and Motionbox. All 3 require you to signing all your rights away to them. Includes rights to reproduce, distribute, prepare derivative works Grouper and Motionbox have perpetual irrecocable licences, hence once given to them you never can regain control of your content. The In-betweens Blip.tv. Not as bad except they want the right to distribute via media other than electronically. Why? They also want to display content on affiliated sites. What is an affiliated site? Google Video Explicit clause stating content creator retains ownership of video an Google has non-exclusive rights are good. Clause granting Google rights to modify and reformat are cause for worry as both are open to interpretation. Reformat could mean changing to different video formats or transferring to cd/dvd. Unclear from the text. Links Tuppenceworth Post Short Stories Where the employees choose the boss Ricardo Semler as CEO of Brazil-based company Semco has turned every aspect of traditional organization and management on it’s head. Employees set their own working hours Employees choose their own salaries All meetings are voluntary and open to everyone Employees hire their own bosses HR has been almost abolished, because leaders need to be able to treat their employees right themselves All employees rate their bosses twice a year and all ratings are published Employees choose which leader they want to work under Employees choose which Semco office they want to work out of Employees can take early retirement, meaning they get one day a week off in return for working one day a week after they retire. Semler in his new book states that he believes life cannot be divided into work and free time any more. If you can work on a spreadsheet on Sunday night then you can go to the movies on Wednesday afternoon. Management works by not interfering and trusting that employees will find a solution. Links The Seven Day Weekend Semco company website Meebo Me! Online IM service Meebo continues to expand and extend its offerings. Recently announced Netvibes interoperability. Now has announced Meebo me. A widget which you can embed on a webpage allowing you to IM anyone who visits the page. allows for realtime chat between the creator of a site and his/her audience. Visitors appear as buddies in the users page on meebo.com, vistors can simply chat by entering text into the widget. This marks meebos first move from a instant messaging aggregator to a network provider Links Meebo Me Corporate Sponsorship of Schools Cash-strapped schools sell naming rights to buildings/rooms even principle’s offices to corporations for one time payments. Payments can be in excess of $500,000 Washington D.C considered selling naming rights to its subway stations. Las Vegas sells naming rights for its monorail. Clark, Texas, council voted in November to rename the town DISH in exchange for a decade of free satellite TV from the DISH Network. Corporations see naming as way of recruiting future workers. What does it say about a country that forces schools to fundraise in this way? Links Corporate Sponsorship of Schools Deathnell for the social network? House moves to block Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) social networking sites and chat rooms must be blocked by schools and libraries or those institutions will lose their federal internet subsidies Motivation in the words of Texas Republican Ted Poe “social networking sites such as MySpace and chat rooms have allowed sexual predators to sneak into homes and solicit kids.” Vague law blocks sites that allow people to post profiles, include personal information and allow communication among users. If law can be enforced it could have an impact on a large number of companies. Would create big obstacles to accessing sites that pose no risk to children including media and news sites like, Slashdot, Amazon and News.com. Implies that social networking sites and chat rooms are inherently dangerous to minors. Links TechCrunch article ZDNet article Special Report Audio Report from Drew @ Slick.comRemind them an IP is not a person According to Tech Dirt – the RIAA are refusing to take to court cases where users point out that an IP address is not the same as a person 2 cases have been dropped on this basis Keeping an open Wifi port has its advantages Links Remind them an IP is not a person Media Pimp Gareth IPTV Boards Free Ebooks in multiple forms Amazing Shockwave FPS Game USA-Trip Our Trip accross the states! Francis Street Performing World Championchips on this weekend!…
https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/42_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 42 Watch: Youtube Notes Is Blue sky R&D dead? Scientific capital is not being replenished via Blue Sky research. Start-ups are being locked out of the market by patent and trade secrets litigation. Cold War era brought us the transistor and Arpanet, seeds of todays information economy at great private and public expense – Kansian pump priming of the economy via public and corporate research spending Bell Labs, Xerox PARC and IBM’s Labs allowed Blue sky research into areas with no apparent commercial applications. Research labs became an unaffordable luxury. Closest is Google’s 20 percent time. Researchers now are under pressure to legitimize research by demonstrating it’s potential as a marketable product. Where then is the opportunity to do Blue sky research? Academia? No – increasingly accademic research is part funded by business IP and trade secret laws prevent new ideas from coming to market. Links Ars Technica article Update on email rummaging We previously reported – plans are afoot to automatically scan the email of every uk citizen, and block ‘objectionable’ websites at the ISP level One of our viewers contact his MP, and recieved an interesting reply Social Celebrity – The strange story of Brooke “Brookers” Brodack Youtube star Brooke “Brookers” Brodack has crossed over into mainstream media. Her profile on youtube has had almost 2 mil views Over 13000 subscribers to her videos on youtube. Brookes video consist primarily of her singing along to songs Spotted by Carson Daly who became a devoted fan. Brookers has signed a talent/development deal to Daly’s company Carson Daly Productions. She will work on developing content for Tv, Internet and mobile outlets. Links Variety.com article Youtube director profile of Brooke “Brookers” Brodack. Short Stories Otavo Your questions answered – social bookmarking, question asking and to-do lists. Users can: Ask and answer questions, organise and comment on bookmarks and share goals which are called quests Users rewarded for inviting new users and adding quests. Question is, is it good enough to abandon your current bookmarking site eg. del.icio.us? Can you import the bookmarks and to-do lists you might already have? Links Otavo.com TechCrunch article on Otavo Finally someone stands up to the MPAA punks MPAA and Universal Pictures are suing Shawn Hogan for downloading Meet the Fockers over BitTorrent. Hogan denies the accusation and states he already owns the film on Dvd. Hogan has declined to settle for $2500 and will fight the case in court. Most people sued by the MPAA or RIAA under similar accusations settle due to the large legal fees that would be incurred fighting the case in court. As we have stated a previous show , very tenuous evidence is often used by MPAA etc. to prove piracy Photos of computer screen and an IP address supplied to Tiscali to prove copyright infringement. Hogan however has the means and the desire to fight. This provides the first opportunity to resolve issues relevatant to these cases: How the associations get access to ISP records whether you can tie someone to an IP address in the age of Wi-Fi, anonymyzing networks, IP spoofing, Zombie networks etc. Links Wired News:Shawn Hogan, Hero Tired of selling your soul? Freecycle! Simple idea: Rather than throwing out something perfectly usable that you no longer want or need, give it to someone else for free: Freecycle it! Freecycle Network is made up of individual groups which give away and get stuff for free. Started in May 2003 to promote waste reduction in Tucson’s downtown and help save desert landscape from being taken over by landfills Members email a list of any unwanted objects to other members in the group who then can respond if they want the item. The giver then can decide who shall recieve the unwanted item. Everything shared is free, legal and appropriate for all age levels. Links Freecycle.org Freecycle groups in Ireland AMD to buy ATI TCAL Story Hard OCP explanation of the purchase FinFacts article Fight the news Games for Change conference this month – showcased many games with political objectives A variety of controversial games have been released dealing with contemporary political issues Peacemaker – strategy game – resolve the middle east conflict as either the Israeli prime minister or the Palestinian president Food Force – released by the UN – explains the difficulty of providing aid to a war zone A forse more powerful – teaches nonviolent political strategy Dafur is Dying – released by MTV & tied to a real world campaign – where players must support thier village Games already carry indoctrinatory messages – look at every action strategy shooter featuring US troops Republican party used games to ‘illustrate’ political points during 2003 campaign Some believe games are a highly effective way of explaining complex systems More research needed to verify pedagoic efficacy A struggle to keep the games interesting Will this trend make things worse, or even the playing field? [1] Dating 2.0 Techcrunch takes a look at the latest Web2.0 dating sites As with other web2.0 services they currently make up a tiny proportion of their market with more traditional sites Match.com & Yahoo personals dominating Consumating – hipsters, tagging, contests, celebration of wierdness Engage – matchmaking users act as daters or matchmakers – viral quality compatibility votes Greatboyfriends.com (and girlfriends) – friends and family leave family – which is then verified Matchtag – social network with activities – users post activities – pick best respondent – then carry out the preprepared date MingleNow – groups meet up by favourite bar / restaurant cafe interesting as it moves away from just dating Poddater (remember podato?) – uses create videos which other users download and review Prescription4Love – users with unique medical conditions / disabilities can meet Verbdate – integrates skype chat, flickr photos, and tags Wikia Personals – free global personals via wiki Problem with many of these sites – US only! Tiny user populations Links [2] Media pimp Gareth New porn only clone of YouTube Play almost any megadrive game online First Look – Valve Portal Downhill Duel – best flash game ever? Top 100 Science fiction books Great Live Buck 65 Performance This weeks theme music Francis Make a steadycam for $14 Item/Lending sharing in Dublin Tourist Remover: Remove unwanted items from snapshots. RiffTrax: Alternative commentaries on your favourite movies.…
