I got the DLink router, and btw, it has a fantastic browser-based interface, best I've ever used -- anyway -- I carefully restarted all the machines after carefully setting up the router -- and then the moment of truth, boot up the MSI Wind. And the exact same thing happened. It took the router down! I don't know how it's even possible, but I repeated the drill and it did it again, and that was the end for me. I am not a professional hardware debugger, I'm just going to say I got a bad unit. I boxed it up and sent it back to Amazon in Lexington, KY. I still had more unwinding to do, because the Slingbox doesn't like the DLink, so finally now I'm back to my Airport Extreme, the router I forgot I had. It worked so well with everything but you-know-what. Kevin Tofel, who I respect enormously has nothing but praise for the MSI, but I paid my dues now, I'm going to take a deep breath and move on to other work for the rest of the week. Five days of futzing with hardware is enough!

I got the DLink router, and btw, it has a fantastic browser-based interface, best I've ever used -- anyway -- I carefully restarted all the machines after carefully setting up the router -- and then the moment of truth, boot up the MSI Wind. And the exact same thing happened. It took the router down! I don't know how it's even possible, but I repeated the drill and it did it again, and that was the end for me. I am not a professional hardware debugger, I'm just going to say I got a bad unit. I boxed it up and sent it back to Amazon in Lexington, KY. I still had more unwinding to do, because the Slingbox doesn't like the DLink, so finally now I'm back to my Airport Extreme, the router I forgot I had. It worked so well with everything but you-know-what. Kevin Tofel, who I respect enormously has nothing but praise for the MSI, but I paid my dues now, I'm going to take a deep breath and move on to other work for the rest of the week. Five days of futzing with hardware is enough!

I got the DLink router, and btw, it has a fantastic browser-based interface, best I've ever used -- anyway -- I carefully restarted all the machines after carefully setting up the router -- and then the moment of truth, boot up the MSI Wind. And the exact same thing happened. It took the router down! I don't know how it's even possible, but I repeated the drill and it did it again, and that was the end for me. I am not a professional hardware debugger, I'm just going to say I got a bad unit. I boxed it up and sent it back to Amazon in Lexington, KY. I still had more unwinding to do, because the Slingbox doesn't like the DLink, so finally now I'm back to my Airport Extreme, the router I forgot I had. It worked so well with everything but you-know-what. Kevin Tofel, who I respect enormously has nothing but praise for the MSI, but I paid my dues now, I'm going to take a deep breath and move on to other work for the rest of the week. Five days of futzing with hardware is enough!

Okay so this one is not scary or hardcore at all. It's basically two skeletons on a see-saw that is powered by a simple to use and cheap wiper motor. Not scary but for those Halloween parties or kid friendly events it's very whimsical.

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This ain't no SpaceShipOne. Copenhagen Suborbitals is a Danish group of maverick researchers hoping to launch a human being into space on a rocket booster vehicle. The nosecone holds one astronaut in an upright position, "with a full view through a polymer plexiglas-dome to experience the entire ballistic ride." From the Copenhagen Suborbitals mission statement:

We are currently developing a series of suborbital space vehicles - designed to pave the way for manned space flight on a micro size spacecraft.

Two rocket vehicles are under development. A small unmanned sounding rocket, named Hybrid Atmospheric Test Vehicle or HATV and a larger booster rocket named Hybrid Exo Atmospheric Transporter or HEAT, designed to carry a micro spacecraft into a suborbital trajectory in space.

The mission has a 100% peacefull purpose and is not in any way involved in carrying explosive, nuclear, biological and chemical payloads.

We intend to share all our techninal information as much as possible, within the laws of EU-export control.

Copenhagen Suborbitals (Thanks, Jens-Martin Skibsted!)

Evan Ravitz has a knoll about curing parasitical infections naturally with Quassia, which contains the "phytochemical quassin, the bitterest substance found in nature."

People traveling in 3rd world countries are often afraid of intestinal parasites, but, having lived for 3 years in poorer areas of Mexico and 2 in Guatemala, I learned there are easy solutions. I picked up amoebic dysentery several times while on long bicycle trips, and knowing how to deal with them, I was able to continue with no problems. This method is for healthy people only!

Here's how I do it: If my gut hurts, I wait two days. If it's just a bacterial infection, you should start to feel better. Coconut milk is very soothing. Definitely avoid alcohol and sweets, which bacteria and other parasites love.

If after 2 days, you feel as bad or worse, you should start treatment with a “full-spectrum antibiotic” -or the herb Quassia, which is used in much the same way -especially if there is mucus in your feces and sulphur in the gas you pass.In most of Latin America, just go to a Pharmacia and ask for Flagyl (or the generic Metronidazole), the cheap drug available everywhere or say “tengo amebas” (“I have amoebas”) and they'll almost certainly give you Flagyl. In the U.S. you need a prescription, so DON'T WAIT until you return or you'll have to pay for expensive tests to get treatment -while the amoebas are eating your lunch, dinner and breakfast and you are getting weaker.

Quassia won't make you feel as bad as Flagyl, but neither is fun. Both are killing everything in your gut, so you need to replenish the beneficial bacteria with probiotics, like yoghurt, kefir, sauerkraut, miso, etc., after the treatment.

Often people with amoebas will wait longer until they're really sick and go to a doctor for a stool test. If they don't find the amoebas with a microscope the first time, and you wait longer, it will take weeks or more to recover your strength after you take the treatment. That's why I assume I have them if I don't feel better in 2 days. Neither treatment is pleasant, but you'll function fine, which is nearly impossible with amoebas.

Quassia is available at herb and health food shops. It will be either shredded or chopped. Take a large handful on your trip, which should cost a few bucks.

How to cure amoebic dysentery, giardia and worms with Quassia

Jerry shares his strategy for weather-proofing a webcam for use on his balcony. Nice video documentation - one might consider using some silicone to seal up those cable ports. You can see the results of his rig on his site.

More:
DIY $27 Outdoor Webcam Enclosure

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There's been a fair amount of interest in my last few posts on the financial crisis and The Insight Community has been providing some great analysis on how the financial crisis is impacting small businesses. You can see some of the initial input over on American Express's OpenForum blog, as they're sponsoring that discussion. Some good posts to check out are Dennis Howlett's quick tips for small businesses and Zack Miller's concept of "black swan" contingency planning for small businesses. We'll definitely have more on the small business front coming up, but I wanted to go back to what's going on with the banks.

After my initial post, I got an email suggesting that I put too much emphasis on the liquidity problem, and not enough on the insolvency problem. There's been something of an ongoing discussion on this point on various websites, and even the Wall Street Journal got into the act a few days ago, talking to Milton Friedman's co-author on A Monetary History of the United States, Anna Schwartz, who makes the point that the problem absolutely is an insolvency issue, while it appears that much of the federal bailout is focused on dealing with a liquidity problem.

So, what's the difference? In simple terms (and, yes, I'm sure the super finance types may quibble over the specifics, but this should get the broad strokes correct), liquidity problems occur when an entity owes money but doesn't have readily available cash to pay off those debts. They may have other assets, and generally speaking, if they're facing a liquidity problem, they're likely to try to sell off those assets, potentially below cost, just to get the money they need to pay off their debts. Say, for example, you owe $100 for your car loan each month, but don't have the cash to make the payment. You might try to sell something else you own to get that cash, and if you're desperate enough, you may even sell something for less than it's worth, just to get the cash and avoid defaulting.

But much of the problem in the financial world over the past few weeks hasn't been a lack of liquidity but an unwillingness to lend. That is, the banks have a ton of cash on hand, but they're afraid to give it out to anyone, because they don't know if whoever they lend it to will still exist when it comes time to repay. So, instead of lending it out, they're dumping it into the safest of safe investment vehicles: US gov't treasury bonds, even though they pay almost no interest. As the good folks on Planet Money note, treasuries are about the equivalent of stuffing the money into your mattress. You won't lose the money, but you won't make any interest either.

Basically, many of the banks have liquidity (cash), but are so afraid that the others they lend to are insolvent (unable to pay back loans) that they won't loan. That's why you may have heard more and more people talking about the (until recently) obscure "TED spread," which basically represents the difference between the interest rate at which banks are lending to each other (the LIBOR -- or London InterBank Offered Rate) and the interest rate on US treasuries. It's a quick measure to determine how secure banks feel about lending to each other vs. putting money in the proverbial mattress. In normal times, this is pretty small, because lending short term money out to other banks is considered pretty damn safe -- almost as safe as lending to the US government. So, it's usually well below 1%. Over the past few weeks, it's been sitting above 4%, on many days -- which basically means that banks are simply sitting on their cash because they don't trust other banks at all. This week, it finally started dropping, representing at least some easing of concern (though it's still pretty high).

