Veteran's Day - Thank You

Wed Nov 11, 2009 12:46 PM EST

Today is Veteran's Day in the United States. I just want to take a moment to say thank you to the men, women, and their families who have or are serving in our armed forces. I would also like to thank the men and women who are our police and firefighters. Thank you.

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us-news, veterans-day, military, honor

Steampunk web series Riese starts tomorrow (11/2)

Sun Nov 1, 2009 10:32 PM EST

I just wanted to bring attention to new video web series Riese. As described by Wikipedia:

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entertainment, steampunk, webseries, riese

Designing a trustworthy Electronic Voting System

Fri Oct 30, 2009 3:22 AM EDT

Newsvine contributor Nearing seeded an article discussing how the German High Court has apparently banned electronic voting. Predictably the first comment to this article was that we should only have paper ballots, which is a common enough position on this subject. Pe …

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technology, voting, elections, doing-it-right

Answering "What to buy: Mac or PC"

Fri Oct 16, 2009 3:33 AM EDT

Recently I've seen some people asking the age old question what shoud I buy Mac or PC. Which always brings out the zealots from each side who proceed to muddle the issue with hype, hyperbole, minutia, and other nonsense. Unfortunately I think this tends to be unprod …

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Obama won the Peace Prize, but for what?

Seeded on Sat Oct 10, 2009 9:53 PM EDT (USA Today)

WASHINGTON — The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to President Obama landed with a shock on darkened, still-asleep Washington. He won! For what?

us-news, obama, nobel-peace-prize

Amazon cuts Kindle price to $259

Seeded on Wed Oct 7, 2009 12:57 AM EDT (USA Today)

Against rising competition, Amazon.com is cutting the price of the Kindle and taking its popular electronic reader overseas. On Wednesday, Kindle prices drop $40 to $259, the second price cut in three months.

technology, amazon, kindle, ebooks

Google Voice and you: what it is and how you can use it - Ars Technica

Seeded on Mon Aug 10, 2009 8:25 PM EDT (Ars Technica)

Have you been hearing all the chatter about Google Voice but still haven't caught up on what it is? Ars gives you the rundown on Google's calling service and how you can use it to screen and forward calls, send free SMSs, and even get your voicemails transcribed and sent to your …

technology, google, google-voice, grand-central, voip, voicemail

Vanish Uses BitTorrent to Make Data Disappear

Seeded on Mon Aug 10, 2009 7:40 PM EDT (Zeropaid.com)

Encrypts messages with a secret key and then distributes pieces of it across random nodes so that as peers leave the swarm it gradually degrades over time, allowing users to regain control over data stored on the web like Facebook PMs, e-mails to others, and even simple posts.

technology, data, privacy, bittorrent, encryption

A Radical New Router

Seeded on Mon Aug 10, 2009 5:29 PM EDT (spectrum.ieee.org)

The Internet is broken. I should know: I designed it. In 1967, I wrote the first plan for the ancestor of today's Internet, the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, or ARPANET, and then led the team that designed and built it.

technology, internet, packets, routers, future-inevitable-internet-collapse

TiVo adds new Web videos, option to watch niche content | Webware - CNET

Seeded on Wed Aug 5, 2009 12:32 PM EDT (CNET.com)

TiVo announced Wednesday that it has added hundreds of free Web videos to TiVo Series3, TiVo HD, and TiVo HD XL DVRs.

tivo, rss, television, podcasts, technology, video, web

Synchronised blinking stops viewers missing the action

Seeded on Tue Aug 4, 2009 4:47 PM EDT (newscientist.com)

Worried you'll blink and miss a crucial piece of the action? Then you can relax. While watching a film, we subconsciously control the timing of blinks to make sure we don't miss anything important.

science, blink, movies, brain, eyes

Is Pluto a planet after all?

