Archive for the 'Technology' Category
Company Makes Copyright Claims Against YouTube Videos Containing Sounds of Birds Chirping
February 27th, 2012Welcome to the future of the Internet. Via: TheNextWeb: You can barely hear the birds chirping in this YouTube video of a man picking some fresh ingredients for a wild salad, and yet that very sound has been identified as copyrighted material, belonging to music company, Rumblefish. YouTube user eeplox posted this to Google’s YouTube […]
FBI Turns Off Thousands of GPS Devices After Supreme Court Ruling
February 26th, 2012Via: Wall Street Journal: The Supreme Court’s recent ruling overturning the warrantless use of GPS tracking devices has caused a “sea change” inside the U.S. Justice Department, according to FBI General Counsel Andrew Weissmann. Mr. Weissmann, speaking at a University of San Francisco conference called “Big Brother in the 21st Century” on Friday, said that […]
Foxconn Hires Public Relations Firm Burson-Marsteller — Other Clients Include Bhopal, Blackwater, Multiple Dictatorial Regimes
February 26th, 2012Via: TechEye: There is no doubt that Foxconn is indeed taking things seriously. The Foxconn spokesperson comes from none other than spin masters Burson-Marsteller, which is a global public relations company which specialises in dealing with enormous PR disasters. Burson-Marsteller has handled Tylenol poisonings, and, according to Corporate Watch, the Bhopal disaster, and the Three […]
Facebook Has 25 Employees to Handle Requests for User Information from Law Enforcement
February 25th, 2012Via: Forbes: If Facebook were a country, it would be the third largest in the world and Joe Sullivan would be head of Homeland Security. … The dirt Facebook holds on its users makes it as attractive to cops as to criminals. Among Sullivan’s responsibilities are daily decisions about how much user information to give […]
Windows 8: Millions of PCs Will Get Kill Switches for the First Time
February 24th, 2012Via: Bloomberg: Janne Kytömäki, a Finnish software developer, was cruising Google’s (GOOG) Android Market for smartphone apps last year when he noticed something strange. Dozens of best-selling applications suddenly listed the same wrong publisher. It was as if Stephen King’s name had vanished from the covers of his books, replaced by an unknown author. Kytömäki […]
Red License Plate in Nevada Means the Driver Is a Robot
February 23rd, 2012Via: Singularity Hub: An extended campaign in Nevada by Google has led to a new host of provisions which will allow automated cars to legally drive in the state. Starting March 1st, 2012 innovators like Google can officially apply for a new kind of robot driver’s license that will give them permission to openly test […]
Tesla Roadsters Parked Without Being Plugged in Brick Themselves (In as Little as One Week)
February 22nd, 2012Check this out: As a second Roadster owner discovered, the Tesla battery system can completely discharge even when the vehicle is plugged in. This owner’s car was plugged into a 100-foot long extension cord for an extended period. The length of this extension cord evidently reduced the electric current to a level insufficient to charge […]
The U.N. Threat to Internet Freedom
February 22nd, 2012Via: Wall Street Journal: On Feb. 27, a diplomatic process will begin in Geneva that could result in a new treaty giving the United Nations unprecedented powers over the Internet. Dozens of countries, including Russia and China, are pushing hard to reach this goal by year’s end. As Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said last […]
Google’s Heads-Up Display Glasses
February 22nd, 2012Via: New York Times: People who constantly reach into a pocket to check a smartphone for bits of information will soon have another option: a pair of Google-made glasses that will be able to stream information to the wearer’s eyeballs in real time. According to several Google employees familiar with the project who asked not […]
Single Atom Transistor
February 21st, 2012Via: Bloomberg: Scientists have taken an early step toward surpassing the limits of a technological principle called Moore’s Law by creating a working transistor using a single phosphorus atom. The atom was etched into a silicon bed with “gates” to control electrical flow and metallic contacts to apply voltage, researchers reported in the journal Nature […]
