Archive for the 'Technology' Category
How the Internet Became a Closed Shop
December 22nd, 2012Via: Sydney Morning Herald: A LITTLE over a decade ago, just before the masses discovered the digital universe, the internet was a borderless new frontier: a terra nullius to be populated by individuals, groups and programmers as they saw fit. There were few rules and no boundaries. Freedom and open standards, sharing information for the […]
Military Turns to ESPN to Help Analyze Drone Footage
December 22nd, 2012Via: USA Today: Can SportsCenter teach the military something about combating terrorists? After rapidly expanding the number of drones around the world, the Air Force is now reaching out to ESPN and other experts in video analysis to keep up with the flood of footage the unmanned aircraft are transmitting. “They’re looking at anything and […]
NYPD to Use Internet to Try to Stop Mass Shootings
December 22nd, 2012Mmm hmm. Via: New York Times: Top intelligence officials in the New York Police Department met on Thursday to examine ways to search the Internet to identify potential “deranged” gunmen before they strike, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said. “The techniques would include cyber-searches of language that mass-casualty shooters have used in e-mails and Internet […]
MIT Discovers a New State of Matter, a New Kind of Magnetism
December 21st, 2012Via: ExtremeTech: Researchers at MIT have discovered a new state of matter with a new kind of magnetism. This new state, called a quantum spin liquid (QSL), could lead to significant advances in data storage. QSLs also exhibit a quantum phenomenon called long-range entanglement, which could lead to new types of communications systems, and more.
Citizen Drone Warfare?
December 20th, 2012How long until direction finding and jamming equipment will have to be carried by police? I know: Ban drones! Via: YouTube:
‘A Dog on Two Legs?’
December 17th, 2012Via: Der Spiegel: A soldier sets out to graduate at the top of his class. He succeeds, and he becomes a drone pilot working with a special unit of the United States Air Force in New Mexico. He kills dozens of people. But then, one day, he realizes that he can’t do it anymore. … […]
Woman Has Extraordinary Skill at Controlling Robotic Arm with Her Thoughts
December 17th, 2012Why Rise of the Machines? The military side will use the data from brain machine interfaces like this to develop algorithms for their killer robots. Remember the one from 2004, about the rat neurons that learned to control a simulated aircraft? ‘Brain’ In A Dish Acts As Autopilot, Living Computer: A University of Florida scientist […]
Cox Communications Adds Code to Web Traffic to Announce Email Outage
December 16th, 2012This means that they can flick a switch and make sites display anything they want. Any ISP could do this, in theory, but this shows that Cox Communications has built it. Countermeasures? * Use HTTPS, when available (assuming your ISP isn’t running equipment made by Packet Forensics) * Run a persistent VPN to some exit […]
Kurzweil Joins Google
December 15th, 2012Via: kurzweilai.net Ray Kurzweil confirmed today that he will be joining Google to work on new projects involving machine learning and language processing. “I’m excited to share that I’ll be joining Google as Director of Engineering this Monday, December 17,” said Kurzweil.
Gigabit Seattle
December 14th, 2012Via: seattle.gov: In December of 2012 Mayor Mike McGinn announced that the City of Seattle has reached an agreement with broadband developer Gigabit Squared to develop and operate an ultra high-speed fiber-to-the-home/fiber-to-the-business broadband network. The plan will begin with a demonstration fiber project in twelve Seattle neighborhoods and includes wireless methods to deploy services more […]
