What's the connection between country and western music and an Irish jig? Where was the drum invented and what music resulted from this? What was the 1850's equivalent of a rock concert? These are some questions that Craig Newton answers or explores in his 45 minute program.
Location: Point Loma/Hervey
Location: Point Loma/Hervey
Posted by Library (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 02, 2010 03:00 PM · permalink
(Returning on September 9th) This program is for adults only who are English Language Learners. Participants must have basic ability to speak and understand English. New members can sign up at any class. No reservations required.
Location: Carmel Valley
Location: Carmel Valley
Posted by Library (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 02, 2010 02:30 PM · permalink
For children 3-5 years old. Listen to stories, learn fingerplays, and sign songs!
Location: Rancho Peñasquitos
Location: Rancho Peñasquitos
Posted by Library (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 02, 2010 02:30 PM · permalink
Gentle form of Yoga practiced sitting in or standing by a chair.
Location: La Jolla/Riford
Location: La Jolla/Riford
Posted by Library (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 02, 2010 02:30 PM · permalink
Every Thursday.
Location: Balboa
Location: Balboa
Posted by No contact (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 02, 2010 02:30 PM · permalink
I’ve just installed the new Justin.tv Android app on my HTC Hero with Android 2.1 running. It allows you to broadcast live streaming video from your phone, either over Wifi or 3G. For this first test I used Wifi, so I can’t vouch for the speed or quality of a 3G connection. First Impressions The [...]
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:50 PM · permalink
Many years ago when I was at ActiveState we had a new manager, I got one of those every month or so it wasn't a big deal. One of the things he said was - he would never use the excuse that a decision will be made because person X said so and they know best. It was 9 years ago, so I can't remember the exact wording.
What he was saying is that all decisions can be questioned, things need to be explained and we shouldn't be just blindly following some people. He was also saying that this is bit of elitism, putting other people down. This came back to me a few times as a manager when I made decisions and was questioned. But it really hit me home in slightly different circumstances on the Django mailing lists - and I will point out, this is a rare exception.
I've seen at a couple of times people say something like: "our code was written by X, so i doubt there's a bug there", "this was designed by X who has quite a reputation...".
Each time, it's felt a bit like the "person X knows best" card has been pulled out and people can't argue with it and it grates a little. As the questioner it would put me down.
There are many people on the Django mailing list whom by following their comments and decisions I've come to respect a lot (Russell, Jakob, Karen, Graham etc). The problem is here that people come into the situation phrasing their issue incorrectly and it comes across dis-respectfully. They haven't realized how smart and (generally) right these people are.
They assume that something is broken and how can we all be so stupid for not seeing it or fixing it. It can be tough not to pull out the card in this case and say "X is right because they are the god of Y".
If you are about to write that in the mailing list, maybe there's another way of phrasing it that will keep Django one of the friendliest and nicest communities out there.
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:50 PM · permalink
Telvee was originally a Facebook app. It was Burak Büyükdemir‘s idea to create a virtual coffee reading app. Rakı Sofrası was super popular then. We have quickly built and deployed and getting some good results. But the competition wasn’t fair. When I decided to give this software a fair chance to succeed on its very [...]
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:50 PM · permalink
FRRX4Q4UX8MD
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:50 PM · permalink
- DjangoDash Happened
- DjangoDash Lessons Learned
- Django Packages
- South 0.7.2 Released
- DjangoCon US
- [[http://blog.roseman.org.uk/2010/08/14/getting-related-item-aggregate/| Getting the related item in an aggregate]]
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:50 PM · permalink
Published on September 02, 2010 Yesterday, I aired our clean laundry. Or at least our towels. Today, this page that calculates the impact of running a single 100-watt light bulb for a year (for starters: it requires the mining of 714 pounds of coal).
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:49 PM · permalink
Personal bankruptcy filings fell in August, nearly erasing the rise in filings the prior month, a new report shows.
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:37 PM · permalink
adeelarshad82 writes "IBM revealed details of its 5.2-GHz chip, the fastest microprocessor ever announced. Costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, IBM described the z196, which will power its Z-series of mainframes. The z196 contains 1.4 billion transistors on a chip measuring 512 square millimeters fabricated on 45-nm PD SOI technology. It contains a 64KB L1 instruction cache, a 128KB L1 data cache, a 1.5MB private L2 cache per core, plus a pair of co-processors used for cryptographic operations. IBM is set to ship the chip in September."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 11:57 AM · permalink
<div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Six months ago, I put together a workbook that would help Linchpin readers ship.</p>
<p>After testing it out on hundreds of people, it's now ready for retail sale. [<strong>UPDATE</strong> on 9/2--yesterday, the workbook was so popular it went to the top 10 of all books on Amazon. And they sold all the warehouse could take. So it's <em>sold out</em>... I have shipped more to them, but they probably won't go on sale until the 8th. I'll update this post then. Thanks guys.]</p>
<p>You can find <a href="http://www.squidoo.com/the-shipit-workbook" target="_blank" title="details">details</a> here, or jump right to the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0970309996/permissionmarket" target="_blank" title="buy">buy</a> page. The goal? To make you uncomfortable at the beginning of a project (and successful at the end).</p>
<p>Here's the core idea: it's weird to write in a book. When you do, you're making a commitment. You're combining the open-mindedness that reading brings with the physical action of writing. If you do that at every step in a project--and if your co-workers do too--the seemingly slippery decisions that get made appear a lot more solid.</p>
<p>The ShipIt workbook is designed to be worked on in groups (hence the five pack) and it delivers. If you can confront the mechanics or the fear that's slowing down (or even killing) your project, it's easy to fix it now, before it's too late.</p>
<p>There's no digital version, because without writing things down, it can't work. But there is an mp3 <a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/files/shipit_booklet-audio.m4a" target="_self" title="interview">interview</a> that will help you get your arms around how each page works. I'm pricing this first batch at $3.20 each in a pack of five just for the launch. [PS Amazon is having trouble shipping to Canadians right now. It may take a while to figure this out, and all I can do is apologize...]</p>
<p>I hope you'll give it a try.</p></div><div class="feedflare">
<a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/typepad/sethsmainblog?a=pT5hvkL35jI:R2YjZQsHMZA:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/typepad/sethsmainblog?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0"></img></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/typepad/sethsmainblog?a=pT5hvkL35jI:R2YjZQsHMZA:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/typepad/sethsmainblog?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0"></img></a>
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Posted by Seth Godin on September 02, 2010 11:52 AM · permalink
Saving dates in text column is a bad idea. But if we already have data entered into the column, how to correct it?<br />In the following example, I have stored all the values in mm/dd/YYYY format and want to change it to the standard mysql date format.<br /><br />mysql>create table datevar(mydate varchar(20));<br />Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.01 sec)<br /><br />mysql>insert into datevar values ('12/31/2009'), ('3/23/2010'), ('09/14/1999');<br />Query OK, 3 rows affected (0.00 sec)<br />Records: 3 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0<br /><br />mysql>select * from datevar;<br />+------------+<br />| mydate |<br />+------------+<br />| 12/31/2009 |<br />| 3/23/2010 |<br />| 09/14/1999 |<br />+------------+<br />3 rows in set (0.00 sec)<br /><br />mysql>update datevar set mydate = str_to_date(mydate, '%m/%d/%Y');<br />Query OK, 3 rows affected (0.00 sec)<br />Rows matched: 3 Changed: 3 Warnings: 0<br /><br />mysql>select * from datevar;<br />+------------+<br />| mydate |<br />+------------+<br />| 2009-12-31 |<br />| 2010-03-23 |<br />| 1999-09-14 |<br />+------------+<br />3 rows in set (0.00 sec)<br /><br />mysql>alter table datevar modify mydate date;<br />Query OK, 3 rows affected (0.01 sec)<br />Records: 3 Duplicates: 0 Warnings: 0<br /><br />mysql>show create table datevar\G<br />*************************** 1. row ***************************<br /> Table: datevar<br />Create Table: CREATE TABLE `datevar` (<br /> `mydate` date default NULL<br />) ENGINE=MyISAM DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1<br />1 row in set (0.01 sec)<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/3043709-4630347444972356451?l=oksoft.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
Posted by shantanu (shantanu.oak@gmail.com) on September 02, 2010 11:21 AM · permalink
We Mac users have been blessed with self-contained applications that (for the most part) don't require an installation/setup. This means trying out a new application is a simple matter of downloading and double clicking and the app is running.
However, in many cases people end up having their applications installed to their Downloads folder instead of the "proper" Applications folder, because they don't know or care where their apps are running.
Stay, a great window helper application with an ungoogleable name, recognizes this antipattern and is able to move itself to the Applications folder if it's running from Downloads.
What a great way to recognize and prevent a potential headache for your customers.
