daria42 writes "An early review of part of the Eoin Colfer-penned sequel to Douglas Adams's Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy series has panned the book as not being very funny. If you read Hitchhiker to have a good laugh, maybe you're going to be disappointed," wrote Nicolas Botti, on his Douglas Adams fan site earlier this month."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

David Kravets at Wired Threat Level blog reports that Hal Turner, a notorious shitbag "hate blogger" in New Jersey who was charged two months ago with threatening to kill judges and lawmakers, was secretly an FBI "agent provocateur" paid tens of thousands of dollars by our government to broadcast white supremacist rhetoric. Snip:

Hal Turner, the blogger and radio personality, remains jailed pending charges over his recent online rants, which prosecutors claim amounted to an invitation for someone to kill Connecticut lawmakers and Chicago federal appeals court judges. But behind the scenes the reformed white supremacist was holding clandestine meetings with FBI agents who taught him how to spew hate "without crossing the line," according to his lawyer, Michael Orozco.

"Almost everything was at the behest of the Federal Bureau of Investigation," Orozco said in a 45-minute telephone interview from New Jersey. "Their job was to pick up information on the responses of what he was saying and see where that led them. It was an interesting dynamic on what he was being asked to do."

Lawyer: FBI Paid Right-Wing Blogger Charged With Threats (wired.com, via Oxblood Ruffin)

Los del Dramatica have a lot to say about this. May he serve 420 years in jail.

The Southern Poverty Law Center saw this one coming. Did COINTELPRO ever really end?

We've been following the lawsuit down in Australia, where AFACT, the local entertainment industry "anti-piracy" group, has sued ISP iiNet, complaining that the ISP refused to do anything when it would send over infringement notices. From the beginning, iiNet's response has been clear:

They send us a list of IP addresses and say 'this IP address was involved in a breach on this date'. We look at that say 'well what do you want us to do with this? We can't release the person's details to you on the basis of an allegation and we can't go and kick the customer off on the basis of an allegation from someone else'. So we say 'you are alleging the person has broken the law; we're passing it to the police. Let them deal with it'.

AFACT continues to insist that iiNet should be responsible for becoming copyright cops themselves, and had won an early battle, forcing iiNet to hand over "sample" records of users. However, Big Al points us to the latest news, where iiNet is claiming that not complying with AFACT's usual demands (it is handing over the sample data after working out the details) isn't just an issue of iiNet not wanting to be AFACT's enforcer, but that it violates Australia's telecom act, and could be a serious breach of privacy laws:

"Under the Act, it is illegal for iiNet to use customers' personal information in the manner demanded by AFACT without a court order or warrant. Breaches of the privacy provisions of the Act can attract a two-year gaol sentence."

Separately, iiNet noted:

"To examine customer communications on the basis of a third party's allegations would be a criminal act for us to engage in."

"Our starting position on this would be there is good public policy reasons for why Australia Post should not be opening your letters. And good reasons for why carriers should not be listening to your phone calls or looking at what you download. Our view is that would constitute a criminal offence."

It should come as no surprise that AFACT isn't buying this, calling it a "very novel" argument and one it hadn't seen before, and claiming that IP address information is not the sort of information that's meant to be included under the telco act, since it's not really "confidential." This case just gets more and more fun to watch (though, if I had to guess, iiNet's arguments probably won't prevail).

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Snip from a news item posted to the EFF's Deep Links blog by Richard Esguerra:

In February, opponents of REAL ID were given a bit of hope when Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said that she wanted to repeal the REAL ID Act, the federal government's failed plan to impose a national identification card through state driver's licenses. But what has taken place since is no return to sanity, as political machi nations have produced a cosmetic makeover called "PASS ID" that has revived the push for a national identification card.

The PASS ID Act (S. 1261) seeks to make many of the same ineffectual, dangerous changes the REAL ID Act attempted to impose. Fundamentally, PASS ID operates on the same flawed premise of REAL ID -- that requiring various "identity documents" (and storing that information in databases for later access) will magically make state drivers' licenses more legitimate, which will in turn improve national security.

PASS ID: REAL ID Reanimated (EFF Deep Links)

Some helpful background on REAL ID in the Wikipedia subject entry.

A report published in the August edition of the European Respiratory Society Journal points to a link between exposure to nanoparticles and severe illnesses suffered by seven factory workers in China who worked with them. One of the workers died. "These cases arouse concern that long-term exposure to some nanoparticles without protective measures may be related to serious damage to human lungs."

Exposure to nanoparticles is related to pleural effusion, pulmonary fibrosis and granuloma (ERS Journal, via Maggie Koerth-Baker)

Related: Deaths, lung damage linked to nanoparticles in China (Reuters)

skywatcher2501 writes "Lockheed Martin, the company producing NASA's new Orion spacecraft, published three videos (news article in German) showing alternative Orion missions. Great efforts are made to show Orion's flexibility as a space transportation system beyond the goals of the Constellation program." The three videos, respectively, illustrate ISS missions with cargo in low-Earth orbit; autonomous use of the service module; and maintenance missions from low-earth orbit to geosynchronous orbit.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Bang Bang Club is the title of a documentary film currently in production that examines South Africa during the last days of apartheid, and the impact that violence had on four photojournalists covering the conflict.

The movie is based on The Bang-Bang Club: Snapshots from a Hidden War (2000), a book documenting the lives of those four photogs: Ken Oosterbroek, Kevin Carter, Greg Marinovich and Joao Silva. The book was written by Marinovich and Silva, the two of that group who survived.

The New York Times photojournalism blog is running a series of photo/audio slideshows with the work and voices of those photographers. Today, Joao Silva retells the story of what was happening outside and within when he shot the photograph above -- a man being hacked to death by an angry mob.

Snip from series introduction:

Their bond was formed in the field, where injustice and death lurked. It was a camaraderie that came from the constant experience of mortal danger -- Mr. Oosterbroek was killed during a gun battle in April 1994. They also shared a mutual understanding of how important it was to document the tumultuous events unfolding in front of them as apartheid gave way and South Africans struggled to form a new government. It was a battle most brutally waged in townships populated mainly by poor blacks.

(...) Mr. Marinovich was fairly new to photojournalism in 1991 when he won a Pulitzer Prize for a series of photographs of supporters of South Africa's African National Congress burning alive a man they believed to be a Zulu spy. "I had been too scared to say anything to try to stop it," Mr. Marinovich said, "and so that really disturbed me about myself and who I thought I was at the moment."

Showcase: The Bang Bang Club (Part 1 of 2) (New York Times, Thanks, Reverse Cowgirl)

In 2004, the CIA hired Blackwater USA contractors as part of a covert program to find and kill top operatives of Al Qaeda, according to statements from current and former US officials.

Snip from New York Times story:

The fact that the C.I.A. used an outside company for the program was a major reason that Leon E. Panetta, the C.I.A.'s director, became alarmed and called an emergency meeting in June to tell Congress that the agency had withheld details of the program for seven years, the officials said.

It is unclear whether the C.I.A. had planned to use the contractors to actually capture or kill Qaeda operatives, or just to help with training and surveillance in the program. American spy agencies have in recent years outsourced some highly controversial work, including the interrogation of prisoners. But government officials said that bringing outsiders into a program with lethal authority raised deep concerns about accountability in covert operations.