https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/41_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 41 Watch: Youtube Notes Guilty by conception UK goverment unveils scheme to identify future criminals at birth. Aim is to identify those at risk of failure, violent behaviour or criminality and then take action to prevent that happening. Midwives, doctors and nurses asked to identify ‘chaotic’ families whose babies are in danger of growing up to be delinqunts, drug addicts and violent criminals. Action on Rights for Children (ARCH) points to evidence that early intervention can in fact be harmful. Assessment tools will include value judgements, made by doctors, nurses, midwives: one person’s dysfunction is another’s normal. Those assessing may feel under pressure to note everything, even part-imagined ‘signs’ to stave off future allegations of negligence. Cases could then be built on very tenuous or non-existent evidence. Misses the point that even if the signs exist there is no guarantee the child will become a criminal. Withholding information may become common as people fear any information given being used against them. Misses the point that we already know where many of the dysfunctional families reside, in the most poor and disadvantaged areas. So why not spend the money and resources in helping these people and their children rather than stymatising them by invading their homes and dictacting their home life. Links The Register article Register Article. Independent Online article. Observer online article. Short Stories Why antivirus doesn’t catch the infestion Evolution in action again – as virus writers specifically test against the most popular packages According to top packages have an 80% failure rate Little known russian antivirus shop Kaspersky produced the most immune to new malware antivirus Links Kaspersky Australian computer emergency responce team – 80% of malware gets through Antivirus software is being defeated Why most antivirus apps dont work YouTube owns your videos YouTubes updated terms and conditions provide the company myspace like ownership of your posted content The licence enables derivative works – meaning that musicians could find their tracks stripped from posted videos and resold While it looks like the company are just being legally cautious, this is another example of how we are relying on such networks not to be evil Links Wired News Story Boing boing Update EU blocks municipal broadband The European Commission is blocking individual municipalities who seek to provide free broadband for their residents Similar laws have been passed at state level in the US – though the Communications, Consumer’s Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006 may change that Is the worship of free market economics reducing access to broadband? Arguably, broadband – like road networks, education, or urban waste disposal – is an example of where government investment provides a massive boon to economic growth – as well as an essential service Let me just take this opportunity to describe the bin tag situation in Ireland! Links Ars technica article Too quick to Taze? As this horrific video demonstrates – US police show little hesitation in using dangerous and highly agressive non-lethal takedown techniques Taze video Artificial Intelligence turns 50 Artificial intelligence the name was coined 50 years ago Although strictly speaking, people have been trying to build AI since Turings 1950 ‘Computing machinery and intelligence’ paper A.I has developed not into the generalist analogue of human intelligence imagined by Turing – but rather into a set of specialist knowledge bases and pattern recognition systems Will general computational intelligence develop out of the exponential increase of computational power? Or – as seems more likely, are we constained by our current inability to perfectly understand the mechanisms of our own cognition Expert systems (like medical specialist programs), and fuzzy logic recognition mechanisms (like security cameras), are still incredibly stupid and specific The simplist insect is more self sufficient, environmentally adaptive, and independent than our most advanced robots Turing test is a red herring – confusing conversation with intelligence Despite their stupidity specialist programmes have multiple uses in a variety of fields Medicial diagnosis, voice recognition, surveillence of the public, aeronautics Is robotics relevent to AI? How much is embodiment a prerequeset for AI? Links Wired News article Great discussion on the dangers of ‘evil AI’ Media Pimp Francis Slimtimer web based time tracking service Gareth YYY’s Cheated Hearts Cheated Hearts Dublin Secret Diary of Steve Jobs Aged 51 1/2…
https://garethstack.com/content/audio/technolotics/40_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 40 Watch: Youtube Notes Police State UK – The abuse of antisocial behaviour orders A physics graduate is fined £80 for describing a metal detector as “piece of shit that wouldn’t stop anyone” in public. Kurt Walker fined £80 for using the word “fuck” in a public park in Kent. He’s refusing to pay. ASBO Law states that it’s illegal to use threatening words or behaviour likely to cause alarm, harassment or distress. Main problem with an ASBO is that due process does not occur. Civil court orders which can be based on hearsay evidence. The burden of proof is much lower than in a criminal case. Police only have to persuade a judge that your behaviour “may cause harassment or alarm or distress” to someone else to get one imposed. Makes it very hard to defend oneself. Less than 1% of applications for ASBOs have been refused. Up to 35% of young people with asbos in the UK had a diagnosed mental disorder or accepted learning difficulty. But breaching an ASBO is a criminal offence. With penalty in the UK of 5 years in jail. Asbos can be used to criminalise behaviour that would otherwise not be illegal. Including: playing football, feeding pigeons, swearing, being sarcastic and riding a bicycle Restricts individuals rights of free speech and association. Little or no evidence they actually solve anything. Justice Minister Michael McDowell plans to introduce them in Ireland. Links The Register news article BBC News: Teenager fined £80 for swear word The Case Against Anti Social Behaviour Orders: Coalition Against ASBOs, March 2005 10 things you should know about Asbos A Guide to Anti-Social Behaviour Orders and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts China harvesting Falun Gong organs, report alleges. 60,000 organ transplants recorded between 2000 and 2005 (by China Medical Organ Transplant Association) 18,500 of the organs came from identifiable sources. 41,500 transplants from no other explained sources. There is a booming transplant industry in China. Number of liver transplant centres has jumped from 22 in 1999 to 500 in 2006. Number of liver transplant operations has jumped from 135 to 4,000 in the same period. Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of the Falun Gong in China (CIPFG) Made recordings of phone calls to hospitals, prisons and transplant centres. organs from alleged Falun Gong prisoners were promised to prospective buyers within as little as a week Ex-wife of Chinese surgeon alleges that he removed the corneas from 2,000 euthanized Falun Gong prisoners over a 2 year period. All died and their bodies were burned. China admitted in 2005 that it harvests and sells the organs of executed prisoners. British Transplantation Society alleged China without the consent of prisoners or next of kin. Report by former MP David Kilgour and Winnipeg lawyer David Matas. Report based on recordings of phone calls, interviews, and info taken from chinese hospital and transplant centre websites. Links CBC News BPI: We should be able to cut off your Internet British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has requested 2 ISP’s to terminate the DSL connections of customers allegedly engaged in infringing file-sharing. BPI asked for immediate action without due process based on the evidence of a single screenshot. Tiscali has refused to comply stating “It is not for Tiscali, as an ISP, nor the BPI, as a trade association, to effectively act as a regulator or law enforcement agency and deny individuals the right to defend themselves against the allegations made against them.” “Notice-and-takedown” regime allows censorship of web-pages if they allegedly infringe copyrright. Embedded in law in Europe through the EUCD and in the US via the infamous DMCA. Used by the Church of Scientology to silence critics. WTO used it to silence a parody site. Diebold used it to suppress the publication of a whistle-blower memo that detailed the critical failings of their voting machines. Significantly it only works on material hosted on the ISP’s server. Notice-and-termination, is the new proposed regime. The ability to communicate over the Internet can be removed by anyone claiming you’re infringing copyright. Alternatively internet connections may be crippled only supporting bandwidths and protocols approved by the entertainment industry. It is being proposed as a United Nations treaty obligation, hence every ISP would be forced to adopt this regime. An obvious target is P2P networks which Notice-and-takedown is ineffective against. Requests for takedowns usually generated by software bots, which often mistakenly identify copyright infringements. No presumption of innocence for the alleged copyright infringer. No method for someone to defend themselves. Entertainment industry becomes judge, jury with the ISP as executioner. Links Boing Boing article: BPI: We should be able to cut off your Internet Ars Technica article: British music industry, concerned about piracy, targets ISPs Ars Technica article: British ISP tells recording industry to provide real file sharing evidence Games That Never Age: The Unrecognized Potential of Procedural Synthesis. Everyone has heard of Procedural Synthesis and what it can achieve. Astounding graphics but with very small file sizes. What is procedural synthesis? Method of using mathematics to produce real-time graphics instead of pre-rendered imagery. Base components are created such as the texture of bark or tree leaves. Algorithms then make them look different as they are re-used throughtout the game. When you consider the number of re-used textures in games you see the benefits: