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Video Game Fashion - Cosplay Imitates Anime and Video Game Characters (GALLERY)(TrendHunter.com) Today we revisit Cosplay (or Cos-Play), which is short for "costume play" in Japan. An entire subculture centers around dressing up like anime and video game characters, or from live...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:34 pm Verizon adds 1.5 million customers in second quarter (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:49 pm TechCrunch Wants To Create an Open Source TabletRKo618 writes "TechCrunch announced that they are planning to design their own $200 web tablet device. Quoting: 'The idea is to turn it on, bypass any desktop interface, and go directly to Firefox running in a modified Kiosk mode that effectively turns the browser into the operating system for the device. Add Gears for offline syncing of Google docs, email, etc., and Skype for communication and you have a machine that will be almost as useful as a desktop but cheaper and more portable than any laptop or tablet PC.' The aim is for the tablet to run on modified open source software, which will be released back to the community along with the specifications for the hardware."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:20 pm Dward Planet Makemake Named As Newest Plutoid - dBTechno
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:15 pm No one's a winner in E3's console wars - PopMatters
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:04 pm Symbian: R&D wants motivated open sourcing (InfoWorld)InfoWorld - Research and development efficiency, and not competitive concerns about the Google Android or Linux Mobile (LiMo) initiatives, was a chief driver in the decision to make the Symbian mobile platform open source, a Symbian official said Monday afternoon.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:00 pm Top 10 Treo & Centro Software - July SpecialsTo celebrate the release of the Treo 800w (see my review) this month, weve created a 20% off coupon that you can use to purchase one or more of this months Top 10 bestselling applications for your smartphone...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:53 am NASA: The moon is not enough - Register
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:04 am Concur's Next Generation Analytics Capabilities Unlock Over $1 Billion In Out-of-Policy Corporate Travel SpendOne seamless service delivers unprecedented access to the richest set of reconciled data available, enabling clients - for the first time - to compare booked travel to actual spendSource: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:02 am GM partners with utilities to advance plug-in hybrids - CNET News
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:01 am Concur's Comprehensive Approach to Managing Carbon Emissions Reflects Company's Enduring Commitment to the EnvironmentSmart and sensible options that help manage carbon emissions are just one facet of comprehensive Concur Cares program REDMOND, Wash., July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ --...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:01 am Three Tellabs Products Set Quarterly Revenue RecordsTellabs reports second-quarter revenue of $432 million NAPERVILLE, Ill., July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Tellabs' second-quarter 2008 revenue totaled $432...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Tamarac Unveils the Next Generation of Their Web-Based Portfolio Monitoring and Rebalancing Software - Advisor(TM)8New version pairs eight years of building industry leading portfolio management features with unparalleled usability and fast implementation time SEATTLE, July 22...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Ralph Muse, ex Booz Allen Hamilton Principal and Nextnet Wireless CEO, Joins AtlasTG as CEOREDMOND, Wash., July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Atlas Technology Group, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: ATYG) is pleased to announce the appointment of Mr. Ralph B. Muse as...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Concur Connect Establishes More Connections With Leading Travel Suppliers to Deliver Full Content and E-Receipts to Power Smart ExpensesAvis Budget Group, SNCF, SWABIZ join other key suppliers all now connected to over $35 billion of spend driven by Concur's over 7,000 clients from around the world ...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Imation Q2 2008 Revenue up 32.5 percent to $547.0 MillionDiluted EPS of $0.19 includes $0.07 per share of Restructuring Charges OAKDALE, Minn., July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Imation Corp. (NYSE: IMN) today released...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Emerging Capital Partners Sells Entire Position in Starcomms, One of Nigeria's Largest Telecommunications OperatorsExit represents nearly 3x firm's initial investment, highlights strength of mobile telecommunications in Africa WASHINGTON, July 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Emerging Capital...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Verizon Offers Enhanced Financing Options for Large-Business CustomersAccelerated Depreciation Under 2008 Economic Stimulus Act Provides Flexibility for Customers Deploying Equipment by Year's End BASKING RIDGE, N.J.,...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Former VP of DuPont Polymers and Automotive Products Joins Lightwave Logic BoardWILMINGTON, Del., July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Lightwave Logic, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: LWLG) ( href="http://lightwavelogic.com">http://lightwavelogic.com ),...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 11:00 am Propeller 2.0 Launches: Ditching The Vote Count, Adding A MascotPropeller, AOL’s Digg-like news site, launches version 2.0 later this morning. The site sports a new design and logo and now has a mascot - described as “part professor, part citizen journalist”...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 10:35 am How to handle SOA vendor consolidation (InfoWorld)InfoWorld - The SOA concept -- developing a software architecture based on service components that can be mixed and matched as needed to reduce development time and increase application deployment flexibility -- is only a few years old, but the providers of SOA-supporting infrastructure are fast consolidating. Oracle captured the headlines with its acquisition of BEA Systems this spring, and Progress Software recently bought Iona Technologies.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 10:00 am Ok, We Have Our First DNA-Based Dating Service: GenePartnerIt was only a matter of time before someone launched a dating site that looks for potential matches based on DNA compatibility. That time is apparently today with the launch of GenePartner (ok, it’s...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:48 am Core 2 Duo Costs Less Now - Techtree.com
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:39 am 25 spots open for Cory's talk tonight in CambridgeAs I mentioned earlier, I'm giving a free talk tonight in Cambridge, UK. The seating is limited and filled up weeks ago, but the organisers now tell me that they've had 25 last-minute dropouts -- if you wanted to go but couldn't get a reservation, here's your chance! Follow the link below to reserve a ticket.We made a bet, some decades ago, that the information economy would be based on buying and selling (and hence restricting copying of) information. We were totally, 100 percent wrong, and now the world’s in turmoil because of it. What does a copy-native economy look like? How do everyone from barbers to musicians become richer, more fulfilled and more civilly engaged in a real information society. And what do we do about the fact that a couple of dinosauric entertainment companies are determined to screw it up?Link Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:33 am 25 spots open for Cory's talk tonight in CambridgeAs I mentioned earlier, I'm giving a free talk tonight in Cambridge, UK. The seating is limited and filled up weeks ago, but the organisers now tell me that they've had 25 last-minute dropouts -- if you...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:33 am Stephenson's Anathem was inspired by Clock of the Long NowNeal Stephenson's forthcoming novel Anathem was inspired by the amazing Clock of the Long Now, a project to make a clock that runs for 10,000 years. The Long Now foundation is helping to launch the book...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:33 am Stephenson's Anathem was inspired by Clock of the Long NowNeal Stephenson's forthcoming novel Anathem was inspired by the amazing Clock of the Long Now, a project to make a clock that runs for 10,000 years. The Long Now foundation is helping to launch the book with a signing in September in San Francisco, and its esteemed board members have been weighing in on the book:Link
