Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Wednesday, March 24th, 2010
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You know all those drones you kids use to rain grim death upon your unfortunate friends in Modern Warfare 2 ? Well, according to an American University law professor’s Congressional testimony, they may be illegal under international law. Of course, they could be totally fine, too, it’s just that nobody really knows for sure. That’s probably not what the U.S. military wants to hear, given how much it has spent, and will spend, on drones. The deal is that the U.S. government has never actually justified, on a legal basis, its use of drones. It has never written a memo, went in front of a Congressional committee, tweeted a quick thought—nothing. The question becomes, OK, at some point you’re going to have to explain the legality of these things, so what’s the hold up? Or, in the words of the professor, one Kenneth Anderson: [Lawyers] have not settled on what the rationales are, and I believe that at some point that ill serves an administration which is embracing this. Now, maybe the answer is: This is really terrible and illegal and anybody that does it should go off to the Hague. But if that’s the case, then we should not be having the president saying that this is the greatest thing since whatever. That seems like a bad idea. Hmm, you’d think the government would have cleared that up before deploying all of those drones… It gets better! It’s cool and all when the U.S. military has a monopoly on drone technology, but what happens when a proper rival gets a hold of them? Do we, as Americans, want to straddle this line of legality ad infinitum, then find out that Rival Country now has ‘em, too? We occasionally write about drones because they’re quite neat: the amount of engineering and research and development that goes into drones is well worth any tech fan’s attention, if only for a moment. Maybe by the time Modern Warfare 13: Still Fighting comes out, the legal status of drones would have been cleared up.
Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Monday, March 15th, 2010
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Apparently there was some sort of media summit in Abu Dhabi recently, and a big topic of discussion was copyright infringement. (I think we need to reserve the word “piracy” for actual, sea-faring piracy, not kids grabbing the random Sublime song off LimeWire.) Rupert Murdoch called on governments to stop copyright infringers, asking them to punish them as they would shoplifters. I guess Murdoch doesn’t understand the different between theft and copyright infringement. And Ari Emmanuel , Rahm Emmanuel ’s brother (and the inspiration for the Entourage character Ari ), has been lobbying President Obama to implement some sort of three-strikes policy, like they have in France . France! A couple things: one, I’m pretty sure President Obama is a little busy trying to get some sort of healthcare law passed; the concerns of Hollywood bigshots aren’t exactly on his radar right now. Two, we’re beginning to enter the next election cycle, so Congress is going to be on its tippy toes trying not to offend anybody or do much of anything . It’s sorta like laying low come 3pm Friday, so your boss doesn’t saddle you with a last-minute assignment that’ll keep you at the office one longer that you need to be. Congress is busy doing nothing, in other words. As for Murdoch: whatever, dude. I think my government has more important things to do than track down high schoolers who download an episode of 24. At least I hope it does!
Posted by 010081
Tech
Sunday, March 14th, 2010
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Up until a moment ago, this was going to be a standard “newsy” post: the FCC will announce its National Broadband Plan on Tuesday, here’s what it’s all about. Then I read the comments of a PC World article discussing that very same plan—many people are outraged that the government would muscle its way into the free market! If Americans wanted fast broadband then the market would provide it on its own terms. That, of course, is complete nonsense: plenty of Americans live in one-ISP towns, and if said ISP provides terrible service, well, though cookies, chico. This is America! Love it or leave it~! And really, the FCC isn’t doing anything particularly controversial, at least I don’t think it’s controversial. All it’s doing is saying, by 2020, we’d like to see 100 million homes (out of an estimated 130 million homes come 2020) have access to broadband with speeds of up to 100 mbps. Some people already have access to that type of Internet connection, myself included . Other ISPs, including universally loathed Comcast , plans to roll out 100 mbps service in the coming months. So it’s not like the FCC is making some sort of unreasonable demand: the market has already decided that it’s worth its while to deploy 100 mbps service all over the country. A cynic might say that the FCC knows this, that 100 mbps service is closer than you might otherwise think, and is merely latching itself onto the ISPs so that it can be all, “See, FCC = leadership.” But don’t be cynical, don’t hold grudges: while you’re holding a grudge, the other guy is dancing. I don’t know, I suppose it makes sense to get into this a bit more when the FCC actually makes the Plan public on Tuesday. But for now, all I have to say is: chill out. Not everything the government announces is tantamount to quartering British soldiers in your house without permission. I suppose I’m talking to people right now who actually believe, and understand, that a wired country is truly in the best interests of everyone.
Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010
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Sir Tim Berners-Lee speaks at TED2010 about the value of open data. I recently heard a talk by David Weinberger, and one of the take-away comments from that speech for me was that the world is “ too big to know .” We use filters to select the pieces of data we want or need, but that assumes that the data is available to be filtered. Sir Berners-Lee’s comments very powerfully demonstrates the need to have data available to be filtered. Via HuffPost .
Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Monday, March 8th, 2010
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We’ve given you a first look at Iron Man 2 way back in June last year, and two months ago, we reported it will be Marvel’s first IMAX movie when it hits screens on May 7, 2010. It’s 2.32 minutes long and very, very cool. This is the official synopsis of the movie: Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment present the highly anticipated sequel to the blockbuster film based on the legendary Marvel Super Hero Iron Man, reuniting director Jon Favreau and Oscar® nominee Robert Downey Jr. In Iron Man 2, the world is aware that billionaire inventor Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is the armored Super Hero Iron Man. Under pressure from the government, the press and the public to share his technology with the military, Tony is unwilling to divulge the secrets behind the Iron Man armor because he fears the information will slip into the wrong hands. With Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), and James Rhodey Rhodes (Don Cheadle) at his side, Tony forges new alliances and confronts powerful new forces. Here’s the new trailer (Trailer on Apple.com in HD ) And to make things complete, here is the first official trailer (released in December last year):
Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Thursday, March 4th, 2010
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Nokia Siemens makes lots of mobile networking gear. Most of it provides the connectivity we use every day. But they also make and sell equipment to monitor that connectivity. Such devices are required in the U.S. and much of Europe for law enforcement purposes, and Nokia no doubt makes a pretty penny selling this monitoring equipment to various governments. New details have emerged recently that Nokia sold the same gear to Iran, where the government used it not for law enforcement purposes but to silence dissent. Big surprise! Nokia’s not alone in this practice of playing both sides of this issue: Cisco sells gobs of equipment to China for their Great Firewall; and plenty of other companies sell stuff to dictatorial regimes in the pursuit of profits. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, right? Ars Technica has a thorough story about the monitoring equipment, and Nokia’s claim that they did nothing wrong after the EU Parliament harshly reprimanded them.
Posted by Kevin Huffman
Tech
Monday, March 1st, 2010
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A Tokyo-based venture called ideal Star [JP] has developed a new method that makes it possible to produce solar cells in the form of flexible and thin threads. The company is supported by a total of six Japanese universities and the government. The current prototype cell is 5cm long and just 0.8mm in diameter. ideal Star says the core consists of polymer material and is surrounded by an electrode layer, and layers for hole transport, power-generating (this layer is made from fullerene), electron transport and another (transparent) electrode layer. Once the company finds a way to make the threads longer, they could be woven into power-generating solar sheets or solar power fabrics for clothing or curtains. As a first practical application, sheets consisting of these threads will be used on rice paddies (while they are being rested) to generate solar power. The solar threads feature an energy conversion efficiency of just around 3%, but ideal Star claims 10% are possible. The picture above shows amperage being measured from one of the threads that’s exposed to light. ideal Star estimates mass-production of their products would be cheaper than that of standard silicon solar cells. For example, all layers in the threads are coated down, meaning production requires no expensive semiconductor manufacturing equipment. The company hopes to commercialize the technology within the next five years. Via The Nikkei [registration required, paid subscription]