So, as you can see, there's plenty of money in many of these banks, suggesting that they're not so worried about liquidity, but the solvency of everyone else they deal with. Of course, the two things overlap a bit. A bank that doesn't have liquidity may then be considered insolvent as well. On the good side, it looks like the federal government is finally recognizing the difference between liquidity and solvency and is trying to deal with the solvency issue by effectively agreeing to buy up commercial paper from money market funds. Basically, the issue here is that the commercial paper market has been standing still. As we described in our earlier post, this is the short-term lending that goes on between companies all the time, and is important for their liquidity. But with the money market managers afraid of insolvency, they're unwilling to lend money out, if there's not enough evidence they'll get it back. So, now, the government is basically saying, "go ahead and lend it out, and we'll make sure that it gets paid back." That could present a huge risk in terms of pushing the market to do bad loans and stick them to the US government, but as a short-term measure it can certainly help in kick-starting the market. Unfortunately, there are already some complaints that the rules are way too confusing.

That said the real problems touch on both liquidity and solvency, so the real solution needs to deal with both. If we don't deal with the worries over solvency, then we'll have a much bigger liquidity problem across the economy. Because the banks are afraid to lend money out, lots of companies are unable to then get the money they need for daily operations -- and then they become insolvent, creating a disastrous domino effect. Those with money are afraid to lend it, because they're afraid they won't get it back -- and their unwillingness to lend is making it so that others really can't meet their obligations. So, while there's some argument about solvency vs. liquidity, a solvency problem at one part of the chain can create a liquidity problem elsewhere, which in turn leads to solvency problems. This is why it is rather important to get those with money to get it moving again, or it very much is like an engine running out of oil. Just dumping money into the market can help somewhat, but until recently, it was mostly going to banks who already had cash, but weren't lending it.

So, what's it all mean? Well, as of today (and these things are changing pretty quickly), the past few weeks showed that no one was lending to anyone as they all seemed to fear that the folks on the other side wouldn't be around or able to give the money back within the next three months or so. That created a pretty significant risk of limited cash flow problems. The initial moves by the gov't with the bailout didn't seem to do much to deal with that problem, but its more recent moves suggest it now recognizes the real issue and will do what's necessary to fix it. My fear, at this point, is that in typical government fashion, it turns the spigot too far, leading to a situation where, in order to force liquidity into the rest of the market, we end up encouraging and paying for bad loans.

Needless to say, this is still a pretty complex situation, and while it looks like we may have (so far) avoided the worst case scenario, there's reason to be afraid that in all the knob spinning the Fed is doing, we're going to end up overshooting in both directions at points, and that can be just as dangerous in simply delaying inevitable pain.

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Evan Ravitz says:

This 1958 episode of the Bell Telephone Hour, "The Unchained Goddess" clearly explains Global Warming and its dangers. But for 50 years the oil and gas and coal and car industries have bought the ads and politicians to pat us on the head and turn us into addicts.

(I loved these old Bell Telephone Hour Shows. ) 1958 TV show on Global Warming

rennerik writes "Scientists at McGill University in Montreal say they've discovered a new state of matter that could help extend Moore's Law and allow for the fabrication of more tightly packed transistors, or a new kind of transistor altogether. The researchers call the new state of matter 'a quasi-three-dimensional electron crystal.' It was discovered using a device cooled to a temperature about 100 times colder than intergalactic space, following the application of the most powerful continuous magnetic field on Earth."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I can has subtle spying?
Here's an Instructable from the Electronic Frontier Foundation about tracking codes printers add to documents they print. Readers of Make learned about this back in volume 6; now, we've got a convenient video to send our friends:

Here's the link to learn more on EFF's site.

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My friends Matt and Loretta (Matt wrote several fantastic articles for the print edition of bOING bOING) have launched the website for their delightfully eclectic retail store in Brattleboro, Vermont, called Boomerang. You can order products online ranging from Cherry Print Rhumba Panties, Mirrored Die-Cut Acrylic Seahorse Necklaces, to Think Fast Hippe T-shirts.

Amid Boomerang's pistachio striped walls and Pacific Coast-meets-New England woodlands décor, retro-styled classics pack the racks alongside fashion-forward lines, high-end resale, and designer vintage pieces. Artful political tees and one-of-a-kind hand crafted jewelry round out a jumble of expertly edited wares, all subject to the savvy eye and fun-loving spirit of Palazzo, a former actress turned retail dynamo who prefers to keep the business on a short leash, working the floor herself—along with Boomerang's famously helpful staff—five days a week.

Boomerang in Brattleboro, Vermont

MIDI input added to a classic Dubreq Stylophone by by Diabolical Devices / Class A Electronics. [via Synthtopia]

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On Sunday afternoon at Maker Faire Austin, the lights went out. All power was lost in one whole area of the fairgrounds. It turned out that a dome tent from the camping area had taken flight in a dust devil and crashed into the power lines. Fernando Rizo got a couple of great shots of the tent moments before impact.

The story does not end well for the tent

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David Gerard writes "SOS Children's Villages has released the 2008/9 Wikipedia Selection for Schools — 5500 checked and reviewed articles matching the English National Curriculum, produced by SOS for use in their own schools in developing countries. The 2007 edition was a huge success, with distributions to schools in four countries, use by the Hole in the Wall education project, thousands of downloads and disks and around 6000 unique IPs a day visiting the online version — the most successful end-user distribution version of Wikipedia to date."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Gareth writes: "On Sunday afternoon at Maker Faire Austin, the lights went out. All power was lost in one whole area of the fairgrounds. It turned out that a dome tent from the camping area had taken flight in a dust devil and crashed into the power lines. Fernando Rizo got a couple of great shots of the tent moments before impact."

Flying tent at Maker Faire

sneakyimp writes "My brother is an architect and sculptor and wants to create kinetic sculptures powered by wind, steam, and sun. He wants to avoid electrical systems and keep this mechanical. He's prepared to cast metals for custom parts if necessary, but is hoping to find a cheap source of gears, axles, and bearings for the internal mechanical workings of these contraptions. We'll need things like miter/bevel/spur/helical gears, standard and thrust bearings, and axles." Read on below for more on the details of what sneakyimp is looking for — dismembered Capsela units won't do it.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Good overview @ FOLIO with some results of MAKE being on Twitter for Make support, doing special deals, Maker Faire scheduling and more... If you're Twitter, add us!.. Likely useful for the folks out there thinking about putting their companies in the tweet-o-sphere.

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From BailoutSleuth.com:

When the Treasury Department's bailout czar provided an update this week on the government's $700 billion plan to rescue troubled financial institutions, he vowed that it would be an "open and transparent program with appropriate oversight.''

The next day, the Treasury Department put out an announcement about a major bailout-related contract with Bank of New York Mellon Corp. that fell short in the transparency department.

The copy of the agreement that was made public had blacked-out paragraphs in the section covering Bank of New York Mellon's compensation. If the Treasury Department is unwilling to disclose the particulars of that contract -- or even the general outline of the compensation scheme -- that raises questions about how it will treat disclosure of other bailout transactions.

The End of Bailout Transparency Already?

Parz writes "Mods have been an important part of gaming for well over 15 years. Not only have they provided plenty of additional free gaming to players, but they've acted as a launch pad for independent and amateur programmers to show off their skills to potential employers. This Gameplayer article highlights the programmers who are doing it best, and what mods have made biggest and most enjoyable impact on gaming. The article not only provides details for each game, but also links to the downloads, and is a great resource for those interesting in getting up-to-date with this exciting scene." Obviously, this list will seem incomplete to anyone whose favorite mod was omitted. What mods contributed most to your enjoyment?

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Two years ago, I posted about artist and software designer Julian Voss-Andreae who sculpts protein molecules from a variety of materials and had written a HOWTO on his process. Julian has just completed his largest work and I think it's breathtaking. Titled "Angel of the West," the 12-foot tall metal sculpture will be installed next month at the Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Florida. He sent me an email with background on the piece:

(Angel of the West) was inspired by the striking similarity of the human antibody molecule (the key molecule in our immune system) in proportion and function as well: It has 'arms' that grab on to viruses etc. with hand-like region that are highly variable and fit perfectly for each new intruder.

My idea was to use the Leonardo man ('Vitruvian Man', 1490) in the circle, replace the man with the molecule (in my mitered cut technique) and use Leonardo's composition, extrapolated into 3d. To subtly strengthen that connection I made 'rays' under 'wings' that converge visually where the man's head would be.

Julian Voss-Andreae's "Angel of the West"

Previously on BB:
• HOWTO make a protein sculpture

James says: "I'm 37, 6'4", 235 lbs, haven't shaved in 9 days, and I play drums in a metal band. Tears are running down my face like I'm a little kid lost in an amusement park. This is really something." Video of Big Bird singing at Jim Henson's funeral

When I was working for Wired, we coined the term jitteratti (what the digerati become after too many cups of coffee). Caffeine and tech journalism (all journalism, for that matter) seem to go hand-in-hand. So it's sort of fitting that Wired is doing a Starbucks art contest. The idea is to make something cool and interesting exclusively out of Starbucks junk (cups, stirrers, drink holders, etc). Tape, glue, and string are allowed. There doesn't appear to be any prize for the winner, except coverage on the site. C'mon Wired, pony up something decent.

To inspire you, Wired posted this incredible TIE Fighter, made by Wired photographer Dan Winters.

