But what if it does? What you're seeing is the tip of the iceberg. When you get sent to some sort of prison or get fined thousands of dollars per "infraction" I think bypassing filters will be like rolling back your odometer in your car. Technically trivial, but few will dare...

And no, the people will NOT rebel. They will swallow the "we're protecting you from child pornographers and terrorists" line whole -- if not right away, 5-10 years from now.

A Glucose BioFuel Cell Implanted in Rats

Cinquin P, Gondran C, Giroud F, Mazabrard S, Pellissier A, et al. (2010) A Glucose BioFuel Cell Implanted in Rats. PLoS ONE 5(5): e10476. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0010476

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0010476

Abstract
Powering future generations of implanted medical devices will require cumbersome transcutaneous energy transfer or harvesting energy from the human body. No functional solution that harvests power from the body is currently available, despite attempts to use the Seebeck thermoelectric effect, vibrations or body movements. Glucose fuel cells appear more promising, since they produce electrical energy from glucose and dioxygen, two substrates present in physiological fluids. The most powerful ones, Glucose BioFuel Cells (GBFCs), are based on enzymes electrically wired by redox mediators. However, GBFCs cannot be implanted in animals, mainly because the enzymes they rely on either require low pH or are inhibited by chloride or urate anions, present in the Extra Cellular Fluid (ECF). Here we present the first functional implantable GBFC, working in the retroperitoneal space of freely moving rats. The breakthrough relies on the design of a new family of GBFCs, characterized by an innovative and simple mechanical confinement of various enzymes and redox mediators: enzymes are no longer covalently bound to the surface of the electron collectors, which enables use of a wide variety of enzymes and redox mediators, augments the quantity of active enzymes, and simplifies GBFC construction. Our most efficient GBFC was based on composite graphite discs containing glucose oxidase and ubiquinone at the anode, polyphenol oxidase (PPO) and quinone at the cathode. PPO reduces dioxygen into water, at pH 7 and in the presence of chloride ions and urates at physiological concentrations. This GBFC, with electrodes of 0.133 mL, produced a peak specific power of 24.4 microwatt/ mL, which is better than pacemakers' requirements and paves the way for the development of a new generation of implantable artificial organs, covering a wide range of medical applications.

Very interesting, and worth the read -- I think.

I'm afraid the author used the same sleazy addiction strategies he discusses on his five-page article with hard-coded returns (preventing me from zooming in too much, causing me to squint and pay more attention) to force me to somehow keep reading to the wishy-washy end.

The gist of the article: such strategies exist, and we (designers of such games, including the author) use them mercilessly to suck away your time/money. This was inevitable because of the gamer behavior data left behind by several generations of hard-core gamers.

That, and the fact that "social game designers" do not touch their products any more than heroin dealers :)

Same with me, but I haven't had the time to experiment. Thanks a lot for the link!

Build a camera array similar to what Stanford has done (see http://graphics.stanford.edu/projects/array/ ) for fast imaging, or building a camera array to refocus images after the fact (see http://lightfield.stanford.edu/ ).

Otherwise, you could do your own "bullet-time" live spin-around imaging system by placing them around a circular room.

While I fully support what the scientists in the TFA are trying to do, I believe there is a danger that the sophomoric intellegentsia here (on /. that is) will see the headline and think "see, technology can solve the extinction problem, no need to worry" and go on to merrily support misguided and unsustainable policies.

Species extinction, ecosystem loss, and general loss of biodiversity are not a bad source code commits that you can simply roll back with enough technology.

You know, Google has to get this information from somewhere. I can't even count the times when I Googled something, only to find 15 other people who've asked the same question, and nothing but snarky replies saying "just Google it you moron!"

Suggestion for you: just don't click on any "Ask Slashdot" links and leave this feature for those of us who actually want to learn something...

There is no shame in asking -- nobody is born knowing everything.