Posted on September 02, 2010 11:14 AM · permalink
<p><i><b>This post is from staff writer Sierra Black.</b> Sierra writes about frugality, sustainable living, and getting her kids to eat kale at <a href="http://childwild.com"><b>Childwild.com</b></a>.</i></p>
<p>The summer heat has taken a toll on my <a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/09/28/in-praise-of-the-debt-snowball/">debt snowball</a>. Two months ago, I <a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2010/06/28/beyond-credit-card-debt/">paid off the last of my credit card debt</a>, but I still have thousands of dollars in loans. I started the summer with over $10,000 in my <a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2007/03/21/which-online-high-yield-savings-account-is-best/">savings account</a>, no credit card debt, and a solid plan to pay off my remaining loans within the next few years.</p>
<p>Then life happened. I’ve been living out of suitcases for the past two months, traveling to New York, <a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2010/07/09/worth-more-than-money-taking-a-detour-on-the-road-to-riches/">Buenos Aires</a>, and Bangor. (I’ve blogged quite a bit about how <a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2010/07/15/how-to-save-money-while-traveling/">travel is one of my budget weak spots</a>.) So I spent some money. Not as much as I was afraid I might, but more than I probably should have.</p>
<p>Also, I have kids. Those of you with children may have noticed that they’re expensive. There are a thousand articles out there on how to keep the cost of having children to a minimum. I’ve written some of those myself. But I’m here to tell you that whether you do your back-to-school shopping at Bloomingdale’s or Goodwill, kids will add to your monthly expenses.</p>
<p>So here I am. Summer’s ending. I’m writing from the lake house in northern Maine where I’ve been holed up for much of the past few months. In the peaceful quiet hour around sunset, I finally steeled myself and looked at my bank balance.</p>
<p><i><b>Resting on my laurels</b></i><br />
It’s not as bad as I’d feared. The numbers are still solidly in the black. My savings have a dent in them, but a smaller one than I expected. My checking account is in good shape. My bills are paid.</p>
<p>The shadow in this rosy picture: I haven’t made any extra debt payments all summer. The hot weather arrived, my credit cards were paid off, and instead of rolling that debt snowball right into my car loan, I sat back on my laurels. No wonder I have more money than I expected: I’ve been letting all my debt snowball money (which adds up to almost $2000 a month) sluice around in my regular budget for two months!</p>
<p>I was going to try to slide this under the radar. I figured I’d turn a new leaf when the leaves changed colors, keep paying my debts off as quick as I can, and no one needed to be the wiser.</p>
<p>But then J.D. pointed out that my recent posts here haven’t had a lot of “me” in them. That’s not just because I’m focused on other things. It’s because I don’t want anyone looking too closely at <i>me</i>. I’m a little ashamed of where my finances are.</p>
<p>Not that there’s anything wrong with taking a few months off from my debt snowball. I wanted to do something indulgent and special to celebrate being out of credit card debt. Taking a summer off would have been an expensive but reasonable choice.</p>
<p>The problem is that I <i>didn’t</i> choose it. It just sort of happened. I let things slide. I put “set up increased loan payments” at the top of my financial to-do list in June. (A to-do list I literally left sitting on my desk when I packed my bags and left for the summer.) But I neglected to do set up those payments, or to do any other active management of my household finances for months. There was money in my checking account, and that was good enough for me.</p>
<p>Now there’s a familiar sinking feeling in my stomach as I look at my bank balance and have no idea where my money has gone or what the numbers mean.</p>
<p><i><b>Failing forward</b></i><br />
I’m not actually in any financial trouble. But my timeline for being out of debt has slipped, and it’s slipped through some of the same cracks that led me into debt in the first place. I don’t know where all that extra money went. Some of it went into preschool tuition and plane tickets and new shoes for the kids. Sure. But I was also careless budgeting for groceries and any number of small purchases. Those add up to a lot of dollars.</p>
<p>My shame isn’t about my bottom line. It’s about my bad habits. I’m making some of the same mistakes I made for years. The mistakes I’m prone to making with money when I don’t pay attention. That’s embarrassing, no matter what my bank balance is.</p>
<p>Of course, shame and fear about money was what led me into this debt trap. I didn’t want to look. <b>For years, I simply refused to know what my spending habits were, or even what my regular bills added up to.</b> By the time I turned 30, that head-in-the-sand approach had saddled me more debt than the total income I’d earned in my life. I’ve spent the past two years digging myself out, and I’m starting to see a light at the end of that tunnel.</p>
<p>I’ve been living on a skinny budget for years. I’ve paid off a mountain of credit cards. But even though I had a lot of credit card debt, the credit cards were still the low-hanging fruit.</p>
<p>Now I have to pay off loans. They have lower interest rates and higher balances than my credit cards did. The bills just come quietly every month and I pay them. The balances only move down, but they move down slowly.</p>
<p>There’s no exciting struggle. No relearning old habits to keep the plastic in my wallet and out of my hand when I’m standing in line at the checkout. No lifestyle changes that will suddenly free up hundreds of dollars to wipe out the debt.</p>
<p><b>I just need to roll that snowball over and keep paying it.</b> I suspect that even being very aggressive about my debt payments, it will be two years before I hit another financial milestone worth throwing a party about. This approach is effective — but boring. That’s what getting rich slowly is all about.</p>
<p>It’s the beginning of September. The beginning of fall, and of a new school year. A great time for new beginnings. I’m back on the wagon with my budget, and making those extra loan payments this month.</p>
<p>I’m writing about all this publicly in the hopes that it’s a teachable moment. The lesson I’ve learned so far: Sometimes we all slip. The key is to fall back on the skills and strengths you know you have, and start over from wherever you are.</p>
<p>What else can I learn here? You’re a bunch of extremely smart readers. <b>What do <i>you</i> do to stay motivated while paying down debt or saving towards a goal?</b> What helps you keep your good financial habits going?</p>
<p>---<br />Related Articles at Get Rich Slowly:<ul><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2008/08/26/free-debt-snowball-spreadsheet/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Free Debt Snowball Spreadsheet">Free Debt Snowball Spreadsheet</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2007/10/05/ask-the-readers-how-to-live-debt-free/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Ask the Readers: How to Live Debt-Free?">Ask the Readers: How to Live Debt-Free?</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/09/28/in-praise-of-the-debt-snowball/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: In Praise of the Debt Snowball">In Praise of the Debt Snowball</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/12/28/ask-the-readers-emergency-fund-or-debt-snowball/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Ask the Readers: Emergency Fund or Debt Snowball?">Ask the Readers: Emergency Fund or Debt Snowball?</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2009/02/20/ask-the-readers-how-to-prioritize-savings-goals/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Ask the Readers: How to Prioritize Savings Goals?">Ask the Readers: How to Prioritize Savings Goals?</a></b></ul></p><br />
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</div>
Posted by Sierra Black on September 02, 2010 11:00 AM · permalink
Six weeks after landing men on the moon, Americans take another giant leap for mankind with the nation’s first cash-spewing, automated teller machine.
Posted by Kim Zetter on September 02, 2010 11:00 AM · permalink
Blazing fast (four minutes and nine seconds!), streamlined and full of highlights, Cuisinart's PerfecTemp puts its kettle competition to shame.
Posted by Joe Brown on September 02, 2010 11:00 AM · permalink
Video calls aren't for people to see you — they're for people to see what you see.
Posted by Steven Levy on September 02, 2010 11:00 AM · permalink
Buffalo55 writes "For the most part, classic games manage to reappear on different systems. Just look at Nintendo. The publisher has done an excellent job bringing NES, SNES, Genesis and even old school Neo Geo titles to the Wii's Virtual Console, while Microsoft's Game Room brings the best of Atari's 2600 into the living room. Of course, not every console was a success. The '90s, in particular, saw quite a few flops from companies like Panasonic, Sega and Atari. Just because a system is a failure, though, doesn't mean all of its games suck. On the contrary, most of these machines have a few gems that fell between the cracks once the console croaked."
What overlooked game on a failed platform would you like to see revived?
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by Soulskill on September 02, 2010 10:39 AM · permalink
<p>So, there’s
<a href="http://galaxytab.samsungmobile.com/">a new kind of Android device</a>
in the world. The world still isn’t sure just where it is that tablets are the right tool
for the job. That granted, this is a nifty product. And I’m developing my own theory of
what tablets are for.</p>
<p>My impressions are based on a couple hours playing with one, which at this
point is a couple hours more than almost anyone else. The model I played was
not <em>quite</em> production — among other things, the product name stenciled
on the back wasn’t “Galaxy Tab” — but close.</p>
<p>I won’t have one on next week’s
<a href="/ongoing/When/201x/2010/08/09/Upcoming-gig-Mobile-Tech">trip to
Mainz</a> for
<a href="http://mobiletechcon.de/">MobileTech</a>, but I’m pretty sure I’ll be
able to take one along to
<a href="http://www.google.com/intl/ja/events/developerday/2010/tokyo/">GDD
Tokyo</a> and
<a href="http://jaoo.dk/">JAOO</a> in Aarhus, Denmark.</p>
<p>Other coverage: At the Financial Times’
<a href="http://blogs.ft.com/techblog/2010/09/samsung-galaxy-tab-first-impressions/">ft.com/techbog</a>,
also
<a href="http://www.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-hands-video">Android
Central</a> (with a useful
<a href="http://www.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-vs-apple-ipad">iPad comparo</a>), also
<a href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/02/samsung-galaxy-tab-preview/">Engadget</a>.</p>
<h2 id="p-1">Impressions</h2>
<p>All the apps I tried ran just fine, including a couple of
immersive games that really benefited from the extra inches.
I’ve heard of a few apps that misbehave, but their problems were obvious & easy to
fix; watch for details over on the
<a href="http://android-developers.blogspot.com/">Android Dev Blog</a>,
starting later today.</p>
<p>Samsung has sprinkled some sugar on the out-of-the-box Google UI elements,
and while the community’s opinions on hardware companies’ efforts to
improve Android software have been, um, mixed (my own is <em>extremely</em>
mixed), I have to say that the Samsungers have shown restraint,
putting the extra real estate to good use in good places, for example the
notifications pull-down. There may be some of that
integrated-social-everything that frankly gets up my nose, but my nose
remained clear around the Tab, so if it’s there it‘s at least easy to ignore.</p>
<p>It’s snappy, especially on games where that matters; maybe there are
places where servicing the extra bits in the 1024x600 screen will hurt, but I
didn’t run across them.</p>
<p>It’s got a phone but (at least on the pre-release model I used) you can’t
hold it up to your head, which is a good thing as that would look supremely
dorky.</p>
<p>Did I mention that the screen is beautiful? Also it feels really good in
the hand and looks pretty nice, and is obviously in the first
microsecond’s glance not an iPad.</p>
<h2 id="p-2">What Are Tablets For?</h2>
<p>The trade-off is obvious. You win because you can show a bigger picture,
which is important, and you lose because it just won’t fit in many pockets,
which is important. It’ll go in most purses, though.</p>
<p>I know what I’ll use the Galaxy Tab for: to show off Android. The big
screen just makes everything easier to see and point at, and graphics look
outstanding, and it passes from hand to hand easily. Showing off Android is
part of my job and this will help me do my job better.</p>
<p>Which leads to a general theory, reinforced by informal
observation of hipsters with iPads in coffee shops: a tablet is, crucially, a
<em>more shareable</em> computer. A laptop, with its fragile hinge-ware and
space-gobbling keyboard, is just not comfy to share. A tablet is easier to
bring to the café, easier to hand across the table or along the sofa, easier to seize in the
heat of the moment, easier to hold up in triumph, easier to set aside when
you need to meet someone’s eyes.</p>
<p>How big a market is that? Anyone who says they know is lying.</p>
Posted on September 02, 2010 10:01 AM · permalink
<p><center><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0470581573?ie=UTF8&tag=allthingsfina-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0470581573"><img src="http://allfinancialmatters.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Buckets-of-Money-Retirement-Solution.jpg" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" /></a></center></p>
<p>I received a copy of Ray Lucia’s <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0470581573?ie=UTF8&tag=allthingsfina-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0470581573"><strong>The Buckets of Money Retirement Solution:</strong> <em>The Ultimate Guide to Income for Life</em></a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=allthingsfina-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0470581573" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />*, a couple of weeks ago. I avoided the first “Buckets” book because the title got on my nerves. As much as the title bugs me, I do think the strategy is solid. When I first became familiar with the “buckets” strategy it reminded me of Paul Grangaard’s <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0399528474?ie=UTF8&tag=allthingsfina-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0399528474"><strong>Grangaard Strategy:</strong> <em>Invest Right During Retirement</em></a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=allthingsfina-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0399528474" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />*, which I <a href="http://allfinancialmatters.com/2006/08/25/a-review-of-the-grangaard-strategy-by-paul-grangaard-cpa/"><strong>reviewed</strong></a> and <a href="http://allfinancialmatters.com/2006/08/28/a-simple-example-of-the-grangaard-strategy/"><strong>discussed</strong></a> several years ago.</p>