Contest: Make Art From Starbuck's Junk [via Bonnie Burton's Twitter feed]

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The new Make: television program is coming to public television stations in the United States this January. It's hosted by my friend, John Park. I met John at a Machine Project event a couple of years ago and invited him to contribute for Make. He wrote some amazing how-tos for the magazine, and when he came to Maker Faire in San Mateo in May, the Make: television producers spotted him and thought he'd be great as the host. And he is! Make: television preview

longacre writes "If you thought online voting in America was a distant pipe dream (nightmare?), think again: the nation's first Internet-based voting system goes online this Friday, just days after the release of the Damning Report On Sequoia E-Voting Machine Security we discussed yesterday. In the first real world run of the Okaloosa Distance Ballot Piloting (ODBP) test program, election officials from Okaloosa County, Florida have set up kiosks in Germany, the UK and Japan where 600-700 absentee voters — mostly military personnel — are expected to cast ballots. Security experts still have many questions, of course, particularly on the potential for interception of voting data while it travels across oceans (via 'secure VPN'), the security of the kiosks ('hardened laptops' with no hard drives and other sensitive components disabled) and the security of the three data centers (one of which is itself housed overseas, in Barcelona, Spain), not to mention the fact that Florida doesn't exactly have a stellar record when it comes to vote counting. Florida's Dept. of State also has a fairly detailed outline of ODBP's components and processes [PDF]."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Marshall Kirkpatrick had an interesting post at ReadWriteWeb last week declaring that "pure open source is no longer a viable business model." The post (and the title) are based on some research from The451 Group (which does very good research, I should mention). While the actual report costs quite a bit of money, the firm did put up a blog post discussing the research, and it's not as inflammatory as the title might have made it out to be.

The simple fact is that "open source" has never been a business model -- in the same way that free, by itself, has never been a business model. They both can be a very important part of a business model, but anyone who thought that "open source" was a business model probably also believed that "give it away and pray" was a business model. The research report simply highlights that point, effectively pointing out that, while some companies may have incorrectly thought it was a business model, "open source" by itself has never been a business model. Those that bet on "open source as a business model" rather than figuring out how open source works in a business model all realized they needed to change strategies down the road.

Unfortunately, the problem is that many will simply read the bottom line of these reports, rather than the details, and think they mean that open source is a failure as a part of a business model. And that would be a huge mistake. Ignoring the opportunities that are opened up for other business models by open source is just as silly as ignoring how "free" can be a part of almost any business model today. Brushing them aside as not worth pursuing is a strategy that will almost certainly come back to haunt those who underestimate the importance of both concepts.

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Invisible Pink Unicorn writes "Despite nationwide public support for his initial death sentence, a three-judge appeals court has reduced the sentence of Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh to 20 years in prison. Kambakhsh was charged with circulating an article on women's rights that he found online. From the article: 'Family members have said Kambakhsh was beaten and threatened with death until he signed a confession and that local journalists who expressed support for him were warned they would be arrested if they persisted.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Psychology researchers have suggested that if you grew up on black and white TV, you are more likely to dream in monochrome than people who have watched color TV all their lives. Dundee university psychology student Eva Murzyn studied data on the color (or lack-thereof) of people's dreams dating back to the beginning of the 20th century. Then she ran her own survey on more than 60 people, half older than 55 and half under 25. My informal survey of a statistically insignificant number of people supports her thesis. From The Telegraph:

Only 4.4 per cent of the under-25s' dreams were black and white. The over-55s who had had access to colour TV and film during their childhood also reported a very low proportion of just 7.3 per cent.

But the over-55s who had only had access to black-and-white media reported dreaming in black and white roughly a quarter of the time.

Even though they would have spent only a few hours a day watching TV or films, their attention and emotional engagement would have been heightened during this time, leaving a deeper imprint on their mind, Miss Murzyn told the New Scientist.

"The crucial time is between three and 10 when we all begin to have the ability to dream," she said.

"Television and films which by their very nature are interesting and emotionally engaging and even dreamlike. So when you dream you may copy what you have seen on the screen.

"I have even had a computer game player who dreams as if he is in front of a computer screen."

"Black and white TV generation have monochrome dreams" (Thanks, Mathias Crawford!)

At Maker Faire Austin, Evil Mad Scientist Labs was demonstrating some really simple and useful circuits powered by solar cells. Today, they've posted the details on their site.

Interruption-resistant direct drive:
The "direct drive" circuits work well for their design function, but are rather basic. They provide no energy storage, and so are quite vulnerable to blinking out when a bird or cloud passes overhead. For some applications, like running a small fan or pump, that may be perfectly acceptable. For other cases, like powering a microcontroller or other computer, a brief power interruption can be disruptive. Our next circuit design adds a supercapacitor as a "flywheel" to provide continued power during brief interruptions.

Adding a microcontroller:
Our last circuit examples extend the previous designs by adding a small AVR microcontroller. We use the voltage output from the solar panel again to perform darkness detection, but instead take it to an analog input of the microcontroller. The microcontroller is potentially a very low current, efficient device that lets you save power by not running the LED all the time, but (for example) waiting until an hour or two after darkness and/or fading the LEDs on or off, or even intermittently blinking for very low average power consumption.

Simple Solar Circuits

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mikesd81 writes "Wired reports Nicholas Lakes and Viachelav Berkovich are charged with computer fraud [PDF] for a man-in-the-middle attack that allegedly let them run a profitable trucking company without the hassle of driving a truck. For over three years the Russian immigrants hacked a Department of Transportation website called Safersys.org, which maintains a list of licensed interstate trucking companies and brokers. They then went on forums where brokers advertise cargo in need of transportation and negotiate a deal, for example, to transport cargo from American Canyon, California, to Jessup, Maryland, for $3,500. But instead of transporting the load, they would outsource the job to another trucking company posing as the legitimate company whose identity they'd hijacked. They would then invoice the company and take the money. When the company that owned the actual truck tried to contact the company that needed the goods delivered, they found they knew nothing about it. Over all they made nearly $500,000."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

mikesd81 writes "Wired reports Nicholas Lakes and Viachelav Berkovich are charged with computer fraud [PDF] for a man-in-the-middle attack that allegedly let them run a profitable trucking company without the hassle of driving a truck. For over three years the Russian immigrants hacked a Department of Transportation website called Safersys.org, which maintains a list of licensed interstate trucking companies and brokers. They then went on forums where brokers advertise cargo in need of transportation and negotiate a deal, for example, to transport cargo from American Canyon, California, to Jessup, Maryland, for $3,500. But instead of transporting the load, they would outsource the job to another trucking company posing as the legitimate company whose identity they'd hijacked. They would then invoice the company and take the money. When the company that owned the actual truck tried to contact the company that needed the goods delivered, they found they knew nothing about it. Over all they made nearly $500,000."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Berlin-based artist Adele Lack has a show of her micro paintings opening tonight at The Montalbán Gallery in Hollywood, California. The exhibition, titled Small Miracles, runs only until October 26. The gallery was kind enough to share these sneak preview photos with BB. Click on the images above to see them larger. Small Miracles: The Paintings of Adele Lack (Thanks, Angelique Groh!)

UPDATE: As BUNT points out in the comments, I should probably note up front that this installation is related to Charlie Kaufman's new film, "Synecdoche, New York," featuring a character named Adele Lack.

This is a really cool project posted by our friends over at instructables.com. Learn how to make it here.

Of course if you have the skills to make something like this be sure to enter our huge Halloween DIY Contest when you have the chance. Time is running out!

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I AM HITTING THE ROAD. As such, posting will be briefer. Maybe not even complete sentences.

AND I AM PAINED.

For during this exact same time, KAKI KING (incredible guitarist and science fiction movie fan) and THE MOUNTAIN GOATS (led by John Darnielle, American songsmith and horror movie fan, with a band that includes Wurster, drummer and legend of radio comedy) will ALSO be touring, BUT NEVER IN THE SAME CITY AS ME.

BUT YOU MUST NOT SUFFER as I do. Please go and see them, and say hello.

IN THE MEANTIME, I have posted this before on my imitation blog, but in case you are one of MOST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD who did not read it, please watch this amazing document: KAKI KING RECITING VIRGINIA MADSEN'S OPENING MONOLOGUE FROM THE DAVID LYNCH VERSION OF DUNE.

THIS IS not just for the win: it is FOR THE TRIUMPH!

That is all.

"A U.S. entrepreneur takes tropical tourists down deep - in an uninsured submarine he built himself"... I'm posting this because the sub looks pretty cool, but the rest of the story sounds pretty dangerous to me - it seems like it's just going to end in legal action and/or death.

Many who admire Stanley's entrepreneurial pluck are turned off by his cavalier attitude toward risk. "The guy's amazing - he's really cool," says Richard Boggs, technical superintendent at yacht brokerage firm Camper & Nicholsons International. "What disturbs me is that he's taking down people who don't fully understand the risk. That's just wrong, morally and ethically. It's illegal everywhere but the Third World, and for very good reason."