C.I.A. Sought Blackwater's Help to Kill Jihadists (NYT via Mitch Kapor)

A related news article, just out today: The Rise and Fall of the Mercenary Formerly Known as Blackwater (Newsweek)

Oh, and by the way, Blackwater has changed its name to "Xe," which I'm none too happy about for personal reasons (cough).

Denver puzzlemaker Kagen Schaefer is an amazing craftsman who has accumulated awards and honors from puzzle-box enthusiasts worldwide. His work deserves at least one post all its own, but right now I can't resist showing you his workbench, above, which is made from purple-heart (yes, it's naturally that color), mutenye, and a small piece of ebony.

Kilothanks to Greg Delisle for this and a bunch of other great puzzle-box leads.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Furniture | Digg this!

"No fish can escape mercury pollution" is the bottom line in a federal study of mercury contamination that tested fish from nearly 300 streams across the United States. Link to AP article.

Over at Dangerous Minds, Richard Metzger says, "I like how the AP writer tries valiantly to put a positive spin on this. It may well be that 100% of all fish in America has some level of mercury contamination, but only one fish in four has dangerously high levels. Dude, we are so screwed..."

Image: "Don't eat an entire fish at once," from mrjoro's CC-licensed Flickr stream.

I haven't been posting about the formation of local versions of The Pirate Party (a name I still hate) in places like the UK and Finland because I actually don't think it's that big a deal. However, Ville Valtasaari writes in and alerts us to the response of the IFPI to the formation of the party in Finland, which, oddly, seems to suggest that the IFPI doesn't think The Pirate Party should be allowed support its own positions at all:

"We are absolutely against the idea that any political party can give their support to the idea of free use of protected content."

Apparently freedom of political expression isn't high on the list of things the old recording industry likes. I have no problem with the IFPI saying that they disagree with the reasons for The Pirate Party's platform, but that's not what's being said here. The IFPI is claiming that no political party should be allowed to support such positions. Of course, the quote also totally misunderstands the party's position, but that's not much of a surprise.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Trio writes "What will cellphones look like in in future? silicon.com explores five future characteristics that could shape tomorrow's phones — from a wearable prototype such as MIT's SixthSense device which projects mobile data into the user's world, to a mobile that mixes the real and the virtual by using holographic telepresence. So far, so futuristic, but one question remains: will there be enough spectrum to support all this wireless communication?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Aleksander Polutnik designed this one-wheeled scooter he calls the Enicycle. It works like a Segway in that it has self-balancing hardware, but looks like a unicycle. He designed it in order to cruise along with his unicycle-riding girlfriend. How sweet! Via Core77.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Transportation | Digg this!

Presto Vivace writes "Greater Greater Washington reports that 'The New York Metropolitan Transit Authority's lawyers are going after a local blogger, and attempting to block an iPhone application showing Metro-North railroad schedules. The blog StationStops writes about Metro-North Commuter Railroad service north of New York City, and often criticizes its operations. Its creator, Chris Schoenfeld, also created an iPhone application to give Metro-North riders schedule information. Now the MTA is insisting he pay them to license the data, and at one point even accused the site of pretending to be an official MTA site.' I can't believe that this the MTA's actions are going to go over well with the public."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Just a quick update that we're getting close to shutting down a bunch of the limited edition offerings in our CwF+RtB experiment. So if you were thinking of ordering things like the t-shirts, hoodies, Book Club or Music Club do so soon. Most of them probably won't last more than another week... We'll eventually be offering up new tiers as well, but if you like what's there, don't miss 'em.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

lee1 writes "The first-ever video advertisement will be published in a traditional paper magazine — Entertainment Weekly — in September. The video will be displayed on slim-line screens around the size of a mobile phone display and will have rechargeable batteries. The associated chip can hold up to 40 minutes of video, and uses technology similar to that used in singing greeting cards, playing the movie when the page is turned. The first clips will preview CBS shows and advertise Pepsi, but they will only be distributed in Los Angeles and New York. Imagine the fun hacking possibilities."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

ChurchHatesTucker alerts us to the news that Sony has applied for a patent on an emotion detection device that could, for example, recognize when someone viewing a television or playing a video game is laughing. I don't have much of an opinion one way or another on the actual patent application, but (like others on the original article about this) did find the patent drawing to be rather amusing: Of course, if you laugh at that, and your computer detects it, you may be infringing. So... be careful.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

An anonymous reader writes "Taking their lead from China, two Americans have opened the first US-based Internet Addiction treatment center in Fall City, Wash. — ironically close to Redmond (Microsoft's hometown). The center, called reStart: Internet Addiction Recovery Program, is a 45-day treatment center where, for a steep set of fees, people can be cured of their addiction to the Web. After paying the $200 application fee, addicts are charged $14,500 for the 45 days, an additional $800 for a screening, and more for extra services, like kayaking ($1,575)."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I love this elaborate cardboard dragon posted by Creativeman on Instructables. In fact, upon further inspection you'll see that he's got about 11 cardboard projects uploaded to the DIY site. Fun stuff!

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Paper Crafts | Digg this!

Hugh Pickens writes "Live Science reports that although life expectancy in the United States has risen to an all-time high of 77.9 years in 2007 up from 77.7 in 2006, gains in life expectancy may be pretty much over, as some groups — particularly people in rural locations are already stagnating or slipping in contrast to all other industrialized nations. Hardest hit are regions in the Deep South, along the Mississippi River, in Appalachia and also the southern part of the Midwest reaching into Texas. The culprits — largely preventable with better diet and access to medical services — are diabetes, cancers and heart disease caused by smoking, high blood pressure and obesity. What the new analysis reveals is the reality of two Americas, one on par with most of Europe and parts of Asia, and another no different than a third-world nation with the United States placing 41st on the 2008 CIA World Factbook list, behind Bosnia but still edging out Albania. 'Beginning in the early 1980s and continuing through 1999 those who were already disadvantaged did not benefit from the gains in life expectancy experienced by the advantaged, and some became even worse off,' says a report published in PLoS Medicine by a team led by Harvard's Majid Ezzati, adding that 'study results are troubling because an oft-stated aim of the US health system is the improvement of the health of "all people, and especially those at greater risk of health disparities.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Chris pointed me down a delightful rabbit hole trying to understand a -- potentially apocryphal -- story concerning what may be the very first "trial" over "copyright" taking place in the middle of the 6th century in Ireland, involving St. Finnian of Moville and a former pupil of his, Saint Columba -- also known as Colmcille or Colum Cille or a few other names, depending on where you look. The story Chris pointed me to is in French, but it eventually points to an English version of the story (pdf -- which, sadly, does not indicate an author!) that not only suggests that this is the first such trial over the right to copy a book, but reflects some of the same arguments we're still hearing today. Though, luckily for everyone, when Jammie Thomas or Joel Tenenbaum loses their lawsuit, it doesn't eventually lead to 3,000 people dying, as happened in this particular story.

The short version of the story is that St. Columba, a monk, apparently led quite an interesting life. The pdf goes through a bunch of details, but at some point, he decided that the best way to spread Christianity and his own teachings would be to spread the important writings he came across:

Colmcille threw himself into these labours with a zeal few ordinary mortals could match and amongst the tasks he attacked most passionately was the transcribing of biblical manuscripts. A devoted scribe himself, he recognised the shortage of books as one of the critical paths restricting the growth of the scholarship of the church, as well as of his own band of followers. Wherever and whenever he could get access to the materials he would copy and encourage his monks to copy, study and disperse the copies of books to spread the teachings of the church.