<p>Lucia opens the book with a discussion of the credit crisis and how it has affected people’s retirement accounts. It seems like every book these days discusses the credit crisis. Lucia approached it more from the standpoint of what can be done from this point forward rather than just rehash the turmoil. The second chapter offers up four steps that people can do in preparing for the future:</p>
<p>1. Rebuild savings.</p>
<p>2. Rethink retirement years.</p>
<p>3. Retool retirement savings plans.</p>
<p>4. Reinvent strategy.</p>
<p>Pointers and ideas (like use less gas) are offered for each step. This particular part of the book seemed unnecessary to me.</p>
<p>The real meat of the book begins in chapter three, which begins the discussion of the “buckets strategy.”</p>
<p><strong>What is the Buckets of Money strategy?</strong></p>
<p>Basically, the strategy sets up three “buckets” representing three different goals and time horizons. Like this:</p>
<p><strong>Bucket 1.</strong> Short-term income. This bucket is used to meet day-to-day expenses.</p>
<p><strong>Bucket 2.</strong> Intermediate-term income. This bucket is used to hold assets that will be used for income a few years down the road.</p>
<p><strong>Bucket 3.</strong> Growth. This bucket is used to grow assets for future income.</p>
<p>He then goes into details about what investments to put into each bucket. Bucket 1 is reserved for short-term investments and lifetime income (annuities). This bucket has a 1-5 year time horizon.</p>
<p>Bucket 2 is reserved for riskier income-generating assets. Fixed annuities, corporate bonds, international bonds, and a whole host of various annuities. Yes, Lucia even suggests looking into fixed indexed annuities. This part bugged me a little. It wouldn’t bug me so much but nearly all the positive vibes for some of these annuities comes from those who sell them. To Lucia’s credit, he did address expenses and the importance of keeping them under control.</p>
<p>Bucket 3 is where the growth assets are kept. This is where stocks, REITs, and other riskier assets are held for the long-term. He dedicates an entire chapter to REITs and nontraded REITs. Lucia is a fan of nontraded REITs, which are purchased through a broker and do incur sales loads.</p>
<p>After discussing the Buckets, he moves on to give a hypothetical example of positioning a couple for retirement. This chapter was interesting but a little on the vague side. For instance, when is the right time to move assets from Bucket 3 to Bucket 2? I never really found a solid answer to that question.</p>
<p>The rest of the book has chapters on annuities, REITs (mentioned above), personally owned real estate, taxes, and withdrawal strategies.</p>
<p>Overall I liked the book. There were a few things I didn’t like. Some of his charts were out of date (one ended in 1997, another ended in 2004). In his discussion of annuities, he cited a study co-sponsored by Wharton and New York Life that was very complimentary toward annuities. This is not surprising since New York Life co-sponsored the study. What would one expect it to say? Finally, staying on the topic of annuities, he talked about how confusing some of the products were. I’m of the mind that if a product is that confusing, it should be avoided like the plague. But, that’s just me. I bring my own biases to the table.</p>
<p>*<em>Affiliate Link</em></p>
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Posted by JLP on September 02, 2010 10:00 AM · permalink
<p><ol>
<li><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/science-blogs">Guardian Science Blogs</a> -- the latest in a series of science blog aggregators. Nobody is too sure what benefits a blog umbrella like Discovery or Nature (or the Guardian) offers bloggers. Regardless of this, the content is fantastic.</li>
<li><a href="http://github.com/livid/v2ex">v2ex: A Community Running on AppEngine</a> -- no hosting costs, massive scalability.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1410492424/tanna-center-for-the-arts-0">Raising Money for Vanuatu Arts Center</a> -- a Kickstarter project to fund <i>a 6-hectare/14.8-acre off-the-grid artists retreat, cultural preservation and technological education space</i> in the remote Pacific island of Vanuatu. Kickstarter is incredible. (via <a href="http://boingboing.net">BoingBoing</a>)</li>
<li><a href="http://xkcd.com/787/">Orbiter</a> (XKCD) -- names are human artifacts, as every Internet mapping company knows. I'm reminded of how Gracenote, who run CDDB, store every datum submitted to them, and consequently have nearly fifty spellings of Britney Spears. </li>
</ol></p>
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Posted by Nat Torkington on September 02, 2010 10:00 AM · permalink
<div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Most of the time, particulary in b2b and luxury sales, the competition is nothing.</p>
<p>"I will buy this treat or I will buy nothing, because I don't really need anything."</p>
<p>"I will buy your consulting services, or I'll continue doing what I'm doing now on that front, which is nothing."</p>
<p>None of the above.</p>
<p>"I will vote for you or I'll do what I usually do, which is not vote."</p>
<p>"I'll hire you or I'll hire no one."</p>
<p>While you think your competition is that woman across town, it's probably apathy, sitting still, ignoring the problem... nothing.</p>
<p>Stop worrying so much about comparing yourself to every other possible competitor you can imagine and start comparing yourself to nothing. Are you really worth the hassle, the risk, the time, the money? Or can't the prospect just wait until tomorrow?</p></div><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by Seth Godin on September 02, 2010 09:36 AM · permalink
aarondubrow writes "Three years ago, researchers from Caltech and The University of Texas at Austin came together to create a computational tool that could model the Earth and answer the most pressing questions in geophysics: What controls the speed of plates? How do microplates interact? How much energy do the plates generate and how does it dissipate? Using a new geodynamics software package they developed, the researchers have modeled plate motion with greater accuracy than ever before. The project is also a finalist for the Gordon Bell Prize — high performance computing's Oscar — at this year's SC10 conference."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
<iframe src="http://slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?op=discuss&id=1774176&smallembed=1" style="height: 300px; width: 100%; border: none;"></iframe>
Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 08:56 AM · permalink
<p><a href="http://passionforcinema.com/the-film-emotional-atyachar/the-film-emotional-atyachar-poster/" rel="attachment wp-att-32732"><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/The-Film-Emotional-Atyachar-Poster-175x250.jpg" alt="" title="The Film Emotional Atyachar Poster" width="175" height="250" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-32732" /></a><strong>Language</strong>: Hindi</p>
<p><strong>Director</strong> : Akshay Shere</p>
<p><strong>Writer</strong> : Akshay Shere</p>
<p><strong>Release Date</strong>: 03 September 2010 ( India ) </p>
<p><strong>Cast</strong>: Mohit Ahlawat, Kalki Koechlin, Vinay Pathak</p>
<p><strong>Producer</strong>: Vinay Gutte</p>
<p><strong>Music</strong>: Mangesh Dhadke, Bappi Lahiri</p>
<p><strong>Cinematography</strong> : Tribhuvan Babu</p>
<p><strong>Film Editing</strong> : Pranav V.Dhiwar</p>
<p><a href="http://passionforcinema.com/the-film-emotional-atyachar/gr-banner44-13/" rel="attachment wp-att-32731"><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/GR-Banner4413-500x110.jpg" alt="" title="GR-Banner44" width="500" height="110" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-32731" /></a></p>
<h4>Vote your reactions for the movie below. Click on the number of stars you would like to give to the movie and add your short reaction in the comment block</h4>
<br /><div><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/plugins/gd-star-rating/gfx.php?type=thumbs&value=0" /></div><div>Score: 0 (0 votes cast)</div><br />
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Posted by PFCdesktop on September 02, 2010 08:54 AM · permalink
zenprofiler helps answer WHAT is being called the most. spyon helps answer WHERE those calls are being made. ZenProfiler provides a faster version of the standard library ruby profiler. It is otherwise pretty much the same as before. spyon provides a clean way to redefine a bottleneck method so you can account for and aggregate all the calls to it.
% ruby -Ilib bin/zenprofile misc/factorial.rb 50000
Total time = 3.056884
Total time = 2.390000
total self self total
% time seconds seconds calls ms/call ms/call name
50.70 1.64 1.64 50000 0.03 0.05 Integer#downto
19.63 2.27 0.63 200000 0.00 0.00 Fixnum#*
14.19 2.73 0.46 50000 0.01 0.05 Factorial#factorial
9.93 3.05 0.32 1 320.36 3047.10 Range#each
5.54 3.23 0.18 2 89.40 178.79 ZenProfiler#start_hook
Once you know that Integer#downto takes 50% of the entire run, you can use spy_on to find it. (See misc/factorial.rb for the actual code):
% SPY=1 ruby -Ilib misc/factorial.rb 50000
Spying on Integer#downto
Integer.downto
50000: total
50000: ./misc/factorial.rb:6:in `factorial' via
./misc/factorial.rb:6:in `factorial'
Changes:
1.3.0 / 2010-09-02
2 minor enhancements:
- Added spycm and spyon_cm for class methods
- Improved zenprofile output for class methods. ENV really sucks.
Posted on September 02, 2010 08:16 AM · permalink
<p><a href="http://passionforcinema.com/we-are-family/we-are-family-poster-2/" rel="attachment wp-att-32729"><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/We-Are-Family-Poster1-172x250.jpg" alt="" title="We Are Family Poster" width="172" height="250" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-32729" /></a><strong>Language</strong>: Hindi</p>
<p><strong>Director</strong> : Siddharth Malhotra</p>
<p><strong>Writers</strong> : Screenplay-Gigi Levangie, Jessie Nelson, Steven Rogers, Karen Leigh Hopkins, Ron Bass<br />
Adapted Screenplay- Venita Coelho, Story- Gigi Levangie</p>
<p><strong>Release Date</strong>: 02 September 2010 ( India ) </p>
<p><strong>Cast</strong>: Kajol, Kareena Kapoor, Arjun Rampal</p>
<p><strong>Producers</strong>: Karan Johar, Hiroo Yash Johar,</p>
<p><strong>Music</strong>: Shankar- Ehsaan-Loy</p>
<p><strong>Cinematography</strong> : Mohanan</p>
<p><strong>Film Editing</strong> : Deepa Bhatia</p>
<p><a href="http://passionforcinema.com/we-are-family/gr-banner44-12/" rel="attachment wp-att-32728"><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/GR-Banner4412-500x110.jpg" alt="" title="GR-Banner44" width="500" height="110" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-32728" /></a></p>
<h4>Vote your reactions for the movie below. Click on the number of stars you would like to give to the movie and add your short reaction in the comment block</h4>
<br /><div><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/plugins/gd-star-rating/gfx.php?type=thumbs&value=0" /></div><div>Score: 0 (0 votes cast)</div><br />
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Posted by PFCdesktop on September 02, 2010 08:14 AM · permalink
Wraps rbaddeventhook so you can write fast ruby event hook processors w/o the speed penalty that comes with settrace_func (sooo sloooow!). Calls back into ruby so you don't have to write C.
% ruby demo.rb
# of iterations = 1000000
user system total real
null_time 0.120000 0.000000 0.120000 ( 0.125279)
ruby time 0.560000 0.000000 0.560000 ( 0.562834)
event hook 3.160000 0.010000 3.170000 ( 3.175361)
set_trace_func 34.530000 0.100000 34.630000 ( 34.942785)
Changes:
1.1.0 / 2010-09-02
2 minor enhancements:
- Allow eventhookklass to work with class and metaclass.
- Force ~/.ruby_inline cleanup in tests
1 bug fix:
- event_hook won't work on any 1.9 w/o major rework :(
Posted on September 02, 2010 08:13 AM · permalink
Vlad the Deployer's sexy brainchild is rake-remote_task, extending Rake with remote task goodness.
Changes:
2.0.2 / 2010-09-02
1 bug fix:
- 1.9 fixes to quell test warnings and the like
- http://rubyforge.org/projects/hitsquad/
Posted on September 02, 2010 08:07 AM · permalink
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<p><em>Saarpu saarpu ji</em> is lyrically amusing; tune-wise it barely passes muster. The spoofy feel continues in <em>Saudi Basha</em> – middling tune again, marred by a cornucopia of middle-eastern sounds. Andrea’s acapella-like <em>Thediyae thediyae</em> sees the composer in much better stead; lilting tune and very well orchestrated. The soundtrack however belongs to the supremely-goofy <em>Unnai kan theduthe</em>, a retro tune, jazzed up with funky arrangements, with Prakash and Gana Ulaganathan having rollicking fun with the vocals! The director duo’s earlier film had equally lampoonish music, but at least sounded good, as a soundtrack. Va Quarter Cutting is several notches below, collectively.</p>
<p>Keywords: Pushkar, Gayatri, Mirchi Shiva, Mirchi Siva, Lekha Washington, Tamil Padam, G V Prakash Kumar, GV Prakash Kumar</p>
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Posted by Karthik on September 02, 2010 07:30 AM · permalink
We recently discussed a man who sued NCsoft for making Lineage II "too addictive" after he spent 20,000 hours over five years playing it. Now, several readers have pointed out that the lawsuit has progressed past its first major hurdle: the EULA. Quoting:
"NC Interactive has responded the way most software companies and online services have for more than a decade: it argued that the claims are barred by its end-user license agreement, which in this case capped the company's liability to the amount Smallwood paid in fees over six months prior to his filing his complaint (or thereabout.) One portion of the EULA specifically stated that lawsuits could only be brought in Texas state court in Travis County, where NC Interactive is located. ... But the judge in this case, US District Judge Alan C. Kay, noted that both Texas and Hawaii law bar contract provisions that waive in advance the ability to make gross-negligence claims. He also declined to dismiss Smallwood's claims for negligence, defamation, and negligent infliction of emotional distress."
