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Submission + - Quantum cryptography speeds slowed by" dead ti (networkworld.com)

Submitted by
coondoggie
coondoggie writes: "Researchers said today that technological and security issues will stall maximum transmission rates at levels comparable to that of a single broadband connection, such as a cable modem, unless researchers reduce "dead times" in the detectors that receive quantum-encrypted messages. Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI), technological and security issues will stall maximum transmission rates at levels comparable to that of a single broadband connection, such as a cable modem, unless researchers reduce "dead times" in the detectors that receive quantum-encrypted messages. http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/20061"
The Courts

Linux Devicemaker Sued In First US Test of GPL 315

Posted by CowboyNeal from the running-it-up-the-flagpole dept.
An anonymous reader writes "For the first time in the U.S., a company is being taken to court for a GPL violation. The Software Freedom Law Center has sued Monsoon Multimedia over alleged GPL violations in the Hava, a place- and time-shifting TV recorder similar to the SlingBox. Interestingly, Monsoon Multimedia is run by a highly experienced international lawyer named Graham Radstone. According to his corporate biography, Radstone has an MA in Law from the University of Cambridge, England, and held the top legal spot at an unnamed "$1 billion private multinational company." He also reportedly held top management positions with Philip Morris, Pfizer, and DHL. Sounds like the makings of a good old legal Donnybrook ahead."
It's funny. Laugh.

Realtime ASCII Goggles 331

Posted by kdawson from the through-crt-colored-spectacles dept.
jabjoe writes "Russian artists from Moscow have created goggles with realtime image filtering. Among the Photoshop-like filters that can be applied is, interestingly, ASCII: you can view the world in real time as ASCII. Pointless but cool."
Science

The Father of Molecular Gastronomy Whips Up a New Formula 144

Posted by Zonk from the delicious-science dept.
An anonymous reader writes "French chemist and cook Hervé This maintains his quest to find the scientific precision behind great tasting food. Chef This is just one of a growing number of cooks that approaches food from a scientific perspective; making recipes in a lab instead of in the kitchen. The difference is that This was one of the pioneers of the field. 'This and a colleague, the late Oxford physicist Nicholas Kurti, conducted the experiments in their spare time. In 1988, the pair coined a term to describe their nascent field: molecular gastronomy. The name has since been applied to the kitchen wizardry of chefs like el Bulli's Ferran Adria and Alinea's Grant Achatz. But This is interested in basic culinary knowledge -- not flashy preparations -- and has continued to accumulate his precisions, which now number some 25,000.'"
Security

Scientists Make Quantum Encryption Breakthrough 156

Posted by samzenpus from the completely-secure-for-at-least-a-few-days dept.
Madas writes "Scientists working in Cambridge have managed to make quantum encryption completely secure (registration required) by putting decoy pulses in the key transmission stream. According to the story this paves the way for safe, encrypted high-speed data links. Could this allow completely private transmission of data away from snooping eyes and ears? Or will it mean film studios can stop movies from being copied when traveling on the internet?"
Books

Vending Machine For Books Coming Next Year 214

Posted by Zonk from the i've-heard-of-worse-ideas dept.
An anonymous reader writes "CNN writes about a $50,000 machine that can print books on demand. It can print up to 550 pages and put a binding on the book in seven minutes. It will be debuting in a select number of U.S. libraries in 2007. The machine is the 'output' end of a service called On Demand Books, which is also just debuting. From the article: 'Some 2.5 million books are now available - about one million in English and no longer under copyright protection. On Demand accesses the volumes through Google and the Open Content Alliance, among other sources. [Co-founder Dane] Neller predicts that within about five years On Demand Books will be able to reproduce every volume ever printed.'"

Robots Could Some Day Demand Legal Rights 473

Posted by Zonk from the good-news-everyone dept.
Karrde712 writes "According to a study by the British government, as reported by the BBC, robots may some day improve to a level of intelligence where they might be able to demand rights, even 'robo-healthcare'." From the article: "The research was commissioned by the UK Office of Science and Innovation's Horizon Scanning Centre. The 246 summary papers, called the Sigma and Delta scans, were complied by futures researchers, Outsights-Ipsos Mori partnership and the US-based Institute for the Future (IFTF) ... The paper which addresses Robo-rights, titled Utopian dream or rise of the machines? examines the developments in artificial intelligence and how this may impact on law and politics." I'd better get started on my RoboAmerican studies degree.

UK Schools Bans WiFi Due To Health Concerns 535

Posted by Zonk from the no-bad-teeth-jokes dept.
Mantrid42 writes "Schools in the UK are getting rid of their WiFi network, citing health concerns from parents and teachers. The wireless emanations, parents fear, may be the root cause of a host of problems from simple fatigue to the possibility of cancer. A few scientists think younger humans may be more vulnerable to the transmissions, because of thinner skulls. From the article: "Vivienne Baron, who is bringing up Sebastian, her ten-year-old grandson, said: 'I did not want Sebastian exposed to a wireless computer network at school. No real evidence has been produced to prove that this new technology is safe in the long term. Until it is, I think we should take a precautionary approach and use cabled systems.'"

Thai IT Minister Slams Open Source 520

Posted by samzenpus from the not-good-enough dept.
patiwat writes "Thailand's newly appointed Information and Communications Technology Minister has slammed open source software as useless and full of bugs: 'With open source, there is no intellectual property. Anyone can use it and all your ideas become public domain. If nobody can make money from it, there will be no development and open source software quickly becomes outdated... As a programmer, if I can write good code, why should I give it away? Thailand can do good source code without open source.' This marks a sharp u-turn in policy from that of the previous government."

Chinese GPS System To Be Offered Free 131

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the maker-of-rules-dealing-with-fools dept.
MattSparkes writes, "The Chinese GPS system, Beidou, is apparently to be opened up for free access within China, worrying European investors on the €2.5 billion competing project, Galileo. Initially, China had declared that access to their system would be restricted to the military, and Europe had planned to recoup some of the cost of their system by selling licenses to China. Michael Shaw, from the US government's National Space-based Positioning, Navigation and Timing Coordination Office in Washington DC, said, 'Frankly, China's behavior towards Europe is not so different to how Europe behaved with us when GPS was the only game in town a decade ago.'"

Hackers Serving Rootkits with Bagles 150

Posted by CowboyNeal from the worm-in-the-apple dept.
Iran Contra writes "Security researchers at F-Secure in Finland have discovered a rootkit component in the Bagle worm that loads a kernel-mode driver to hide the processes and registry keys of itself and other Bagle-related malware from security scanners. Bagle started out as a simple e-mail borne executable and the addition of rootkit capabilities show how far ahead of the cat-and-mouse game the attackers are."

Sony More Trustworthy Than Microsoft 410

Posted by CowboyNeal from the and-nintendo-too dept.
DesertBlade writes "Forrester Research examined the trust that American households place in PC and consumer electronics. Sony, Dell and Bose all recieved a ranking of A+ while Microsoft recieved a C (I know most of you would say it is closer to a F). "Microsoft faces big consumer defection risk. One measure of consumers' dissatisfaction with Microsoft is seen in the 5.4 million households that give it a brand trust score of 1 [distrust a lot] or 2 [distrust a bit]. Compared with all Microsoft users, these at-risk users have higher income, are much more likely to be male, and are bigger online spenders.(see endnote 7) These households know they run Microsoft software but would be just as happy to leave it behind -- if they could." Does Microsoft face that big of a risk?"

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