As this was happening, he became aware that his former teacher and friend, Finnian, had returned from Rome with the "Vulgate" -- a Latin translation of the bible that had been done about 100 years earlier. Columba traveled to see is friend... and the book. Finnian gladly shared his treasure with Columba, but was still quite protective of it, and wasn't keen on the whole "copying it for others' bit. So, Columba took matters into his own hands and started surreptitiously copying the manuscript at night. He was eventually spotted, and a fight ensued, which the two former friends agreed to settle via arbitration, held in the court of Diarmaid, the High King of Ireland. Finnian argued for a basic form of copyright: claiming that the book was his "property" and any attempt at copying it violated his property rights. It was then that Columba allegedly made something like the following speech (which was, admittedly, loosely translated in the pdf above):

"My friend's claim seeks to apply a worn out law to a new reality. Books are different to other chattels (possessions) and the law should recognise this. Learned men like us, who have received a new heritage of knowledge through books, have an obligation to spread that knowledge, by copying and distributing those books far and wide. I haven't used up Finnian's book by copying it. He still has the original and that original is none the worse for my having copied it. Nor has it decreased in value because I made a transcript of it. The knowledge in books should be available to anybody who wants to read them and has the skills or is worthy to do so; and it is wrong to hide such knowledge away or to attempt to extinguish the divine things that books contain. It is wrong to attempt to prevent me or anyone else from copying it or reading it or making multiple copies to disperse throughout the land. In conclusion I submit that it was permissible for me to copy the book because, although I benefited from the hard work involved in the transcription, I gained no worldly profit from the process, I acted for the good of society in general and neither Finnian nor his book were harmed."

I have to be honest: such a speech (even with the admittedly "loose" translation) seems so current that I have my doubts about the whole story having happened at all. But, since this is just for fun, let's keep going.

According to the story in the pdf, the "trial" wasn't exactly on a fair basis, as there were all sorts of separate political pressures on the king and his advisors, including some worries about by some druids that Columba might be too successful in spreading Christianity with such copied books. Think of the druids as the "recording industry" in this story, with Christianity I guess being the Napster of the sixth century. No surprise: the legacy industry had the ear of those in power, and used it to influence how the court would rule:

"I don't know where you get your fancy new ideas about people's property. Wise men have always described the copy of a book as a child-book. This implies that someone who owns the parent-book also owns the child-book. To every cow its calf, to every book its child-book. The child-book belongs to Finnian."

Yup. The breakthrough "startups" have been losing such copyright battles for over a millennium apparently -- though, of course, in the long run (thank you Gutenberg), it seems that the copiers eventually win out. So, while Napster may suffer in the courts of today, certain things, such as the spread of knowledge and content are eventually unstoppable.

And, oh yeah, the post script to the story, is that following this loss in "court" and the humiliation that came with it, there were a series of events that led to a real fight -- the so-called "Battle of the Book" that left 3,000 dead, and despite being the victor in that battle, Columba was almost ex-communicated and then eventually (if temporarily) exiled from Ireland. But, then again, he also became a saint in retrospect. I can't see the same happening for Tenenbaum or Thomas, but perhaps they'll take some solace in knowing that the ridiculous fines put on them might not be quite as bad as what Columba faced.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

William Ward built a fire alarm module to protect the shop's laser cutter from any unauthorized thermal events. He designed it around an interesting UV sensor made by Hamamatsu, which uses a combination of the photoelectric effect and the gas multiplication effect to detect very small amounts of ultraviolet light. Future plans include adding a Twitter interface (of course!), and connecting it to a larger alarm system.

[via NYC Resistor]

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Arduino | Digg this!

Professor_Quail writes "PC Magazine reports that the PCI SIG has officially delayed the release of the PCI Express 3.0 specification until the second quarter of 2010. Originally, the PCI Express 3.0 specification called for the spec itself to be released this year, with products due about a year after the spec's release, or in 2010."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

graviplana was one of several people to submit that Avatar, James Cameron's 3D Sci-Fi epic has released a trailer to whet your appetite. There's a lot of very cool visual elements in there but no indication of any actual story. Here's hoping there is one.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

According to some reports, toy designer Tim Kehoe spent 15 years and $3 million US to bring his vision of colored soap bubbles to market. Making a colored bubble is apparently hard enough, but the real challenge is making them non-staining. That's right: By virtue of some very fancy dye chemistry, Zubbles are only colored as bubbles. Once they pop the color disappears. After years of hype, they can finally (and only) be purchased here.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Toys and Games | Digg this!

A bunch of folks have been sending in this story about Flickr supposedly taking down the "Obama Joker" Time Magazine cover that's been in the news lately, but I have to admit that I'm confused about the reasoning behind the takedown. There are questions of whether it's just "censorship," but I'm trying to figure out what's the actual copyright claim. The suggestion is that the concern is from Time Magazine, which doesn't like its brand associated with the falsified cover -- but wouldn't that be a trademark issue, rather than a copyright one? If there's any copyright issue at all, it would potentially (and then, weakly) be from whoever owns the rights to the original photo that was changed. But seeing as there's still an ongoing battle in the Shepard Fairey case to determine if that sort of thing is fair use and I haven't seen anyone identify the original Obama photo that was used here, it's not even clear who would be crying copyright infringement. So... where exactly is the copyright infringement here?

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Colonel Korn writes "The Seattle PI Blog is reporting that a soon to be published Game Informer survey finally shows the failure rate of XBOX 360s: 54%! The survey also shows the rates of failure for the PS3 (11%) and Wii (7%). Impressively, only 4% of respondents said they wouldn't buy a new 360 because of hardware failures."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I really like this wooden flashlight sold my the Museum of Modern Art. It's pricey, but if you have a wood lathe sitting around and are looking for something more original to make with it than a bowl, a pen, or a salt shaker, this could be a great project.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Reviews | Digg this!

We recently wrote about the ridiculous job for lawyers making sure no unauthorized brands appear in a movie -- which doesn't have much of a legal basis. But, for some reason, companies back down on that sort of stuff all the time. The latest example involves the classic mockumentary band Spinal Tap, who is putting out a new DVD, where they thought (correctly) that it would be cool to include a fan-made video of one of their "hits," "Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight." The video was made by a then 14-year-old and was a stop-action video involving a lego version of the band and its fans: Now, from Spinal Tap's point of view, this is a very cool way of connecting with fans: making use of a cool video in their DVD. In fact, they even played it up, and during a live performance where the video was shown, got real-life fans to mimic the lego fans, by holding their hands in the infamous "C" position of the plastic lego figures. But, of course, the lawyers got in the way. Lego objected to some of the words in the song and denied the use of the video on the DVD (oddly, the DVD still shows the fans with their hands, though it no longer makes any sense). But the real question is why Lego was even consulted. As Kimberley Isbell notes, Lego doesn't seem to have a legal leg to stand on here:

Lego justified its stance by citing the "commercial" nature of the Spinal Tap video.  But can Lego really prohibit the use of their products in commercial videos?  If you ask the federal courts, the answer is likely "no." It's a lesson that Mattel has repeatedly had to learn the hard way.