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Posted by Soulskill on September 02, 2010 07:29 AM · permalink
Flay analyzes code for structural similarities. Differences in literal values, variable, class, method names, whitespace, programming style, braces vs do/end, etc are all ignored. Making this totally rad.
Changes:
1.4.1 / 2010-09-01
2 minor enhancements:
- Added extra error handling for ERB flay to deal with tons of bad ERB
- Skip plugin if another version already loaded (eg local vs gem).
1 bug fix:
- Fixed all tests that were having problems on 1.9 due to unstable hashes
- http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb
Posted on September 02, 2010 07:23 AM · permalink
Flog reports the most tortured code in an easy to read pain report. The higher the score, the more pain the code is in.
Changes:
2.5.0 / 2010-09-01
1 major enhancement:
- Added plugin system. Define a module under Flog to extend it.
3 minor enhancements:
- Added special case penalty for wtf to_proc: blah(&b = proc {...}) (benjaminb)
- Improved tests and test coverage.
- Unfactored & refactored report code. Much cleaner and more maintainable now.
2 bug fixes:
- Fixed API change for FlogTask (andreacampi)
- Fixed bad edgecase handler for block_pass (benjaminb)
- http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb
Posted on September 02, 2010 07:19 AM · permalink
<p>zenprofiler helps answer WHAT is being called the most. spy<em>on helps
answer WHERE those calls are being made. ZenProfiler provides a faster
version of the standard library ruby profiler. It is otherwise pretty
much the same as before. spy</em>on provides a clean way to redefine a
bottleneck method so you can account for and aggregate all the calls
to it.</p>
<pre><code>% ruby -Ilib bin/zenprofile misc/factorial.rb 50000
Total time = 3.056884
Total time = 2.390000
total self self total
% time seconds seconds calls ms/call ms/call name
50.70 1.64 1.64 50000 0.03 0.05 Integer#downto
19.63 2.27 0.63 200000 0.00 0.00 Fixnum#*
14.19 2.73 0.46 50000 0.01 0.05 Factorial#factorial
9.93 3.05 0.32 1 320.36 3047.10 Range#each
5.54 3.23 0.18 2 89.40 178.79 ZenProfiler#start_hook
</code></pre>
<p>Once you know that Integer#downto takes 50% of the entire run, you
can use spy_on to find it. (See misc/factorial.rb for the actual code):</p>
<pre><code>% SPY=1 ruby -Ilib misc/factorial.rb 50000
Spying on Integer#downto
Integer.downto
50000: total
50000: ./misc/factorial.rb:6:in `factorial' via
./misc/factorial.rb:6:in `factorial'
</code></pre>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>1.3.0 / 2010-09-02</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>2 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added spy<em>cm and spy</em>on_cm for class methods</li>
<li>Improved zenprofile output for class methods. ENV really sucks.</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb">http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb</a></p></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 02, 2010 07:16 AM · permalink
<p>Wraps rb<em>add</em>event<em>hook so you can write fast ruby event hook
processors w/o the speed penalty that comes with set</em>trace_func (sooo
sloooow!). Calls back into ruby so you don't have to write C.</p>
<pre><code>% ruby demo.rb
# of iterations = 1000000
user system total real
null_time 0.120000 0.000000 0.120000 ( 0.125279)
ruby time 0.560000 0.000000 0.560000 ( 0.562834)
event hook 3.160000 0.010000 3.170000 ( 3.175361)
set_trace_func 34.530000 0.100000 34.630000 ( 34.942785)
</code></pre>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>1.1.0 / 2010-09-02</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>2 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Allow event<em>hook</em>klass to work with class and metaclass.</li>
<li>Force ~/.ruby_inline cleanup in tests</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p>1 bug fix:</p>
<ul>
<li>event_hook won't work on any 1.9 w/o major rework :(</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb">http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb</a></p></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 02, 2010 07:13 AM · permalink
<p><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-twitter-saved-me-700/">How Twitter Saved me $700</a> is a post from <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com">Chris Pirillo</a></p><p>I rented a car from National recently. When I picked up the vehicle, I asked the agent what it would take to switch to a Prius from what had been reserved for me. To my surprise, he said it would actually be a *downgrade* from the reservation. Huzzah!</p><p><img src="http://chris.pirillo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/national.png" alt="national" title="national" style="width: 130px; height: 130px; float: right" /></p><p>At no time did the agent state that this would cost me an additional $700 (fees plus taxes). In my estimation, and by dictionary definition, this would imply: “a lower grade, rank, or level of importance.” I didn’t discover this oversight until after I had returned the rental.</p><p>Certainly, I was not expecting to cover month-long expenses accrued from this trip, and would have opted to stick with the original car assigned (had I been told it would have cost me $700 more for the Prius option).</p><p>Immediately, I posted my <a href="http://twitter.com/ChrisPirillo/status/22643621902">financial frustration</a> to Twitter, making sure I referenced <a href="http://twitter.com/NationalCares">National’s Twitter account</a> in the process. A few minutes later, someone from National reached out to me with a response tweet. We took the discussion to email.</p><p>The result? Within a day, all seemingly-erroneous charges were reversed. Social Media isn’t just for geeks, folks – it’s your direct line to customer service agents the world over.</p><p>More importantly, I’m more likely to *CHOOSE* National next time I go to rent a car – since I know I can get ahold of a human being should something go awry. It’s not a specific issue you should focus on, but how an entity handles the issue. Thank you to National for empowering Elizabeth to help me solve this issue, and for creating a repeat customer.<ul class="related_post"><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/youtube-captions-and-rentals/" title="YouTube Captions and Rentals">YouTube Captions and Rentals</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/2010-toyota-prius-v-car-review/" title="2010 Toyota Prius V Car Review ">2010 Toyota Prius V Car Review </a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-are-computers-and-cars-alike/" title="How are Computers and Cars Alike?">How are Computers and Cars Alike?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/is-the-american-auto-industry-dead/" title="Is the American Auto Industry Dead?">Is the American Auto Industry Dead?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/what-will-cars-of-tomorrow-be-like/" title="What will Cars of Tomorrow be Like?">What will Cars of Tomorrow be Like?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/diecast-car-collecting/" title="Diecast Car Collecting">Diecast Car Collecting</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/energy-efficient-cars-what-you-dont-know/" title="Energy Efficient Cars: What you Don’t Know">Energy Efficient Cars: What you Don’t Know</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/whats-the-best-way-to-buy-a-car/" title="What’s the Best way to Buy a Car?">What’s the Best way to Buy a Car?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/tips-to-properly-maintain-your-vehicle/" title="Tips to Properly Maintain your Vehicle">Tips to Properly Maintain your Vehicle</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-deal-with-winter-and-your-car/" title="How to Deal with Winter and your Car">How to Deal with Winter and your Car</a></li></ul>
<p><a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/ZsIGczoHaOrGVLvcN_NhNXojii0/0/da"><img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/ZsIGczoHaOrGVLvcN_NhNXojii0/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a><br/>
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Posted by Chris Pirillo on September 02, 2010 07:11 AM · permalink
<p>Vlad the Deployer's sexy brainchild is rake-remote_task, extending
Rake with remote task goodness.</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>2.0.2 / 2010-09-02</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>1 bug fix:</p>
<ul>
<li>1.9 fixes to quell test warnings and the like</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyhitsquad.com/">http://rubyhitsquad.com/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/hitsquad/">http://rubyforge.org/projects/hitsquad/</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 02, 2010 07:07 AM · permalink
<div><br /><b>uTouch</b><br /><br />Back in March, I blogged about <a href="http://oubiwann.blogspot.com/2010/03/some-thoughts-on-mobile-device.html">future possibilities</a> (in a blue-sky sense) of multi-touch, mentioning the project management I was doing for MT hardware kernel driver support in Lucid (and then proceeding to dive into the deep end of speculation). It's now an Ubuntu cycle later, and holy crap... I'm having a hard time finding the words. I think the blog title says it all. But I'll try to elaborate :-)<br /><br />Unless you've been living under a rock, you've probably noticed the big announcements we made a few weeks ago: <div><ul><li><a href="https://lists.launchpad.net/multi-touch-dev/msg00218.html">uTouch mail list announcement</a></li><li><a href="http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/455">Mark Shuttleworth's blog post</a></li><li><a href="http://blog.canonical.com/?p=414">The Canonical uTouch announcement</a></li><li><a href="http://blog.canonical.com/?p=414"></a>Chase's blogging extravaganza (<a href="http://voices.canonical.com/chase.douglas/2010/08/16/multitouch-gestures-project/">uTouch</a>, <a href="http://voices.canonical.com/chase.douglas/2010/08/16/thoughts-on-the-architecture-of-multitouch-in-ubuntu/">MT architecture</a>, <a href="http://voices.canonical.com/chase.douglas/2010/08/16/decoding-apples-magic-trackpad/">Magic Trackpad</a>, <a href="http://voices.canonical.com/chase.douglas/2010/08/25/news-on-the-magic-trackpad-driver/">Trackpad update</a>)</li></ul>For the next few days, we were all over Google news. This was quite a shock, given that we'd been heads-down into the project for so long and hadn't really come up for air nor fully anticipated the impact (to others <i>or</i> ourselves). Needless to say, after the intense amount of work that the team had engaged in over the previous couple months, this was quite gratifying, if somewhat unexpected.</div><div><br />There has been a lot of discussion in blog posts, mail lists, IRC (#ubuntu-touch on freenode.net), Launchpad bugs and merge proposals, etc., so much so that touchscreens now pursue me feverishly when I sleep at night. I'm really not interested in writing more of the same :-)<br /><br />As such, I want to mix things up a bit...<br /><br /><b>HCI Remixed</b><br /><br />I've been reading an amazing anthology of essays on human-computer interaction. I still haven't finished the book (yeah, I've got about 10 in-progress titles on my nightstand), but am relishing every word in this particular collection. The book is <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0262050889">HCI Remixed: Reflections on Works That Have Influenced the HCI Community</a>. </div><div><br /></div><div>While doing some research at the beginning of the Maverick development cycle, I came across <i>HCI Remixed</i> at the local library -- the title intrigued me and I couldn't resist. Weeks later, after having maxed out the number of times I could renew the book, I just purchased it -- I simply couldn't get enough of the book. Every essay I'd read up to that point was fantastic; each one provided volumes of information, experiences, insights, ideas for follow-up, etc. Whenever I finished one essay, I spent <i>days</i> and sometimes <i>weeks</i> reading up on references, pondering the past and future of human-computer interaction.<br /><br />Due to the unusual nature of the book, describing it is surprisingly difficult. That being said, <a href="http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=11330">the MIT Press page</a> gives you a great taste:<br /><blockquote><i>Over almost three decades, the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) has produced a rich and varied literature. Although the focus of attention today is naturally on new work, older contributions that played a role in shaping the trajectory and character of the field have much to tell us. The contributors to HCI Remixed were asked to reflect on a single work at least ten years old that influenced their approach to HCI. The result is this collection of fifty-one short, engaging, and idiosyncratic essays, reflections on a range of works in a variety of forms that chart the emergence of a new field.</i></blockquote>If you're into HCI, learning from others, and discovering new sources of inspiration for your own work, this is simply a must-have book :-)<br /><br /><b>A Small Piece of History</b><br /><br />By the time I checked the book out of the Golden public library, it was May and we had begun building the MT team. By July -- once it became clear how astounding the team's work was -- I realized that in 10 or 20 years I could very well be writing an article about Henrik, Chase, Stephen, Ikbel, and Rafi. Much like those in the book, I could be sharing the conversations I'd had with Stéphane Chatty, Mark Shuttleworth, Neil Patel, David Siegel, and John Lea. And that's only the crew which which I was collaborating or discussing directly. There are a lot of folks who've been working very hard on multi-touch infrastructure solutions and exploring ways of integrating these for several years (e.g., Peter Hutterer and Carlos Garnacho). </div><div><br /></div><div>Though many foundations have been laid, as of yet (to the best of my knowledge), no Linux distribution has released a multi-touch stack that integrated gestures in a unified manner across everything from applications to window managers and beyond. This was something that Mark wanted us to provide to the open source world. In this spirit, the multitouch team hasn't just hacked things together to get a product out in time. A <i>lot</i> of generative, creative thought and care has gone into <a href="https://edge.launchpad.net/canonical-multitouch/">uTouch</a>. A lot of original problem solving has taken place. Physics PhDs, kernel hackers, X.org hackers, driver creators, application integrators, toolkit gurus -- all of this knowledge was concentrated, applied, and used to distill a first approximation of what a gesture stack in Linux could look like, using the latest available technology and methodologies.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>To be honest, we weren't really sure we could pull it off. There was a very good chance we could have failed at our task, quietly chalking up the loss as a lesson learned. Now that we've managed to shape these ideas into actual software, taken the threads of dreams and woven something real, we are thrilled to be engaging with others to see where all of us can take multi-touch and gestures from here.</div><div><br /></div><div>Thanks to expert input from the wider open source community, we're already looking at ways in which we can improve upon the first version, ways of bringing new ideas and experiences to developers and users of multi-touch hardware running Linux. Things are only just warming up, and the greatest contributions have yet to be made. Every single person in the community has before them a world of possibilities for getting involved and creating the future human-computer interfaces for the free and open source world in the coming weeks and months. These are indeed exciting times.</div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width="1" height="1" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8825992-6746957139050217659?l=oubiwann.blogspot.com" alt="" /></div><div class="feedflare">