walls, sidewalks, sky etc. Drawback of procedurally generated graphics is that it’s computationally intensive. Lack of computing power restricts the complexity of algorithms that modify textures. However as processors get faster then higher resolution textures can simply created by modifying the algorithms that work with the base textures. Graphics of games can improve as better algorithms are released and downloaded via automatic updates. Problems include: It won’t be widely adopted. Every visual element a game is not procedurally generated, hence not everything can be upgraded. You’re still playing the same game, procedural synthesis doesn’t address gameplay only graphics. Why not AI procedurally generated so you can get updates of smarter opponents? Will Wright’s latest project: Spore uses procedural synthesis liberally. This includes the way creatures move and behave being generated on the fly. Links About.com article Will Wright’s Spore Short Stories FBI plans new net-wiretapping push FBI has drafted legislation that requires ISPs to create wiretap hubs for surveillance It also will force networking gear manufacturers to build “backdoors” in equipment to enable eavesdropping Measures included are: Expanding wiretapping requirements to “commercial” Internet services including instant messaging if the FCC deems it to be in the “public interest.” Forcing ISP’s to monitor and identify for instance VoIP calls. Remove the requirement that the Justice Department publish a “notice of the actual number of communications interceptions” every year FBI claims changes in law needed to thwart terrorists and criminals who have turned to such things as VOIP. Links Boing Boing article CNet article Microsoft hit with 280m euro fine Microsoft fined for failing to comply with anti-competition ruling. Landmark ruling in 2004 ordered Microsoft to provide rivals with info on Windows. Microsoft was ordered to supply “complete and accurate” technical information to rival developers. Aim was to allow rival firms to write programs that could run more smoothly on Windows. Daily fines of 3 million a day will come into effect from the 31st of July if Microsoft fails to comply. Microsoft claims to have complied and will appeal the fine. It also plans to argue that the commission’s original demand was too vague. Links [1] Friendster wins a patent on social networking Friendster has received a patent that covers online social networks. patent,is extremely general would seem to cover the activities of many other sites Patent refers to a “system, method, and apparatus for connecting users in an online computer system based on their relationships within social networks.” Patent covers the basic steps involved in joining a social network: entering a personal description and relationships to other users, mapping relationships and degrees of separation, and connecting to others through these friends. Company could in future pursue licenses and litigation from its competitors. Expecially LinkedIn (covered last week) that allows people to connect within a certain number of degrees of separation. Patent could be challenged in the patent system or the courts. “Once the patent is issued there is a presumption of validity that follows with it,” said attorney Bill Heinze of Thomas, Kayden, Horstemeyer & Risley. Friendster has fallen on hard times, eclipsed by rivals such as MySpace. Patent was applied for about 3 years ago Another 11 patents are in the pipeline for Friendster. Links Red Herring Article TechCrunch Article Media Pimp Mark The Skeptics Guide To The Universe Adult Swim on Bravo UK Ciaran Ask A Ninja Francis Balcony TV Dave Chappelle on the Internet Lily Allen.…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/39_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 39 Watch: Youtube Notes Fear and loathing in single sex schools Review of data from across the world showed no evidence that single-sex schools were consistently better. Ability and social background of the pupils reason for their performance in school league tables. Success of single sex schools could be attributed to them creaming the best students. Situation occurs of co-educational school having a large gender imbalance containing the girls deemed unfit for the single-sex school. Is it natural to seperate boys and girls at school as is simply denies them the chance to interact? Hence stunting their social and personal development? An interesting study would be to compare the social skills of those from single and co-educational schools. Children go to school together up until the age of 11, why then seperate them? Links The Observer news article Guardian Unlimited news article Social networking products that game the system. SalesGenius, Allows a salesperson to see exactly what you looked at and clicked on on their website after clicking on a link sent via email. The subsequent telephone sales pitch is then based on what they have learned by observing you. LinkedIn is a social networking site for jobs. It allows people to connect to strangers who may employ them via someone they do know who will vouch for them. Situation may occur where you are asked to connect people you don’t know to one another, which can be socially awkward. Jigsaw allows one to trade business contacts almost like baseball cards. You get money or credits for submitting contact information which can then be used to buy contact information. Idea of trading your contacts or obtaining contacts merely to trade them for better ones is kindof creepy. Links Break the social contract–for fun and profit by Rafe Needleman Who’s reading your email? New plans to scan e-mails for illegal images of child abuse. AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft, EarthLink and United Online have joined with the US National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to create new ways to safeguard children. First initiative is to create a database of images of child abuse and then process each to create a digital fingerprint. They will then monitor email attachments and images files sent over the networks in the hopes of spotting illegal images. Chances of false positives are quite high. Seems more of a token gesture rather than a real effort to stop the trading of images of abuse. Trading often happens on restricted servers with files encrypted and obfuscated to hide their true content. UK is moving towards forcing ISP’s to put in place technical measures that will block customers from accessing websites identified by the IWF (Internet Watch Foundation) as containing illegal images. Interestingly the IWF has not a statutory body and has no legal powers. But it will have the power to block a website it considers unacceptable or illegal under current law. Why would you oppose this? Another foot in the door of the total surveilence of email False positives – family snaps etc What other images will trickle into later versions the tracking algorithem – essentially anything illegal that is distinct enough to algorithmically analyse cheaply – any form of drug useage, or how about photos of you at a protest. But technology is never used for repression right? Look at the list of other things the IWF watch for things that may be banned at the ISP – copyright violations, peer to peer services (note – not just file sharing), mobile camera violence (happy slapping we think) Great UK firewall anyone? Links Commentary by Bill Thompson on BBC Technology website [1] The Future of Futurism In 1976 Stefan Kanfer divided futurists into two groups: Neo-Malthusians are convinced that the world is going to hell. Cornucopians, in contrast, promise vast riches. Most futurists believe technology will empower the ordinary individual. Glenn Reynolds believes in a “comfy chair revolution” that will turn every consumer into a producer. John Robb believes that such empowering technology has the downside of also being available to terrorists, criminals etc. Philip Longman, believes “the comfy chair revolution” will strengthen the hand of fundamentalists worldwide. The forces of reaction will simply outbreed the secular world. Barry Lynn argues that the global supply chains we count on are too fragile to survive a major shock, be it natural disaster or terrorist attack or otherwise. Some things don’t change, i.e. death and taxes etc. Good futurists take the constants into account and extrapolate on current trends. The author states that the Cornocopians have generally got things right. Rising standard of living: Not for all, gap in wealth between rich and poor has widened. the XBox as a Superintelligent robots: eh.. no. Vast Undersea cities: This may come true but not through design, more likely through rising sea levels flooding cities. Links Slate.com article Short Stories New Defamation bill makes it harder to sue for libel The Irish Governments new defamation bill allows a defence of innocent publication to people providing the medium. The bill has been proposed and is due for debate in the Dail before being passed into law in November. ISP’s could be liable if they exercise an editing role on a site as they would then have the opportunity to excise defamatory material. In the UK ISP’s are absolved from liability over what at third party writes about another person online. The new legislation may well force ISP’s to disclose the identity of bloggers and contributors to chatrooms so that the defamer can then be sued for everything he owns. All this means is that the ISP is less likely to get sued. You however will still be at risk for damaging someone’s good name, even more so now they can find out who you are. Links SiliconRepublic article Amanda Congdon leaves Rocketboom. Anchor of popular daily video blog Rocketboom Amanda Congdon leaves the show. She claims she was forced to by Andrew Baron her former partner in RocketBoom. Rocketboom released a statement stating she was no longer with them due to her wanting to move to a different part of the country. RocketBoom has catapulted itself to success, with 250,000ish daily viewers, distribution via Tivo and $40,000 per week in advertising revenue. How much of that is attributable to the anchor is debatable but future success may depend on finding a suitable replacement. Or maybe they will kiss and make up. Links TechCrunch Article US military turns to “blog analysis” for intelligence Air Force Office of Scientific Research, is currently funding a US$450,000 study that attempts to mine blogs for “invaluable help in fighting the war of terror.” Some genius has come up with the idea of basing the relevance of a source by the number of hyperlinks to it. Someone contact the Nobel foundation. This of course is not at all like the method used by the world’s largest search engine. System will allow warhawks to figure out what topics bloggers are talking about before it makes it onto Fox News. Links Ars Technica article Media Pimp Gareth Lost Words Become a camcorder pro Francis StoryCorps – Oral history of the USA…