Seeded on Fri Jul 31, 2009 4:29 PM EDT (newscientist.com)

HOW many planets are in the solar system? The official answer is eight - unless you happen to live in Illinois.

science, pluto, astonomy, iau, planet, debate

There is no WiFi allergy: newspapers misreport PR as science - Ars Technica

Seeded on Wed Jul 29, 2009 1:35 AM EDT (Ars Technica)

The recent Pew survey on the status of science in the US public included two findings: the public is interested in the latest news about health issues, but it doesn't necessarily feel the press does a good job. Last Friday produced a clear indication of why.

technology, press, pr, wifi, stunt, hoax

Bad Apple: An Argument Against Buying an iPhone - iPhone - Lifehacker

Seeded on Wed Jul 29, 2009 1:15 AM EDT (Lifehacker)

Apple just rejected the Google Voice iPhone application from App Store distribution, the most recent in a long line of questionable moves, and the message is clear: If you want a device that won't lock you out of innovation, skip the iPhone.

technology, apple, at-t, google, google-voice, iphone

Apple pulls Google Voice apps from the App Store

Seeded on Tue Jul 28, 2009 9:26 PM EDT (Download Squad)

Apple doesn't particularly like it when developer release applications that compete directly with Apple's iPhone software. That's why you won't find any full featured web browsers in the App Store. And apparently it's why you also won't find any mobile apps for using Google Voice.

technology, apple, google, google-voice, iphone

Amazon CEO apologizes for Kindle book deletions | Web Crawler - CNET News

Seeded on Thu Jul 23, 2009 10:08 PM EDT (CNET.com)

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos issued an apology Thursday to customers over last week's surprise deletion of a number of books that Kindle owners had purchased and downloaded to their devices:

technology, amazon, kindle, jeff-bezos

Amazon remotely deletes Orwell e-books from Kindles, unpersons reportedly unhappy

Seeded on Fri Jul 17, 2009 5:05 PM EDT (Engadget)

If you're into keeping tabs on irony, check this out. Amazon apparently sent out its robotic droogs last night, deleting copies of the George Orwell novels Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four from Kindles without explanation, then refunding the purchase price.

technology, amazon, kindle, drm, ownership

Some E-Books Are More Equal Than Others

Seeded on Fri Jul 17, 2009 4:33 PM EDT (The New York Times)

This morning, hundreds of Amazon Kindle owners awoke to discover that books by a certain famous author had mysteriously disappeared from their e-book readers. These were books that they had bought and paid for—thought they owned.

technology, amazon, kindle

The hazy future of Web typography - Ars Technica

Seeded on Mon Jul 6, 2009 5:49 PM EDT (Ars Technica)

Current technology can break Web type free from the Georgia/Verdana prison, but getting all the stakeholders—Web designers, type designers, font vendors, and browser vendors—to agree on a standard may be a bigger challenge than the technology.

technology, web, fonts, typeface

The pillars of PC gaming: why StarCraft 2 LAN play matters - Ars Technica

Seeded on Mon Jul 6, 2009 5:23 PM EDT (Ars Technica)

While it may not change the game's bottom line, the exclusion of LAN play from StarCraft 2 bothers many old-school gamers. It's an uncomfortable reminder of just how much the PC gaming world has changed.

technology, blizzard, activision, starcraft-2, sc2, lan

CompuServe Classic laid to rest

Seeded on Mon Jul 6, 2009 4:12 PM EDT (CNET.com)

CompuServe Classic, the initial on-ramp to the information superhighway for a generation of Americans, has died. It was 30 years old.

technology, compuserve, aol

Facebook's Twitterification: Is it the Right Move?

Seeded on Sun Jul 5, 2009 10:21 PM EDT (Mashable!)

It's tough to argue against the perception that Facebook (Facebook)'s been on a Twitter (Twitter) emulation spree. In the last month alone they announced public content sharing, profile fans, real-time search, and brand new privacy changes.

technology, facebook, twitter

Blind Advocacy Groups sue Arizona State University over KindleDX Use

Seeded on Sun Jul 5, 2009 4:28 PM EDT (nfb.org)

Baltimore, Maryland (June 25, 2009): The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) and the American Council of the Blind (ACB) filed suit today against Arizona State University (ASU) to prevent the university from deploying Amazon's Kindle DX electronic reading device as a means o …

technology, civil-rights, kindle-dx, amazon

CN Real . . . ly Stupid

Seeded on Wed Jul 1, 2009 11:56 PM EDT (blog.toonzone.net)

On Wednesday, June 17, Cartoon Network's umpteenth pandering of Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel's usual audience while ignoring the successes of the past year with the exception of Total Drama Island and Clone Wars premiered.

entertainment, cartoon-network, cable, brand-wandering

Top 10 Thinking Traps Exposed

Seeded on Wed Jul 1, 2009 3:39 PM EDT (litemind.com)

Our minds set up many traps for us. Unless we're aware of them, these traps can seriously hinder our ability to think rationally, leading us to bad reasoning and making stupid decisions. Features of our minds that are meant to help us may, eventually, get us into trouble.

science, psychology, mind-traps

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