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Google

Google Reveals Wireless Vision — Open Networks 90

Posted by Soulskill from the optimizing-the-ethertubes dept.
Anti-Globalism writes with this excerpt from CNet: "Google's vision of tomorrow's wireless network is in stark contrast to how wireless operators do business today, setting the two sides on a possible collision course. Earlier this week, the search giant filed a patent application with the US Patent Office describing its vision of an open wireless network where smartphones aren't tied to any single cell phone network. In Google's open wireless world, phones and other wireless devices would search for the strongest, fastest connection at the most competitive price. Essentially, wireless operators' networks would be reduced to 'dumb pipes.'" The full patent application is available as well. Google founder Larry Page recently asked the FCC to free up portions of the broadcast spectrum for this purpose.
Google

Google To Fund Ideas That Will Change the World 165

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the we-should-all-become-deities-the-end dept.
Peace Corps Online writes "This week, as part of their tenth birthday celebration, Google announced the launch of project ten to the 100th, a project designed to inspire and fund the development of ideas that will help to change the world. They have called on members of the public to share their ideas for solutions that will help as many people as possible in the global community, offering a $10 million prize pool to back the development of those chosen as winners. 'We know there are countless brilliant ideas that need funding and support to come to fruition,' says Bethany Poole, Project Marketing Manager for Google. 'These ideas can be big or small, technology-driven or brilliantly simple — but they need to have impact.' The project's website asks entrants to classify their ideas into one of eight categories listed as Community, Opportunity, Energy, Environment, Health, Education, Shelter and Everything Else. Members of the public have until October 20th to submit their ideas by completing a simple form and answering a few short questions about their idea."
Space

Submission + - Return of the Static Universe

Submitted by Dr. Eggman
Dr. Eggman writes: According to an article on ars technica and its accompanying General Relativity and Gravitation journal article The return of a static universe and the end of cosmology, in the far future of the universe, all evidence of the origin of the universe will be gone. Intelligences alive 100-billion-years from now will observe a universe that appears much the way our early 1900s view of the universe was: Static, had always been there, and consisted of little more than our own galaxy and a islands of matter.
Bug

Submission + - Vista Security Claims Debunked (seclists.org)

Submitted by
[Send Bug Reports Here]
[Send Bug Reports Here] writes: "Apparently Microsoft still hasn't learned that counting vendor acknowledged vulnerabilities isn't a good way to establish the security of an OS. As an analysis of Microsoft's claims on Full Disclosure shows, we see that the methodology used was badly flawed. A bug in Firefox (not to mention emacs), counts as a flaw for Linux, while IE bugs get ignored on Vista's chart. Then we see that vulnerabilities aren't vulnerabilities when they're security-challenged features such as Vista's Teredo. Also, there's far too little consideration given to severity, given that it stoops to counting even extra access restrictions on a file in OSX to have something to show. In short, the original Microsoft analysis was good PR and poor research."

Comment Re:Privacy != anonymity (Score 1) 368

by lostlyre (#19630535) Attached to: Google May Close Gmail Germany Over Privacy Law
I think we're mostly agreed here, especially in that publication of works online should have equal weight compared to some mass public communication. I understand the similarities between posting something online and posting things in public places. However, I do not believe surfing the web or whatever form of researching information should be logged in the same manner. Additionally, e-mail, phone conversations and SMS messages are intended to be private communications. I think that in an emergency situation they can be intercepted ethically, but not just passively, automatically logged where they can be subject to theft and misuse. That methodology is an unnatural, artificial social construct just as much as complete anonymity is. But I don't think I need to tell you that; surely you've seen the numerous private and public thefts of PII on laptops and what have you.


Thanks for your reply, I really enjoyed reading it.
Announcements

Submission + - Scientists get plastic from trees (pressesc.com)

Submitted by
amigoro
amigoro writes: "Scientists have found a method to replace crude oil as the root source for plastic, fuels and scores of other industrial and household chemicals with inexpensive, nonpolluting renewable plant matter. They directly converted sugars ubiquitous in nature to an alternative source for those products that make oil so valuable, with very little of the residual impurities that have made the quest so daunting."
Communications

Submission + - Bones Could Become Conduits For Data Swaps

Submitted by
Billosaur
Billosaur writes: "New Scientist Tech has an intriguing article about researchers at Rice University in Houston, TX who are looking at ways to use the human skeleton to transmit data. The idea is to use bones to conduct sound waves, with 0's and 1's being represented by different frequencies. Preliminary results, shared with a conference on body networks in Florence, Italy, this week, show that bones can conduct even low-power vibrations with few errors. The idea is that the conduction of sound along bone would be more secure that via radio waves, leading to the possibility of swapping data with someone by shaking their hand."

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