Archive for the 'Technology' Category
French IT School ’42’
October 26th, 2013The application process for 42 reminds me a bit of what happens to people who try to get into the French Foreign Legion. The Legion doesn’t care about your background, they just want to know if you’re up to the job. If you don’t know about the French Foreign Legion, take a few minutes to […]
‘Data Shows Google’s Robot Cars Are Smoother, Safer Drivers Than You or I’
October 26th, 2013Via: MIT Technology Review: Data gathered from Google’s self-driving Prius and Lexus cars shows that they are safer and smoother when steering themselves than when a human takes the wheel, according to the leader of Google’s autonomous-car project. Chris Urmson made those claims today at a robotics conference in Santa Clara, California. He presented results […]
All Can Be Lost: The Risk of Putting Our Knowledge in the Hands of Machines
October 26th, 2013Via: The Atlantic: We rely on computers to fly our planes, find our cancers, design our buildings, audit our businesses. That’s all well and good. But what happens when the computer fails?
The PC is Not Dead, We Just Don’t Need New Ones
October 26th, 2013Unless you plan on playing Star Citizen. *chortle* Via: Idiallo: When was the last time you needed to buy a new PC? Two years ago? Three years ago? The last PC I built was in 2009. I had to upgrade because I pushed the previous one I built to the limit and that was in […]
Filesharing Site Revealed to be Anti-Piracy ‘Honeypot’
October 26th, 2013Via: Guardian: A high-profile file-sharing site has been revealed to be a year-long pirate “honeypot”, collecting data on users, file hosters and websites. The revelation, which had users of the forum up in arms, accompanied the purchase of the UploaderTalk (UT) site by US-based anti-piracy company Nuke Piracy. A honeypot is a facility, in this […]
Is Google Building a Large Floating Data Center in San Francisco Bay?
October 26th, 2013It’s made out of shipping containers and will possibly harness the motion of waves to generate electricity. Great reporting, Cnet! Via: Cnet: Something big and mysterious is rising from a floating barge at the end of Treasure Island, a former Navy base in the middle of San Francisco Bay. And Google’s fingerprints are all over […]
Meet the Private Companies Helping Cops Spy on Protesters
October 25th, 2013Via: Rolling Stone: While the specifics of which police departments utilize what surveillance technologies is often unclear, there is evidence to suggest that use of mass surveillance against individuals not under direct investigation is common. “The default is mass surveillance, the same as NSA’s ‘collect it all’ mindset,” says King. “There’s not a single company […]
Mozilla’s Lightbeam Tool
October 25th, 2013Update: Supported by the Ford Foundation Sent in by bretwalda. — It’s interesting to compare the graphs on sites when you have your browser shields up vs. browser shields down. Via: Independent: Just who is looking over your shoulder when you browse the Internet? Tomorrow, web users will be given a new tool to shine […]
“I met two otaku, who believe themselves to be in relationships with virtual girlfriends.”
October 23rd, 2013Via: BBC: Unless something happens to boost Japan’s birth rate, its population will shrink by a third between now and 2060. One reason for the lack of babies is the emergence of a new breed of Japanese men – the otaku, who love manga, anime and computers more than sex. Tokyo is the world’s largest […]
Rights Groups Say Some U.S. Drone Strikes May Be War Crimes
October 23rd, 2013Via: Wired: Two prominent human rights groups today blasted America’s drone wars in Pakistan and Yemen, painting a grim picture of massive civilian deaths and potentially grave violations of international law. One report by Amnesty International (“Will I Be Next?“) focuses on recent drone strikes in Pakistan while the other, by Human Rights Watch (“Between […]
