Comment Re:Two words: (Score 1) 250
And I imagine the abstract was invented around the time of Gutenburg.
Comment No, VoIP will be blocked (Score 5, Insightful) 300
They'll block VoIP in the initial sky Wifi: http://blogs.zdnet.com/ip-telephony/?p=1506
I read a suggestion that when someone has a loud "private" conversation, you simply join into the conversation as they clearly intended all their neighbors to do by talking so loudly:
- "Oh you're right about that. I wouldn't put up with it for a minute. You should just tell him where to go."
- "How long has your sister had this disease?"
- "That's great news for you. I sure hope none of your competitors find out that you're going to bid 20k. Will you give me a call later and tell me how it comes out?"
Feed Techdirt: White House Opposes Surveillance... Of Its Own Surveillance Policy (techdirt.com)
Since it was formed in 2004, on the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission, The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board has been blasted by civil libertarians as a tool of the administration, more interested in whitewashing War on Terror–related privacy violations than serving as a genuine check on government intrusion. One of the board's five members even resigned in protest, citing among other things "the vast array of alphabet soup agencies and bureaucracies in the national security apparatus" that sought "to control and modify the Board's public utterances." So last year, Congress sought to give the board greater autonomy by moving it out from under the aegis of the White House and reconstituting itself as an independent boad within the executive branch. The response of the White House, Wired reports, has been to drag its feet in appointing a new board -- meaning there is no one on the board as of January 30th -- prompting bipartisan criticism from top members of the Senate's Homeland Security Committee.
The board's second annual report (pdf), released late last month, does not exactly inspire confidence in its assiduousness as a privacy watchdog -- even when staffed. After touting its excellent working relationship with the White House, it moves to a "nothing to see here" review of the post-9/11 use of the material witness statute (MWS) as a detention tool. Aside from one "terrible mistake," the report asserts the board "was not made aware of specific problems with the use of the MWS in the anti-terrorism context" and cites a claim by the Justice Department that "on only nine occasions since the attacks of September 11, 2001 has the MWS been used in terrorist-related investigations." That is hard to square with the findings of a joint report by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union, which found some 70 instances of 9/11-related detention, though the discrepancy may be explained by the frequent use of immigration violations as a pretext for detentions that were actually related to terror investigations. The board's analysis of the Protect America Act, passed last August, similarly reads like a compilation of White House talking points.
This should not be all that surprising given the composition of the old board, which consisted of such Republican stalwarts as President Bush's former solicitor general, Ted Olson. With debate over reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act raging in the Senate, the White House appears less than eager to have a less-friendly set of eyes reviewing its surveillance policies.
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The board's second annual report (pdf), released late last month, does not exactly inspire confidence in its assiduousness as a privacy watchdog -- even when staffed. After touting its excellent working relationship with the White House, it moves to a "nothing to see here" review of the post-9/11 use of the material witness statute (MWS) as a detention tool. Aside from one "terrible mistake," the report asserts the board "was not made aware of specific problems with the use of the MWS in the anti-terrorism context" and cites a claim by the Justice Department that "on only nine occasions since the attacks of September 11, 2001 has the MWS been used in terrorist-related investigations." That is hard to square with the findings of a joint report by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union, which found some 70 instances of 9/11-related detention, though the discrepancy may be explained by the frequent use of immigration violations as a pretext for detentions that were actually related to terror investigations. The board's analysis of the Protect America Act, passed last August, similarly reads like a compilation of White House talking points.
This should not be all that surprising given the composition of the old board, which consisted of such Republican stalwarts as President Bush's former solicitor general, Ted Olson. With debate over reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act raging in the Senate, the White House appears less than eager to have a less-friendly set of eyes reviewing its surveillance policies.
Julian Sanchez is an expert at the Techdirt Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Julian Sanchez and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.
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Submission + - Huge offshore wind power programme launched in UK
OriginalArlen writes: The UK government has announced an ambitious plan to expand the existing, already extensive offshore wind turbine farms to an estimated 7000 units, enough to generate 20% of the UK's power needs by 2020. The newly green-friendly Conservative opposition party is also backing the scheme. Wonder what they'll make of it in Oregon...
Submission + - Open source takes aim at high-cost math software (networkworld.com) 2
coondoggie writes: "A new open source mathematics program is looking to push aside commercial software commonly used in mathematics education, in large government laboratories and in math-intensive research. The program's backers say the software, called Sage, can do anything from mapping a 12-dimensional object to calculating rainfall patterns under global warming.
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/22768"
House Bill Won't Criminalize Free Wi-Fi Operators 540
Velcroman98 sends word of a bill that passed the US House of Representatives by a lopsided vote of 409 to 2. It would require everyone who runs an open Wi-Fi connection to report illegal images, including "obscene" cartoons and drawings, or be fined up to $300,000. The Securing Adolescents From Exploitation-Online (SAFE) Act was rushed through the House without any hearings or committee votes, and the version that passed on a voice vote reportedly differs substantially from the last publicly available version. CNET reports that sentiment in favor of such a bill is strong in the Senate as well. Update: 12/07 06:22 GMT by Z : As clarified in an Ars writeup, this summary is a bit off-base. The bill doesn't require WiFi owners to police anything, merely 'stiffening the penalties' for those who make no effort to report obvious child pornography.