<a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?a=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:yIl2AUoC8zA"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?d=yIl2AUoC8zA" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?a=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:4cEx4HpKnUU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?i=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:4cEx4HpKnUU" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?a=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:F7zBnMyn0Lo"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?i=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:F7zBnMyn0Lo" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?a=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:V_sGLiPBpWU"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?i=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:V_sGLiPBpWU" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?a=caTzbrSNUos:_AyHhQCU4pU:qj6IDK7rITs"><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~ff/ElectricDuncan?d=qj6IDK7rITs" border="0" /></a>
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Posted on September 02, 2010 06:56 AM · permalink
Julie188 writes "Target will begin selling Facebook's virtual currency as gift cards on September 5, becoming the first brick-and-mortar retailer to do so. Facebook Credit gift cards will be available in $15, $25 and $50 denominations at the retailer's 1,750 stores. That's right, you can now spend real dollars to get fake ones so you can buy imaginary items for games like FarmVille, Bejeweled and 150 other FB games or apps. If that interests you, please contact me. I have some swamp land in Florida I'd like to show you."
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Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 06:48 AM · permalink
Today is three years since I lost my father, JB D'Souza. He spent his career in the IAS and wrote what I think (yeah, son's bias and all that) a good memoir of his experiences in government, "No Trumpets or Bugles: Recollections of an Incorrigible Babu".<br /><br />After it was published, he started writing what he thought might be a second volume, of more personal memories growing up and working in a very different Bombay. Sadly he didn't finish that, though he put down a good deal. <br /><br />For this third anniversary, I thought I would post here a small excerpt from that effort, some lines -- favourite family stories -- about his brother-in-law Hilary Carrasco. Hilary married Pat, JB's elder sister, in the early 1940s. (Their three children, my cousins, are among my favourite people in the world, not least for their wicked humour. <a href="http://carrasco.com/">This is the oldest of them</a>.)<br /><br />With no further ado, here's JB on Hilary.<br /><br /><center>***</center><br />One of the best-natured persons I have met, Hilary was generally laid back and relaxed -- at home, which for many years he and Pat made at Versova, in the firm that employed him, and on the way there and back. He commuted daily to his office in south Bombay in a third-hand Renault, a car that had seen many better days. Joe [JB's oldest brother] travelled to work with him. As they drove through Bandra on the Ghodbunder Road one morning, there was a sudden thud, and a full stop. A wheel rolled past. "Gosh, that's my rear wheel", Hilary exclaimed. And indeed it was.<br /><br />One Xmas season Joe asked for the loan of the car to go to town for a "Bring in the New Year" dance. For Joe, the 31st December revels were always a must. Carefully attired in evening dress, he had danced in every New Year in since his college days. That year he asked a friend, Joe Rodricks, to come to Versova to drive the car, as Joe himself had long ceased to drive, and Hilary preferred to greet the New Year in the morning after a good night's rest. <br /><br />So Rodricks came to Versova. They bathed, powdered themselves, and donned their formal clothes -- starched shirt, black tie and silk-lapelled black jacket. But then the car wouldn't start. With Hilary at the wheel, the two Joes began an attempt to push-start it. They pushed it up the drive, which sloped upward to the street. The wretched vehicle stayed stubborn, so they let it roll down the slope, to try again. Forlorn and breathing heavily after several tries, one of the pushers asked, as a bit of hopeless teasing: "Hilary, have you switched on the engine?" <br /><br />"Gosh!" came the answer. <br /><br />Hilary turned on the ignition and the car lurched forward; it was still in gear. By now the sweat was pouring down those starched shirts. Fresh baths, and a return to less formal clothing, delayed the would-be revellers still more. They reached the dance-floor just in time to wave the old year off. <br /><br />Later, Hilary switched from his decrepit Renault to a tiny two-door Anglia. I remember the day when the car was parked in the hot sun, the windows shut tight. He courteously let us all in, then got in himself. Then he reached for his pipe, which he tapped on the dashboard to empty the bowl. He filled it with tobacco, which he tamped in, and began a series of attempts to light it. Pipes are, as you know, not the easiest things to light. Meanwhile, we squirmed and sweated on the back seat, but there was no escape.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/8070362-1946136952581679979?l=dcubed.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
Posted by Dilip D'Souza (noreply@blogger.com) on September 02, 2010 06:43 AM · permalink
<p>Flay analyzes code for structural similarities. Differences in literal
values, variable, class, method names, whitespace, programming style,
braces vs do/end, etc are all ignored. Making this totally rad.</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>1.4.1 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>2 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added extra error handling for ERB flay to deal with tons of bad ERB</li>
<li>Skip plugin if another version already loaded (eg local vs gem).</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p>1 bug fix:</p>
<ul>
<li>Fixed all tests that were having problems on 1.9 due to unstable hashes</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://ruby.sadi.st/">http://ruby.sadi.st/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb">http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 02, 2010 06:23 AM · permalink
Copyfighting banjo-picker Patrick Costello has a new book of free/open banjo tunes: <a href="http://funkyseagull.com/songs%20for%20sunday.html">Songs for Sunday</a>: "In this book you will find a selection of hymns, country gospel and even some blues
songs arranged for frailing banjo. The arrangements presented here blend melody and
rhythm so that you can sing along with the banjo and still be able to knock out a solo
once in a while. The accompanying DVD contains video workshops where I walk you
through each song." (<i>Thanks, Patrick, via <a href="http://boingboing.net/submit">Submitterator</a>!</i>)
<br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
<br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 02, 2010 06:22 AM · permalink
<p>Flog reports the most tortured code in an easy to read pain
report. The higher the score, the more pain the code is in.</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>2.5.0 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>1 major enhancement:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added plugin system. Define a module under Flog to extend it.</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p>3 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added special case penalty for wtf to_proc: blah(&b = proc {...}) (benjaminb)</li>
<li>Improved tests and test coverage.</li>
<li>Unfactored & refactored report code. Much cleaner and more maintainable now.</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p>2 bug fixes:</p>
<ul>
<li>Fixed API change for FlogTask (andreacampi)</li>
<li>Fixed bad edgecase handler for block_pass (benjaminb)</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://ruby.sadi.st/">http://ruby.sadi.st/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb">http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 02, 2010 06:19 AM · permalink
Recently, Nina "<a href="http://questioncopyright.com/sita.html">Sita Sings the Blues</a>" Paley and I conducted a protected email exchange debating the merits of the Creative Commons "noncommerical" licenses (like those used on my novels and here at Boing Boing). It was an instructive and sometimes productive debate, and Nina's edited the thread and posted it.
<blockquote>
Here's my perspective: the purpose of any cultural policy or regulation
should be to encourage a diversity of both participation and works (that
is: more people making art, and more kinds of art being made).
<p>
ISTM that your assertion amounts to: "Whatever forms of participation
that come into existence as a result of the capitalization opportunities
that accrue in an exclusive rights regime, they are dwarfed by the works
that lurk in potentia should such a regime perish."
<p>
IOW: we unequivocally get *some* participation in culture as a result of
exclusive rights regimes, some of which would not exist except for
exclusive rights. You believe that if this regime and the works that
depend on it was to vanish, the new works that would come into existence
as a result would offset the losses.
<p>
I don't know how either assertion could be tested. We both have
firsthand experience of both modes of creativity -- I know of works that
wouldn't have been capitalized absent the higher returns expected in the
presence of exclusive rights; I also know of works that could only have
been made in their absence.
</blockquote>
<a href="http://blog.ninapaley.com/2010/09/01/paley-vs-doctorow/">
Paley & Doctorow argue over Non-Commercial licenses
</a>
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/05/18/nina-paleys-wonderfu.html#previouspost">Nina Paley's wonderful "Sita Sings the Blues" cartoon</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/04/25/nina-paley-passes-ne.html#previouspost">Nina Paley passes Netflix DRM and thousands of dollars</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/07/01/nina-paley-and-eff-s.html#previouspost">Nina Paley and EFF: Sita Sings the Blues benefit in San Francisco ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/03/18/nina-paleys-copyrigh.html#previouspost">Nina Paley's Copyright Song</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/12/15/copying-isnt-theft-v.html#previouspost">Copying Isn't Theft video needs YOUR music!</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/08/20/sita-sings-the-blues-3.html#previouspost">Sita Sings the Blues sourcefiles online</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 02, 2010 06:17 AM · permalink
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/cg1dzbthst.jpg" height="400" width="600" border="0" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt="Cg1Dzbthst" />
<br clear = "all"> <P>Take a look at this art project entitled, "<a href="http://www.londonfieldworks.com/projects/spontaneous-city/gallery.php">Spontaneous City in the Tree of Heaven</a>"
<blockquote>In the sought-after London boroughs of Chelsea and Islington, inner city birds often have to claim their nesting space quickly! However, birds that are open to changing their wild ways might be convinced to try out the innovative bird-housing concept developed by the artists at <a href="http://www.londonfieldworks.com/index.php">London Fieldworks</a>. The <a href="http://www.londonfieldworks.com/projects/spontaneous-city/gallery.php">"Spontaneous City in the Tree of Heaven"</a> </strong>opened recently as part of the <a href="http://www.upprojects.com/secretgarden/projects/london-fieldworks--spontaneous-city-in-the-tree-of-heaven/6">Secret Garden Project</a> by <a href="http://www.upprojects.com/">UP Projects</a>and hopes to develop into a haven of biodiversity and create a new public awareness of the ecological and cultural value of urban green spaces. (via <a href="http://inhabitat.com/2010/08/17/pixelated-birdhouses-sprout-on-city-trees-in-london/">Inhabitat</a>)</blockquote>
<p>These look very pretty, although I am curious as to how they fare when the tree moves or when it grows.