See also: Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:33 am Esquire makes E-ink the cover star - Inquirer
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:32 am Gear Live custom iPhone contest winnersWe wanted to shout out the winners of the customized Gear Live iPhone giveaway that we held a couple of weeks ago. We let three winners walk away with a piece of the action, with the grand prize, of...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:32 am How To Encourage a Young Teen To Learn Programming?Anonymous Hacker writes "I'm in a bit of a bind. My young teenage son is starting to get curious about computers, and in particular, programming. Now, I'm a long time kernel hacker (Linux, BSD and UNIX). I have no trouble handling some of the more obscure things in the kernel. But teaching is not something that I'm good at, by any means. Heck, I can't even write useful documentation for non-techies. So my question is: what's the best way to encourage his curiosity and enable him to learn? Now, I know there are folks out there with far better experience in this area than myself. I'd really appreciate any wisdom you can offer. I'd also be especially interested in what younger people think, in particular those who are currently in college or high school. I've shown my son some of the basics of the shell, the filesystem, and even how to do a 'Hello World' program in C. Yet, I have to wonder if this is the really the right approach. This was great when I was first learning things. And it still is for kernel hacking, and other things. But I'm concerned whether this will bore him, now that there's so much more available and much of this world is oriented towards point-n-click. What's the best way to for a young teen to get started in exploring this wonderful world of computers and learning how to program? In a *NIX environment, preferably." Whether or not you have suggestions for generating interest or teaching methods, there was probably something that first piqued your curiosity. It seems like a lot of people get into programming by just wondering how something works or what they can make it do. So, what caught your eye?Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 22 Jul 2008 | 9:11 am GitHub unites Version Control with the PastieGitHub, the popular service for hosting Git repositories, has taken a step outside the box and improved upon the classic pastie service (place for coders to post code snippets). To do that, GitHub took...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:45 am IBM Sets up Tivoli Center in India (PC World)PC World - IBM sets up new center in Pune, India focused on service management around its Tivoli software.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:40 am China Blogs to Read During the Olympics (PC World)PC World - Staying home this summer instead of winging off to Beijing? No problem, when your interest in team handball and Greco-Roman...Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:30 am Chemical Clear-OutMore than 150 staff we re evacuated from Aberdeen Royal Infirmary yesterday after a chemical spill. Police said formaldehyde had been spilled in the pathology department. (c) 2008 Daily Record; Glasgow (UK). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Integrated Biomass Technologies: A Future Vision for Optimally Using Wood and BiomassBy Winandy, Jerrold E Rudie, Alan W; Williams, R Sam; Wegner, Theodore H Abstract Exciting new opportunities are emerging for sustainably meeting many global energy needs and simultaneously creating high- value bio-based consumer and construction products frorn wood, forest and agricultural residues, and other bio-based materials.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Drowning Cases Up As Water Levels Go DownBy Rob Pavey It's a statistic rescue workers know all too well: When water levels go down, drownings go up.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am A Coalition in East Liberty is Tackling Stormwater IssuesBy Mike Cronin, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Jul. 22--Not many things are less sexy than raw sewage flowing into Western Pennsylvania waterways. But few are more important, said Nate Wildfire, a policy coordinator for East Liberty Development Inc.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Ashtabula Council Rolls With Tax HikeBy Shelley Terry, Star Beacon, Ashtabula, Ohio Jul. 22--ASHTABULA -- City Council voted 5-1 Monday night to place a special, three-year, .15 percent income tax increase before voters in November. Ward 4 Councilwoman Julie Lattimer cast the dissenting vote.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Man Charged With Operating Sewage Plants Without LicenseBy Kathleen Brady Shea, The Philadelphia Inquirer Jul. 22--A Coatesville man entrusted with operating multiple sewage plants throughout Chester County did so for more than 21/2 years without a license, state authorities said yesterday. Thomas M.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Sanford Stresses Problems in UpstateBy Joey Holleman, The State, Columbia, S.C. Jul. 22--S.C. DROUGHT WATER TIPS Suggestions for conserving water in and around homes: Turn off water while brushing teeth and shaving. Take shorter showers. Install a water-efficient shower head.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Community News BriefsLONG BEACH Photographers will capture city Photographers will try to record a typical summer day in Long Beach. Beginning at noon Saturday, life in Long Beach will be immortalized through digital photography.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Crews Begin Lake Delton RepairsBy Sharif Durhams, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Jul. 22--Floodwaters that chewed through Lake Delton's shoreline next to a dam last month took all the lake's water, five homes and the lake's tourism economy downstream.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Botetourt Co. Faces New Trash LawsuitBy Jay Conley jay.conley@roanoke.com 981-3114 A private trash company has tidied up its lawsuit against Botetourt County and refiled it, continuing to claim that the board of supervisors violated the Virginia Public Procurement Act.Source: RedOrbit News - Science | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am NewsOK Develops New Template for iPhone UsersBy Nick Tankersley, The Oklahoman Jul. 22--iPhone users are pleasantly surprised to find that the development team behind NewsOK.com has already anticipated the launch of the iPhone 3G with a custom site built specifically for iPhone users.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Bully Police Restricting InternetBy Anonymous The Internet, home of no-holds-barred political blogs, democratic forums on every subject, and Wikipedia, often is hailed as an untouchable bastion of free speech. However, bills passed earlier this year in Missouri make "cyber-bullying" a criminal offense.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Comcast to Sign New York's Anti-Child-Porn CodeBy Jane M. Von Bergen, The Philadelphia Inquirer Jul. 22--Comcast Corp. said yesterday that it expected to sign an agreement with New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to try to reduce the availability of child pornography on the Internet.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Protect Kids From the Net ; You and YoursONCE again, research has highlighted the dangers kids face when using the internet. Recent findings showed that 11 per cent of children have had a sexually explicit conversation online and a quarter have visited adult websites.