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Political Campaigns Mining Online Data To Target Voters 131

Posted by Soulskill from the watching-you-through-your-webcam-too dept.
New submitter nicoles writes with this quote from an AP report: "The Romney and Obama campaigns are spending heavily on television ads and other traditional tools to convey their messages. But strategists say the most important breakthrough this year is the campaigns' use of online data to raise money, share information and persuade supporters to vote. The practice, known as 'microtargeting,' has been a staple of product marketing. Now it's facing the greatest test of its political impact in the race for the White House. ... The Romney team spent nearly $1 million on digital consulting in April and Obama at least $300,000. ... Campaigns use microtargeting to identify potential supporters or donors using data gleaned from a range of sources, especially their Internet browsing history. A digital profile of each person is then created, allowing the campaigns to find them online and solicit them for money and support."
Science

Science and Religion Can and Do Mix, Mostly 1345

Posted by samzenpus from the can't-we-all-just-get-along? dept.
coondoggie writes "A recent Rice University study found that in one of the more vitriolic social (and increasingly political) battlegrounds, science v. religion, there is more common ground that most folks believe. In fact, according to the study, only 15% of scientists at major U.S. research universities see religion and science as always in conflict."
Earth

Submission + - Two More Google Software Dogs Go to Heaven

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Two more software products will be going to Google Software Heaven shortly. On Friday, Google issued a death certificate for Google Health (date of death = Jan. 1, 2012), and added that the lights will go out on Google PowerMeter on Sep. 16, 2011. 'We've observed that Google Health is not having the broad impact that we hoped it would,' said Google. 'There has been adoption among certain groups of users like tech-savvy patients and their caregivers, and more recently fitness and wellness enthusiasts. But we haven't found a way to translate that limited usage into widespread adoption in the daily health routines of millions of people.' Regarding PowerMeter, Google's 'Green Energy Czar' had this to say: 'We're pleased that PowerMeter has helped demonstrate the importance of this access and created something of a model. However, our efforts have not scaled as quickly as we would like, so we are retiring the service.' Google added that the White House will carry on the fight after being inspired by success stories like the Harker School (tuition: $36,435), which used grant money to acquire off-the-shelf sub-metering technology that revealed their energy bill could be reduced by not air conditioning the gym from 9pm-3am.
Australia

Laser Incidents With Aircraft On the Rise 546

Posted by Soulskill from the plays-better-with-cats dept.
EqualSlash writes "High-power laser pointers available for cheap are increasingly finding abuse as the ultimate long-distance weapons of pranksters and vandals. The Federal Aviation Administration says laser events aimed on planes have nearly doubled in the last year, leaping from 1,527 in 2009 to 2,836 in 2010. The highest number of incidents was reported at Los Angeles International Airport, which recorded 102 in 2010. Lasers pointed at cockpits can temporarily blind pilots, forcing them to give up control of an aircraft to their co-pilot or abort a take-off/landing. In March of 2008, unidentified individuals wielding four green laser pointers launched a coordinated attack on six incoming planes at Sydney Airport, which resulted in a ban on all laser pointers in the state of New South Wales."

Comment Re:When this happens to the US or its allies (Score 1) 406

by odd42 (#34894476) Attached to: New York Times Reports US and Israel Behind Stuxnet

Uh. The US barely 'won' against a FAR inferior Iraq, and is losing badly against a stone age country. I'm pretty sure Iran would do just fine, especially seeing as how they have control of 100% of the straits of Hormuz.

Long-term Iraq and Afghanistan "wars" were failures as police-actions (after any major military conflict) in attempts to eliminate civilian casualties, having this goal to maintain legitimacy in initiating the conflicts. Iranian war on the US (the feasibility of which if judged according to the above US difficulties in Iraq/Afghanistan) is not advisable by any sane person.

Comment Re:Pick the one that CREATES energy... (Score 1) 633

by odd42 (#34683354) Attached to: Trek Tech That Most Needs To Be Invented Before I Die:

Pick the one that CREATES energy... not consumes it. The only logical choice is the warp drive.

The first law of course is 'Energy can neither be created nor destroyed: it can only be transformed from one state to another.'
Though your general line of reasoning stands, in solving the energy problem.
The Media

Google's New Meta-Tags For News Story Authors 71

Posted by timothy from the tree-of-attribution dept.
EreIamJH writes "Google News is experimenting with meta-tags in an effort to ensure that the correct news source is credited with an article. The original-source meta-tag will identify the newspaper that breaks a story, while syndication-source is for everyone who repeats the story. Both meta-tags can appear multiple times — for instance an article that sources information from other articles would include an original-source tag for each article used in preparing the new article. While the intention is worthy, I look forward to lots of snarky blogger fights as journalists vent their hurt feelings for having been omitted as an original source."
Google

Big Media Wants More Piracy Busting From Google 186

Posted by samzenpus from the lend-a-hand dept.
suraj.sun writes "Last month, executives from two music-industry trade groups, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), asked Google if it could provide a means to help them track down pirated material more efficiently. Typically, copyright owners are responsible for finding pirated links and alerting Google, which is required by law to quickly remove the links. But Google's response raised eyebrows at some of the labels. James Pond, a Google manager, wrote in a letter dated September 20, that Google would be happy to help — for a price."

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