But that hasn't stopped trademark and copyright owners from trying. The court summarily rejected Wham-O's claims against Paramount Pictures for the unflattering use of its Slip 'N Slide toy in the movie "Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star." Caterpillar likewise had its claims against Walt Disney (relating to the portrayal of the brand in the oh-so-popular movie "George of the Jungle 2") shot down. Similar claims by Emerson Electric Co. (makers of the In-Sink-Erator garbage disposal) and the Canadian folk band the Wyrd Sisters also failed to go anywhere.

But, unfortunately, the people putting together the Spinal Tap DVD did, in fact, cave in, and the video has not been included.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

This pizza box is making a clear play at eco-design by calling itself the Green Box, but really, it's just more sensible and convenient than a normal pizza box. All it took was a few extra perforations.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Paper Crafts | Digg this!

Ant writes "John Scalzi's AMC blog shows a short guide to the most epic FAILs in Star Wars design — 'I'll come right out and say it: Star Wars has a badly-designed universe; so poorly-designed, in fact, that one can say that a significant goal of all those Star Wars novels is to rationalize and mitigate the bad design choices of the movies. Need examples? Here's ten ...'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ant writes "John Scalzi's AMC blog shows a short guide to the most epic FAILs in Star Wars design — 'I'll come right out and say it: Star Wars has a badly-designed universe; so poorly-designed, in fact, that one can say that a significant goal of all those Star Wars novels is to rationalize and mitigate the bad design choices of the movies. Need examples? Here's ten...'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Boring day at the office? Here's a cardboard frisbee to throw around.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Paper Crafts | Digg this!

1sockchuck writes "Opinions differ on when the Internet will run out of IPv4 addresses, prompting a wholesale transition to IPv6. In recent videos, John Curran of ARIN provides an overview of issues involved in the IPv6 transition, while Martin Levy of Hurricane Electric discusses his company's view that early-mover status on IPv6 readiness can be a competitive advantage for service providers. Levy's company has published an IPv4 DeathWatch app for the iPhone to raise awareness of the transition."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Last we checked in on David Coursey, a long-time tech columnist, he was claiming that The Pirate Bay made money selling subscriptions to users and didn't seem to understand the difference between "theft" and "infringement" or the difference between a search engine and a user. So... I guess we shouldn't really be all that surprised that he's about the only person around who seems to think it was a good thing that a court forced an anonymous blogger to be revealed for referring to model Liskula Cohen as a skank. Apparently, Coursey is unfamiliar with the fact that the US has a strong history of protecting anonymous speech as a part of our First Amendment rights, and this ruling seems to go against that entirely. And, yes, you can be unmasked for truly defamatory speech, but calling someone a skank hardly qualifies. And, of course, he doesn't even acknowledge the fact that almost no one would have seen that particular anonymous blogspot blog if Cohen hadn't freaked out and sued.

It's difficult to see how that makes her a "hero." Thin-skinned? Short-sighted? Perhaps. Hero? Please.

Oh yeah, Coursey then goes on to suggest this should be a warning sign for Google to start censoring the blogs it hosts:

It should also make Google take a hard look at the kinds of sites its Blogger service is willing to host. A "Skanks of NYC" blog may give jealous people a chance to vent their frustration, but hardly seems to ennoble the human spirit.

I don't know. I think Coursey's column should make PC World take a long hard look at the kinds of columns it's willing to host (and, one imagines, pay for). A David Coursey column may give a clueless tech columnist a chance to state his opinion with little knowledge of the facts or history, but hardly seems to ennoble the human spirit. (And, yes, I'm joking, but the point is that this is almost, but not quite, as ridiculous as Coursey suggesting Google needs to monitor and censor blogs).

By the way, the Coursey column does reveal that the anonymous blogger was revealed to Cohen, and it was some woman she didn't know (big surprise there). So, I'm curious how this is a good thing for anyone involved or how Cohen is somehow a hero. If she ignored this site, no one would have seen it or cared (and those who saw it wouldn't have thought that it was some sort of NY Times report on the skankiness of Liskula Cohen). They would have dismissed it as a lame venting from someone who didn't like Cohen for whatever reason. But, now with a lawsuit, lots of people aren't just questioning whether or not Cohen is "a skank" but about her rather sensitive reaction to the slightest criticism from a nobody. How does that make Cohen better off?

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Nina Paley, creator of the wonderful and copyright-fraught animation Sita Sings the Blues writes, "All the Flash authoring (.fla) files I used to make Sita Sings the Blues have just been posted on archive.org, under a Creative Commons Share Alike license. Want to know how I got a certain animated effect in Sita Sings the Blues? Open up the .fla files and find out. Want to put flying eyeballs and demons in your next music video? Now you can. Want to make a 'Sita Sings the Blues' video game using all the assets? Go for it. (But I strongly suggest you negotiate my endorsement if you want to actually market the end product.)"

"Sita" Source Files now on Archive.org (Thanks, Nina!)

Ant writes "The Linux Foundation's report (PDF) on who writes Linux — "... Linux isn't written by lonely nerds hiding out in their parents' basements. It's written by people working for major companies — many of them businesses that you probably don't associate with Linux. To be exact, while 18.2% of Linux is written by people who aren't working for a company, and 7.6% is created by programmers who don't give a company affiliation, everything else is written by someone who's getting paid to create Linux. From top to bottom, of the companies that have contributed more than 1% of the current Linux kernel, the list looks like this: ..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Kroden's head-slappingly simple SD socket solution will likely come in handy for those looking to experiment with the memory format via breadboard. The step-by-step also outlines a sturdier horizontal version using right-angle header pins.

In the Maker Shed:

Arduino WaveShield Kit

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Electronics | Digg this!

There's something oddly appealing about charging a mobile phone on the back of a dinosaur. Heck, even mentioning that to someone sounds absurd. Yet here we are; iPhones and dinosaurs living together in harmony. What a fun dock mod. Though, if I were building a similar dock I'd go for the plastic pineapple.

[via iPhoneSavior]

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in iPhone | Digg this!

Dan sez, "Its been 40 years since the Grim Grinning Ghosts first opened their doors and invited guests into the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland. Take a look back to the beginning with Walt and the Imagineers who created the beloved attraction. From stretching rooms to hitch hiking ghosts the 999 Happy Haunts never disappoint and always invite guests to hurry back!"

Haunted Mansion Celebrates 40 Years of Happy Haunts! (Thanks, Dan!)

coondoggie writes "On its current space scouting mission, NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is using a pumped up communications device to deliver 461 gigabytes of data and images per day, at a rate of up to 100 Mbps. As the first high data rate K-band transmitter to fly on a NASA spacecraft, the 13-inch-long tube, called a Traveling Wave Tube Amplifier, is making it possible for NASA scientists to receive massive amounts of images and data about the moon's surface and environment. The amplifier was built by L-3 Communications Electron Technologies in conjunction with NASA's Glenn Research Center. The device uses electrodes in a vacuum tube to amplify microwave signals to high power. It's ideal for sending large amounts of data over a long distance because it provides more power and more efficiency than its alternative, the transistor amplifier, NASA stated." It kills me that the moon has better bandwidth than my house.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Matt sez, "Sasha Pohflepp created a wonderful counter-factual history of a USA where Carter beat Reagan and created a 'space-race' for renewable energy and planetary engineering. Regine from We-Make-Money-Not-Art has the story..."