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Broadband Called a 'Civil Right'By Mark Houser, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Jul. 22--Besides life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the government should guarantee everyone a high-speed Internet connection, according to a member of the Federal Communications Commission.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am S.B. Man Warns of Web ScamsBy Sean Smith When Phillip Miller got an e-mail last week saying he could win more than $1million, he decided to follow through with the offer to some extent, even though he was certain it was just another "too good to be true" Internet scam.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am EDITORIAL: MethbusterBy The Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio Jul. 22--The physical harm in using methamphetamines should be well-known. Consider the brutal impact on a set of teeth.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am EDITORIAL: Flugtag Launched Fun In DowntownBy Tampa Tribune, Fla. Jul. 22--Who knew Tampa would flip over Red Bull Flugtag? But flip it did, with more than 100,000 people crowding into downtown to watch competitors launch homemade aircraft off a ramp into the Hillsborough River near the Convention Center.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Period-Instrument Group Gets Out MoreBy Tom Strini, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Jul. 22--Ensemble Musical Offering, Joan Parsley's period-instrument group, has in recent seasons focused on the most intimate of venues, the private home -- especially Parsley's own Wauwatosa residence.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am Connect One Ships Miniature IP Controller for Mobile Machine-to- Machine SolutionsCO2144 delivers Internet connectivity and security for M2M devices For Connect One Ltd. Janice Hughes, Media Relations, 705-751-9740 Cell: 705-774-8686 janice@hughescom.net or Connect One Ltd.Source: RedOrbit News - Technology | 22 Jul 2008 | 8:00 am More Globalization ThoughtsSo I was thinking about the stats that I posted yesterday about global internet users. North America makes up about 20% of all Internet users. But the Internet revenues in North America are certainly greater...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:48 am Weve Seen Wine In A Box, But In A Can?By Luke Anderson When I was younger, I always wondered what wine tasted like. Once I even snuck a sip of a bottle in my parents’ house, only to find it was one of the most awful things I’d...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNBlogTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:27 am Ericsson: 2Q profit down 70 percentSweden's LM Ericsson on Tuesday posted a 70 percent plunge in second-quarter profits, mainly citing recent acquisitions and high development and restructuring costs.Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:00 am Ericsson: 2Q profit down 70 pctSweden's LM Ericsson on Tuesday posted a 70 percent plunge in second-quarter profits, mainly citing recent acquisitions and higher development costs.Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:00 am Yahoo, Yang agree on cease-fire with IcahnA tense proxy battle over, the Internet firm can concentrate on its turnaround strategy. Yahoo Inc. reached a...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:00 am Apple stock tumbles despite jump in earningsPredictions of a slower quarter drag down shares' earlier gains. Apple Inc.'s strongest-ever fiscal third quarter...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:00 am Software maker SAP to shut down Texas unit cited in rival's lawsuitTomorrowNow was accused of stealing information about Oracle's software. German software maker SAP said Monday...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 7:00 am Blu-ray Disc Rapidly Gaining Popularity in Japan (PC World)PC World - Shipments of Blu-ray Disc-based video recorders and players are increasing fast in Japan and hit 122,000 in June, according to...Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:50 am AOL expands health site (CNET)CNET - AOL announced partnerships to bolster its AOL Health site with content from Caring.com, Health.com, and HealthCare.com, the Time Warner subsidiary said Monday.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:11 am Photos from SF Zine FairWired's got a nice gallery of photos taken at the San Francisco Zine Festival:Link Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:09 am Buy a full-size T. Rex replicaA mere $100,000 gets you a STAN museum-grade T-Rex replica, a whopping 40' long and 12' high. They'll pose him for you, too.Link (via Geekologie) Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:06 am HOWTO install your keys in a Leatherman handle Instructables user Pyro222 has a great HOWTO for installing your keys in the handle of an old Leatherman Micra tool. I love this idea -- except the TSA would probably confiscate it, because installing a key in the hands of something that once held a knife confers magical, knife-like properties on the key (obviously). Link (via Make) Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:02 am Consumer 3D Television Moving ForwardTheSync writes "Hollywood Reporter claims that SMPTE (the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) will 'establish an industry task force to define the parameters of a mastering standard for 3D content distributed via broadcast, cable, satellite, packaged media and the Internet, and played-out on televisions, computer screens and other tethered displays.' Already, Japanese Nippon BS viewers with Hyundai 3D LCD sets can watch an hour of 3D programming daily. Even your existing DLP TV set might be 3D capable today with the addition of LCD shutter glasses." Reader DaMan1970 makes note of another developing television technology; telescopic pixel displays. "Each pixel consists of 2 opposing mirrors where the primary mirror can change shape under an applied voltage. When the pixel is off, the primary & secondary mirrors are parallel & reflect all of the incoming light back into the light source."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 22 Jul 2008 | 6:02 am Chinese Tian-Ling worker shoes remade as fashion plimsolls Ospop has taken the classic Chinese Tian-Lang worker-sneaker, a handsome, highly evolved little plimsoll, and reworked it, adding insoles, designer colors, eyelets, improved laces -- and sweat-free labor practices -- to produce a high-fashion export version. I bought a pair last week in dark green and I've been wearing them around, and I've found them surprisingly comfy and exceptionally handsome. The tennies arrive wrapped in paper designed by noted calligrapher Zhao Zhi Gang. The company is also running an educational charity for development in the area around its factory. Link Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 5:59 am Amazon offers automatic credit for S3 outage - CNET News
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 5:51 am Learn to build a network-attached storage out of old PCs tonight in LALos Angeles's Machine Project continues with its series of seminars tonight with "Unix for N00bz: How To Access Your Data From Anywhere" -- a class on turning old PCs and hard-drives into network-attached storage devices that serve your files from anywhere.Since we are asking you to bring your own equipment to work with, the class will be structured into two parts:Link (Thanks, Michele!) Source: Boing Boing | 22 Jul 2008 | 5:49 am Brocade deals for Foundry Networks in Cisco salvoBrocade Communications Systems Inc. , dominant in an obscure corner of the data storage market, wants a piece of a bigger pie: Cisco Systems Inc.'s cash cow business of networking equipment that shuttles...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:30 am Apple stock drops despite jump in Q3 profitShares of Apple Inc. fell sharply as investors focused more on the company's cautious guidance for the current quarter than on the blockbuster Macintosh and iPod sales during the previous three-month period...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:28 am Brocade deals for Foundry Networks in Cisco salvo (AP)AP - Brocade Communications Systems Inc., dominant in an obscure corner of the data storage market, wants a piece of a bigger pie: Cisco Systems Inc.'s cash cow business of networking equipment that shuttles Internet traffic.