<p>As an added layer of biodiversity speak, there's a bit of irony in the title of the project. Turns out the "Tree of Heaven" or <i>Ailanthus altissima</i> is actually a tree species of much botanical interest in London, and elsewhere in England generally. Essentially, a lot of folks are quite concerned that this ornamental turn invasive species is poised to rocket in numbers. It's one of the fastest growing trees around, it's allelopathic (meaning it produces a chemical that inhibits the growth or other plants), and its seed production capabilities are almost unmatched. In fact, the female tree is capable of producing upwards of 30,000 seeds <i>per kilogram</i> of tree! That would be akin to a small tree as heavy as me (at about 160 pounds), being able to produce 2.2 million seeds!
<p>Why is this tree a particular interest these days? Well, over the years, climate has been steadily getting warmer and sunnier in England, and given that the Tree of Heaven is shade-intolerant, the extra sunlight is possibly giving the opportunistic tree the small push needed to expand greatly in numbers.
<p>Anyway, perhaps this means more places for the birds to live?<p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/chic-apartments-for.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/chic-apartments-for.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by David Ng on September 02, 2010 05:41 AM · permalink
angry tapir writes "Late last week an Australian court issued an injunction against a handful of retailers selling or importing hardware — commonly known as 'mod chips' — that allows unauthorized software to run on Sony's PlayStation 3. The court also required that the four parties that were the subject of the injunction actually hand over to Sony any PlayStation modchips they have. Sony's PlayStation 3 mod chip lawsuit could be just the first of many such cases in Australia, according to a lawyer who defended a client against Nintendo in a similar case earlier this year."
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Posted by Soulskill on September 02, 2010 05:41 AM · permalink
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-32718" href="http://passionforcinema.com/why-i-will-not-watch-%e2%80%9cwe-are-family%e2%80%9d/we-are-family-poster/"><img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-32718" src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/We-Are-Family-Poster-172x250.jpg" alt="" width="172" height="250" /></a>The world has had the pleasure of two ‘luminaries’ of Indian cinema—Mahesh Bhatt and Amitabh Bachchan reinforce their views on ‘plagiarism’ and ‘originality’. Bhatt <em>saab</em> has long maintained that nobody is original; while the ever gracious Bachchan <em>saab</em> went further “Originality is the art of hiding your source”. With such cocky but effete statements coming from seemingly popular people in the bigger “We are Family” fraternity, it is little wonder that the Sanjay Guptas, the Karan Johars and the rest of the “Adapters” brigade continue to revel in an unoriginal, false bubble-gummy world.</p>
<p>At the outset, I’d like to declare I have nothing against adaptations—Some of the best movies in the world have been brilliant adaptations of earlier movies, novels, plays, what have you. When Marty transported the crime lords of <strong>Hong Kong</strong> in <em><strong>Infernal Affairs</strong></em> to the Irish mobs of <strong>Boston</strong>, the result was not only a crackling, intense, yet <strong><em>original</em></strong> interpretation of the original, but also a standout in a genre that had apparently been done to death. As Vishal Bhardwaj transformed the <strong>moor </strong>of <strong>Morocco</strong> to the <strong>adha-brahman of Saharanpur</strong> or <strong>Ramesh Sippy re-created the Warring States Period in Sholay</strong>, you can’t help but gawk at the screen in absolutely fan-boy adoration. But when a Sanjay Gupta rips off <strong>Tarantino </strong>and <strong>Park Chan-Wook</strong> <em>frame by frame</em> or Johar groupie Siddharth P Malhotra directs a bolly take off on a strictly average holly rom-com, it’s hard not to have those claws out.</p>
<p>This week’s <strong>We Are Family</strong>, its cheesy English title notwithstanding is a case in point— it is supposed to be an ‘Indian’ adaptation of Stepmom, but has its characters based in Australia. Evidently Johar’s bored of New York City and has decided to explore the land Down Under. My first question is, if it is about Indian characters and everything almost seemingly Indian, why can’t it be based in Bombay or New Delhi? What demands that a My Name is Khan be about an autistic Indian living in the USA but not about an average Indian in Dehra Dun or Bangalore? Would a Dostana have been a box office dud if it was based in Bombay? Does Johar think that the Indian setting does not bring in the so called visual allure of the West? The problem with the Dharma-Yash Raj Films (YRF) mindset is that whatever location they choose to base the story in, every second person there is Indian and speaks Hindi, doesn’t matter if it is sunny Palm Beach or chilly Reykjavik. Years ago, Barjatya did the unthinkable—he created an Indian small-town–Sundargarh based somewhere in New Zealand or Continental Europe (can’t figure out where). Johar and co are pretty much the same, just that they don’t change the name of New York City to Sundargarh or Rampur. This is just a minor rant in the midst of a storm.</p>
<p>India, I would like to believe has a treasure trove of stories, situations, pop-culture, movies that are waiting to be adapted or even remade, yet Johar only manages to find a silly Hollywood movie to adapt? I am no one to advise the executives at Dharma or question how Johar spends his money, but as an aficionado, I have every right to wonder if the moneybags of Bollywood have gone creatively bankrupt? Atleast YRF produces something different once in a while, but all that Johar does is come up with “I Hate Luv Storys”. Gee, he can’t even get his spellings right. And here’s a guy, who can de-construct Pedro Almodovar like no other (according to informed sources), watch and appreciate the crème-de-la-crème of Indian as well as World Cinema? Would it have hurt if he voluntarily took up the marketing of Udaan or Antardwand? What’s worse is when A-listers such as Kajol and Kareen Kapoor agree to be part of such monstrosities, without as much as battling an eyelid? And Elvis–well, that I will reserve for another day.<a rel="attachment wp-att-32712" href="http://passionforcinema.com/why-i-will-not-watch-%e2%80%9cwe-are-family%e2%80%9d/x2_2888129/"><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/x2_2888129-200x243.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="243" /></a></p>
<p>Will Johar and Co realize they can make distinctly original, fun, ‘commercial’, ‘masala’ yet ‘Indian’ movies too? Or will they continue to act as pimps for foreign tourism boards? Of course I am sure they’d like to believe those movies can and will be made by the likes of Anurag Kashyap, Vishal Bhardwaj and Dibakar Bannerjee only. While the Johars, the Guptas, Malhotras and Anands continue to dish out assembly line bumblefudge and somehow, laugh their way to the banks every single time. Until Johar and co alter their creative sensibilities, I for one will not contribute in any form to the bank laughter.</p>
<p>PS: 1. As I write this, Natkhat K must have picked all the stars in the sketch book of a nursery kid to paste in her review. Sadly she can’t do the same for the review as Roger Ebert or A O Scott would most likely have not seen the movie and will most likely not see it.<br />
2. Call RGV whatever you want, atleast his <strong>Aag </strong>was atleast an original interpretation, its content and commercial fate notwithstanding<br />
3. My personal opinion about <strong>Dostana</strong> is that it was a terrible terrible movie full of toilet and bawdy humor and reinforced the gay stereotypes. It could have been better off had it been written by a screenwriter and not a groupie and it was based in Bombay.</p>
<br /><div><img src="http://passionforcinema.com/wp-content/plugins/gd-star-rating/gfx.php?type=thumbs&value=0" /></div><div>Score: 0 (0 votes cast)</div><br />
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Posted by Shanks on September 02, 2010 05:08 AM · permalink
beschra writes "BBC writes of 'terra-forming' Ascension Island, one of the islands Charles Darwin visited. He and a friend encouraged the Royal Navy to import boat loads of trees and plants in an attempt to capture the little bit of water that fell on the island. They were quite successful. The island even has a cloud forest now. From the article: '[British ecologist] Wilkinson thinks that the principles that emerge from that experiment could be used to transform future colonies on Mars. In other words, rather than trying to improve an environment by force, the best approach might be to work with life to help it "find its own way."'"