The project asks how visions like these are being created in the public imagination but also how they are being reflected by the economy and by individuals. In the case of weather modification, people are modifying their cars into lightning harvesters to participate in the experiments, both scientifically and commercially. The car presented in the model below is a modified Chevrolet El Camino that has been fitted with a lightning rod and various electrical equipment like variable resistors and capacitor banks to store the electricity from a lightning strike. Drivers are then able to sell the stored electricity at any one of the drive-through energy exchanges, which have opened around the zone.

The Golden Institute found a way to modify freeways and harness the energy which would otherwise be lost through braking when a vehicle exits the freeway at a velocity of about 55 miles per hour. Now, vehicles are equipped with magnets. As they exit the freeway at high-speed, the cars are gradually slowed down employing the Lorentz force as they pass through a series of induction-coils. The coils are typically operated by a franchise like Chuck's Café and if used effectively can get the driver a discount on a cup of coffee.

The Golden Institute (Thanks, Matt!)

From the MAKE Flickr pool

Steve Hoefer shares this photo showing the first iteration of his dice reader project -

Working on a robot that plays dice. Since the "robot" part is easy i started with the dice reader which can read the number of pips on the dice that's placed face down on it.

Version 1 just uses 4 photo resistors with white LEDs behind them. It only works right about 70% of the time and is incredibly sensitive to ambient light, but it's pretty good for about $0.99 worth of parts and a first try. V2 will add more, smaller, sensors with greater sensitivity.

Judging from the ongoing conversation on his blog, it sounds like the next version will incorporate IR sensors. Have a closer look at his setup on Flickr.

… and for a larger scale, software-intensive approach to the problem, check out GamesByEmail's Dice-O-Matic.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Electronics | Digg this!

John Scalzi's list of bad design decisions in the Star Wars universe had me LOLing when I should have been working:

C-3PO
Can't fully extend his arms; has a bunch of exposed wiring in his abs; walks and runs as if he has the droid equivalent of arthritis. And you say, well, he was put together by an eight-year-old. Yes, but a trip to the nearest Radio Shack would fix that. Also, I'm still waiting to hear the rationale for making a protocol droid a shrieking coward, aside from George Lucas rummaging through a box of offensive stereotypes (which he'd later return to while building Jar-Jar Binks) and picking out the "mincing gay man" module.

Lightsabers
Yes, I know, I want one too. But I tell you what: I want one with a hand guard. Otherwise every lightsaber battle would consist of sabers clashing and then their owners sliding as quickly as possible down the shaft to lop off their opponent's fingers. You say: Lightsabers can slice through anything but another lightsaber, so what are you going to make a hand guard out of? I say: Dude, if you have the technology to make a lightsaber, you have the technology to make a light hand guard.

John Scalzi's Guide to the Most Epic FAILs in Star Wars Design

Home Movies At DisneyLand - 1956 from Jeff Altman on Vimeo.

Here's some recently unearthed home movie footage of Disneyland in 1956, the year after it opened. The footage was shot by Jeff Altman's grandfather using a Bell & Howell Filmo and 16mm Kodachrome film stock and includes a scene of his grandmother meeting Walt Disney. John Frost of The Disney Blog calls it "One the best videos of early Disneyland I've seen."

Home Movies At DisneyLand - 1956 (via The Disney Blog)

flynn writes "Irelands oldest and largest ISP will be blocking access to the pirate bay from September 1st while other ISPs have rejected the request to block TPB. From the Irish Times: 'Under an out-of-court agreement with EMI Records, Sony Music, Universal Music and Warners in January, Eircom agreed to cut off customers found to be repeatedly downloading music illegally. The deal also required Eircom to cut off access to Pirate Bay if requested. Yesterday, cable TV operator UPC, which has more than 120,000 broadband subscribers, announced it would not comply with a request to block access to Pirate Bay'."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A few months back, we wrote about how the town of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, not only had installed more surveillance cameras than many large cities, but was also allowing resident volunteers to control the cameras, which seemed to raise quite a few questions about the potential for abuse. The town insisted it was fine, because even though the screening process was "informal" it planned to "weed out voyeurs and anyone who might use the tapes for blackmail or other illegal activity." Apparently that weeding process needs a bit of work. Someone who prefers to be anonymous notes that it took a third party to notice that one of the residents approved to control the cameras had been convicted of stalking and harassment, as well as impersonating a public official, in the past. Oddly, the newspaper that wrote up the report still claims that the effort to screen the camera operators has been "a success." Oh really? The anonymous tipster also notes that the newspaper in which that article appeared just happens to have donated over $200,000 to the surveillance program while also giving the program a $2 million interest-free loan (and you thought all newspapers were broke), so perhaps it isn't the best judge of how well the program is going.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Instructables announced the winners of their Art of Sound contest - as expected, some very sweet projects make up the group the finalists. The top prize went to RocketScientist's Homebrew Marimba how-to which includes instructions for wrapping your own mallets, an interesting project in it's own right -

First & second prize went to the Nixie Tube Visualizer and Fretless Guitar projects respectively. Head over to the list of winners to check out the runner up projects as well.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Instructables | Digg this!

Eponymous writes "A seven month study by academics at the University of New South Wales has found that the response times of cloud compute services of Amazon, Google and Microsoft can vary by a factor of twenty depending on the time of day services are accessed. One of the lead researchers behind the stress tests reports that Amazon's EC2, Google's AppLogic and Microsoft's Azure cloud services have limitations in terms of data processing windows, response times and a lack of monitoring and reporting tools."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This October, 1967 Playboy article on computers and their limitations features an all-hands computer debugging session in which the machine's minders grab their "trembling screwdrivers" and leap into the "machine's intestines."

Over the past ten years, it has been fashionable to call these great buzzing, clattering machines "brains." Science-fiction writers and Japanese moviemakers have had a lovely time with the idea. Superintelligent machines take over the world! Squish people with deadly squish rays! Hypnotize nubile girls with horrible mind rays, baby! It's all nonsense, of course. A computer is a machine like any other machine. It produces numbers on order. That's all it can do.

Yet computers have been crowned with a halo of exaggerated glamor, and the TV election-predicting circus is a classic example. The Columbia Broadcasting System got into this peculiar business back in 1952, using a Remington Rand Univac. The Univac did well. In 1956, for instance, with 1/27 of the popular vote in at 9:15 p.m., it predicted that Dwight Eisenhower would win with 56 percent of the votes. His actual share turned out to be 57.4 percent, and everybody said, "My, my, what a clever machine!" The Univac certainly was a nicely wrought piece of engineering, one of the two or three fastest and most reliable then existing. But the credit for insight belonged to the political experts and mathematicians who told the Univac what to do. It was they, not the machine, who estimated that if Swamp-water County went Democratic by X percent, the odds were Y over Z that the rest of the state would go Democratic by X-plus-N percent. The Univac only did the routine arithmetic.