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:25 am Apple stock drops despite jump in Q3 profit (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:24 am Texas Instruments hit by weak 2Q wireless salesShares of Texas Instruments Inc. took a beating after its second-quarter earnings missed Wall Street estimates.Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:23 am Texas Instruments hit by weak 2Q wireless sales (AP)AP - Shares of Texas Instruments Inc. took a beating after its second-quarter earnings missed Wall Street estimates.Source: Yahoo! News: Technology News | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:20 am Video: Hands-On With the $11,000 Clover CoffeemakerWired.com takes a look at the Clover, an $11,000 coffee machine hand-built by Stanford engineers.Source: Wired: Gadgets | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:00 am Seafloor Zombie Microbes May Look Like Exo-OrganismsPrimitive organisms found on the sea floor have a metabolism so slow that it might be more accurate to call them undead rather than alive. And how they live may be a model for how life might survive on Mars or a Jovian moon.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:00 am Blogs for Print Nerds: Zine Fest Flaunts Camp and Crafts : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comSAN FRANCISCO – More than 100 zine-makers packed the County Fair building in Golden Gate Park over the weekend to celebrate San Francisco's annual Zine Festival. The two-day conference featured a wide variety of DIY arts and crafts, zines, comics and a gypsy-like atmosphere. Attending noobs were also treated to hands-on workshops, from bookbinding to illustration and Q & A sessions with accomplished self-publishers. For zinesters, zines are like the blogs of the print world. They're an essential part of offline geek and underground culture and their DIY aesthetic has influenced an entire generation of designers and writers. Click through the gallery for highlights from this DIY ComicCon. Left: Festival-goers browse through the plethora of independently published zines and books.  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comJonathan Fetter-Vorm, one half of the production company Two Fine Chaps, displays an array of his self-published work. His work ranges from a large, full-color illustrated book of the poem Beowulf to a very small, hand-made, three-dimensional pop-up fable titled The Clockmaker's Joy. "I wanted to make books that are fun to hold, interesting to read and beautiful to look at," Fetter-Vorm said.  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comRani Goel's Typecritters zines feature letter art made from mirroring and layering type. Her booth also displays her Servings zine, which tackles the issue of body image and our cultural obsession with weight and food. "There's something about someone's handwriting, something more real about it than a MySpace or a blog, something raw," Goel said. "And there's room to be messy, it doesn't have to be perfect."  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comJennie Hinchcliff (left) and Carolee Gilligan Wheeler, of Pod Post, model their zine merit badges. "We wanted the merit badges to be about something we care about," Hinchcliff said. "Merit badges for book and zine making." "Instead of cookie selling," Wheeler adds.  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comAmy Martin, a cartoonist, gets a little work done at her booth and perhaps a head start for next year's festival. "Last year was the first [festival] I did," Martin said. "The shows are great and you get to meet lots of people."  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.com
Matt DeLight, illustrator and co-producer of several comics, described his work as autobiographical, funny and tragic. "It started with a love of comics as a kid," DeLight said. He stumbled upon an issue of Too Much Coffee at 16 that detailed how to make your own mini comic. "It blew my mind to think that I could go to Kinko's and make my own comic."  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.comThe 2008 SF Zine Festival moved to the SF County Fair building in Golden Gate park this year in anticipation of more exhibitors and a larger crowd than ever -- twice the size of last year's.  : Emily Lang/Wired.comKelly Lee Barretts (right) mans her street-photography mini-book booth with Jon LaSalle (middle). "I had taken a bunch of photos and was rolling around with them on the floor of my room one night and decided to make a book out of it," said Barretts, a UC Santa Cruz graduate. Barretts has books available in three different sizes, from the miniscule to the pocket-size.  : Photo: Emily Lang/Wired.com
Lori Stein (left), author of Ranger Strange Bunny, shares table space with professional Yo-Yoer and ziner, Doctor Popular. Doctor Popular peddled his zines, hand-made iPhone cases and yo-yos. "Three things keep me alive: yo-yoing, crafts and tailoring," Popular said. "Some of that is represented here."
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:00 am July 22, 1952: Genuine Crop-Circle Maker Patented1952: Frank Zybach gets a patent for the center-pivot irrigator. Hundreds of thousands of crop circles will appear on landscapes around the world ... eventually. You've seen 'em if you've flown across farmland in the United States or other nations: big green circles of irrigated land, making repeated dot patterns. But they weren't always there. Zybach grew up in Nebraska but was farming in Colorado in 1947 when he saw a demonstration of modern movable irrigation. Workers were moving and connecting pipes fitted with sprinkler heads from one part of a field to another. Sprinklers could beat a couple of problems: uneven, hilly terrain and the tendency of water to run into sandy ground before getting to the end of the ditch. But Zybach, a lifelong tinkerer, saw something more: Why have humans set up, take down, move the equipment and repeat? Why not have the equipment move itself? Zybach built his first prototype within a year. It rotated around a center wellhead. Guy wires that were attached to support towers held the sprinkler-fitted water pipes above the ground. Control wires and two-way water valves kept the towers in line. The first support towers moved on skids, but Zybach soon replaced those with wheels propelled by the irrigation water itself. He applied for a patent for the "Zybach Self-Propelled Sprinkling Apparatus" in July 1949. He knew he needed to improve his invention -- making it tall enough to work for corn, among other things. So, the same year he got his patent, he moved back to Nebraska and went into business with a friend, A. E. Trowbridge. The duo didn't immediately succeed, partly because Zybach kept making improvements before Trowbridge could sell the models they'd already manufactured. They sold the patent rights for a 5-percent royalty to farm-equipment manufacturer Robert Daugherty of Valley Manufacturing (later Valmont) in 1954. Valley built only seven systems the following year, but it kept on improving the device. Variable pressure let farmers apply different amounts of water on each full rotation. They could apply fertilizer and pesticides automatically, too. End guns let water reach those dry corners between the circles. Business took off in the 1960s. The amount of land tended by one irrigation worker quadrupled from about 400 acres to 1,600 acres. More than a quarter-million center-pivot irrigation systems now water fields around the world. Modern systems run in forward or reverse on rubber wheels driven by electric motors. The control sensors that keep the support towers in line have evolved from simple mechanical linkages to computerized sensors. Some systems use GPS and wireless to control water flow. They take directions from laptops and cellphones. Sophisticated mechanical trusses, not wires, support the pipes. But what about those empty corners between the circles? Some countries now arrange their circular fields in large, hexagonal patterns to minimize the unsprinkled areas. That's hardly practical in the United States and elsewhere where land holdings have already been divided up in big, old-fashioned squares. So, the up-to-date center-pivot systems rely on low-voltage, radio-signal wires buried in the corners of the field. A sensor at the end of the pivot arm picks up the signal and telescopes the pipe outward toward the corner, then retracts again, following the border of the field. And, as that technology spreads, the circles you see from your jet-plane window seat may someday be a thing of the past. Source: Wessels Living History Farm