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Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 04:42 AM · permalink
<p>Twitter is launching the first native app it’s built from scratch tonight, Twitter for iPad. Aimed at fostering content consumption, the app is designed for new users and power users alike.</p>
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/twitteripad.png"><img title="TwitteriPad" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/twitteripad.png?w=300&h=200" alt="" width="300" height="200" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-152862" /></a>The iPad app indicates the direction all Twitter-designed apps will be heading, said Leland Rechis, Twitter’s mobile product manager, in an interview at Twitter headquarters on Wednesday. “It’s not about timelines, it’s about consuming information and encouraging exploration.” The iPad app, he added, “is a great place for us to show how important the content is in the tweets.”</p>
<p>Rechis created the app with Loren Brichter, who joined Twitter when it <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/04/09/twitter-buys-tweetie-adds-fuel-to-developer-fires/">controversially purchased</a> his iPhone Twitter app, Tweetie (which is now Twitter for iPhone, and is actually the same app as the one released tonight, but with different features expressed in the iPad environment).</p>
<p>Twitter for iPad makes use of the device’s touch interface and big-screen real estate by letting users see multiple cascading panels of information. So, for instance, you might click on a person’s twitter handle, open a panel of information about them, then click on one of their tweets, and open another panel that shows the full text of a linked article from the tweet. If users are new or not signed in, the first panel is a scrollable list of recommended users. There are also nice multitouch features, like pinching to see a user’s profile and swiping to see the rest of a thread of a conversation.</p>
<p>At launch, web pages are the only content format fully supported, but Rechis said to expect support for other inline media such as videos. He said Twitter’s mobile group is highly focused on the goal of connecting the Twitter experience to the real world in whatever ways it can. That could be something like location, but it could also be connected to helping a phone or iPad user who’s fiddling with the device on her sofa while watching television.</p>
<p>Twitter for iPad is free, it’s available in all regions, and it should be live tonight. At this point (like other Twitter apps) it does not contain Twitter’s version of advertising (<a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/04/12/the-twitter-ad-model-revealed-what-were-you-expecting-a-pony/">Promoted Tweets</a>).</p>
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Posted by Liz Gannes on September 02, 2010 03:59 AM · permalink
<span class="Apple-style-span"><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Hello,</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">The next meeting of pyCologne will take place:</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Wednesday, September, 8th</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">starting about 6.30 pm - 6.45 pm</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">at Room 0.14, Benutzerrechenzentrum (RRZK-B)</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">University of Cologne, Berrenrather Str. 136, 50937 Köln, Germany</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Agenda:</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"> - Cooking Eggs - A distutils & setuptools recipe book (Christopher</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span"> Arndt)</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"> - Lightning Talks</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Further discussion topics, news, book-presentations etc. are welcome </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span">on each of our meetings!</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">At about 8.30 pm we will as usual enjoy the rest of the evening in a </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span">nearby restaurant.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Further information including directions how to get to the location </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span">can be found at:</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">http://www.pycologne.de</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">(Sorry, the web-links are in German only.)</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Best Wishes,</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">Andi (on behalf of pyCologne)</span></span></div></span><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width="1" height="1" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/2012718544703280651-8192606029901889477?l=python-groups.blogspot.com" alt="" /></div>
Posted on September 02, 2010 03:52 AM · permalink
Do you want to lose weight? And use the natural things? Think seriously about using water in various ways. Lets understand at least three ways:... read more
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Posted by Desh on September 02, 2010 03:37 AM · permalink
<p><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/seven-ways-itunes-10-missed-the-mark/">Seven Ways iTunes 10 Missed the Mark</a> is a post from <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com">Chris Pirillo</a></p><p>You know, when Steve Jobs suggested (this morning, during his keynote) that the iTunes icon was outdated – I found myself nodding in severe agreement. Let’s put aside the notion that Carbon is even more outdated (and that iTunes remains completely ineffective for managing apps across multiple devices) for just a moment and focus on something a bit more tangible to the average user? Okay.</p><p>So, yes – iTunes manages music and iDevices. It also manages:</p><ol><li>Movies</li><li>TV Shows</li><li>Podcasts</li><li>Seminars (iTunes U)</li><li>eBooks</li><li>Apps</li><li>Ringtones</li></ol><p><img src="http://chris.pirillo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/headernav_overview20100901.png" alt="headernav_overview20100901" title="headernav_overview20100901" style="float: right" /></p><p>So why the *fuck* is a note symbol still the only thing in the icon? And, for that matter, why are we still calling it iTunes?! They renamed the iPhone OS to iOS in recent months – why couldn’t they have taken this pedestrian UI change as an opportunity to call it ANYTHING other than iTunes?! Barring any other copyright issues, here are some workable suggestions:</p><ul><li>iNexus</li><li>iCenter</li><li>iMedia</li><li>iMatter</li><li>iEncounter</li></ul><p>At this rate, it’ll be iTunes 15 before we see a rebrand in conjunction with a recode (which I’ve already given up on). For anybody who would ever accuse me of being an Apple fanboi, let it be clearly known that I have never had love for iTunes.</p><p>What would I change about iTunes? It.<ul class="related_post"><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/apple-special-announcement-event-on-september-1st/" title="Apple Special Announcement Event on September 1st">Apple Special Announcement Event on September 1st</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/paypal-accounts-drained-due-to-itunes-fraud/" title="PayPal Accounts Drained Due to iTunes Fraud">PayPal Accounts Drained Due to iTunes Fraud</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/yoko-ono-nixes-beatles-on-itunes/" title="Yoko Ono Nixes Beatles on iTunes">Yoko Ono Nixes Beatles on iTunes</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-do-you-rate-the-quality-of-an-app/" title="How Do You Rate the Quality of an App?">How Do You Rate the Quality of an App?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/people-want-itunes-in-the-cloud/" title="People Want iTunes in the Cloud">People Want iTunes in the Cloud</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/apple-confirms-what-you-already-knew/" title="Apple Confirms What You Already Knew">Apple Confirms What You Already Knew</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/app-store-vs-android-marketplace/" title="App Store VS Android Marketplace">App Store VS Android Marketplace</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/problems-connecting-the-iphone-4/" title="Problems Connecting the iPhone 4">Problems Connecting the iPhone 4</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-gain-weight-fast/" title="How to Gain Weight Fast">How to Gain Weight Fast</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/adobe-is-coming-to-the-ipad/" title="Adobe is Coming to the iPad ">Adobe is Coming to the iPad </a></li></ul>
<p><a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/b4YhqurBQ6Z9sJhLqiguDdIGt84/0/da"><img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/b4YhqurBQ6Z9sJhLqiguDdIGt84/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a><br/>
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Posted by Chris Pirillo on September 02, 2010 03:29 AM · permalink
<p><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/the-story-about-ping-and-itunes-10/">The Story about Ping (and iTunes 10)</a> is a post from <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com">Chris Pirillo</a></p><p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0670672238?ie=UTF8&tag=lockergnome-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0670672238"><img border="0" src="http://chris.pirillo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/storyaboutping.jpg" hspaace="6" align="left"></a><img src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=lockergnome-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0670672238" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px !important;" />To me, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0670672238?ie=UTF8&tag=lockergnome-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0670672238" target="_blank">Ping is a duck</a> who gets left behind one afternoon and spends a whole children’s book trying to get back to his family and their boat on the Yangtze River.</p><p>Like my fowl little friend Ping, Apple’s iTunes app has been left behind for a while. Still sporting a CD in its icon, iTunes gets a facelift and <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/whats-new/" target="_blank">new features</a> this week, including the <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/ping/" target="_blank">Ping social network</a>, <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/whats-new/#rentals" target="_blank">99¢ TV show rentals</a>, <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/whats-new/#airplay" target="_blank">AirPlay</a> wireless music playback, and <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/whats-new/#sync" target="_blank">improved syncing</a>.</p><div align="center"><img src="http://api.ning.com/files/t52I99So3uaUNpMMZyIEkJbiDos5WcwInBEMPrM9SugxAPGcKgr2Np2xYOR39oAV/10itunesmain.jpg?width=500&height=338"></div><p>iTunes Ping is the most interesting part of this upgrade. The Ping social network lets us all become online groupies without ever having to sneak backstage or hide out on the tour bus.</p><p>Just click the Follow button, and you can see status updates, photos and videos they’ve posted, and find details on new releases and concerts. Ping will definitely help musicians connect with their fans in new ways. Still no word on whether Apple will extend the tool to podcasters (like yours truly).</p><p>You can create your own profile in Ping to share let everyone know about the music your listening to, the videos you’re watching, and the live events you attend. Ping will create customized top ten lists, based on what you listen to and what the people you follow listen to and download.</p><p>Want to limit who can see details about your status and what you listen too? You can create a circle of friends (like a group) and keep things just among your closest buddies.</p><p>Ping is built into iTunes 10, which you can <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/">download for free</a> from the Apple site. According to Steve Jobs, right this minute, you could connect to over 160 million iTunes users in 23 countries with Ping. Don’t be like my little duck friend though. Download it now so you won’t be left behind!<ul class="related_post"><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-add-more-music-to-your-ipod-or-iphone/" title="How to Add More Music to Your iPod or iPhone">How to Add More Music to Your iPod or iPhone</a></li></ul>
<p><a href="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/MW3RupHdddAVJTIxW7n8Pv4EPUo/0/da"><img src="http://feedads.g.doubleclick.net/~a/MW3RupHdddAVJTIxW7n8Pv4EPUo/0/di" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a><br/>
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Posted by Chris on September 02, 2010 03:25 AM · permalink
thecarchik writes "It is not an easy task to compare the environmental effects of battery powered cars to those caused by conventionally fueled automobiles. The degree to which manufacture, usage and disposal of the batteries used to store the necessary electrical energy are detrimental to the environment is not exactly known. Now, for the first time, a team of Empa scientists have made a detailed life cycle assessment (LCA) or ecobalance of lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries, in particular the chemically improved (i.e. more environmentally friendly) version of the ones most frequently used in electric vehicles. Researchers decided to find out for sure. They calculated the ecological footprints of electric cars fitted with Li-ion batteries, taking into account all possible relevant factors, from those associated with the production of individual parts all the way through to the scrapping of the vehicle and the disposal of the remains, including the operation of the vehicle during its lifetime."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 03:04 AM · permalink
One weekday evening a few weeks before our son was born, my wife commissioned me to find a box of raspberry red leaf tea for the delivery. I promptly drove to the nearest grocery store, which has an awe-inspiring wall of tea. After diligently scanning the wall and not finding the tea, I began to wonder if it even existed. Was the similarly-labeled raspberry tea the same thing? What about red leaf tea? Stumped, I pulled out my phone and looked up "raspberry red leaf tea" on Google. Beneath the "Shopping results," I saw a red map marker for a nearby Vitamin Shoppe and a link, "In stock nearby," next to a picture of Alvita Raspberry Red Leaf Tea. I hopped back in the car, and 15 minutes later had accomplished my mission. Two weeks later, my wife accomplished her much more important mission and we welcomed Benjamin, a healthy and happy baby boy, to our family.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_1bncLPxI3rU/TH73eNIsu4I/AAAAAAAAAEY/QaOWAxnD5y0/s1600/blog.png"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 256px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_1bncLPxI3rU/TH73eNIsu4I/AAAAAAAAAEY/QaOWAxnD5y0/s400/blog.png" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5512115092242348930" /></a><br />Since we announced the <a href="http://www.google.com/products/submit/local">Local Shopping</a> inventory beta some months ago, we have received great user feedback on the feature, and retailers have been clamoring to take part. Today, we’re making public our <a href="http://google.com/support/merchants/bin/answer.py?answer=187892">help documentation</a> for participation. Please take a moment to review those documents, and if you’re interested, fill out the <a href="http://google.com/support/merchants/bin/request.py?contact_type=local_shopping">local shopping interest form</a>. While we won’t be able to accept all retailers who apply, we will keep your name on file if we can’t take you at this time. Please note that excellent Product Search data quality is a prerequisite for participation, so make sure that you are submitting an accurate and complete data feed, including <a href="http://googlemerchantblog.blogspot.com/2010/07/improving-product-search-experience.html">unique product identifiers</a>. Additionally, to take part you’ll need to have your stores listed on Google Places, so make sure you have <a href="http://www.google.com/places">submitted</a> and <a href="http://www.google.com/support/places/bin/request.py?hl=en&contact_type=feeds_verify&rd=1">verified</a> your store listings.<span class="post-author"><br /><br />Posted by Paul Lee, Business Product Manager, Google Product Search</span><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/7576853141576099446-3704436266976332049?l=googlemerchantblog.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by Vivek Tata (noreply@blogger.com) on September 02, 2010 02:37 AM · permalink
Geoffrey.landis writes "According to the Wall Street Journal, there's a new species of patent troll out there. These new trolls sue companies that sell products with an expired patent number on them. That's right, it's against the law to sell a product that's marked with an expired patent number. The potential fine? $500. Per violation - and some of the companies have patent numbers on old plastic molds that have made literally billions of copies. Using whistle-blower laws, 'anyone can file a claim on behalf of the government, and plaintiffs must split any fine award evenly with it.' You've been warned."