This is how they touted CDs in the earl 1990s. Tapes from the early 1980s are still playable (despite physical abuse), and can be repaired easily if they are not. It's a rare CD which lasts 10 years under non-archive conditions.

By the time this technology is proved useless, they will have made their money and retired!

(or perhaps this is a good thing and I'm being too cynical -- but they'd better have a self-powered player unit that will live as long as the media -- or human-readable plans to build one)

To accomplish this, each of the individuals in the models "talked" to each other about their opinion. If the listener held the same opinions as the speaker, it reinforced the listener's belief. If the opinion was different, the listener considered it and moved on to talk to another person. If that person also held this new belief, the listener then adopted that belief.

In the real world, I think you could very easily have two groups of true believers holding mutually exclusive beliefs who each comprise more than 10% of the society

>> but instead pause in lament for the majority and progress in general

I always do! The other thing I try to do is leave as soon as possible if the company I happen to be working for is the one that has been acquired (former co-workers are inevitably laid off several months later). I hate mergers more as a customer since I've never seen service _NOT_ suffer... (the exception might be the acquisition of KeyHole by Google to form Google Earth)

They are in the business of selling data access. Just charge an extra $10/GB (or whatever the market will bear) and be done with it, and quit lying to customers about having sold them an "unlimited" plan in the first place.

There is something seriously innovation-chilling about the company dictating what the source of the data is...

For now, maybe. But in the future, choosing your participation in Facebook may be like choosing your degree of participation in the Internet.

Think about it: 20 years ago, if you wanted to buy a plane ticket you could look in your Yellow Pages, find a travel agent, and call them up to find you something at a reasonable price. You could go to a college campus and pick up a printed course catalog. Gadgets used to come with printed manuals instead of URLs where you can download them. The Internet is not exactly "voluntary" except for the most hard-core of Luddites.

In the same way, I'm seeing companies starting to advertise their Facebook pages and twitter accounts instead of web pages. It may not be long before mainstream businesses become Facebook only and force you to log in before you even see their content. What this does is erode the non-identity-based ecosystem that has evolved on the Internet. There are pages that won't let you comment on forums without having a Facebook account. The Internet will still be there, but you may see an uncomfortable amount of content go behind a "Facebook wall" instead of the "paywalls" we used to fear.

* Privacy Everywhere at Stake *

Fixed that for you. Do you really want Facebook to know the phone numbers of everyone you call with Skype and share it with 300 of your closest friends in one of their inevitable revisions of "privacy" practices?

I like Skype -- I'm a paying customer. I like Facebook. I wouldn't trust Facebook (the company) with anything that I don't mind becoming 100% public, including my credit card, and use it with that knowledge in mind. I am not necessarily interested in Skypeing with my Facebook friends or the awkwardness of socially networking with my Skype contacts (who are mostly business collaborators). [One would hope that everyone has learned the lesson of Google Buzz].

I don't like the fact that the Internet is turning into AOL 2012.

One of the stupidest tech questions I've heard in a while. I haven't read the TFA, of course :)

The iPad is shiny, substantial, and satisfying. A bit like a big, juicy steak. Not cheap, not good for you or the ecosystem, but darn delicious. Both sell primarily because of the satisfaction they bring to their consumers.

A phone, on the other hand, does its basic function well even without a visible operating system. It's also something you need and will buy without too much thought. It's like the Taco Bell burrito. Android is its soy-based, meat-flavored filling. Practically free to the manufacturer, and good enough for its purpose.

Though you tolerate soy-filled Mexican fare for $5, you won't order grilled tofu when you go out to eat in a fine restaurant where you'll be shelling out $100. You order a steak -- unless you're a vegetarian or an eco-freak. In the same way, you won't spend $800 on a half-baked Android tablet -- you'll buy an iPad -- unless, of course, you're an Apple-hater or an open-source freak :)

Until Android tablets become dirt cheap or the user experience improves significantly (including a decent market where everything works on every machine), only the vegetarian eco-freaks amongst us will be asking the question in the article!