In the course of nearly 1,000 dives, Stanley has managed to amass an enthusiastic clientele. At the end of one ride, a customer was so wowed that he told Stanley that he owned a machine-tool plant in the rural town of Idabel, Okla., and that Stanley could use it free if he ever wanted to build another submarine. Stanley took him up on his offer and spent a year and a half there building a new sub that could carry three people instead of two. It cost him less than $200,000. In gratitude, he dubbed his new vessel Idabel.

Even when carrying one extra paying passenger, Stanley is hardly making a killing. He charges $1,500 per person for a shark dive, which can take more than five hours - not including the time it takes to prep the sub or haul a horse ahead as bait. Stanley conducts about 100 dives a year and posts annual revenues of slightly more than $100,000. He has only a single part-time employee.

To keep himself afloat, Stanley says, "I've had to exploit numerous niches." One is collecting a rare type of mollusk called a slit shell, or Pleurotomariidae, which lives below 300 feet. Stanley figured out how to rig a net on the end of a pole and snag the creatures, earning him up to $3,000 each. "Without them," he says, "I wouldn't have been able to stay in business." Pleurotomariidae are not on any conservationist's list of endangered species - yet.

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We've seen all sorts of abuses of trademark law over the years, but this one may be the most bizarre (by far). Slashdot points us to a government crackdown on a California-based motorcycle gang called the Mongols. Sixty members in seven states were arrested for a variety of crimes including murder, robbery, racketeering, extortion, money laundering, gun trafficking and drug dealing. Basically, it's a takedown on organized crime.

However, what's really odd is that the government is also asking the court to hand over the Mongol's trademarks. Apparently, the group trademarked the name and insignia. If the court grants the request, police say they'd be able to automatically stop anyone they see wearing a Mongol patch and simply take the jacket away from them on the spot. While I'm sure the police would love that authority, this is clearly not what trademark law was intended to do, and would be a pretty big stretch for how trademark law could be used. It would set a dangerous precedent as well in simply handing over trademarks to the government. While I have no doubt that this motorcycle gang was likely involved in plenty of illegal and dangerous activities, that doesn't mean it's okay to abuse trademark law in dealing with them.

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Maximum Prophet writes "When I was in High School, I built an X-Ray machine that (probably) didn't produce any X-Rays. I used an old vacuum tube and high voltage. Little did I know that simple triboluminescence would have enough energy to do useful work." The catch: you'll need to peel your tape in a vacuum, and have the x-ray film at the ready.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Maximum Prophet writes "When I was in High School, I built an X-Ray machine that (probably) didn't produce any X-Rays. I used an old vacuum tube and high voltage. Little did I know that simple triboluminescence would have enough energy to do useful work." The catch: you'll need to peel your tape in a vacuum, and have the x-ray film at the ready.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Safari Books Online, the folks who bring O'Reilly's menagerie of books and thousands more online in the form of an electronic reference library, are now one of BB's sponsors. They're offering every BB reader online access to any one of the following three titles for free:

• JavaScript: The Definitive Guide
• Learning Perl
• Head First HTML with CSS & XHTML

Joel and I thought it would be fun to have a contest based on the kinds of things you might learn from these books. So we came up with a bit of a challenge and Safari put up a sweet prize: a one year subscription to Safari Books Online which normally costs $515. We'll announce the contest here in a few weeks! Free O'Reilly books from Safari

One of my favorite blogs, Photoshop Disasters, found this photo from the Sept. 2008 issue of Marie Claire, and compared the faces of the people in the photo with their reflections in the glass table.

Marie Claire: On reflection, perhaps not

A preview of our upcoming show, debuting in January 2009: A new national series from MAKE magazine, Twin Cities Public Television, and American Public Television... The MAKE stage has gotten a whole lot bigger Make: television brings the spirit and energy of the magazine to TV sets in beautiful HD.

Featuring stories of accomplished Makers and their amazing projects, accompanied by how-to guides that will inspire the Maker in all of us, Make: will draw viewers to delightful examples of American ingenuity and inspire them to make their own projects.

Stay tuned to this website for regular updates. And be sure to visit www.makerchannel.org for a chance to have your video featured in the show — you provide the content, we'll provide the airwaves!

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According to Tokyo Times, this broom shop hasn't sold anything since 1972.

A store that, perhaps due to a niche that’s not exactly necessary nowadays, unfortunately hasn’t had the pleasure of a patron since 1972 — Saturday, September 2nd, to be precise. And even then the customer in question was after a hand brush that unfortunately they didn’t have.

Will someone in Tokyo reading this please go to the store and buy a broom? (And take photos of the transaction so we can post them here?) Tokyo retail reflection

javipas writes "A simple analysis of the most updated version (a Git checkout) of the Linux kernel reveals that the number of lines of all its source code surpasses 10 million lines of code, but attention: this number includes blank lines, comments and text files. With a deeper analysis thanks to SLOCCount tool, you can get the real number of pure code lines: 6.399.191, with 96,4% of them developed in C, and 3,3% using assembler. The number grows clearly with each new version of the kernel, that seems to be launched each 90 days aproximately."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I really like this one as it could be part of a whole circus from hell type of theme. Every good circus needs a human cannon ball and a knife throwing wheel. The cannon ball is up to you but here is the wheel o death for your knife throwing.

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Todd's article on getting the new T-Mobile G1 (Google Android) to sync with a Mac...

My T-Mobile G1 phone based on Google's Android platform arrived on Monday. It was a big change for me because I've been using Windows Mobile based smartphones since 2002 when I started with the very first T-Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition. Since Android phones sync directly with Google Calendar and Gmail Contacts, this also meant switching away from Microsoft Outlook on my old Windows XP PC. Given this big change, I thought it might be interesting to see if I could sync Contacts and Calendar with my Mac. One of my goals was to only use tools provided by Apple or Google. I wanted to avoid trust issues involved with using third party web services that worked as an intemediatry between the Google web services and my Mac.

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Last week, Microsoft was kind enough to invite me to sit down, one-on-one with Horacio Gutierrez, the company's VP and Deputy General Counsel in charge of intellectual property and licensing. As you might imagine, given my views on the patent system in general, and Microsoft's gradual embrace of the patent system specifically, he and I disagreed on a fair amount. We agreed that the patent system should be focused on encouraging innovation. We agreed that there were abuses of the system. From there, our views pretty much diverged, though the conversation was fun and lively.

Gutierrez began the conversation by focusing on all of the "benefits" that Microsoft sees to the patent system, which focused on all of the licensing deals that the company has done. He positioned it by noting that the patent portfolio allows the Microsoft to get into deeper business relationships with other entities. Specifically, he noted that in many cases what began as a patent licensing discussion eventually leads to a much more complete business relationship that increases interoperability. He cited deals with both Sun and Novell as examples of this.

The problem, of course, is that this ignores how these deals actually began. Rather than approaching each other over mutually beneficial relationships, they really involve an implicit threat. That is, Microsoft shows up with its big patent portfolio (or, let's say, a big pointy stick) and says "hey, let's make a deal, or I'll jab you with the pointy stick." Yes, that can obviously lead to further business deals, but it's not about two companies entering into a relationship willingly for mutual benefit. It's all based on a rather clear threat.

The fallacy that Gutierrez laid out is that these sorts of relationships and interoperability are impossible to come by without the use of that pointy stick. That's difficult to believe. If the relationships really are mutually beneficial, then they are likely to come about in a much more friendly manner anyway. When I pointed out (literally) that Microsoft coming to companies with a big stick didn't seem like the friendliest of business negotiations, Gutierrez suggested that you "need" the stick to make the conversations work. On that we disagree, and there's a pretty long history of companies entering into mutually beneficial relationships that don't necessarily involve the threat of a lawsuit or government granted monopolies on processes.

Gutierrez also pointed out that any complex product these days, by its very nature, will violate numerous patents from numerous other companies and individuals. Thus, his argument is that we really should focus on mechanisms to avoid lawsuits to allow those products to move forward. Thus, licensing is preferable to lawsuits. That's true, but misses the point. The fact that no complex product can be brought to market without violating numerous patents should be seen as the problem, rather than a truism that is solved through licensing. Let's fix the problem that makes it so difficult for products to get to market without paying a "tax" to other companies, and figure out ways to let companies innovate freely and compete in the marketplace.

I was somewhat surprised to also hear Gutierrez claim that because of this "patent thicket" situation these days, you couldn't innovate without patents. I interrupted him to point out that this was ridiculous on its face, as Microsoft's own history showed. His response was that the situation had changed as the interpretation of both copyright and patent law over the past couple of decades had changed, such that protections that the company had thought it had in the early years didn't really exist, and additional rulings made it clear that other protections would be useful. Needless to say, I find that unconvincing. There's plenty of evidence that a ton of innovation occurred when software companies focused on the market, rather than on ownership of ideas.

Gutierrez also insisted on pointing out that Microsoft's rather massive patent portfolio had been voted by some third party to be one of, if not the, best patent portfolios in terms of quality. He suggested that other firms, such as IBM, were more likely to file very questionable patents, but Microsoft was much more focused on quality. Perhaps that's a subjective measure, but given how many questionable Microsoft patents we see around here all the time, some may beg to differ -- or at least point out that some questionable patents are getting through.