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:00 am Video: Hands-On With the $11,000 Clover CoffeemakerWired.com takes a look at the Clover, an $11,000 coffee machine hand-built by Stanford engineers.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 4:00 am Floating Cities On VenusGeoffrey.landis writes "Some of you may have heard me talk about colonizing Venus. Well, for those who haven't, Universe Today is running story about floating cities on Venus. It's a reasonable alternative for space colonies — after all, the atmosphere of Venus (at about 50 km) is the most Earth-like environment in the solar system (other than Earth, of course). '50 km above the surface, Venus has air pressure of approximately 1 bar and temperatures in the 0C-50C range, a quite comfortable environment for humans. Humans wouldn't require pressurized suits when outside, but it wouldn't quite be a shirtsleeves environment. We'd need air to breathe and protection from the sulfuric acid in the atmosphere.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 22 Jul 2008 | 3:58 am Firefox's Effect On Other BrowsersAn anonymous reader points out an interview with Mozilla's "evangelist," Christopher Blizzard, regarding the future of Firefox and how it affects other browsers. It's an Austrian site, so forgive the comma abuse. From derStandard: "It's sort of interesting though, part of our strategy is to make sure, that we continue making change and the indirect effect of this is that Microsoft continues to have to do releases, because if we get so far ahead that we're able to drive the platform they are not able to keep up and keep their users. I mean, we have this joke which says 'Internet Explorer 7 is the best release we ever did,' because they would not have done it, if we would have not built Firefox. And the same is true for Apple, they are doing a lot to keep up with us. Safari 3.1 is a good example, as far as we see it, the only reason they did this release was that Firefox 3 would come out and have Javascript speed which would be twice as fast as theirs, cause that's how it was before. So by pushing other people to make releases we can go on our mission to make sure the web stays healthy."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 22 Jul 2008 | 1:59 am Hands on: Facebook redesign tries to clear the social smog - Ars Technica
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 1:24 am One Sweet Pony: Soon, we’ll see if the new Camaro has the tricks ... - AutoWeek
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 22 Jul 2008 | 1:05 am The Coffee Fix: Can the $11,000 Clover Machine Save Starbucks?It's 10 am on a Thursday, and the line at Ritual Coffee Roasters in San Francisco snakes out the door. Inside, an espresso machine hisses like an angry tomcat as customers order their cappuccinos. But the real action is taking place a few steps away, where a scruffy barista stands at a stainless steel contraption, introducing the coffee he's about to serve to his rapt audience. "The Honduran is sweet," he says, "with a refined acidity and an excellent finish." He lets one perfectly measured scoop of fresh grounds shimmy deep into the machine, then goes to work, twiddling knobs, pushing buttons, and whirling a whisk in a chamber at the top of the silver box. Forty-five seconds later, he sets down a single cup of custom-made coffee that's Jessica Alba hot, Bill Gates rich, and as unique as a snowflake. No foam. No caramel. No whip. Just beans and water — pushed through a cool little machine called the Clover — for a pricey $4 a pop. The Clover coffeemaker debuted in a handful of cafés in 2006 and was promptly hailed as the best thing to happen to coffee lovers since the car cup holder. With an $11,000 asking price, the Clover has become a fetish object among the coffee-obsessed. Long queues signal its arrival in new cities, and self-described "Cloveristas" post videos on YouTube demonstrating the machine's flashy brewing process. There are more photos on Flickr paying homage to this shiny gadget (700 and counting) than actual Clovers in existence (roughly 250 worldwide). Writer Mathew Honan tries out the Clover machine at Ritual Coffee Roasters in San Francisco.
For more, visit video.wired.com.
The Clover also wowed Howard Schultz, founder and CEO of Starbucks. Last year, Schultz stumbled upon the machine in New York City when he had spotted a line of people standing outside a tiny joint called Café Grumpy. He tried a sample and declared it "the best cup of brewed coffee I have ever tasted." In March 2008, Starbucks announced the acquisition of the Coffee Equipment Company — the Seattle-based startup that manufactures Clovers in a converted trolley shed. His hope is that the Clover will bolster Starbucks' bottom line. Chalk up some of the excitement — and the equipment's hefty price tag — to artisanal tech. A robotic hybrid of a French press and a Dirt Devil, the Clover is the first coffeemaker that lets the user program three key variables: dose, water temperature, and brew time. (Example: 37.5 grams of Brazilian Fazenda São João at 204 degrees for 43 seconds.) After the coffee steeps, a piston mechanism extracts the liquid from spent beans, resulting in a fresh cuppa in less than a minute. A filter platform pops a hockey puck of grounds out of the top, where it's easily wiped away. An Ethernet port connected to an online database is designed to let users save favorite recipes for specific beans. Made of stainless steel and copper, a single Clover typically takes several hours to assemble by hand. Fast, fancy, and idiot-proof? No surprise that Starbucks is all over the Clover — the company has been rolling them out since last summer. Half-caf nonfat toffee-nut latte lovers, get ready for a real cup of coffee. I'm a coffee achiever, as that old ad campaign goes. I own two French presses, a stainless steel Cuisinart grinder/drip, a retro De'Longhi espresso machine, an Italian Vev Vigano moka pot, and a Vietnamese drip that I purchased in old Hanoi for making ca phe sua nong. My San Francisco neighborhood has five coffee shops within a five-block radius: four mom-and-pop operations and a Peet's. But compared with David Latourell, CEC's 42-year-old resident coffee expert, I'm a Sanka-slurping rube. Latourell and I are standing in the middle of CEC's cupping room, a tasting area next to the company's small Seattle factory. The Clover is specifically designed to bring out the nuances of high-end coffees like Los Delirios, which comes from a Portland, Oregon, company called Stumptown Coffee Roasters. Los Delirios is a blend of Caturra, Typica, and Bourbon beans grown near Esteli, Nicaragua. Actually, it's on a micro lot located at 13° 22'45.99"N x 86° 28'50.45"W, between 1,050 and 1,450 meters above sea level, according to a manila "origin" card that comes with each bag of beans. Underneath the farm's GPS coordinates are flavor descriptions that read in part, "violets and black cherry, baking chocolate, and chocolate covered raisins." Latourell hands me a cup of Los Delirios coffee made in the Clover. We both take slow, even sips. "I'm picking up a little chocolate," he says with a toss of his shoulder-length hair. I sip again, summoning every taste bud. I just taste — well, coffee. Delicious, sure, but coffee. Like wine and, more recently, chocolate, a quality coffee bean must reflect a certain terroir — the climate, soil composition, and elevation of its place of origin. At least in theory, this gives a bean its unique and desirable flavor. Whether or not your average caffeine fiend can tell a Guatemalan Maragogype bean from a Honduran Catuai is debatable, but terroir explains how Stumptown can sell bags of beans for $40 a pound (about 10 times the price of commercial-grade coffee) and cafés can charge from $3 to $7 for a single cup of joe. "For $7, you can get a bad glass of wine," says CEC cofounder Randy Hulett. "Or you can get one of the best cups of coffee in the world." 