https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/38_technolotics.mp3 Listen: Episode 38 Watch: Youtube Notes Bush to set up domestic spy service George Bush has announced a new Intelligence agency to be set up within the FBI – the National Security Service The agency will be empowered to sieze the property of those suspected of spreading WMD This story ironically comes shortly after GB intervened to prevent the controversial supreme court decision allowing so called ’eminent domain’ where local governments to enact compulsory purchase orders for private developments The FBI will restucture to include a new The NSS will consolidate the bureau’s counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and intelligence duties The expantion of the FBI’s duties from crime fighting to domestic surveilance seems clear The agency will be headed up by John Negraponte, the controversial former US amassador to Hondoras alleged to have been involved in the training and aid to Nicaraguan Contras death squads Actions that would later result in the conviction of the United Stated in the UN International Court of Justice for unlawful use of forse additionally he is alleged to have been involved in the running of CIA trained Honduran death squads – responsible for the deaths of opponents of the US supported regieme and the establishment of secret detention and tortue facilities in Honduras One potentially positive move is the establishment of a counter-proliferation center – to prevent the spread of chemical / biological / nuclear weapons The changes are being marked as a reaction to the Silverman-Robb Commission report on the “Intelligence Failures” in Iraq – which led to the ‘mistakes’ on WMD Links BBC News Article Associated Press – Bush Limits Property Siezure Sourcewatch profile of John Negroponte Scientist Unite To Attack Creationism The Inter Academy Panel on International Issues – of the International Council for Science has released a strong condemnation of anti scientific / anti evolutionary education The statement attacks the denial of evolution – and the confusion of untestable beliefs with scientific hypotheses It urges parents and educators to teach children about the scientific method and scientific discoveries It also lists a variety of evidence based statements in support of evolution and the scientific method The statement is signed by representatives of 68 International scientific representative bodies Links ICSU Statement (PDF) Physics Today Article ACLU hounds NSA on brain scan misuse In a story right from the pen of Philp K. Dick – The ACLU have accused the NSA of adapting functional neuroimaging in the questioning of suspects domestically and internationally FMRI likely to be the technology involved The technology works by capturing statistical alterations in oxygenated bloodflow to various brain regions in response to activity which is assumed to correllate with brain activity When hemoglobin – the bloods oxygen transporter – is oxygen rich, it become magnetic in response to the application of external magnetic fields – allowing the recording of blood oxygen level dependent images of neural activity Images are mathamatically transformed into meaningful analogues of brain activity MRI and fMRI techniques are revolutionizing neuroscience – however the very idea of a ‘lie region’ in any individuals brain is absurd – although it might be possible to present individuals with stimuli (e.g.: photographs) and observe their brains activation in response The ethics of subjecting suspects (or even convicted criminals) to unnecessary medical proceedures in order to extract information, is highly dubious Links ACLU Article Wikipedia on FMRI Short Stories Warner to sell movies via GUBA.com Studio Giant Warner Bros. (a subsidiary of Time Warner) have announced a deal with startup GUBA.com Interestingly the studio is not persuing horizontal integration with TM owned America Online Warner are experimenting with a variety of distribution mechanisms – having already signed a deal with bittorrent creator Bram Cohen Pricing Movie – 24 hour rental – $1.99 Movie – ‘Permanent’ DRM’d download – $19.99 / $9.99 – same day DVD release TV shows – $1.79 per episode Compatibility – Windows media PC’s, networks and portable devices Links Yahoo News Article Google launches Paypal rival Google has finally launched its long awaited PayPal rival checkout # If the service proves popular – it could ultimately be an even greater income generator than adwords Signing up is as simple as filling in a single page form with credit card / billing details Each user can store an unlimited number of credit card / billing address combinations Google have cleverly linked the tech into adwords adds – with a shopping cart icon indicating support for the service Order / shipping status & fraud protection are included Links Google Checkout Slashdot Article Google Checkout Promo Video Canadian Scientists Regrow Teeth and Bones Eh Canadian Scientists are using ultrasound to fix fractured & diseased teeth The wireless device – inserted like a cap above teeth stimulate the gum and roots to produce growth The technology may one day allow bone growth to increase height Links BreitBart.com Article Java may go open source in months Sun have announced their intention to Open Source their Java virtual machine / programming environment The move may save the beliegered language which has come under attack from new tech Like Microsofts .Net and C# technologies It could additionally provide a huge boon to embeded devices running Linux Move comes 2 years after it was suggested by IBM & Eric S. Raymond Compatibility & forking issues may delay the move for several months Links Infoworld – Sun to open Java Cnet – IBM urges Sun to open Java Media Pimp Gareth An interesting article I almost wholly disagree with Artificial General Intelligence and its Potential Role in the Singularity – by ben gortzel AGI is unlikely to be developed – primarily because humans don’t have General Intelligence – but rather a wide variety of modular intelligences Evolutionary computing – rather than a grand design is likley to produce the first highly intelligent AI – but as this process involves problem solution – and the solution space of general category problems is huge – we shouldn’t expect to be able to comprehend the thoughts – or even the perspective of such a creature After all – from one perspective, language enabled memes can be percieved as globally active artificial intelligences Podcatcher Matrix Compare Podcasting Clients Scientology Orientation Video Daniel Director Jonah The Year 2012 Fiona The Perry Bible Fellowship…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/37_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 37 Watch: Youtube Notes LA Police to watch from the air Police in LA have announced plans to launch UAV’s ‘The SkySeer’ Am I the only one who thinks Farenheit 451 has come to pass? The drones – autonomously controlled via GPS – will observe the ground for signs of dissent, bright colours or dark skin (sic) They are intended to fight crime “This technology could be used to find missing children, search for lost hikers, or survey a fire zone,” – Commander Sid Heal, of LAPD “Unmanned surveillance crafts may become the norm in urban policing” Em..so the technology can see into basements, people hike in the city, and city fires now grow so big they need a survey? Currently they lack zoom – but are silent, and can pan and tilt their video cameras – sending visual feeds back to base – future versions could see into your living room LAPD current have 18 helecopters – the UAVs are much cheaper 25 – 30k and are likely to quickly become ubiquitous “Do we really want to live in a society where our backyard barbeques will be open to police scrutiny?” – Beth Givens of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse “You shouldn’t be worried about being spied on by your government,” said Heal. “These days you can’t go anywhere without a camera watching you whether you’re in a grocery store or walking down the street.” Links: Drones in the Sky Earth Temp at 400 year high National Academy of Sciences concludes Earth is the hottest it has been in 400 years. Scientists explained human activities as being responsible. The panel agreed that the warming in the last few decades of the 20th century was unprecedented over the last 1,000 years Reviewed the scientific work of other scientists Panel looked at how other scientists reconstructed the Earth’s temperature over thousands of years. Reconstruction carried out based on tree rings, corals, glaciers, cave deposits, ocean and lake sediments. One study compared the sharp curve of the hockey blade to the recent uptick of temperatures and the stick’s long shaft to centuries of previous climate stability. Bush administration has maintained that threat is not severe. White House says new pollution controls would have cost 5 million Americans their jobs. Last year House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman, Rep. Joe Barton launched an investigation of three climate scientists. House Science Committee, Rep. Sherwood Boehlert said Barton should learn from scientists not intimidate them. National Academy of Sciences is a private organization chartered by Congress to advise the government of scientific matters. Links: Global warming Kyoto promices nothing but hot air Countries that signed up to Kyoto are emitting more greenhouse gases than they say they are. Under Kyoto, each government calculates its gas emissions by adding up estimates from individual sources. Emission calculation system accepted by atmospheric scientists but not independently audited. Peter Bergamaschi of the European Commission Joint Research Centre at Ispra, Italy has come up with an alternative “top-down method of estimation” Claims he has convincing evidence that the figures for many countries are wrong, UK and France worst offenders. Measured in detail how concentrations of greenhouse gases vary across the globe. Concentrations are higher near sources and dependent on weather conditions. Scientists claim they can now calculate a country’s emissions independently of government estimates. Bergamaschi admits system not perfect but is based on real atmospheric measurements. National figures often based on uncertain extrapolations from sites such as landfills whose emissions are highly variable. Countries now have incentive to underestimate as carbon-trading occurs. Links [1] Short Story Digg 3.0 screenshots Techcrunch have exclusive