In discussing all of this with Gutierrez, I brought up the company's continual FUD campaign, where it goes to the press to wave that pointy stick around, in announcing that Linux violates over 200 Microsoft patents. Gutierrez noted that he was among the Microsoft execs who had made those statements, and he stood by them, claiming that Richard Stallman agrees, and falling back on his earlier claim of all complex products violating some patents, which is why he says they just want Linux vendors to work out some sort of patent licensing agreement. That, of course, doesn't answer the question of why Microsoft keeps screaming about patent infringement, but never bothers to show what patents anyone infringes on.

Finally, we did have a fun conversation on the historical and macro level impacts of patent systems throughout history, where he asserted that perhaps the reason so many countries have found faster innovation in eras of fewer patents was because it makes sense to ignore patents during developmental phases, but after that to put protections in place. I pointed out that it seemed difficult to believe that there was some fundamental shift in economics that meant patents made sense at one time, but not at another -- but by then we were running out of time to discuss things.

On the whole, however, I'll say that we had a spirited discussion on the role of the patent system in encouraging innovation. More than once, we agreed that the conversation might have been more fun if we were having it around a couple of beers, rather than a Microsoft conference table. While I don't think either of us changed each other's minds, I did appreciate the chance to sit down and discuss these issues face to face on the record, and I hope to have a chance to continue the discussion in the future. I can understand where he is coming from and what Microsoft's position on the matter is, but you have to admit, as the holder of a bigger pointy stick than most other participants, Microsoft may be more inclined than others to be a big supporter of being allowed to use the big pointy stick.

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Radley Balko of Reason says the current GOP is nothing like the limited-government party of days past, and because of that, the Democrats must win in the upcoming election.

While I'm not thrilled at the prospect of an Obama administration (especially with a friendly Congress), the Republicans still need to get their clocks cleaned in two weeks, for a couple of reasons.

First, they had their shot at holding power, and they failed. They've failed in staying true to their principles of limited government and free markets. They've failed in preventing elected leaders of their party from becoming corrupted by the trappings of power, and they've failed to hold those leaders accountable after the fact. Congressional Republicans failed to rein in the Bush administration's naked bid to vastly expand the power of the presidency (a failure they're going to come to regret should Obama take office in January). They failed to apply due scrutiny and skepticism to the administration's claims before undertaking Congress' most solemn task—sending the nation to war. I could go on.

As for the Bush administration, the only consistent principle we've seen from the White House over the last eight years is that of elevating the American president (and, I guess, the vice president) to that of an elected dictator. That isn't hyperbole. This administration believes that on any issue that can remotely be tied to foreign policy or national security (and on quite a few other issues as well), the president has boundless, limitless, unchecked power to do anything he wants. They believe that on these matters, neither Congress nor the courts can restrain him.

That's the second reason the GOP needs to lose. American voters need to send a clear, convincing repudiation of these dangerous ideas.

Why the Republicans Must Lose

stoolpigeon writes "The number and functionality of web based applications has exploded recently. Many of these applications rely heavily on AJAX to provide a more desktop-like experience for users. As the number of people using JavaScript grew, libraries were developed to assist with commonly encountered issues. Jim Harmon's new book Dojo: Using the Dojo JavaScript Library to Build Ajax Applications aims to introduce readers to one of those libraries, the Dojo Toolkit." Keep reading for the rest of JR's review.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Rob Ullman writes:

A few years back, my good pal J Chris Campbell and the fine folks of Wide Awake Press published the Wide Awake 666 anthology. As a way of celebrating one of my favorite holidays, and because I don't imagine I'll have time to create anything new before said holiday, I thought I'd share one of my pieces from that fine book. It's one of two pieces I did for the book, the other which I mentioned quite awhile ago.

Now, as you're well aware, I'm kinda known as a guy who draws the girls. I wanted to do something in that vein for WA666, but I didn't want to do some gross thing where some cutie is being killed by a zombie or something, so I compromised, and came up with something totally gross yet pretty funny. I used the cover of an oft-seen collection of pin-up paintings by the great Gil Elvgren as a starting point, and did my own little homage to this familiar image.

Zombie Gil Elvgren

Yesterday I went to lunch at one of my favorite local lunch places. 12:30PM on a weekday, the place usually is buzzing, but not today. I was the only lunch customer. While I waited another person came in. The place had an awful dead feel to it. I thought to myself: Okay this is what a recession looks like.

Yesterday I went to lunch at one of my favorite local lunch places. 12:30PM on a weekday, the place usually is buzzing, but not today. I was the only lunch customer. While I waited another person came in. The place had an awful dead feel to it. I thought to myself: Okay this is what a recession looks like.

The Toyota station wagon recreational vehicle that never happened, Popular Science 1973.

Toyota recently unveiled this jazzy-looking station wagon at the New York auto show. The station wagon (bottom photo) opens into a roomy camper (top). Toyota calls this 186-inch-long car the RV-2. It seats four, and stores in any garage. But the clamshell canopy can be unfolded anytime you’re parked, and there’s enough room for the passengers to eat and sleep inside. Beds, table, and chairs store neatly inside when not in use. Unfortunately, there are no definite plans to produce this unique RV, but it’s interesting to see auto manufacturers cooking up some attractive new ideas.

More: World's lowest camper van - built in 3 days. Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Transportation | Digg this!

I just tripped over a heretofore unknown feature of Google.



Theoretically, unless I misunderstand, and I probably do, if you "subscribe" to Scripting News, then you'll be more likely to see results from this site in your Google searches?

Oy it seems I have to add keywords to my RSS feed.

Google doesn't need keywords. That's the whole point of Google. That's what makes it great, why it works. It can find stuff without keywords.

This is 1/2 a great idea (I've been lobbying for something like it for years) but I'm not jumping through all these hoops.

This is wrong in so many ways.

Of course I could still be completely missing the point.

PS: There was no need to invent a new namespace for the feature they added to RSS, it already has a category element that does what their new element does. They made the same mistake Apple made with iTunes. If they had looked before they lept they would both be using the same element and their feeds would be interchangeable.

I just tripped over a heretofore unknown feature of Google.



Theoretically, unless I misunderstand, and I probably do, if you "subscribe" to Scripting News, then you'll be more likely to see results from this site in your Google searches?

Oy it seems I have to add keywords to my RSS feed.

Google doesn't need keywords. That's the whole point of Google. That's what makes it great, why it works. It can find stuff without keywords.

This is 1/2 a great idea (I've been lobbying for something like it for years) but I'm not jumping through all these hoops.

This is wrong in so many ways.

Of course I could still be completely missing the point.

PS: There was no need to invent a new namespace for the feature they added to RSS, it already has a category element that does what their new element does. They made the same mistake Apple made with iTunes. If they had looked before they lept they would both be using the same element and their feeds would be interchangeable.

An anonymous reader writes "They've been on the drawing board for 40 years but the politicos have finally approved routes for the 500kph maglev trains to replace bullet trains." I wonder if they'll let me test out maglev rollerblades on the track.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "They've been on the drawing board for 40 years but the politicos have finally approved routes for the 500kph maglev trains to replace bullet trains." I wonder if they'll let me test out maglev rollerblades on the track.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "They've been on the drawing board for 40 years but the politicos have finally approved routes for the 500kph maglev trains to replace bullet trains." I wonder if they'll let me test out maglev rollerblades on the track.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

It's been over five years ago since we pointed out how silly the world would be if we started bringing real world justice into virtual worlds. It sets up a ridiculous situation, since the way any virtual world works is based on how it's programmed. If there's a problem with an action, it should be up to whoever controls the game to fix the problem, rather than the real world police. If you start setting a precedent where the "theft" of a virtual item in a video game is considered theft, then how do you deal with online worlds where theft is a part of the game? If the game allows it, then it should be a part of the game.

Even with plenty of people warning about how ridiculous it would be for police to get involved in searching for a stolen magic sword, it seems that hasn't stopped people from going to the police. In the past, the lawsuits have usually been for other crimes besides theft, though. We had one for illegal computer access, after a woman logged into a boyfriend's account and deleted his virtual objects. In another case, someone was charged with copyright infringement for "copying" weapons.

However, now we have a case of an actual theft charge in the Netherlands. Two kids have been convicted of theft of a (I kid you not) "virtual amulet and a virtual mask" in the game Runescape. The details are pretty scarce, but apparently the two kids "coerced" another kid to hand over the items, and to the court that's as good as theft:

"These virtual goods are goods (under Dutch law), so this is theft."

I have to admit I don't know much about Runescape, but a quick look at the website mentions that it can involve "fights to the death." Does that mean we'll soon have murder charges stemming from the game? Update: Some folks in the comments have helpfully filled in some of the details that were lacking from the original article. The two kids in this case apparently beat up and threatened at knifepoint (in real life) the other kid in order to get him to give them the virtual amulet. As others in the comments point out, it sounds like they should have been charged with assault and battery, but still not theft.

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A lovely "mostly old transistor radio" photo set....