Which escaped attention. By the 1960s, the U. S. public had the idea that some kind of arcane, unknowable, hyper-human magic was soldered into computers--that a computerized answer was categorically better than a hand-cranked answer. As the TV networks and hundreds of other businesses realized, computers could be used to impress people. A poll prediction looked much more accurate on computer print-out paper than in human handwriting. But, as became clear at least to a few in 1966, it's the input that counts. Honeywell programing expert Malcolm Smith says: "You feed guesswork into a computer, you get beautiful neat guesswork back out. The machine contains no Automatic Guess Rectifier or Factualizing Whatchamacallit."

COMPUTERS: THEIR BUILT-IN LIMITATIONS (Oct, 1967)

Aaron sez, "At a chemistry conference, nuclear scientists gave away some hilarious swag, including kitchen table place mats with facts about radiation exposure and playing cards with nuclear weapons trivia."

All is not Sturm und Drang among the WMD crowd. During the talk, with the help of other symposium participants, everyone in attendance received a set of RADACAD playing cards. The back of each card sports a picture of what appears to be a nuclear-explosion-triggered fireball that will grow into a mushroom. The face of each card provides a teaching moment. The four of diamonds, for example, lists eight radioactive isotopes used in industry that are of the greatest concern when it comes to dirty bombs. The joker cards show a cartoon character clad in a hazmat suit as he holds out what appears to be a tray bearing a picture of a nuclear explosion bomb, sort of like an offering of an hors d'oeuvres.

WMD Goodie Bag (Thanks, Aaron!)

Beloit College's annual "Mindset List" is a list of truisms about the historical context of the incoming freshman class -- all the things that have existed "forever" for them and all the things they never knew firsthand. It's a fast train to self-doubtsville for those of us who feel like we are still young and with it. Here's some I liked:

# Salsa has always outsold ketchup
# Tattoos have always been very chic and highly visible.
# They have been preparing for the arrival of HDTV all their lives.
# The KGB has never officially existed.
# Babies have always had a Social Security Number.
# Women have always outnumbered men in college.
# We have always watched wars, coups, and police arrests unfold on television in real time.
# Britney Spears has always been heard on classic rock stations.

Beloit College Mindset List (via Charlie Stross)

The Robot Comics folks have been industriously converting my Creative Commons licensed IDW graphic novel, Cory Doctorow's Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now (which collects six of my short stories adapted to comics form by an array of talented writers and editors) to a multiplicity of mobile phone platforms. This is all under the auspices of the CC license and all the resulting comics are free -- there's stuff for Android, the Nintendo DSi, and the iPhone/iPod Touch (Apple finally caved and decided that the panel depicting an orc in a video-game being decapitated didn't disqualify the comic of Anda's Game from being included as a freebie in the iPhone store).

Cory Doctorow's Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now reaches 60,000 downloads

Lovely videos @ Wired Science...

Some of the most impressive images in science are produced when researchers take numerical data and represent it visually through modeling and computer graphics. The Department of Energy honored 10 of this year’s best scientific visualizations with its annual SciDAC Vis Night awards, at the Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing conference (SciDAC) in June. Researchers submitted visualizations to the contest, and program participants voted on the best of the best. From earthquakes to jet flames, this gallery of videos and images show how beautiful (and descriptive) visual data can be.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Science | Digg this!

The current ish of Entertainment Weekly has a tiny video screen embedded in a two-page CBS ad that auto-plays when you turn the page. The screen is controlled by a slim PCB sandwiched between the pages. As Wired's John C Abell says, "The audio quality is equally good (extremely poor video shot by this reporter notwithstanding), but beware: There are no volume controls, and in a quiet environment, it's quite loud. This is surely a intentional design feature, aimed at getting the attention of people nearby."

I wonder if the video screen is worth more than the newsstand price of the magazine, and if so, what makers could do with this subsidized video hardware?

CBS Embeds a Video Playing Ad in a Print Magazine

My wonderful sister sent over the following quote on plagiarism vs. a community of knowledge and scholarship by famed literary critic F.O. Matthiessen, from his classic book, American Renaissance:

"During the course of this long volume I have undoubtedly plagiarized from many sources--to use the ugly term that did not bother Shakespeare's age. I doubt whether any criticism or cultural history has ever been written without such plagiary, which inevitably results from assimilating the contributions of your countless fellow-workers, past and present. The true function of scholarship as a society is not to stake out claims on which others must not trespass, but to provide a community of knowledge in which others may share."
-F.O. Matthiessen, American Renaissance 1941

Good stuff. Too bad so few still seem to feel the same way.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Urchin writes "Some of the techniques used by literary detectives and courts of law to identify the authorship of text are easily fooled, say US researchers. They found that non-professional writers could hide their identity from 'stylometric' techniques by writing in the style of novelist Cormac McCarthy. Stylometric methods have been used in a number of high-profile legal cases in recent decades, including the 'Unabomber' trial. 'We would strongly suggest that courts examine their methods of stylometry against the possibility of adversarial attacks,' say the researchers."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Adobe has announced release candidates of Photoshop Camera Raw 5.5 and DNG Converter 5.5 for immediate download from its Adobe Labs site. The latest versions extends RAW support to the Nikon D300s, Nikon D3000, Olympus E-P1 and Panasonic DMC-FZ35. In addition, the ACR update also includes a correction for sensors with non-conventional color filter arrays. The 'Release Candidate' label indicates the update is tested, but not yet the finalized version.

Adobe has announced release candidates of Photoshop Camera Raw 5.5 and DNG Converter 5.5 for immediate download from its Adobe Labs site. The latest versions extends RAW support to the Nikon D300s, Nikon D3000, Olympus E-P1 and Panasonic DMC-FZ35. In addition, the ACR update also includes a correction for sensors with non-conventional color filter arrays. The 'Release Candidate' label indicates the update is tested, but not yet the finalized version.

Last week, we wrote about the launch of RECAP, a neat little tool for making sure that more public domain court rulings are actually accessible to the public (what a concept). Apparently, the tool is already useful. Thomas O'Toole points us to the news of someone who used RECAP to point to rulings that were vacated and then (oddly) ordered to be removed from various databases. All of this was a part of a settlement agreement. Rulings get vacated all the time, but having the judge order the various databases that hold rulings to delete them seems a bit extreme. However, thanks to RECAP it seems that the original rulings are still available. Yet another reminder that you can't make things disappear online.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Pre-IFA 2009: Ricoh has unveiled the CX2 compact super-zoom. Featuring the same 9 MP CMOS sensor inherited from its predecessor CX1, it offers a larger 10.7x zoom range at 28-300mm equivalent, a faster continuous shooting range of 5 fps, Pre- and Continuous-AF modes and additional scene modes. The rest of the features mirror the CX1 including the 3.0 LCD with 920k dot resolution and the faster Smooth Imaging Engine IV processor.

Pre-IFA 2009: Ricoh has unveiled the CX2 compact super-zoom. Featuring the same 9 MP CMOS sensor inherited from its predecessor CX1, it offers a larger 10.7x zoom range at 28-300mm equivalent, a faster continuous shooting range of 5 fps, Pre- and Continuous-AF modes and additional scene modes. The rest of the features mirror the CX1 including the 3.0 LCD with 920k dot resolution and the faster Smooth Imaging Engine IV processor.

A cute story about my 6th grade class.