Illustration: Jameson Simpson
Clover, From the Grounds UpClover looks like just another countertop coffee machine. But peek under the hood and you'll find an innovative brewing system. Here's how it works: 1. A barista selects dose, water temperature, and steep time. 2. A piston pulls down the filter platform while freshly ground coffee is poured into the chamber. 3. Hot water flows into the chamber. 4. The barista briskly stirs the grounds with a whisk, and the water and beans steep for several seconds. 5.The piston rises, creating a vacuum that separates the brew from the grounds, then lowers, forcing the joe out of a nozzle below. 6. The piston rises to the surface again, pushing up a disc of grounds, which are squeegeed away. Then there's the top-shelf stuff. Stumptown sells beans from Nicaragua called Las Golondrinas for $80 a pound. On the international market, Esmeralda Special, a rare kind of Panamanian bean, can go for $130 a pound wholesale. And consider Kopi Luwak, also known as catshit coffee: It's an Indonesian bean that's eaten by a civet cat, then "harvested" from the animal's dung. (The bean's bitter flavor is apparently greatly improved by passing through a cat's digestive tract.) A single cup of Kopi Luwak at the Peter Jones espresso bar in London goes for $100, and a pound of the beans can cost as much as $600. If you're going to pay that much for beans, of course, you want to have the right machine. Back in the cupping room, Latourell fires up the Clover and goes to work on a second cup of Los Delirios: He measures out 46 grams of beans, grinds them, and then slides them into the recessed chamber on top. Next, he programs a new brew time and temperature, raising the heat from 205 degrees to 207 and increasing the brewing time from 45 seconds to 50. As the hot water rushes into the chamber from a topside nozzle, Latourell stirs the blend with a metal whisk, being careful not to break the stream, which would cool the water. "The temperature has a massive effect on the extraction of chemicals that affect flavor," he explains. I take a swig. Bang, there it is: chocolate. Scharffen Berger, eat your heart out! A few tweaks and I have a new beverage. And it's not just the chocolate flavor; the mouthfeel and acidity are completely different from the first cup. All Latourell did was adjust the brew time and temperature and add 6 grams of beans. Taste-testing it against the earlier brew, I wouldn't have guessed they were the same bean. I'm starting to become a Clover convert. 
Photo: RJ Shaughnessy
Brewed coffee is awful.That's what Zander Nosler thought back in 2001, when he was developing a commercial coffeemaker for — of all places — Starbucks. The bespectacled, rail-thin product designer had previously spent 18 months at Ideo developing everything from sunglasses to medical supplies. As he tinkered with a revolutionary single-serve, push-button brewing machine targeted for the workplace, he realized that most makers were as stale as the coffee. "I got to see firsthand how coffee was better by the cup," Nosler says. "The coffee coming out of those glass office pots is wretched." (Starbucks later called the prototype the Interactive Cup.) When the project was finished, Nosler kept thinking about the single-brew concept. He soon decided he could do better, making a superior brewer that wasn't one-size-fits-all. By 2004, Nosler had cooked up a business plan. He recruited other Stanford alums, including Hulett, 34. Within a year, the team raised half a million dollars from friends and family and set up shop inside an old trolley shed a few minutes north of downtown Seattle. The Coffee Equipment Company was born. For months, the group reworked the design. They abandoned the office market in favor of cafés, ditched the grinder, and shrunk the countertop footprint. By spring 2005 they had the first Clover prototype. Code name: Chalupa. Made of particleboard, with its guts bolted crudely on the outside, it looked like Mr. Coffee designed by Dr. Frankenstein. But to roasters wanting a high-end single-serve option, it was gorgeous. CEC demo'd a final prototype that October at a local party and sold three units before they were even built. When Clover debuted at the Specialty Coffee Association of America event in 2006, Nosler was mobbed. "People saw us walking in and began chanting, 'Clo-ver, Clo-ver!'" he says, his eyes wide at the memory. To the little indie guys, Nosler was a god. While interest in CEC was percolating, Starbucks was crashing. Its share price had dipped from nearly $40 in 2006 to around $19 in January 2008. The company that brought macchiato to the masses had lost its way — and a chunk of its profit margin. Was Starbucks in the market of selling coffee drinks or fancy milk shakes? Cappuccinos or compact discs? Was it competing with Peet's or Mickey D's? After just three years, CEO Jim Donald was on his way out, and Schultz, Starbucks' founder, retook the helm. On Valentine's Day 2007, Schultz wrote an internal memo (later leaked to the press) lamenting the state of the company. "I'm not sure people today even know we are roasting coffee," the missive read. "You certainly can't get the message from being in our stores ... At a minimum [we] should support the foundation of our coffee heritage." Schultz announced that Starbucks would return to its roots. No more vacuum-sealed bags of beans or breakfast sandwiches (the smell of bacon and eggs overwhelmed the coffee aroma). Starbucks would once again grind beans in the store. It would introduce new blends and better espresso machines. But most important: It was going to road-test a little machine that Schultz had discovered a few months before on a walk through New York's Chelsea district. "In my 25 years at Starbucks, the Clover machine unquestionably delivers the best cup of brewed coffee I have ever tasted," Schultz later gushed to his stockholders. "And we want to share this experience with our customers." Starting in summer 2007, Starbucks discreetly purchased and installed a few Clovers at stores in Seattle and Boston. It sold a cup of Clover-made coffee for as much as $3.05, about a dollar more than Starbucks' regular brew. The early reviews were glowing. As one Yelper put it, "If you're a coffee snob who normally scorns Sbucks and its burnt offerings, you might try the Clover pressed coffee at this location and be pleasantly surprised." After roughly six months of successful trials, Schultz proposed buying Clover's maker, the Coffee Equipment Company. "We thought Starbucks wanted to take us out on a few dates," Nosler says of the deal. "But they wanted to go steady." Michelle Gass, a senior VP of global strategy for Starbucks, is slightly less romantic: "Frankly, we just don't want anyone else to have it." Starbucks is willing to share custody, however, of the 250 machines already out there, plus maintain and repair them, but it won't sell any more Clovers to independent cafés. The company has already pulled the plug on CloverNet, the online database that tracks sales, maintenance, and brewing preferences for Clover owners. Clover's early adopters are outraged to see their coffee machine become part of the Coffee Machine. "We made the decision to purchase the Clover to support this small independent manufacturer," says Stumptown owner Duane Sorenson, who bought the first Clover in the US. "When we found out that CEC was sold to Starbucks, we made the decision to sell our Clovers." Nosler shrugs off the criticism: "Everyone has their favorite little band that they've watched change as it signs with bigger labels," he says. "But I can defend to anyone that selling to Starbucks was absolutely the right thing for us to do. Starbucks has a larger market than all the independent roasters and specialty shops combined. I'm a product designer first, a coffee guy second. I love coffee; I'm passionate about it, but I want to make products, plural. Having a gigantically hungry customer is appealing on a lot of levels. It was the best of all possible paths for us — and the coffee industry as well." By the end of 2008, there will 80 machines installed in upscale urban markets across the country. Next year, Starbucks plans to remodel those stores with the Clover as their centerpiece. "Other than espresso, there's been no innovation in brewed coffee to speak of," Schultz says. "Now we're driving new traffic because of the Clover." Then there's that other counter where the Clover is destined to end up — the one in your kitchen. "The Clover is a commercial machine," he says, "but there's potential to create more consumer-based opportunities, specifically at home." Today, you buy a $10 bag of Starbucks French Roast to take home. Soon, you might buy a $40 bag and use your very own Clover to brew it. 