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This huge spider is made from a lawnchair, septic tubing, and, of course, duct tape. Looks like it's gotten someone already.

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An anonymous reader writes "The economic crisis will ultimately eliminate open source projects and the 'Web 2.0 free economy,' says Andrew Keen, author of The Cult of the Amateur. Along with the economic downturn and record job loss, he says, we will see the elimination of projects including Wikipedia, CNN's iReport, and much of the blogosphere. Instead of users offering their services 'for free,' he says, we're about to see a 'sharp cultural shift in our attitude toward the economic value of our labor' and a rise of online media businesses that reward their contributors with cash. Companies that will survive, he says, include Hulu, iTunes, and Mahalo. 'The hungry and cold unemployed masses aren't going to continue giving away their intellectual labor on the Internet in the speculative hope that they might get some "back end" revenue,' says Keen."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

... we can stop waiting around for browser makers to give us what we want, thanks to their efforts on JS engines, and start using the advanced CSS we've been hearing about for years.

#

The ASRD is a clever design concept project with shoes that tell you when you're near Wi-Fi... via Bruce Sterling. I fully expect someone to actually "make" these by the end of the week! Below are some links to get you started...

The idea of footwear was pushed further by converging elements of digital culture with fashion and design into a wearble technology. The end product is a sneaker designed to detect Wi-Fi wireless internet hot-spots wherever the user may roam, with every step.

The ASRD™ sneaker is equipped with an integrated wireless internet detection unit embedded under the flap of the left shoe. Once the pressure sensitive insole is activated, the unit scans the surrounding area for Wi-Fi signals and displays the result through LEDs.

The three LEDs on the flap enclosure represent the signal strength of any wireless internet signals within a 50 meter area. A blinking LED represents no signal, while a solid LED shows that there is a signal present.

More:


Embedding a wifi detector into a backpack strap workshop.

Wi-Fi finder hacking.

Make your own wireless detector...

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The Atlantic has a very striking ad campaign, I like neon - so it's fun to see these Jenny Holzer style messages in various places - the one above is my fave, very MAKE-y.

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miller60 writes "Google doesn't allow the public inside its secret data centers. But a recent groundbreaking event at the company's new South Carolina data center provided glimpses of the exterior of the facility, which shows a design that has evolved since Google's Oregon data center made front page news. A new feature: an open, lighted area resembling a parking deck (containers?). Still missing: moats filled with sharks with friggin' laser beams on their head."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Opto-Isolator - Interactive Art by Golan Levin and Collaborators via NOTCOT.

Opto-Isolator (2007: Golan Levin with Greg Baltus) inverts the condition of spectatorship by exploring the questions: "What if artworks could know how we were looking at them? And, given this knowledge, how might they respond to us?" The sculpture presents a solitary mechatronic blinking eye, at human scale, which responds to the gaze of visitors with a variety of psychosocial eye-contact behaviors that are at once familiar and unnerving. Among other forms of feedback, Opto-Isolator looks its viewer directly in the eye; appears to intently study its viewer's face; looks away coyly if it is stared at for too long; and blinks precisely one second after its visitor blinks.

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John Markoff quotes Steve Jobs. "We don't know how to build a sub-$500 computer that is not a piece of junk."

As with all Jobsisms, it's beautifully elegant, true -- and misleading. You have to read it very carefully.

He isn't saying no one knows how to build one, just that "we" don't know how to. Fine. And the last part is almost Republican it's so clever and nasty. He's not actually slamming Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Acer and MSI, but if you don't read it carefully you might think he's saying they're pieces of junk. I think he's been studying Sean Hannity.

Now here's what Dave Winer, Mac user, says: They are not pieces of junk. Quite the opposite, they are elegant Mac-like products, and you can be absolutely sure behind the scenes Steve is throwing tantrums at his engineers day and night extolling their virtues and telling them to hurry up cause their lunch is being eaten. This is the same guy who said people don't want video on their iPods until he had an iPod with video.

Jobs then said that the iPhone could be seen as Apple's netbook. Hmmm. Maybe Jobs doesn't understand what's so appealing about netbooks. I suppose it's possible.

Look, iPhones are not and never will be netbooks. Just like writing for the NYT is not and never will be blogging (Markoff once said the NYT was his blog).

iPhones are too locked to be netbooks.

OK, I suppose it's time to say what a netbook is...

1. Small size.

2. Low price.

3. Battery life of 4+ hours. Battery can be replaced by user. Atom processor seems to be a requirement, those that aren't Atom aren't selling (and are apparently being discontinued).

4. Rugged.

5. Built-in wifi, 3 USB ports, SD card reader. It seems it must have 802.11n to be taken seriously.

6. Runs my software.

7. Runs any software I want (no platform vendor to decide what's appropriate).

8. Competition (users have choice and can switch vendors at any time).

As a Mac user I would very much like to see a Mac netbook. Yes, I know if I'm willing to hack, I can get Mac OS to run on one, but I have a hard enough time keeping supported hardware working.

On the other hand, Windows XP/Home is not so bad as long as it doesn't get infected with malware. So far I'm happy.

What I am using (the most frequent question potential netbook owners ask): Asus Eee PC 901, purchased in July for $600, now sells for $440. I took it with me to the DNC and it was the only computer i used. Now when I travel, I leave the MacBook Pro at home. Too heavy, too much computer to carry.

I've suggested elsewhere that it might be time to have a Netbook conference. I'd be happy to participate as a host, organizer, or speaker. There's an active community of bloggers following netbooks, and it's a happy cooperative place. It feels like the early days of the Apple II or IBM PC.

If Jobs is missing the excitement that would be a shame because it would be nice to have an Apple netbook, and no the iPhone is not a netbook. Not even close.

Smivs writes "The BBC report on a new gizmo that can block/filter spam phone calls. The system basically intercepts all calls. If it recognizes them as a friend or a member of the user's family — numbers on the so-called star list created by the user — it lets them through as normal. If the caller's number is on a zap list — numbers of telemarketers or other nuisance callers — the device answers it, and all future calls from that number, with an automated message which means the phone does not ring at all. If the system doesn't recognize the caller's number, or the caller withholds their number, it asks them who they are, puts them on hold and then rings the user's phone. The user has the option of taking the call, having the system take a message, or they can reject the call and add the number to the 'zap' list. Users can add callers to their 'star' list by pressing the star button on their phone at any point during a call." So wait, they can't spam me twice? If I press a button? And if they actually show their phone number on my caller ID? What about the auto insurance scammers that hit me 10x/week?

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Yesterday I got an email from Bret Taylor at FriendFeed saying that their new "realtime" API had been deployed publicly, so I quickly took a look, and found that, as with all other elements of their API, it's simple and easy to support. I immediately wrote glue to connect it to the OPML Editor.

FriendFeed: Real-time API (beta).

To understand how it works, consider a hypothetical web app. I live about 1/2 block from a bus that goes to the BART station. Suppose there's a web page that updates when the bus passes a stop about a mile from my house. I'd point my web browser to the page, but it wouldn't refresh right away, but when the bus approached, the page would upload, and flash some kind of message saying "Get out there Dave!"

That's how FriendFeed's realtime API works. Ask a question and wait for a response. You might wait a long time, minutes, even hours, and that's a good thing. When the event you asked about happens, you can act on it instantaneously. And instead of making thousands of calls asking "Is it done yet?" you make just one.

Now it may sound like a silver bullet, but like all things in computer design, there's a tradeoff. You have to keep a process running waiting for the answer, and over on the FriendFeed side, they have to keep a process running too. But it's probably a good tradeoff. And the performance is stunning. I tested it with my own FriendFeed account and the script running on my machine detects updates the instant they happen; unlike polling apps I have running against Twitter that sometimes take 2 or 3 minutes to detect a change.

I have a project that's been waiting for just this functionality, I hope to get to it after the election.

One more comment -- FriendFeed does a good job with the APIs. When asked, I recommend that other developers just do it the way FriendFeed does. I was able to get something running within a couple of minutes. Once I got that far, I'm pretty well hooked, but only had to put in another hour to complete the project. Considering that the goal of an API is to get developers to hook into your service, this feature, and the performance of the service which is also excellent, is all that it takes to get a chance at uptake. That's why I'll generally put aside other work when there's a new feature in the FriendFeed API.

Last week, we wrote about the details showing how Radiohead's experiments with a new business model was successful. However, a couple of readers sent in an article at The Register, which looked into Radiohead's success, and concluded that musicians shouldn't be happy about it, because Radiohead's success may destroy their "hard-fought" collective bargaining arrangements.

There is some amount of truth in this, but it shouldn't be seen as a bad thing for musicians. Part of Radiohead's success was that it, indeed, was able to get certain royalty collections groups to effectively "bend the rules" for the experiment. The Register seems to argue that this is a bad thing, as it will destroy the validity of those royalty groups. However, that's not a bad thing for musicians at all. We've already explained why we think compulsory licenses are a bad idea, creating a bureaucratic nightmare where only the lawyers really benefit. More importantly, they serve as a complex patchwork system to guarantee an old and obsolete business model -- which is why Radiohead had to work around them. Because of this, you get various collections societies making ridiculous claims about representing artists, when some artists don't agree with their stance at all. Yet, because it's "compulsory" many artists have no choice.