screenshots of the new Digg New Features include.. Collapsable Groups of topics bundled together Science, World, Business, Entertainment, Gaming, Online Video – youtube, yahoo video New sections include – technology, entertainment, gaming, science, world & business, and online video. Digg is now one of the post popular news sites in the world – 800,000 visitors a day Links Screenshots New Features Microsofties search with google Overwhelming majority of MS workers use google 80 / 20 % Google and Yahoo workers apparently do 100% at google & 64% at yahoo Techweb Article Royle Society to try open publishing UK royal society cream of UK academia to publish some journals under open licensing will be available for free online contributers will cover costs Comes in wake of RS publishing a paper attacking Open publishing subsequent open letter from members reversed policy Welcome Trust have recently decided to publish all articles supported by its research grands through open access European commission have recommended the same for state funded research in the EU [2] Opera 9 Launches Includes primative built in torrent support A must in future browsers if citizen media is to survive The worst website in history has been launched to advertise it It’s ment to be amusing we think New features include Skins Pop Up Blocker Password Manager Source code editor, WC3 validator Widgets My Opera Community – a user community with photo upload and 300meg free space Opera 9 launches Media Pimp Gareth The Power of Nightmares Against School Instructables Dark Light Film Festival Francis Quickmuse Give me a name Ten Dollar Digital Camera…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/36_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 36 Watch: Youtube Notes A Dose Of Genius Dramatic increases in the numbers of students using “smart pills” to increase concentration, focus, wakefulness and short-term memory. Adderall, used to treat attention-deficit disorder. Sales up 3,135 per cent in the last 4 years. Provigil used to treat narcoleptics, who fall asleep uncontrollably. Sales up 359.7 percent in the last 4 years.. These “brain steroids” are cheaply available, with those having legitimate perscriptions selling or giving away the pills to their friends. Study published in an international biomedical and psychosocial journal noted that 7 million Americans used bootleg perscriptions in 2002 and 1.6 million were in the student age group. In May, the Partnership for a Drug-Free America issued its annual attitude-tracking study on drug use it concluded 2.25 million kids of middle school and high school age are abusing stimulants. This represents 1 in 10 students in that age group. These represent the first geneneration of brain pills, memory drugs may soon be on sale pending the results of clinical trials. Four US companies are racing to bring drugs for Alzheimer’s patients to market. Researchers expect those drugs to slowly filter into use by a population sick of forgetting what they meant to buy at the shops and students looking for an edge. One new drug boosts the activity of glutamate, a key neurotransmitter that makes it easier to learn and encode memory. For the future: Will business see it as a way to get more out of the average worker. Certainly in jobs where mental endurance matters it will creep in, especially as those who take them at school move into these roles. What about the side effects? Cleaner student accomodation. Strattera — the ADHD medicine can result in liver failure a form of Adderall was pulled from its markets as a result of sudden unexplained deaths in children with cardiac abnormalities. How long before it becomes common over here? Points race and pressure to succeed placing greater pressure on students. Will those who cannot attend grind schools use these drugs to keep up? Links Original Article from Washington Post The Last Radio The GNU programmable radio Capable of grabing most of the electromagnetic spectrum Most devices that use wireless communications utilize single purpose radios which operate over a narrow band of frequencies. A general purpose radio that can be reconfigured offers greater flexibility and economy of scale. Imagine being able to recieve or transmit any kind of signal using one device. Eric Blossom & Matt Ettus teamed up to develop a HDTV reciever. While they have yet to decode HDTV they have gone on to build the a software-defined radio. The system consists of the: Universal Software Radio Peripheral, or USRP motherboard the daughterboards that allow it to transmit and recieve over various parts of the electomagnetic spectrum. The device is already being used to track shopper movements within a closed area using triangulation of the GSM signals. Blossom is working on a passive radar system which will use ambient radio waves to track flying objects up to 50 km away. System opens up vast possibilities for researchers and amateurs, Ettus is selling the kits from his website starting at $550 Links Wired News Ettus.com Netvibes Ecosystem Popular WEb2.0 online desktop / portal netvibes have launched Netvibes Ecosystem The ecosystem is a cleverly designed one way mirror of RSS content, widgets created with the netvibes API, and flash content You can alter how netvibes works, subscribe to feeds created by users, add a clock, games etc With integrated POP3 mail, mouseover feed preview, and built in RSS viewer, Netvibes is rapidly becomming a top notch alternative to separate RSS feed viewers Links Netvibes Ecosystem Gesturtek outdo the Wiimote New camera software from Gesturetek should enable X360 and PS3 to replicate all the functionality of the Wiimote and more Gesturetek showed off their Software development kit at E3 It is used to program for the as-of-yet unannounced XBox 360 camera. This is not a slightly better EyeToy which could only identify motion and direction. The SDK allows for the identification and tracking of a single person’s face. It also tracks limbs in 3 dimentional space. It can in fact identify and track individual fingers. This allows for very sophisticated gesture recognition if the hype is to be believed. The SDK is also being ported to the PS2 and PS3 and should be ready by the end of the summer. The question is – will software support the peripheral? Writer makes the point that Nintendo Wii is all about the controller. Game makers have no incentive to incorporate gesture control into their games. It’s much easier to churn out generic sequels to popular titles. Those that do might do so poorly. Nintendo on the other hand incorporate gesture recognition by default. It’s the unique selling point of the Wii. For developers it is much more likely to be fully incorporated into games for the Wii. Gesture games are hugely popular, Guitar Hero allowing air guitar afficionados everywhere to strut their stuff. If the system works then it would be nice to see other uses of it. no more seaching for the remote control, simply control every device in the room via gestures. Links About.com Short Stories Google Spreadsheets Googleblogger – Spreadsheets for everybody else Will not replace advanced corporate functions But – multiuser / post online / all basic functions – fine for home / small business use Only major feature missing = charts Google Browser Synch Google have launched a tool for those of us forced to skip from Desk to desk Google browser synch lets users carry their settings with them bookmarks, history, persistent cookies, and saved passwords are kept up to date handy, but do you trust google with this info? NSA Lawsuit will go ahead Judge rules that the lawsuit against the NSA over their illegal wiretapping can go ahead Lawsuit filed by the ACLU in Detroit and the Center for Constitution Rights in New York in January. Claim was that the wiretapping violated American’s rights to free speech and privacy. Plaintiffs asked the judge in March to declare the wiretaps illegal. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act requires a visit to a secret court to authorize spying within the United States. The NSA had not done this, making their wiretaps warrentless and illegal. Government filed a motion saying no court can consider the issues as it may harm national security. Judge said she will hear the government’s motion only after proceeding with the hearing on the plaintiff’s motion to declare the spying illegal. The Justice Department has yet to respond to the legal challenge. Link: : Boston.com Hitch – iPod to iPod without PC Finally – rip to and from portable devices without a PC Link: : Sima Products Media Pimp Gareth Man vs Flash Observer Chris Morris Special The Amen Break Video The Establishment – Ultimate Peter Cook Fan Site Amazing RC Piloting Powers of 10 Francis Search for content with a particular tag on flickr, youtube, del.icio.us,technorati, feedster, newsvine, reddit and tailrank, all at the same time on Tagfetch.com Make your own lcd projector Make google maps the easy way with Google Map Maker Prison Break begins on RTE 2 on Tuesday night.…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/35_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 35 Watch: Youtube Notes The Stolen Election Rolling Stone on how Bush stole the 2004 election Robert Kennedy Jr, son of Robert Kennedy, leading US environmental campaigner writes It’s never been clear the exact (actual) outcome of the 2000 election – first election since the 1876 election in which the Supreme Court affected the decision – but most have assumed the 2004 election – although fraut with controversy was a clear victory for Bush Not so says R.F.K disparity between exit poles and results – in all but 4 states favouring Bush Exit polls are almost never wrong – with a margin of error of approximately 1% (beyond that require in science for significance) variety of discrepancies pollsters view as almost completely impossible half of 6 million americans abroad did not recieve ballots on time Pentagon shut down the website used to file oversea registrations Consulting firm hireed by Sproul & Associates hired by RNC to register voters – caught shredding Dem registrations New Mexico – 20,000 votes unregistered on ballot machines 1 million ballots spoiled by electronic voting equipment nationwide In deciding electoral college state Ohio – 350,000 voters (most dem) did not have votes counted or could not vote, officials removed thousands of eligable voters from register (1/4 of total), provided too few vote counts to democratic precincts & derailed a recount 50 thousand complaints were recieved from voters Irregularities invariably favoured Bush Evidence points to a systematic co-ordinated campaign refusing to accept registrations removing voters who were already registered failing to properly count ballots