FTA: "It found fundamental differences in the structure of the harmonics of the 50 Hz which could be detected because Total Harmonic Distortion was strongly affected by local factors and had as a result little geographical consistency."

Not that any of this is likely to matter. Even if they had a unique spectrum capture of a specific location at a specific time for comparison purposes, turning one computer on, (or off), would totally change the harmonic signature appearing on the local wiring, thereby making the reference capture useless. And a vacuum cleaner running would really mess things up.

For anyone worried about this, running a randomly-swept audio generator through a frequency range of, say, 20 to 150 Hz, and injecting the signal into the audio capture at a level that is just audible without being too annoying, should seriously reduce any chances of the 'power line signature' being traced.

Now if someone is actually injecting a unique signal into the grid for a defined geographic area, countermeasures would be more involved. Recording in a very good Faraday cage, using battery power only, with no cables entering the Faraday cage from outside, would probably thwart any such attempts at tracking. The sweep-generator technique mentioned above would provide additional insurance. But now we're very far into tin-foil-hat territory.

That's only because they picked the low-hanging fruit first, and long-ago compromised closed-source with the sometimes-eager help of the companies who sell it.

Replying to reverse a fumble-fingered mod. Meant to mod you up as Insightful - accidentally modded you down as Redundant. Sorry about that...

And how much greenhouse gas are you going to add to the atmosphere when you make 'millions' of those 'solar lights'? That manufacturing process had better have a very small carbon footprint if you're going to come out ahead with only a 2% conversion efficiency...

This attitude reminds me of how I felt when cell phones started incorporating cameras. I didn't want one, thought it was a stupid idea, and couldn't see how the idea would ever take off. Now I use mine all the time. It was a similar story with 'the cloud', except I saw the attraction and the utility - I just don't like giving up that much control over my data.

The point is that new technologies, (and new uses for/integrations of them), have a way of becoming wildly popular and successful, even when their usefulness or appeal isn't immediately evident to most of us. Smart companies realize that and gamble on new tech and new uses for existing tech; these gambles often pay off big time.

I'm still not happy with MS getting into bed with Open Source though. My first thought was best expressed by an earlier commenter talking about 'embrace, extend, eliminate'. My second thought is 'who's fucking whom here', and I'm afraid I already know the answer.

This, exactly. Now if Microsoft allowed governments to build their own binaries from the source they had just finished reviewing, there might be some reassurance that this isn't just a smoke-and-mirrors act. Then again, the toolchain might be compromised. Somehow I don't think MS will allow governments to have access to the toolchain sources as well. And even if they did, I suspect most governments don't have the resources to conduct such a comprehensive review.

Man, this has to be the most blatant Slashvertisement I've ever read. The summary even sounds as though it was written by a professional ad copy writer. Gimme a break, Dicedot!

It's worse than annoying. I'm not exaggerating when I say this kind of thing should be treated as a crime against humanity. The cost of the resulting resource depletion and environmental damage that we're passing on to future generations may well mean the difference between our survival as a species and our extinction, or at least our decimation. And it's not as though the things we're producing as throwaway items are even essential; in many cases they actually reduce our quality of life, (although they raise our 'standard of living', which is a metric we ought to abolish).

Don't get me wrong - I love tech toys and modern conveniences, and the technology and manufacturing sectors have much to be proud of in the area of making human lives better and more fulfilling. But we really need to band together as a species, separate the good from the bad, and stop committing slow suicide.

My good sir, how dare you besmirch the efforts of those who are trying to make our economy grow ever larger and ever faster? Don't you WANT a booming business environment? Is buying overpriced junk that fails early and often, and leaves our planet an empty husk, REALLY too high a price to pay for petty amusements and diversions that further line the pockets of the already-wealthy? How selfish of you!

...and I'm generally not interested in games. But this could turn me into a convert - the concept seems really awesome, and the sample video looked very cool.

Just now I've slipped off my armour of techno-jadedness, and I'm amazed at the wonders we humans are capable of creating when we're not busy engaging in pillaging, war, and petty bickering. Off-topic perhaps, but what the hell.

That "every device" phrase sounds like a loophole to me. So long as they DON'T record the digital address of even ONE device that crosses their path, they're technically telling the truth, even as they're lying.

True. The thing that concernes me is the number of such initiatives that are flying under our radar. It may be the case, (and IMHO probably is), that there is a huge amount of this kind of crap going on that we only find out about when it's way too late, or never find out about at all.

The real solution here is NOT to fight these fires as we see them crop up. The real solution is to stop the corporations and governments from lighting the damned fires in the first place, before they burn our collective home to the ground. We need to find a way to restore the accountability they once had to us, their customers and citizens, their meal ticket - otherwise we'll continue to become more and more like animals in factory farms, and less and less like the autonomous geings we were born as.

I'll leave it to your creativity and imagination to figure out how this might best be done - there are lots and lots of approaches, and we propbably need to use most of them if we're to reverse this inexorable march toward irreversible feudal serfdom. We're already a LONG way down that road...

"Getting upset on other people's behalves" - isn't that called 'empathy'?

Except for the 'closet' part, that sounds like a disturbingly accurate description of today's reality...