Cracking the legitimacy of these royalty collecting societies isn't damaging to musicians. It's just the first step in helping them to embrace much better business models.

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Singer-songwriter Josh Pyke rode this rather nifty guitar-boat into Australia's Sydney Harbor as part of a shoot for an upcoming music video. The giant-sized floating six-string is a replica of the musician's instrument of choice - a Maton brand acoustic.

No details on the construction, but I'm guessing Pyke's a big Roger Waters fan … err … Billy Ocean? - Rockin' the boat

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We've blogged about the Touchshield for Arduino before here on Make, but this demo shows an interesting use of the add-on that allows for 3D animation on the device. Check out the video for details.

via Tinker

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hackerdownunder writes "India's maiden lunar mission (Chandrayaan-1) got off to a flying start today. Describing the launch as "perfect and precise", the chairman of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), G Madhavan Nair, said that it would be 14 days before the satellite would enter into lunar orbit. Chandrayaan carries eleven payloads, five designed and developed in India, three from European Space Agency, one from Bulgaria and two from NASA."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

johkir writes "As early as 1965, when Al Gore was a freshman in college, a panel of distinguished environmental scientists warned President Lyndon B. Johnson that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels might cause 'marked changes in climate' that 'could be deleterious.' Yet the scientists did not so much as mention the possibility of reducing emissions. Instead they considered one idea: 'spreading very small reflective particles' over about five million square miles of ocean, so as to bounce about 1 percent more sunlight back to space — 'a wacky geoengineering solution.' In the decades since, geoengineering ideas never died, but they did get pushed to the fringe — they were widely perceived by scientists and environmentalists alike as silly and even immoral attempts to avoid addressing the root of the problem of global warming. Three recent developments have brought them back into the mainstream." We've discussed some pretty strange ideas in the geoengineering line over the last few years.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Come along on a whirlwind video tour of musical devices found at Maker Faire Austin 2008.

There was much goodness to be seen and heard on the Travis County Fairgrounds this past weekend - a ginormous thanks goes out to all the creative minds that made it happen! Keep on with the makin' and shakin'!

For a better view, be sure to click over to Vimeo for the HD version

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It's taken us a little while, but we've finally found the time to write up a much-needed 'Help' section for our lens reviews. Focusing mainly on how to use our interactive data display 'widget', but also featuring useful tidbits of extra information and a 'Frequently Asked Questions' page, it can be found in the 'Learn/Glossary' section of the site.

Here is my flickr photo set from Maker Faire Austin 2008. It was an amazing event filled with great people, amazing performances, and thousands of really cool projects. See you all at the next Maker Faire!

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You have to admit that there are some creative scammers out there. Take, for example, a group of Russian immigrants, who used their hacking skills to effectively run a trucking company that didn't exist. They would hack into a Department of Transportation website that listed licensed trucking firms to change the contact info (temporarily) on certain firms to their own address and phone number. Then, they would go to another online site that listed cargo in need of transportation. They'd pose as the firm whose contact info they'd replaced, get the deal, and then go find another trucking firm to actually deliver the cargo. The cargo itself would get delivered, and the scammers would contact the original cargo owners to get paid. Then, the company that actually delivered the cargo would contact the company these scammers pretended to be working for, and discover that it had no clue what they were talking about. Apparently, this scam was effective enough to net the scammers over a half-million dollars. Of course, it wasn't effective enough to keep them from getting arrested.

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This little hack would certainly double your haul at my house on Halloween. I guess it's never too early to teach your kids how to work the system!

More:

DIY Halloween contest! This is the BIG ONE!!!!

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Just Posted! Sony Alpha 900 in-depth review. Sony's eagerly anticipated flagship digital SLR finally gives Minolta/Konica Minolta users a full frame option and, on paper, looks like a strong new entry to the exclusive full frame club. Featuring the 24.6 MP CMOS sensor announced in January, the Alpha 900 offers several enticing features, including sensor-shift image stabilization, a super 100% coverage viewfinder and the same high resolution screen as the Alpha 700. To find out how it fared in our extensive testing check out the in-depth review after the link.

Adobe has released updates to its Camera Raw Plug-in for Photoshop CS4 and Lightroom 2. Camera Raw 5.1 provides raw support to the 15 cameras that were included in the 4.6 update for CS3 users. Lightroom 2.1 has now been released officially, improving Photoshop integration and keyword migration from Lightroom.

Alex Leone made a keyless entry system with an Arduino, a touch sensor, and a giant servo. The web site has the code and according to Alex "The Worst Schematic Ever". Alex, I've seen worse...way worse.

More about the Keyless Entry System Using the Arduino [arduino.cc]

In the Maker Shed:


Make: Arduino

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BearGrylls writes "As a young lad and aspiring technologist I have found shows like Revision3's 'The Broken' and 'Systm' to be entertaining, informative, and, most importantly, thorough. As time has gone on revision3 has kept some of the tech-related shows, but dumbed them down to appeal to a larger audience. This annoyed me, but I've continued to be a loyal viewer of their tech shows anyway. However, I suspect this trend to continue and my disappointment to grow. Where can I find tech shows that dive deep into projects and discussions instead of simply skimming the surface?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Video from MindBites of their visit to Maker Faire Austin, nice music!

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Last month, we mocked some mainstream press reports claiming both a broadband price war and the fact that broadband prices were rising. There doesn't really seem to be much of either, as broadband prices have remained pretty constant, even accounting for promotional pricing. However, with Comcast getting ready to significantly boost speeds (yes, with its broadband caps, Ryan Radia is wondering if the actual "price war" is hidden by the fact that it's in price per megabit.

In other words, if prices remain constant, but your speed doubles, isn't that something of a price decrease? Radia chalks this all up to competition in the market, but it should at least be admitted that the speeds (even these higher speeds) still pale in comparison to other countries where there is much greater competition than in the US, where most people still are limited to only two real choices. Either way, as someone who's still stuck on a home connection that runs around 500k (below the new 768k cutoff for "real" broadband) despite being in the center of Silicon Valley, I'm still not convinced that these greater speeds are so readily available yet.

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The art of gigantic wall decals nears perfection with this huge-mongoose zombie silhouette design, up for bids on eBay.

HUGE LIVING DEAD ZOMBIE ATTACK WALL ART VINYL DECAL! (Thanks, Chip!)

This interesting art project consists of a computer speech to text loop that continually degrades over time. One machine reads text aloud that is alayzed by another computer which then speaks the text, while the next machine analyzes it and speaks the result as well. The result is printed out in real-time on a nearby printer to keep a record of the conversation. Also see Apple Talk by Jurg Lehni as a reference for this project.

Taiwa-Hensokuki

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Amenacier writes "Melbourne scientists recently discovered that stem cells isolated from human fat could be made to turn into beating heart muscle cells when cultured with rat heart cells. This discovery may lead to the use of fat stem cells in repairing cardiac damage, or fixing such cardiac problems as holes in the heart. It is proposed that culturing the stem cells with rat heart cells allows them to differentiate into heart muscle through signals from the rat cells. In the future it may be possible to inject/transplant the stem cells into the damaged area and have them naturally differentiate into the type of cell required, with only the natural stimuli provided by surrounding cells, without any danger of rejection by the body. Quoting: 'The next step is to implant the human heart cells onto the damaged heart of a laboratory rat to see whether they repair the heart. Then they would be trialled in higher species such as sheep and pigs before human applications could be considered. Clinical application could be five years away ...'" The Age has a multimedia treatment (Flash) of the discovery.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Today at Boing Boing Gadgets, there was a a vintage typewriter turned noise machine; the Motorola Aura, a mobauble; and an amazing cell phone called "The King of Cigarettes." Rob spotted a dollar store LED Lament Configuration; Microsoft's Arc Mouse; the Eye-Fi Compact Flash adapter; and a really quite mesmerizing Google Android fan rap. There was acheap USB microscope; an unpleasant EULA from Sony; the iKit, a handheld computer like the old Sharp Zauruses; and jewelry made from old Sinclair/Timex computer keys. John found a fork designed for spaghetti twirling; a portable memo-writing device that requires the attention of hackers; plus a cleaning "gak" for computer keyboards. He also spotted the startling LittleBigPlanet recall, apparently inspired by a single forum post. Joel ogled the Hardcore Computer Reactor, which has its hot innards suspended in mineral oil. There was also a suede sleeve for your notebooks; a Red Jack O' Lantern of Death; a knife-cleansing knife block; 16:9 laptops from Gateway; and the Lockwasher Imperial HD 700. Rest in peace, Mac mini? Boing Boing Gadgets

There's been an ongoing discussion in Europe as to whether or not IP addresses should be considered personal info. The implications have a lot to do with how companies deal with your IP address. If it is considered private info, then they are quite limited in what they can do with it. If it's not, then it opens up ISPs to being required to store your IP addresses in log files that they may be required to keep. As we noted when this debate first heated up, the entire argument is a little misleading, as it sets up a false scenario. Lots of your info is private in some scenarios and public in others. You give out your name freely in some cases, but in others might not want it known. Your IP address is, by default, "public" in that you have to display it to computers you connect to in order to do anything online.