providing too few voting machines to democratic areas on a massive scale designed to throw the election – particularly in Ohio – where the election was run by a hardline republican – who broke many state and fedral laws in his running of the vote A disgusting but unsurpring report of an election stolen brazenly and on a massive scale, a crime unreported in the partisan US media Redefining Journalism Blog c-lo.net argues in it’s latest post that journalism is broken. Inspired by Mark Cuban post on how that journalism no longer offers people (particularly young people) enough of a “payoff”. Writer argues to throw objectivity out the window and embrace subjectivity because it already occurs, witness the popularity of Fox News. Main ideas on what journalism should be: Objectivity is a load of bull. Transparency and honesty are not. Don’t act like opinions don’t exist. People need opinions. Opinions give meaning to facts. Redefine the concept of authority. Journalists currently control who is seen as an expert on any particular subject. User created content means that journalists no longer control access to expert opinions. Post argues people want the facts presented and interpreted in a particular way. Commenter makes the point: will people choose the presentation and interpretations that question their preconceptions of an issue or bolster those preconceptions. Links Post on c-lo.net Post by Mark Cuban Tag the fuckers Scott Silverman, Chairman of the Board of VeriChip Corporation, has proposed implanting the company’s RFID tracking tags in immigrant and guest workers. Idea disclosed in response to Bush administrations call to know “who is in our country and why they are here ” VeriChip make very small passive RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) chips about the size of a grain of rice. Chip can be injected directly into the body, FCC has approved VeriChips for this purpose. Reader broadcasts a signal which powers the chip which then sends its data to the reader. I frankly don’t see how this helps them track illegal immigrants or nefarious individuals who will either not have the chips or remove them. VeriChip are a solution in search of a problem. Probably a more realistic worry is the near inevitable tagging of currency and consumer goods. Consumer goods will almost certainly be tagged, a number of testing centres already exist where every product for sale in the store is tagged. Main worry for many is that anybody can read the tags after you have bought the product e.g. mugger scanning you to find out whether you’ve anything worth stealing. Research has been carried out into disabling the chips before they leave the store. Revelation, chapter 13 Then I saw another beast which rose out of the earth; it had two horns like a lamb and it spoke like a dragon…16: Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead…17: so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. So great for shopping then Revelation, chapter 14 8: Another angel, a second, followed, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who made all nations drink the wine of her impure passion.”…”If any one worships the beast and its image, and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand he also shall drink the wine of God’s wrath, poured unmixed into the cup of his anger, and he shall be tormented with fire and sulphur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.” Bad breath and cramping ahead for the chipped ‘Security’ and the death of amature science Consumer Product Safety Commission has begun a crackdown on the sale of chemicals which could be used to make illegal fireworks. CPSC wants buyers to have an explovive chemicals licence to buy any of the chemicals, presumable in any amount. The problem is that those same chemicals have a wide range of other uses. This is having a huge impact on the teaching of science in schools. Schools are shying away from hands on experiments due to fears of accidents and the law. students lose interest reading text books This eventually leads to less scientists and less able scientists because they don’t have the experience. This and other forces are also having a chilling effect on amateur research. More than 30 states have passed laws to restrict sales of chemicals and lab equipment associated with meth production In certain states you now need a licence to own certain types of glassware and unbelievably ph strips. Any amateur scientist now fears discovery, and not the scientific kind but the S.w.a.t. team breaking down the door kind. Strangely enough amateur scientists have always played some part in science’s progress In recent years, citizen scientists have discovered comets and supernovas and invented tools for gauging Earth’s magnetic field. Some big names in tech and science started out as amateur chemists. Intel cofounder Gordon Moore, Vint Cerf, one of the architects of the Internet and David Packard the late cofounder of Hewlett-Packard spent time in their youth making home made bombs which they then detonated… cuz it was cool. Consider on the other hand that you can buy bullets in Wal-Mart, a product made with the sole purpose of maiming and killing. Links Wired News Story The net as enemy Declassified “Information Operations Roadmap” provides glimpse of the Pentagon’s plans for “information operations” US military are looking to fight an electronic war Using propaganda dessimated electronically via blogs, websites etc. and physically via unmanned aerial vehicles, “miniaturized, scatterable public address systems”, wireless devices, Document intriguingly thinks of the internet as the enemy with “fight the net” Grand finale describes their aim to control the electromagnetic spectrum. Anything that depends on the electormagnetic spectrum they want to be able to destroy. That includes every telephone, computer, mobile phone, radio on the planet. Links BBC News Short Stories Gaming Propaganda from the other side An interesting counterpoint to the usual US special forces in Iran game the Union of Islamic Student Societies are releasing a game storyline: US special forces kidnap an iranian nuclear scientist on pilgrimage – Commander Bahman must save him EU Propose Email Tax A european parliment working group has suggested a tax on text message and emails – just who would pay this tax, or how it would be collected, has not been explained A variety of proposals for an EU tax or taxes have been announced in the light of negotiation difficulties expaning the EU budget, before now primarily paid by import duties, VAT, and contributions from member states Big Oil Attacks Gore Former US presidental candidate Al Gore has released a new film based on his anti-global warming lectures An inconvenient truth Predictably ‘Big Oil’ is critical Oil companies have hired ‘the competitive enterprise instiute’ which denies the effects of global warming to produce 2 sixty second adds attacking Gore, and the film directly Make More babies to catch up to the brown people Fox News ‘pundit’ John Gibbons has suggested in his show ‘The Big Story’ that white americans need to ‘make more babies’ His reasons? Hispanic americans are having more children White europeans are having less “hence ‘Eurabia’.” “Because civilizations need population to survive.” We wouldn’t want the brown people taking over, now would we Media Pimp Francis Make your PC look like a WMD Gareth CC Hits – Digg for CC music List of Podsafe Music How to Protect yourself from Big Brother Cooked and Bomd Monkey Mail Sarah Aharef: Websites as graphs…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/34_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 34 Watch: Youtube Notes Evil Broadcast Treaty stopped Podcasters saved from new broadcast copyright – for now WIPO – Broadcast treaty Seeks to give copyright rights to the first person to transmit something – even if they have no role in creating it Creators would have to seek permission from the first body to broadcast a work to show it on any other channel Even public domain and fair use clips would be included! For now the web has been excluded – due to the opposition of every country in the world other than the United States Still affects podcasters – e.g.: under the treaty the portion of our show clipped on blizzard of odd – could never be shown on any television station world wide again – without RTE’s permission!!! The broadcast treaty is a work of monsterous greed which shows US copyright and patent laws – and the ‘international body’ created to inforse them for what they are – property rights for communication and ideas Have no fear – webcasting will be added in due course. Is Bebo Dangerous Irish Blogger Red Mum has hopped into the debate on the dangers of bebo Is bebo a haven for nefarious pedorasts? Yes and know Yes Kids do post too much personal information Kids befriend individuals they don’t know personally Kids use their own names No This is no different to IRC, Yahoo chats, or any of hundreads of kinds and millions of examples of internet communications tool We can either wrap our children in cotton wool, or teach them appropriate care One thing is certain – very soon it will be effectively impossible to restrict omnipresent internet access Kids in fact meet strangers from online – very rarely – without either their friends present or a real world contact in the group Parents are understandably worried – but in the real world, abusers are much more likely to be carers – whether relatives, educators or care home staff [3] Wall marts Wikipedia war Two years ago the wikipedia page was highly critcal of Wall Mart, however lobbyists have gradually been changing the page to present Wall Mart more positively, eg no mention of disputes over unions. No one knows whether these people are being employeed by Wall Mart. Up a dozen edits a day, those speaking up against NPOV are threatened Universe(s) May be a Trillion years old Small value of the cosmological constant which goes against the value predicted by particle physics theories. This has long been a problem for cosmologists. New theory proposes a cyclic universe. Theory by: Paul Steinhardt at Princeton University, in New Jersey, US, and Neil Turok at Cambridge University in the UK Universe goes through a series of big bangs and big crunches. At each step the universe is essentially reset. Cosmological constant drops after each reset. The length of each cycle is thought to be about a trillion years. This may indicate that the universe is many trillions of years old. The theory does not explain why the size of the cosmological constant is so similar to the density of matter in the universe today. [5] Short Stories A copy-right controlled museum is a crime against humanity [6] Museums are starting to restrict photography claiming that it violates copyright, despite that fact the most exhibits aren’t copyrighted, or have expired years ago. They want to maintain a monopoly a postcards and images of the exhibits. High resolution scans of Michelangelo’s David were only allowed to be taken by Stanford provided the resulting 3d images were DRMed, Italy wants to copyright the countryside of Tuscany to prevent companies taking advantage of images of the scenery. [7] Do the curators really ‘own’ images of their exhibits? The purpose of museum is to spread knowledge. Bad Science [8] Misconceptions spread by K6 textbooks SCIENTISTS USE THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD? not quite. THERE ARE SEVEN COLORS IN THE RAINBOW? FRICTION IS CAUSED BY SURFACE ROUGHNESS? no one knows, chemical bonds are involved as well Archaeoacoustics [9] Recovery of sounds from objects made before the invention of recording. 