My girlfriend in sixth grade, Gail Schneider, who I still see from time to time, will tell you that I haven't changed in the 42 years since I was a 12-year-old boy growing up in Queens. I always thought it's funny how women, even when they are little girls, think they can peer into your soul and see the real you, but in this case I think Gail is right. (BTW, that might be a picture of Gail, a few years later, at Woodstock.)

My mother accumulates things, it's her curse. She wishes she traveled lighter, in the George Carlin sense, with less baggage. She keeps shedding stuff, but then a relative dies and she ends up with another closet full of stuff that's too precious to throw out. Anyway, she had been holding on to my sixth grade autograph book, and gave it to me on my last trip to NY, and I've been reading it. This one was worth keeping!

Some observations. Well, men never know what women are thinking. There were a couple of girls who had a crush on me, all the girls knew it, but I was clueless at the time. The trail is right there in the book.

And (finally I get to the point) along with a couple of friends, Clifford Hable and John Monterisi, I was part of a club of sixth grade communists. Of course we weren't really communists, we were just kids, but we read the news and knew the adults were freaked out by the commies, and we thought they were silly (don't all 12-year-olds think adults are silly). So we had a club, and in that club we were communists. That's all over the autograph book too. Hammers and sickles, comrade this and comrade that. It still makes me laugh how we adopted the symbolism and language of our most feared enemy.

I wrote to the Chinese mission to the UN asking for literature about their country, and boy did they send stuff. Color magazines and posters mostly in English, a copy of Mao's Little Red Book, a huge wall-size poster of Chairman Mao. I loved reading the stuff the way I loved District 9. It was science fiction, but it also bore some semblance to reality. It was forbidden and terrorized the adults. I liked it!

So today when a Republican Twitterer from the Deep South called me a commisar and said I should communicate with the Kremlin and said dasvidaniya, I smiled, and almost thanked him. As if it were Clifford or John, complimenting me on some daring or noble revolutionary act in defiance of Mrs. Dori, our sixth grade teacher.

On reflection, I realized this is the new Republican macho. Call anyone who criticizes a Republican a Nazi or a Commie. Can't call me a Nazi (I have relatives who died in Hitler's camps) so go for commie. Except the Cold War has been over for almost 20 years. It's really sad that it has come to this.

BTW, another woman who could peer into my soul was Mrs. Dori, who was one of my two favorite teachers. She wrote in my autograph book: "To David, a boy who really cares." I don't know if she wrote that for everyone, maybe she did. But in my case, it was true.

Hugh Pickens writes "The New Scientists reports that faced with global warming and potential oil shortages, the US Navy is experimenting with making jet fuel from seawater by processing seawater into unsaturated short-chain hydrocarbons that with further refining could be made into kerosene-based jet fuel. The process involves extracting carbon dioxide dissolved in the water and combining it with hydrogen — obtained by splitting water molecules using electricity — to make a hydrocarbon fuel, a variant of a chemical reaction called the Fischer-Tropsch process, which is used commercially to produce a gasoline-like hydrocarbon fuel from syngas, a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen often derived from coal. The navy team have been experimenting to find out how to steer the CO2-producing process away from producing unwanted methane by finding a different catalyst than the usual cobalt-based catalyst. 'The idea of using CO2 as a carbon source is appealing,' says Philip Jessop, a chemist at Queen's University adding that to make a jet fuel that is properly 'green', the energy-intensive electrolysis that produces the hydrogen will need to use a carbon-neutral energy source; and the complex multi-step process will always consume significantly more energy than the fuel it produces could yield. 'It's a lot more complicated than it at first looks.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Wow! From Coilhouse:

Helen Keller — inspiration to generations and inspiration for an entire genre of schoolyard humor — and her teacher and friend Anne Sullivan in a clip from 1930 in which they describe the way in which Helen learned how to speak ... It’s a fascinating little clip which pays homage to a woman who, even beyond her amazing circumstances, was a radical socialist, suffragist, and supporter of birth control, who was friends with the likes of Mark Twain and who worked tirelessly to champion the rights of both the downtrodden and the physically disabled.

(Via Richard Metzger)

We were just talking about how NY's public transit authority, the MTA was following in the footsteps of other short-sighted transit groups, by claiming ownership of scheduling data, and trying to squeeze license fees for anyone who uses it. Instead, if they were smart, they'd recognize that their money is made by making it easier and more convenient for people to take public transportation. It appears there are at least a few public transit authorities that recognize this. Rosedale points out that up in Boston, the MBTA is actually taking an open approach to its data. They're opening up all of the data and allowing developers to create their own apps:

"Our priority is to consistently improve customer service for the riders who rely on the T and RTAs everyday to get to their job or their doctorâ??s appointment on time," said Transportation Secretary Aloisi. "With the help of thoughtful technical developers, making this data public will spawn many possible applications to help transit users use their cell phones or laptops to find and use the right bus or train in the right place at the right time for them."

Nice to see at least a few out there who have figured this out.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

BB reader Jeannine (@j9drost) tweets, "My brother helped illustrate a 25-page Afghan election manual. More civic education materials here."

Above, a detail from the Pashto version of "Your Voice. Your Vote. A 25-page manual designed for instructors teaching adult learners about issues, candidates, and appraisal of elected officials' performance." PDF Link. (Author: National Constitution Center, afghanelections.org)

This election is only the second to take place in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Some cardboard, a plastic handle, and some sound insulating foam make for an impressively portable vocal booth by Instructables user humanworkshop.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Instructables | Digg this!

I'm having fun going through old zines as part of my research for a book I'm writing on the DIY movement. Here's a page from Mike Gunderloy's zine-of-zines, Factsheet Five #33 (1989), which has an ad for bOING bOING. It also has a review of bOING bOING #1 on the previous page:

BOING BOING #1 ($4 CASH from Mark Frauenfelder, 712 Redacted St, Boulder, CO 80302): A delightful new zine for the neophiliac. Mark apparently was influenced by a lot of the same subversive literature that shaped my life, and now he's done something about it. The first issue features an interview with Robert Anton Wilson, book, zine and software reviews, wild predictions, comics, and much more. Nanotechnology, comics, libertarianism, drugs and sibling rivalry all play a part. An enjoyable romp through memespace.

It sure was fun poring over Factsheet Five with a highlighter. I'd order at least 30 different zines each time a new issue arrived.

chrb writes "BBC News is reporting on how the Alive in Afghanistan project is helping to oversee the Afghan elections using open-source technologies. The site was set up by Brian Conley, who is also responsible for 'Alive in Baghdad', 'Alive in Mexico', and who was arrested for filming protests in China last year. The Afghan site uses FrontlineSMS and Ushahidi to process and visualize SMS texts from Afghani citizens, allowing reports from all over the country to be rapidly collated and re-distributed globally."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A 1970s teenager's bedroom via Joel. What was yours like if you were a teen in the 70s?

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Retro | Digg this!

This certainly isn't a condemnation of the USPTO itself, but apparently a financial analyst within the PTO worked with a minister to steal more than $500,000. The minister has plead guilty, but the PTO employee is still just under investigation:

One of the patent employee's tasks was to process requests for funds from customers who had completed the application process, documents said. In his guilty plea, Reid said the patent office employee identified accounts that had gone dormant. She then changed the name on the accounts to Redeemed Music House and wired the cash to the company's bank account.