A German court has now ruled that IP addresses should not be considered personal info, and thus can be stored without problem by ISPs. In this case, an individual had sued, claiming that sites that kept log files were violating his privacy, but that would be like saying a store that videotaped you entering their premises violated your privacy. Putting yourself out in public means you're out in public, even if it's online. In this case, it sounds like the court got it right.

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Here's an interesting idea: kits for making things from recycled objects. You provide the refuse, they provide the part you might not otherwise be able to fabricate (however some of us makers I'm sure would beg to differ on that point). The wine cork trivet framework is quite intriguing, however. Hey, anything to give folks a leg-up in making something, right? Via Core77.

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There is an epic presidential election themed Yo Mamma Fight going down on Twitter right now. I follow Matt Haughey and Anil Dash, so I saw bits of it in their tweets and, thinking myself clever, tossed out a few and foolishly tried to keep up. But then Anil pointed to the super duper momma-lode, between Fernando Rizo and Lore Sjöberg. Realizing I was out of my league, I gave up and am blogging some of theirs instead:

# Yo mama so fat, she authorized a $700 billion bailout of Dairy Queen.

# yo mama so fat, she thinks the G8 is a Value Meal.

# Yo mama so fat, her other biography is called "The Audacity of Hardee's.

# Yo mama so fat, the only Supreme Court verdict she wants to overturn is HomeTown Buffet v. Yo Mama.

# Yo mama so fat, she thinks sub-prime is a steak cut.

# Yo mama so fat, McCain refers to her as "Those Ones."

# Your mama so fat, when they asked which menus she reads, she said "You know, all of 'em."

# Yo mama's so ugly, Obama said "You can put lipstick on a pig and it would look a lot like yo mama on dollar margarita night."

# you moms so fat ACORN registered her to vote *three* times.

# Yo moms so fat Russia can see her from *their* house.

# Yo mama such a ho, the tab for the federal bailout plan is "700 billion dollars, plus fifty cents to have sex with yo mama."

# your mama so stupid she tried to arrange the genres on her iPod to put Country First.

# yo mama so fat McCain gives patronizing air quotes when he talks about the "health of yo mama"

Well played, dudes. Matt suggests this time-stamped Twitter search link to get you started in the relevant part of @anildash's feed.

theodp writes "Blaming an unquantified decline in usage, AOL has notified users it's decided the best thing to do is delete all of their blogs and files on October 31st. Want to save that precious blog of yours? AOL not-so-helpfully suggests: 'The quickest and easiest way to do this is by copying and pasting your content into a word processing document such as Microsoft Word, Notepad or even into an email and mailing it back to yourself. If you have any images we suggest you save them separately by right clicking on the image, choosing "Save Picture As" and allocate the drive on your PC where you would like to save them to.' Gee, thanks. And don't get too smug, Google users - the search giant has put its users on notice that Google Page Creator will be a thing of the past by year-end, although details of the transition have yet to be provided."

These are just a few more in a long line of attempts by big companies to enable user generated content without much of a plan. With so much attention in the space, plenty of large companies (including Yahoo and Microsoft, in addition to Google and AOL mentioned here) rushed out various tools for users, but forgot to explain to them why they might want to use them. For the most part, they just launched them and figured users would show up willingly. It turns out that, even if you're a big company, it's not so easy to get user adoption if you don't offer anything particularly special compared to what's already out there.

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This weekend Syuzi Pakhchyan and I had the opportunity to show off Sparkfun's new E-sewing kit and LilyPad Pro kit at Maker Faire Austin. Syuzi writes:

The Lilypad E-sewing Kit is a great starters kit for individuals tackling their first wearable LED project. The components in this kit can be used for either the Rockstar Headphones or the LED Bracelet in Fashioning Technology .

The E-sewing kit includes:

• 5 LilyPad Bright White LEDs
• 3 LilyPad Button Boards
  
• 1 Coin Cell Holder
  
• 1 Spool 4Ply Conductive Thread
  

The LilyPad Pro kit includes:

• LilyPad Mainboard
• LilyPad Power Supply
• LilyPad USB Link
• Mini USB Cable

Also just released is Massimo Banzi's "Getting Started with Arduino" book, a fantastic beginner's guide to this happy little microcontroller.
Via the Fashioning Technology blog. Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Wearables | Digg this!

LucasArts and Bioware held a press conference today to confirm what has been suspected for a long time: they're working on a Star Wars MMO. It will be called Star Wars: The Old Republic, and it will be a continuation of the Knights of the Old Republic franchise. Further coverage is available at Gamespot, and IGN has some of the concept art. An official website for the game was launched as well. "According to the game's official announcement, Star Wars: The Old Republic is set thousands of years before the rise of Darth Vader, with the galaxy divided by war between the Empire and the Sith. That's about 300 years after the events of KotOR, a time frame that, according to Zeschuk, 'is completely unexplored in the lore.' Players can take the role of either a Jedi, a Sith or other classic Star Wars characters -- and, as perhaps can be expected from BioWare, Muzyka says story will be a major component, underlying and driving all of the player's actions."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Last year, we were surprised to see American Airlines sue Google over the fact that competitors were buying keyword-based ads on American Airlines' trademarks. Plenty of similar lawsuits had been brought, but for the most part (in the US at least), search engines are on the right side of the law. First of all, simply buying keywords based on trademarks isn't considered a violation of the trademark. Trademark law doesn't give you total control over the mark, but it is designed to prevent confusing uses. Advertising against a competitor isn't a confusing use by itself, so long as it's clear that the advertiser is different from the trademark holder. Second, and more importantly, even if it was a violation of trademark, the liability should fall on the advertiser, not the search engine. Since the search engine is just a platform, the real claim should be against whoever created and paid for the advertisement.

Given that the search engines have come out on top in many such cases, we were surprised this past summer to see Google and American Airlines settle the case, while keeping the actual details secret. Initially, it appeared that Google had won the settlement, as it was still possible to find those competing ads. However, it's possible that the terms of the settlement hadn't taken effect yet, as a more recent search no longer finds those ads. Even more damning is the news that American Airlines has now basically done a copy & paste and search & replace on the original lawsuit and re-filed it against Yahoo. It even includes the same mistakes as the first lawsuit. As Eric Goldman notes, this is strange for a variety of reasons, including the fact that Yahoo is known to be much more friendly to trademark holders in such cases. However, this certainly suggests that Google may have caved in its settlement, rather than the other way around. If so, that would have been an unfortunate decision by Google, and Google's settlement may only lead to more trademark holders taking their chances on suing as well.

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couchslug writes in with a Reuters account of a Federal raid on a California-based motorcycle club, the Mongols, on charges "ranging from murder and robbery to extortion, money laundering, gun trafficking and drug dealing." The interesting twist is that the authorities are asking the courts to seize the IP of the biker club — specifically, their trademarked name "Mongols." "Federal agents and police in seven states arrested more than 60 members of the Mongols motorcycle gang on Tuesday in a sweep that also targeted for the first time an outlaw group's 'intellectual property,' prosecutors said. The arrests cap a three-year undercover investigation in which US agents posed as gang members and their girlfriends to infiltrate the group, even submitting to polygraph tests administered by the bikers ... [T]he name 'Mongols,' which appears on the gang's arm patch insignia, was trademarked by the group. The indictment seeks a court order outlawing further use of the name, which would allow any police officer 'who sees a Mongol wearing this patch ... to stop that gang member and literally take the jacket right off his back' ..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

couchslug writes in with a Reuters account of a Federal raid on a California-based motorcycle club, the Mongols, on charges "ranging from murder and robbery to extortion, money laundering, gun trafficking and drug dealing." The interesting twist is that the authorities are asking the courts to seize the IP of the biker club — specifically, their trademarked name "Mongols." "Federal agents and police in seven states arrested more than 60 members of the Mongols motorcycle gang on Tuesday in a sweep that also targeted for the first time an outlaw group's 'intellectual property,' prosecutors said. The arrests cap a three-year undercover investigation in which US agents posed as gang members and their girlfriends to infiltrate the group, even submitting to polygraph tests administered by the bikers... [T]he name 'Mongols,' which appears on the gang's arm patch insignia, was trademarked by the group. The indictment seeks a court order outlawing further use of the name, which would allow any police officer 'who sees a Mongol wearing this patch... to stop that gang member and literally take the jacket right off his back'..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

IT TRULY ISN'T. For I have no direct connection (and very little contact) with the army of brilliant obsessives who are illustrating the list of 700 Mole-Men that appears in my new book.

ANY MORE than I was connected to them when they illustrated the 700 HOBOES from my last book.

OR TO Boing Boing back when Mark Frauenfelder put them up to it.

IT IS ALL GENUINE, GRASS ROOTS madness. And I am delighted and awed and scared by it. It's sort of the same way I feel about grass and roots.

That is all.