1969 Woodbridge experiments were able to recover the sound of a potter wheel from a pot using a hand-held crystal cartridge. Was also able to recover words spoken while painting from a canvas. There have been excellent april fools on this theme in the past [10] X-Files also feature the word of god being recorded in clay – in the episode Hollywood AD Chindogu Intentionally useless devices Chindogu means “a tool that exists on the edge of reason” Essay by John Lienhard describes them as: can’t be intended for real use, but it must be meant for everyday life. It must actually exist. Its purpose cannot be humor, propaganda, or vulgarity, nor can it serve any religious or ethnic prejudice. Remaining guiding principles are: Chindogu must reveal the spirit of anarchy It must challenge, and I quote, the suffocating historical dominance of conservative utility. Chindogu must represent freedom from true purpose. Examples include t-shirt with grid on the back so that a friend can be told which grid square to scratch. Butter stick, like a chapstick but with butter for easy spreading on bread. My personal favourite is the ten in 1 gardening tool.. it’s like a giant swiss army garden knife. [11] Slashdot Redesigns Some cool entries from the slashdot redesign contest [12] [13] Ultra High Definition TV Invented So sharp it makes you naucious 6 times the resolution of standard tv this new experimental UHDV used 4*HD recordeds to store 3.5 terabtyes Projected onto a 4 * 7 metre screen [14] The School with no Rules Conceived by an assortment of parents who had taught their children at home and others in search of educational alternatives, Fairhaven opened in 1998 with 33 students. No timetables, compulsory classes, set cirriculum. Students study what ever interests them. To graduate students must write and defend a thesis saying why they can be considered adults. However their diploma is offically recognised. Danny Mydlack spend two years there filming a documentary, a preview is available on you tube. He came to conclude that how the kids learn is more important then what they learn. [15] Now you see me Another stab at a cloaking device [16] This weeks new cloaking technology Scientists at Utah and Sydney University Using superlenses to make light travel backwards Might make objects transparent or semi-invisible Even invisibility over some wavelengths would be useful for stealth craft Media Pimp Gareth Behold the Banana – The athiest nightmare [17] The New Metrosexual superman [18] Colbert Burns Bush – The complete videos [19] Francis The Raconteurs [20] Web 2.0. Mashup Matrix [21]…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/33_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 33 Watch: Youtube Feed: RSS Notes The Death of Net Neutrality Article by Daniel Berninger on GigaOM website. Argues that net neutrality refers to “the uses of the Internet not the quality of access”. Already a large number of classes of service available from the telcos, you pay for the performance and capacity of your Internet access. The telcos have in mind creating another kind of customer, charging for the right of transit. Technology already exists to examine packets at the routers. Kills innovation as the ability to charge per application allows telcos to block technologies such as VOIP from ever getting a foothold. Allowing telcos this kind of control allows them to make more money while providing nothing new. Link [1] The New Digital Millenium Copyright Act Intellectual Property Protection Act of 2006 will expand the copyright restrictions of the DMCA. Will also expand federal police wiretapping and enforcement powers. Attempted copyright infringement would become a federal crime punishable by up to ten years in prison. This is more time in prison for those who download child pornography. Will make it a crime to “make, import, export, obtain control of, or possess” software that can bypass DRM systems. Amazingly it will allow copyright holders to impound “records documenting the manufacture, sale or receipt of items involved in” infringements. According to the EFF this is a Godsend for the RIAA as they can demand server records. EFF’s “ Unintended Consequences ” report exposes further issues with the basic DMCA which obviously will only become worse. One issue is that Sony’s DRM rootkit software may not have been publicized because it exposed the people who discovered it to litigation by Sony. Links [2] [3] Where Windows Vista Fails Vista was first unveiled on in October 2003 it still isn’t here. Worse many features have come and gone, promises made and broken time and time again. Writer points the finger of blame at a mindset of establishing market dominance at any cost as the root of the problem. Bill Gates is seen as the epitomy of this philosophy and all that is wrong with Microsoft. Some of the wonderful things we have to look forward to in Vista are. User Account Protection Meant to prevent even administrators from carrying out dangerous actions that could harm the system. Actually annoys the user with continuous popup warnings regarding simple actions. Glass Windows Vista’s touted transparent windows. You can’t tell which Window currently is at the top (i.e. has focus) Media Center Tv and multimedia interface software that’s not integrated into Vista and not a standalone product. Simply it doesn’t follow the same UI structure of previous versions, is ugly and confusing. Interesting point made by John C. Dvorak, IE is also a disaster and chews up a lot of Microsoft’s attentions. IE is linked to the OS and is the source of many of the security problems. Dvorak urges MS to drop IE and concentrate on making a working OS. Might not be a bad idea considering how slow Vista is taking to get to market. Links Paul Thurott’s Supersite for Windows The Great Microsoft Blunder Short Stories Googleblogger Report: Google SketchUp New downloadable program from Google that allows the creation of 3D objects. Integrates into Google Earth, so you can see what your 3D object would look like in the world. Buildings such as the Whitehouse are available and can be edited. SketchUp comes in 2 versions, Pro and Free. This is the first time that Google has offered software in this form. Apple’s all seeing eye Apple application for a patent for dual monitor/image capture device. Image capture devices placed in between each pixel. Overall image produced as amalgum of images from each device. Acts as both a monitor and camera. Aim is to make videoconferencing etc. easier Camera is always present. User looks directly at the camera. Eerie similarity to the viewing screens in 1984. Also raises serious security issues, zombie machine can be used to spy on others. Link [4] Media Pimp Gareth Top 20 Fake [5] Francis Jeff Bridges Blog [6] The Soul Exchange [7] I used to believe [8]…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/32_technolotics.mp3] Listen: Episode 32 Watch: Youtube Feed: RSS Notes Digg hits a gas main Social bookmarking phenomena Digg is in trouble this week, after being accused of the blogosphere’s greatest sin – censorship Slashdot have posted a story – in Taco’s mangled grammer ‘submitted so numerous that I had little choice but to post’ – accusing dig of a variety of heinous crimes The allegations Stories put onto the front page by the editorial staff, rather than the community Site which reports this banned from being dug Stories which report site which reports this disapearing Users who submit stories which report site which this disapearing, being banned by name and IP Other stories being removed for being critical of ‘Go Daddy’, a Revision 3 Sponsor Digg’s Responce It’s the system man! Kevin Rose say’s the stories removed we taken down due to user reports No response on the front page editorial control Users who report this are being banned, because accusing other users of gaming the system ‘violates digg’s terms of use’ (paraphrase) – even if the accused is digg itself! Links Slashdot Story Splasho Story Forever Geek Story Kevin Rose’s Responce Another ‘Digg bullying’ example The RIAA vs the EFF Ars Technica have an article on the Internet culture wars – the RIAA vs the EFF Elektra v. Barker – one of the thousands of frivolous RIAA lawsuits – if the RIAA win, the repercussions could undermine the very nature of the internet. RIAA state sharing a folder constitutes infringement – even if files are never accessed RIAA attempting fundamental changes to copyright law through courts RIAA is argue copyrighted uploads to P2P infringe as much as downloads Current law: to “distribute” a copyrighted work – physical exchange of a material object must take place – law doesn’t take account of the digital distribution of copyrighted works. Ars Technica say – ironically EFF are arguing for pre-internet disribution model We say – hooey – this mearly points out the absurity of applying arbitary legal weight of theft to duplication => makes sence from a commercial perspective, insanely fascistic if actually applied on individual scale => this is not how information works Links: Ars Technica – The RIAA vs the EFF The Flaws of HDCP HDMI is a technology that restricts the availability of high-def TV content. Devices carry out a HDCP handshake before sending HD video over a connection. Handshake authenticates devices & computes secret key for encrypting video between them Each HDCP device is given two things: a secret vector, and an addition rule (not secret.) A device uses it’s own vector and the other device’s addition rule to compute the secret key. Vector and key are set so that both devices end up with the same key. Problem is that conspiring devices can break the system and discover the secret vectors, thereby impersonating any HDCP device. They came up with their own rather than using established handshake protocols such as Diffie-Hellman. Reason for custom