California Testers Find Flaws In Voting Machines 167
quanticle writes "According to Ars Technica, California testers have discovered severe flaws in the ES&S voting machines. The paper seals were easily bypassed, and the lock could be picked with a "common office implement". After cracking the physical security of the device, the testers found it simple to reconfigure the BIOS to boot off external media. After booting a version of Linux, they found that critical system files were stored in plain text. They also found that the election management system that initializes the voting machines used unencrypted protocols to transmit the initialization data to the voting machines, allowing for a man-in-the-middle attack. Altogether, it is a troubling report for a company already in hot water for selling uncertified equipment to counties."
British Village Requests Removal From GPS Maps 539
longacre writes "The tiny village of Barrow Gurney, England, has asked GPS map publisher Tele Atlas to remove them from the company's maps. The reason: truck drivers using GPS navigation devices are being directed to drive through the town despite the roads being too narrow for sidewalks, which has led to numerous accidents. At the root of the problem lies the fact that the navigation maps used by trucks are the same as those used by passenger cars, and they don't contain data on road width or no-truck zones. Tele Atlas says they will release truck-appropriate databases at some point, but until then they advise local governments to make use of a technology dating back to the Romans: road signs."
Feed Engadget: Aptera's 300 MPG car available for pre-order (engadget.com)
Filed under: Transportation
Aptera certainly managed managed to attract a fair bit of attention for itself earlier this year, when its concept car turned as many heads for its space age looks as it did for its promised 200 MPG range. Now the company looks to be taking the next step on the long road to availability, with it accepting pre-orders for the car, which apparently now boasts a range of 300 MPG in typical driving conditions. What's more, the company says its also readying an all-electric version of the vehicle in addition to the plug-in hybrid model, with promising to last for around 120 miles before needing a recharge. Both models will also apparently come packed with features, include driver and passenger side airbags, interior and exterior LED lighting, a "solar assisted" climate control system, and an "advanced drive computer" that includes GPS, a rear-view camera, and a complete vehicle diagnostic system. All that apparently comes at a bit of a premium over the initially-estimated $20,000 price, however, with the electric and plug-in hybrid models now set to run $26,900 and $29,900, respectively. If that's still in your ballpark, you can reserve yours now for a mere $500, with the first vehicles promised to be in drivers hands in 12 months or so.
[Via Digg]
[Via Digg]
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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!
Submission + - "Wiki the Vote" project open-sources oppo (sourcewatch.org)
Gabriela writes: ""Wiki the Vote" was just launched on Congresspedia.org for citizens, professional researchers and even candidates to collaborate on profiles for each and every candidate for Congress in 2008. The project is non-partisan and, in true open-source fashion, is free for anyone to participate — even the candidates themselves.
Unlike Wikipedia, people connected to the subjects of articles are free to add to them as long as their contributions are rhetoric-free and comprised of fully documented, verifiable facts. The citizen editors are assisted and fact-checked by professional editors.
The project is starting with nearly 300 basic profiles of candidates that 2008RaceTracker has identified as definitely running, and will eventually expand to cover every candidate on the ballot in the primary and general elections next year. When the OpenSecrets.org 2008 congressional campaign contributions database goes online in a few weeks, the candidate profiles will also display live feeds tracking the money race and who is funding it."
Submission + - Canonical chases deal to ship Ubuntu server OS (vnunetblogs.com)
Kurtz'sKompund writes: Canonical, the company that supports Ubuntu Linux, is trying to work out a deal with hardware vendors such as Dell to make Ubuntu available preinstalled on servers.
http://www.computerworlduk.com/technology/operating-systems/nix/news/index.cfm?newsid=5559
Fairly Realistic Flying Car Offered for 2009 Delivery 276
An anonymous reader writes to tell us about yet another promise of a flying car. The Register is reporting on the latest from Terrafugia Inc called the "Transition" which is a combination car and airplane that runs on unleaded gas. The idea is that it's a car that you can drive to the nearest airstrip and, with the touch of a button, convert to an airplane, fly to an airstrip close to your goal, then convert back to a car to reach your ultimate destination. Of course, how many times have we been promised flying cars only to suffer in perpetual disappointment.
Submission + - Mozilla to Develop Mobile Firefox (mozillazine.org)
Kelson writes: "Mozilla has announced a new initiative to bring Mozilla to the mobile web, including a fully functional mobile version of Firefox (yes, with extensions). The focus will be part of Mozilla 2, the big revision coming after Gecko 1.9 and Firefox 3. Minimo, the previous attempt to port Mozilla to mobile platforms, is apparently dead, but "has already provided us with valuable information about how Gecko operates in mobile environments, has helped us reduce footprint, and has given us a platform for initial experimentation in user experience.""
Submission + - Cracking Go (ieee.org)
prostoalex writes: "IEEE Spectrum looks at current trends in artificial technology to crack the ancient Chinese game of Go, which theoretically has 10^60 potential endings. Is conquering the game via exhaustive search of all possibilities possible? "My gut feeling is that with some optimization a machine that can search a trillion positions per second would be enough to play Go at the very highest level. It would then be cheaper to build the machine out of FPGAs (field-programmable gate arrays) instead of the much more expensive and highly unwieldy full-custom chips. That way, university students could easily take on the challenge.""
Feed news.com: Japan discovers electric cars. Is it doomsday for the EV start-ups? (news.com)
With big names discovering electric cars, how long can the new guys last?
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