Photo: RJ Shaughnessy
Coffee snobs are skeptical. "Clover will differentiate them from the Dunkin' Donuts, the McDonald's," says Tony Konecny, an industry consultant who runs the coffee blog Tonx.org and was one of the first to see a Clover prototype. "But it comes down to the coffee." The machine is only as good as the beans you put in it. Which is a problem for Starbucks, a chain that purchases coffee in mass quantities and can't deliver fresh bags of beans as quickly as the indie cafés. Then there's quality control: "By the time the customer experiences it, the beans have been blended and have been sitting in a bag for six weeks. Anything special about the coffee is lost." A few days after my cupping room challenge, I'm standing in line at a hilltop Starbucks in Seattle's Queen Anne neighborhood — one of Clover's beta sites. I do a taste test: a cup of Clover coffee versus brewed coffee. A young barista tells me they're out of the first two specialty coffees I request and suggests instead Starbucks' everyday blend, called Pike Place. During brewing, the barista stirs the grounds into the Clover with a clunky rubber spatula — not a metal whisk — and pours the concoction into a crummy paper cup. I smell, I sip, I inhale. I can't tell which cup of coffee is which — and neither is anything special. Is it the beans? My palate? After a few minutes, I finally pick it out: This coffee tastes a little bit like hype. Mathew Honan (mhonan@gmail.com) offers tips on Twittering in our How To: Self Promote package. Source: Wired: Gadgets | 22 Jul 2008 | 1:00 am Tackling al Qaeda Where It Thrives — OnlineDuring the Cold War, each side had a frighteningly effective deterrent against nuclear first strikes: Threaten to launch an apocalyptic nuclear retaliation. The strategy — aptly named MAD, for mutual assured destruction — paradoxically cemented peace. Such "thinking about the unthinkable" still works well against Russia, China, and North Korea and likely would even deter Iran. But it obviously has little effect on Islamist terrorists. They have no state to protect and pose no threat warranting nuclear payback. They can't build a hydrogen bomb, and even a crude Hiroshima-style fission bomb would be a technological stretch. So brandishing the vast US military arsenal over al Qaeda is a little like holding a .44 Magnum on a buzzing mosquito: It won't discourage the bug from drawing blood. After seven years of wishing al Qaeda was more like the Soviet Union, it's time US antiterrorism experts muster the same creativity that the great nuclear strategists marshaled to stave off Armageddon. When it comes to military tactics, Osama bin Laden is hardly an innovator. The most he and his minions can do is improvise with old techniques, like using a hijacked plane as a cruise missile. Yet jihadists are righteously wired. They have turned the Net into what Israeli expert Reuven Paz calls an "open university for Jihad studies," covering everything from indoctrination to DIY car bombs. America's current counterterrorism measures can do no more than tenuously contain a threat whose radical ideology spreads like a virus through cyberspace. We should be launching our counterattack on their turf — online. The problem is that our ham-fisted policies, centering on a reckless war of choice and forced democratization, have eviscerated US public relations efforts. So Washington leads its Web campaigns on tiptoe. The Pentagon has begun launching foreign-language news sites to counter jihadist propaganda, but their sponsorship is intentionally obscure. The name of the site for Iraq (Mawtani.com) references the Iraqi national anthem, and its DoD provenance is revealed only when you click on the About link. These kinds of unattributed information ops will never create a decisively positive view of the West. Whoever wins the White House in November should take the opportunity to give US foreign policy a makeover, which would allow us to emerge from the cybercloset. From there, the path is clear: harness the Net's unique combination of community and privacy to shape the debate within Islam about the best mechanisms for political change. A new tone in Washington could make moderate Muslims less averse to linkages with the US, which might in turn quietly provide support for anti-jihadist clerics — like Abdul Haqq Baker of the Brixton mosque in London — encouraging them to speak up in the blogosphere. But here's where the creative thinking can really kick in: A bolder strategy, driven by ideas as counterintuitive and ostensibly distasteful as MAD, should also be deployed in cyberspace. US-sponsored Web sites need to acknowledge that radicalism remains highly appealing — thanks in part to the Bush administration — and, unthinkable as it may sound, we'd be well advised to manifest greater tolerance for radical Muslims. Of course, no official US site should sing the praises of Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood. But recognizing that such organizations have gained some legitimacy by participating in nonviolent politics would signal to potential recruits that there's an effective and honorable third way between capitulation and terrorism. Muslims seem increasingly receptive to such efforts. Polls indicate that only 10 percent of Saudis view al Qaeda favorably and that in Indonesia, Lebanon, and Pakistan, support for suicide bombings has dropped dramatically. Showing jihadists an alternate path to a stake in a functioning government — as opposed to the chaos that currently reigns — could make them easier to deter and influence. But more immediately, it might keep some of them from clicking on the link to that build-your-own IED site. Jonathan Stevenson (jhs.wired@gmail.com) is a professor of strategic studies at the US Naval War College. His book, Thinking Beyond the Unthinkable: Harnessing Doom From the Cold War to the Age of Terror, is due out in August.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 1:00 am How to Use URL Patterns and Views in DjangoThe last time Webmonkey looked at Django, we showed you how to install the web framework and set up a simple blog application. Easy enough, but your site didn't do much, and it wasn't very interesting to look at. In this tutorial for advanced web builders, we show you how to dress up a basic Django-powered website by building URL patterns and constructing views.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:30 am Epilepsy drug Topamax linked to birth defectsjavascript:loadQuickSelectObject();%20void(true);A study of 203 pregnant women finds a connection, but experts caution that the group is too small to draw definitive results. Still, they say they aren't surprised. ...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:19 am Epilepsy drug Topamax linked to birth defectsA study of 203 pregnant women finds a connection, but experts caution that the group is too small to draw definitive results. Still, they say they aren't surprised. ...Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperTech | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:19 am Search Every Craigslist Site at OnceCraigslist limits you to searching its classified listings locally. What if you don't care where your stuff comes from as long as you find the right stuff? Using Google, you can scan through all of Craigslist's listings globally in one search query.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 22 Jul 2008 | 12:17 am Switching To Solar Power – One Month LaterThinSkin writes "After an interesting article on solar panel installation for the home, Loyd Case at ExtremeTech has written a follow-up after about a month of normal use. Posting an $11.34 electric bill (roughly 3% of previous months), Loyd shares his experiences using solar power and how it can be fun for the geek, with computer monitoring services and power generation data. Of course, solar power isn't all fun and games, given the amount of required maintenance — even unpredictable maintenance, like wiping off accumulated ash from fires in Northern California."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:51 pm Qik Lets Video Cell Phones Broadcast to the World - TechNewsWorld