protocol seems to be to accomodate reduced computational ability, protocol is a simplified and less secure version of Diffie-Hellman. Links: Freedom to tinker Diffie Hellman Key Exchange The ignorance of crowds This is a question we tacked back in show 2 Do folksonomy sites like Wikipedia lead to a better ‘infosphere’, or just a noiser and more confusing media landscape WikiTruth (wikitruth.info) charts the inner machinations of wikipedia. Creators of the website (who claim to be wiki admins) say the increasing banality of entries and decrease in the quality is self-inflicted. Essentially, the more edits by more people is decreasing the quality of the information. Problems with the homogenity of information, Diverse views become suppressed, denying the viewer the ability to see an issue from multiple viewpoints. Options for the administrators include restricting access. This risks driving away contributors. Raises the question of whether traditional sources such as encylopedia Britannica are better due to an editing process. Links Guardian Article Acerbic comments from Lore Sjöberg Wiki Truth The latest on bionics Super vision Scientists are concentrating on restoring sight to blind people. Daniel Palanker, a physicist at Stanford University in California has created a bionic eye. Dead cone and rods are bypassed and the cells of the inner retina are stimulated with electrical signals directly. Dr Palanker believes the system will provide a human user with 20/80 vision, enough to read large fonts and recognise faces. Super strength The Berkeley Lower Extremity Exoskeleton (Bleex) fits along a user’s legs and allows the carrying of 90Kgs with no strain on the user. Made up of 40 sensors, a hydraulics system and a central controller that decides how to distribute the weight so the user feels none of it. Bionic limbs Modern artificial hands, give wearers a better quality of life but they have little of the functionality of the real hands they replace. William Craelius of Rutgers University in New Jersey has developed Dextra. System can be trained to recognise muscle movements in user’s arm and then carry out a corresponding action. Dextra can control up to three fingers, one user even could play the saxaphone with it. Future work will concentrate on many types of hand motion – grasping a key, opening a door, holding a hammer. Links Guardian Science Article Another Front in the Global War on Islam Bush will attack Iran Because it’s about the dumbest thing he could do. Why Iran is a much worse place to invade than Iraq It’s geographically 3 times larger. It’s population is approximately 3 times larger. Population is a military strategists dream: a large number of fighting age men ~ 18 million with few very old or very young. The failure to “win hearts and minds” in Iraq when you are replacing somebody like Saddam is not much encouragement that it can be achieved in Iran. It will be another muslim country invaded within a few short years. Iran has strong links to terrorism. Shia Islam is the state religion, an attack on the country may be used by terrorists to claim the US is attacking Islam. Current rumours indicate that the US will carry out airstrikes and limited special ops raids on the nuclear sites to disable them. This may be difficult as the sites are spread thoughout the country to make such a task more difficult. The New Yorker allege Special Op’s Troops are already on the ground Airforce planners drawing up target list Disagreement between Europe and US over how long it would take for Iran to build a bomb Bush’s white house refer to Irans president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as another hitler – clearly violating Godwins Law ‘Saving Iran’ will be Bush’s legacy Administration purport to believe – “a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government.” Only alternative administration will consider – campaign of coercion “The real issue is who is going to control the Middle East and its oil in the next ten years.” administration wants to change to power structure of Iran senate is being selectively briefed on the plans no one is ‘really objecting’ Special Op’s on the ground would be needed to knock out nuclear and chemical factories Administration considering ‘tactical use’ of nuclear weapons Joint Chiefs of staff want to take nukes of the table – administration refuses Pentagon advisor – “The problem is that the Iranians realize that only by becoming a nuclear state can they defend themselves against the U.S. Something bad is going to happen.” Case for a near and present danger is being built on unreliable evidence – A. Q. Khan, the so-called father of the Pakistani atomic bomb I.A.E.A – Iran 5 years from bomb – “the Iranians want confrontation, just like the neocons on the other side” “there’s nothing the Iranians could do that would result in a positive outcome. American diplomacy does not allow for it.” Flynt Leverett (european diplomat) – Europeans want sanctions & diplomacy – US & Isreal want bombs – “There may be a military option, but the impact could be catastrophic.” Unanswered Questions Who is the rogue regieme here? The ones who want a bomb, or the ones who want to use the bomb? How will Russia and China react to an attack on Iran – nuclear or conventional What chaos will erupt, if the heart of the muslin world is invaded (remember ‘regime change’) by a western millenarian christian conservative nation Links New Yorker Article Justin Gauvin excellent blog Godwins Law International Atomic Energy Agency Addendums to last weeks show FYI, not sure if Rowan mentioned this – but the creator of comment cast Robin Blandford is his cousin LASIK@Home is a joke site Media Pimp Gareth Negative Pimp – Freaky Ajax Hell Hive 7 Mark Echo Tags Airforce One [1] – or does he [2] The iPod Box, MS Style [3] Quake3 in a browser [4] Poetrymagazines.org.uk – huge searchable archive of a variety of British poetry magazines [5] David Elsewhere (worlds best dancer) [6] Francis Help me win my Bet [7] Lost Episode 17 related map [8]…
[audio https://garethstack.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/31_technolotics_dialup.mp3] Listen: Episode 31 Watch: Youtube Feed: RSS Notes Mac BootCamp Intel macs now officially run Windows http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/ Macs get mainstream – All silicon valley geeks must have PowerBooks (except me) How will OSX cope with the competition – Who will reboot? The hardcore will stay for the unix backend But Mac enthusiasts already talking about a no-windows-booting pledge http://www.applematters.com/index.php/section/comments/take-the-no-windows-booting-pledge/ Reasons to love Open Source DRM Sun Microsystems has proposed, with its DReaM initiative open source DRM. Central idea is to assign rights to users not devices, hence rights can follow user across devices allowing access to DRMed media from a multitude of devices. Lawrence Lessig approved Sun’s plan apparrently because they have with the Creative Commons to support their licences. However: Sun’s DReaM “Usage Scenarios” document says that its fair-use mechanism is purely optional for rights holders. No obligation on copyright holders to support fair use. who would certify the players, and what would block the non-certified players from playing DReaM-protected content, that is still not clear. Not all are happy with Sun’s scheme: ‘I wish Sun would figure out a way to let me do less with my music and movies,'” Cory Doctorow. EFF makes the point that “open” and “royalty-free” DRM doesn’t make it any less capable of restricting the public’s rights under copyright. Link: Wired Laser Eye Surgery for the Home! LASIK@Home was founded in 2004 by Dr. Amir Khadim, M.D., Ph.D. Key to the system is the Scal-Pal Scanning Adjusting Laparascopic Personal Laser. Contains two lasers: first laser cuts a small flap in the cornea of your eye. Then the second laser vaporizes a tiny section of the lens without damaging the surrounding tissue. Claim that “LASIK@Home is 100% safe” is a little hard to believe, especially for what it does. Normally such surgery costs thousands of dollars and is carried out by trained professional who have years of experience. Would you trust yourself and a piece of plastic and electronics to do as good a job? Risks of Lasik surgery include: loss of vision Link [1] Comment Tracking CoComment – http://www.cocomment.com/ only comments on posts you’ve commented on only shows comments by other cocomment users co.mments – http://co.mments.com/ lets you track any comments commentcasting http://commentcasting.bytesurgery.com/ Robin Blandford, final year DCU leave comments on podcasts by phone, which are nicely wrapped up in an RSS feed Short Stories Listen to this NSA Phil Zimmermann’s (creator of PGP)newest encryption software, Zfone. The fruit of 10 years trying give the world easy-to-use software to cloak internet phone calls. Open source, currently in Beta. uses the industry standard SIP protocol, so it will work with a number of clients. It has been submitted to IETF for approval as an internet standard, and rumours exist that it is indeed good enough to beat the acres of computers under Fort Meade. Question is whether it will be adopted widely or will Skype continue to dominate. Skype uses their own closed-source, own proprietary protocols. may end up being used by the paranoids and geeks. Face Recognition riya – http://riya.com launched publically a week ago after months of valley hype recognizes common faces in your photos You upload all your photos it finds the faces automatically then you train it by telling it who’s who eventually it learns to recognize people and label them you can search for other people’s photos of yourself (or whoever) They employ lots of vision processing guys and plan to expand into more areas of image recognition You can’t import all your photos from flickr yet looks cool but haven’t used it yet Can this level of technology beat the cutest kitten test? http://www.thepcspy.com/articles/security/the_cutest_humantest_kittenauth better have a good supply of kitten photos and other animals to stop a brute force attack Media Pimp Rowan Kleptones Latest Album http://www.kleptones.com/pages/downloads_24h.html Shadow of the Colossus – PS2 game http://www.us.playstation.com/Content/OGS/SCUS-97472/Site/ Francis Greg Apodaca’s Digital Portfolio If you ever wondered how much photoshopping is used in glamour magazines then take a look at this… the skill of this guy is unbelievable! Nottie to hottie with a wave of his mouse! Link: bikini_nottie_to_hottie How to pull an all-nighter How to pull an all-nighter when you have that all important assignment due in the morning. Link How to pull an all-nighter…
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