Court documents show that the patent worker stole a total of $534,338 over 32 transfers, 27 of which were to Reid. It is unclear from documents where the other $80,000 went.

This is obviously a scam by a corrupt employee, but a couple folks submitted it, noting that with so much interest in the USPTO around these parts, some folks might be interested. It's certainly not a condemnation of the USPTO (it does plenty of things officially for that), as it's pretty clearly a bad employee scamming money.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Above: An old ten-speed with a rusty chain and a few missing parts. A perfect project bike for personal use or for donation. Below: A reincarnated Raleigh road bike ready to ride for many miles.

Abandoned, neglected bikes are by no means a rare sight. Seeing one sticking out of the bushes behind our parking lot made me think of Thomas Arey's "Bike Scrounging" article from MAKE Volume 12. Thomas offers up some great tips and resources on how to recover discarded rides and even donate them. Here's the full article for you.

Bike Scrounging
How to fix a castoff bike and give it away.
By Thomas Arey

I'm going to venture a guess that many makers' earliest experiences working with tools and trying to figure out machines involved a bicycle. Even today it's the rare kid who hasn't tried to fix or even modify their bike. It's one of the reasons I still have great hope for humanity.

Cycling is good basic transportation, a boon to the cardiovascular system, and most of all, fun! But have you ever considered that cycling can also be free?

In the course of the trash picking and dumpster diving I do to bring these occasional articles to MAKE, I often run across bicycles left at the curb with other signs of our society's tendency to toss away what might be repaired or repurposed.

I've taken many of these rejected rides, turned them back into working bicycles, and donated them, either locally or through service organizations, to folks whose lives can literally be changed by owning a bicycle.

My general experience shows that the parts from 2 or 3 disposed bikes can make for 1 good bike. Any leftover parts from each scrounging venture go into storage to support future bike recovery operations.

Bicycle recovery is the perfect "learn by doing" process. Beyond stripping some threads (also repairable) you can't really hurt anything. Mixing and matching parts from different bikes will make you more adept at repair. This can even turn into a marketable skill with enough practice. Good bicycle mechanics are hard to find.

Your public library and the internet will turn up dozens of books and websites to help you get beyond the basics quickly. A good book that covers just about everything you need to know and more is The Bicycling Guide to Complete Bicycle Maintenance and Repair: For Road and Mountain Bikes by Todd Downs.

Sheldon Brown (sheldonbrown.com) is a well-known cycle mechanic who shares tons of information free on the web. A good source for odd and hard-to-find parts is Loose Screws (loosescrews.com).

Older bikes and most consumer-grade cycles can be worked on with common hand tools. The only specialty tool you may need from the start is a chain tool, required to remove and replace the chain on most multigear bikes. This tool can be found for as little as $10, but if you plan to do this a lot you should invest in high-quality tools.

When you come upon a bike leaning against a trash can, don't assume it's being trashed. I always knock on the door and check. More often than not I hear, "I got a couple more around back, you want them, too?"

When you get your bike(s) home, go through these steps:

1. Check your find over. Why was this bike tossed? I am always surprised to find that a few small problems led to the trip to the curb: a flat tire, snapped brake cable, or rusted chain being the most common.

2. Once you fix up the obvious problems, go over every nut, bolt, and bearing to tighten things up and check for more subtle problems that may require further disassembly.

3. In most cases, if it moves, lubricate it! Extremely neglected bikes may require greasing the bearings, but a little chain oil will get most bikes back on
the road.

4. Replace bad or worn parts with other items from your trash-picking efforts. Get friendly with your local bike shop. They have trash bins, too!

5. Even if the tires inflate, check both tires and tubes for signs of dry rot. Well-cared-for tires can last a long time but this may be the one place you need to spend money.

6. Broken spokes and bent wheels are intermediate-level repairs. Until you master the skills for this task just keep an eye out for other good wheels on your scrounging route.

7. Double-check all matters of safety, especially the braking system.

8. Enjoy the ride. It may be a little rough and rusty, but it rolls and the price is right!

After you've built a bike or two for your personal needs, why not think of getting your rebuilds into the hands of folks who can use them? Check your local social-service and faith-based organizations.

If you want your bikes to go beyond your local neighborhood to help the world, one clearinghouse website for bike donation is the International Bike Fund's page at ibike.org/encouragement/freebike.htm. This site lists organizations throughout the United States and other countries, and includes details about how your efforts to repair and reincarnate castaway cycles can truly work to change the world.

You can still pick up a back issue of MAKE Volume 12 in the Maker Shed.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Bicycles | Digg this!

MAKE reader Travis pointed out this neat technology that is being used to make robots that can climb on almost any surface. Scientists at SRI have been developing robotic climbers that attach to the wall using a technique they call electroadhesion. Details about the technology seem to be scare at the SRI site, however there is a nice write-up at hizook.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Digg this!

Peter Steinkamp, who makes neat little walker devices, sent me this 1945 patent for a one-legged hopping tank. Imagine a battlefield full of these things bouncing around.

One of the objects of this invention is to provide a tank having an extensible leg capable of imparting a series of vertical oscillations to the tank, and having means to vary the angle of inclination of the leg to obtain directional movement of the tank.

Another of the objects of the invention is to provide a tank which is adapted to traverse difficult terrain.

Yet another object of the invention is to provide a tank which is propelled in such a manner that its progress is intermittent, thereby rendering it a difficult target. Still another object is to provide a tank provided with means whereby the direction of its course may be rapidly changed, thereby rendering it a difficult target.

Haggis points us to an article about a guy who's been called "Jay-Z's favorite new rapper," who seems to be working with all the big names in the music business these days. But, Olubowale Victor Folarin, who goes by the name Wale (pronounced wah-lay) understands the importance of "free" within a business model. After all... it's how he got discovered:

Initially, he gained attention by making mix tapes available for free on the internet. Immediately they caught the eye and ear of musical magpie and producer Mark Ronson.

But, wait... wasn't the RIAA telling us that mixtape makers were criminals who needed to be thrown in jail while having their homes raided by SWAT teams? Looks like Wale understands the lessons of free music:

"Free music is the way for the future. To get your music off the ground you've got to give it away for free at first."

And apparently it's the way of big popular bands as well. So, who is free music bad for again? Oh, right. The folks who bet their entire business on selling plastic discs and refused to embrace what technology allows.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

coondoggie writes "The US Marine Corps has a request — build and rapidly deploy more 10lb-or-under robots its personnel can throw into dangerous situations that can quickly gather information without endangering Marines. The throwable robot is part of a family of robots that would range from the 10lb version to one that would act as a central controlling device and weigh close to 300lbs. Marine commanders are demanding ever lighter robots so that troops don't have to offload critical equipment from their rucksacks to accommodate them."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Instead of chaining multiple guitar effects in search of a new sound, I decided to mod just one. Using an Arduino microcontroller board + digi-pot chip (MCP41100), I was able to add a variable gating effect to a fuzz pedal fairly easily. I definitely dig the resulting sounds and a bit of rewiring should reduce the unwanted noise in the output. Switching to the MCP42100 would allow control over a second pot - perhaps the volume control for a tremolo effect.

You can find the "WavePot" sketch I used (including the necessary wiring list) here.

Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Arduino | Digg this!