Source: Google News - Sci/Tech | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:34 pm Video uses boy band to sell lab equipment Constantine says: How do you market a machine that automates using a pipette (an instrument used to transport a measured volume of liquid)? Romance, of course. Eppendorf is pushing its new epMotion machine with a video of a boy-band group of lab types singing a boy-band type of love song about how you deserve to have your pipetting done by a machine. Pipetting all those well-plates, baby, sends your thumbs into overdriveepMotion music video Source: Boing Boing | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:26 pm Simon Pegg's Geek Roots Show in 'Spaced'The star of genre-twisting flicks like Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz talks about the geek references in his Brit TV show and his future as Star Trek's Scotty.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:17 pm Britain on alert for deadly new knife with exploding tip that freezes victims' organs
(UPDATE: Originally posted on BB Gadgets) Police in London are on the lookout for £200 frozen-gas knives designed to kill bears and sharks, according to the never-inflammatory Daily Mail. The manufacturer describes [the Wasp Knife] as perfect for downed pilots, soldiers and security guards and boasts that it will "drop many of the world's largest land predators".Wasp injection knife (Daily Mail, Thanks James Olson!) Source: Boing Boing | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:08 pm Crowd-source haircut videoBilal Ghalib says: "This is how I got San Francisco to cut my hair. Crowd-sourced grooming in action." Link Source: Boing Boing | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:01 pm Kaminsky's DNS Attack Disclosed, Then PulledAn anonymous reader writes "Reverse engineering expert Halver Flake has recently mused on Dan Kaminsky's DNS vulnerability. Apparently his musings were close enough to the mark to cause one of the Matasano team, who apparently already knew of the attack, to publish the details on the Matasano blog in a post entitled 'Reliable DNS Forgery in 2008.' The blog post has since been pulled, but evidence of it exists on Google and elsewhere. It appears only a matter of time now before the full details leak." Reader Time out contributes a link to coverage on ZDNet as well.Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 21 Jul 2008 | 11:00 pm IT Jobs To Drop In 2009ruphus13 writes "A new Goldman Sachs IT report recently released states that IT jobs will be dramatically reduced in 2009, starting with contract and offshore developers. From the article: 'Sharp reductions likely in contract staff, professional services and hardware, and almost no investment in cloud computing.' The article goes on to say 'The CIOs indicated that server virtualization and server consolidation are their No. 1 and No. 2 priorities. Following these two are cost-cutting, application integration, and data center consolidation. At the bottom of the list of IT priorities are grid computing, open-source software, content management and cloud computing (called on-demand/utility computing in the survey) — less than 2% of the respondents said cloud computing was a priority.' Postulating a 'pointy haired boss' problem, an analyst goes on to say, '[Grid computing, Open Source and Cloud computing] require a technical understanding to get to their importance. I don't think C-level executives and managers have that understanding.' But they do control the paychecks ..."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 21 Jul 2008 | 10:15 pm NIA Brain-Computer Interface, Mind-Control GamingMojoKid writes "Sunnyvale-based manufacturer OCZ Technology has laid claim to being the first to bring a 'brain-computer' interface to the retail market and they have aimed it squarely at the gamer. The device is called the NIA, which is an acronym that stands for Neural Impulse Actuator. Instead of buttons, sticks, gyroscopes or motion sensors, it reads the body's natural bio-signals and translates them into commands that can be used to control PC games. This evaluation of the NIA shows the product actually works as advertised, with a little practice. It can, in some cases, offer reaction times superior to standard controllers, based on faster trigger response time, and the difference is quite noticeable and immediate."Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 21 Jul 2008 | 9:35 pm Piracy-Schmiracy: 'The Dark Knight' Rakes in the DoughHollywood execs argue that piracy is killing their business. Just how much has it hurt business? "The Dark Knight," with bootleg copies available online almost immediately, grossed a record-breaking $155.3 million in one weekend.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 21 Jul 2008 | 9:30 pm Facebook's Redesign Mimics FriendFeedFacebook's new look includes a total redesign of the default user homepage, combining each user's news, updates and statuses into one feed -- a layout scheme which closely resembles that of the social network aggregation service FriendFeed.
Source: Wired Top Stories | 21 Jul 2008 | 9:00 pm 2008 Pwnie Award Nominees Announcedruphus13 writes "The Pwnie Awards, an 'annual awards ceremony celebrating and making fun of the achievements and failures of security researchers and the wider security community' announced their 2008 nominees. From their site, 'The final list of nominees for the nine Pwnie Award categories is finally published. We've received some really good submissions and it was not an easy task to narrow them down to five nominees per category, but we hope that we've done a good job. The next step for the Pwnie Awards judges will gather in an undisclosed location prior to the award ceremony and vote on the winners.'"Read more of this story at Slashdot. Source: Slashdot | 21 Jul 2008 | 8:51 pm Gray Wolves Returned to Endangered ListA judge restores special protections for Rocky Mtn. gray wolves.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 21 Jul 2008 | 8:26 pm Scholar Finds Archaeological Sites by GooglingAn archaeologist unable to travel to war-torn Afghanistan turns to Google.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 21 Jul 2008 | 5:42 pm Coral-Wrecking Starfish Curbed by Fishing RegsNo-take marine reserves protect coral by controlling invasive starfish.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 21 Jul 2008 | 4:00 pm Portraits: Michelangelo Was No BeautyMichelangelo was a master at sculpting male beauty, but he was not one, himself.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 21 Jul 2008 | 2:26 pm Could a Contact Lens Save Your Vision?Drug-dispensing contact lenses could be the solution to a host of vision problems.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 21 Jul 2008 | 1:50 pm
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