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Posted by samzenpus on September 02, 2010 02:18 AM · permalink
<p><strong>Washington should not undermine the sanctity of the Indus Waters Treaty</strong></p>
<p>The formidable Richard Holbrooke and his talented team could have been more effective in their Af-Pak brief if they had a better grip on reality. They can achieve a whole lot more if thety were to solicit and receive genuine co-operation and support from New Delhi. Unfortunately, their thinking appears to be in the direction of reinforcing failure.</p>
<p>See what Steve Clemons says (via <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://twitter.com/vali_nasr/status/22734966674">@vali_nasr</a>). <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2010/09/bolder_initiati/">Writing about US efforts to help Pakistan</a> raise funds after the flood disaster, he says, “…even with Clinton and Holbrooke on board, the US government is still not doing as much as it should in terms of contributing at a systemic level to helping the Pakistanis and Indians turn this nightmare into a strategically significant trust-building event.”</p>
<p>While that statement sounds logical, and more importantly, nice, it is largely bereft of the former. India has been making strategically significant trust-building events since Atal Bihari Vajpayee took that bus to Lahore in 1999. These were all perceived as weaknesses and exploited by the Pakistani military-jihadi complex to attack India. Other than Operation Parakram—which was itself carried out after grave provocation—India’s policy can be described as strategic reassurance. Satyabrata Pal, India’s former high commissioner to Pakistan, strongly argues that New Delhi must continue along this direction. It appears that the likes of Mr Clemons weren’t paying attention when Manmohan Singh responded to the Pakistani-sponsored terrorist attack, and its brazen refusal to act against the perpetrators, by…delivering <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://acorn.nationalinterest.in/2009/07/23/manmohan-singhs-costly-lollipop-giveway/">sweet lollipops</a> to the Pakistani prime minister. </p>
<p>Yes, there is a need for a strategically significant trust-building event. It has to come from Pakistan. Getting the Pakistani government to obtain a guilty verdict against the Lashkar-e-Taiba leaders fingered in the 26/11 conspiracy would be a good start. But Team Holbrooke isn’t concerned with trust-building in India. </p>
<p>Mr Clemons refers to <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://rothkopf.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/08/26/it_is_time_for_even_bolder_initiatives_in_the_indus_river_valley">David Rothkopf’s post</a> on what this trust-building event might be. Apart from using tired and absurd cliches like “few relationships on the planet are as important or as potentially dangerous as that between India and Pakistan” he suggests the Mr Obama must propose a “a massive, multilateral Indus River Valley Development Initiative” on his trip to India. </p>
<p>The problem with Mr Rothkopf’s proposal—of massive technical and financial assistance to improve river water management—is that India doesn’t need that help. Pakistan does. So President Obama should be announcing this if and when he goes to Islamabad.</p>
<p>Actually, there is something Mr Obama can do before, during or after his trip to India with regard to Indus waters. And that is to say that “both sides must abide by the treaties they have signed”. The Indus Waters Treaty is a strategic trust-building device. Undermining its legitimacy by pointing to its being “strained by dam projects and shifting demand” is counterproductive to stability because it allows Pakistan to opens up another unbounded dispute with India.</p>
<p><strong>Related Link:</strong> See <a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://polaris.nationalinterest.in/2010/04/10/pani-poor/">Dhruva Jaishankar’s post</a> on Indus river water issues.</p>
Posted on September 02, 2010 01:45 AM · permalink
<p><img src="http://boingboing.net/images/apple0810/1.jpg">
<p>
Xeni's in San Francisco for <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/08/31/live-coverage-of-app.html">Apple's press event</a> today. Watch this space for live commentary from the event, and tune in to the live streaming broadcast from Yerba Buena <a href="http://www.apple.com/">at apple.com</a> (the short version: to watch the HTTP Live Streaming, you <a href="http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/08/31alert.html">gotta have a Mac/iPhone/ipod/iPad</a>. But following Boing Boing? Pick any OS and hardware you like.)
<p>Liveblog archive after the jump.<p><p><br />
9:00AM: Big crowd of reporters gathered outside Yerba Buena. Ratio of dudes to women at all big tech events always seems so skewed. Today, 20:1, it seems! Tech media is so overwhelmingly male. But nice to see some familiar faces here, female and otherwise. If you're wondering if lady-reporters have a secret handshake we give one another at these things? We do. But if I tell you, I'll have to spray perfume on you.<br />
<p><br />
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/img_0539_a343.jpg"><br />
<p><br />
10:00AM: Mr. Jobs takes the stage to applause. Steve Wozniak is in the house, Jobs calls him out, much applause. Talk of the new Apple store in Paris. And the second Apple store in China, in Shanghai. 40' high curved glass cylinder. Third store in London. Covent Garden. 300 stores, 10 countries. Spain store coming soon, which will make total number of countries with Apple stores 11.</p>
<p>
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/img_0541_d01c.jpg">
<p>
"120 million IOS devices shipped. 230,000 IOS activations per day, not counting upgrades. 6.5 billion apps in App store. 200 apps downloaded per second. (beat) Whoosh! Another app sold." <p>
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/img_0543_131e.jpg" align="left">"IOS 4.1 introduced today. A lot of bug fixes. Proximity sensor bugs, bluetooth bugs, iPhone 3g performance bugs. all the bugs we get emails about." <p>
"Also new: HDR photos. High Dynamic Range." (Explains how HDR works.)<p>
"Game Center: Multiplayer games. Challenge friends, or auto-match if you don't have any friends." <em>(laughter in audience).</em> "Compare scores, discover new games your pals are playing." <p>
<em>(Mike Capps, President of Epic Games, demos "Project Sword," sword-battle adventure. Staged trash-talking ensues between the game's designer and Mr. Capps).</em><p>
<em>( Jobs returns: IOS 4.1 next week.)</em> <p>
"Surprise peek at next release... IOS 4.2, coming later this year. All about iPad. Wireless printing. And AirPlay... stream photos, audio, video. More than AirTunes was capable of doing." <p>
<em>(cues Jack Johnson music... multitasks with email, browsing, and other tasks while stopping and starting music using multitask bar.)</em><p>
"IOS 4.2 comes out in November. Free update for iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch."<p>
"Now... iPods. This is our music event where we unveil cool music products for the holidays -- and today's no exception. 275 million iPods sold..."<p>
"New designs biggest changes ever in the iPod line. First: Shuffle... people miss the buttons, and liked voiceover playlists. New iPod shuffle is smaller than 2nd generation device, has buttons, voiceover, playlists, and it's really small..."<p>
"Small, wearable, playlists, genius mixes, tells you when battery needs charging. 15 hours of music. It's really cute, 5 colors. New Shuffle will sell for $49."<p>
"Now, let's look at the nano..." <em>(walks through the 5 generations of Nano.) </em> "This one is multitouch." <em>(applause-o-meter loudest yet since Jobs walked on stage.) </em>"46% smaller, 42% lighter. Clip, no more armbands, if you want to use for athletics. Volume buttons... 24 hour battery life."<em> (demo includes ability to rotate display with touch gesture, to many whoops and claps.)</em> $149 for 8 gig version, $179 for the 16 gig version."<p>
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/4949014792_c688aebd10_o_a7c0.jpg" align="left">
"iPod touch has, in the past year, become the most popular iPod. A lot of people call it an iPhone without a phone... or an iPhone without a contract. It's the number one portable game player in the world. 1.5 billion game and entertainment titles downloaded. New iPod touch: even thinner. Even more beautiful. Has amazing retina display we pioneered with iPhone. 4x pixels 326 ppi, 24 bit color, LED backlit. Best display in the world. Apple A4 chip, same as powers iPhone. 3-axis gyro for gaming. ios 4.1 with game center. Facetime and front-facing camera and rear-facing HD, all in the new iPod touch. 40 hours of use." <p>
"You edit your videos right on the phone." (<em>Heh, Freudian slip!</em>). Pricing: 8 gig for $229, 32 gig for $299, 64 gig for $399. All three products are available next week. Available today for pre-order, to ship next week." <em>(Editor's Note: no iPod Classic mentioned, they must have aborted this from the line.)</em><p>
"Wouldn't be Apple without some new ads... I've got some ads to show you."
<p>
<p><em>(Cake song blasts, multitouch is the focus of this Nano ad... then the Shuffle and Touch featured in 2 more video ads.)</em><p><br />
"Now, iTunes. 11.7 billion songs, 450 million TV eps, #1 online media store in the world. Today we're excited to launch iTunes 10. This is the venerable logo we've been living with for a decade... next Spring, iTunes will surpass CD sales, time to ditch CD in the logo...here's the new logo for iTunes 10."<em> (LOL.)</em><br />
<p><br />
"One of the big things we've focused on in iTunes is... discovery. Discovering new music... There must be a better way to share than email. We're announcing something new... <p><br />
"Ping. A social network for Music. <p><br />
"Facebook and Twitter meet iTunes."<p><br />
"Social network all about music, built right into iTunes. follow your favorite artists and friends, discover what music they're listening to, talking about, and download it. Built right into iTunes. Here's a post by one of you're friends you're following... a post by Lady Gaga, an artist you're following... find people just by looking for their names. You get a custom top ten chart of songs and albums, customized to only the people you follow are downloading from iTunes."<p><br />
"Here's Lady Gaga, an artist you're following. Here's a post from her. About concerts, posts she's written... here are posts from all he other artists you're following. Here's your friend Kevin Angel. Here's the concerts he's going to... here are the friends he's following. <p><br />
"Most of us will live in the feed right here, and all of the people we follow will be delivered right to us. Ping is for social music discovery. Follow and be followed. An artist can say, follow me. You can say, follow me, and everyone can follow you. Or, you can follow me only if I approve, because I'm particular. Me and my ten buddies and that's it. And whenever any one of us hears a great song we'll post it and the ten of us will know instantly. Be as private or public as you want. Privacy is super simple to set up anyone can do it -- it's great." <p><br />
"Privacy is easy. 17,000 concert listings, and you can connect with 160 million iTunes users in 23 countries immediately upon launch. We're starting with a very large base of itunes users." <p><br />
<em>(Demo begins. A knowing flutter of chuckles in the crowd upon privacy mention, clearly Apple learned from Facebook's epic failures in that arena.)</em><p><br />
"Ping will be available not just on your computer, but on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch. It's a social network for music, built by Apple, built into iTunes 10, available today to those 160 million people. Free download starting today... I think it's gonna be pretty hot."<p><br />
"We've got... one more thing.... one more HOBBY."<p><br />
"Apple TV. Introduced 4 years ago. We've sold a lot of them... but never been a huge hit. Netiher has any competitor product. But we talked to people who use it, and they love it. <P><br />
"What have we learned from our users? The number one thing they want is Hollywood movies and TV shows when they want where they want it. They don't want amateur hour. They want pro content, in HD. <p><br />
"They'd like to pay lower prices. The lower the prices the more they'll watch. And they don't want computers on their TV. They go to widescreen TVs for entertainment, not for a computer. Consumers get it. They don't want to manage storage. They don't want to sync to a computer. Most haven't figured out what that is, too complicated. They want whatever hardware we have to be silent, cool, and small."<p><br />
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/4948473537_2eb5f84d44_o-1_bb5c.jpg" align="left"><br />
"So, we've made something new for them. This is the current Apple TV... and we are introducing the second generation today. It's really small, you can hold it in the palm of your hand. Power supply built in. HDMI. Ethernet. WiFi 802.11n. Don't need a hard network connection. Great remote. Beautiful aluminum remote. Easy. IT's about music, Tv shows, and streaming music from your computer... it's all HD when the content's available... we've gone to the rental model. Rent everything. Prices are more affordable. No storage problem. Rental prices are so cheap that you can watch a few times and it's still cheaper than if you'd bought it. No syncing. Stream from your computer."<p><br />
"First-run movies day and date, from $4.99, the day they come out on DVD. Commercial-free television shows from ABC and Fox rentable for 99 cents. Other networks we hope will come on board. <p><br />
"In addition, you can stream content from Netflix. And whatever you want on YouTube, including HD video. Flickr, and MobileMe photos, too. Stream content off your computer, Mac or PC. Music, photo, videos." <em>(UI integrates Rotten Tomato reviews for movies... IMDB-style info on features... shows Netflix UI within Apple TV... computer access, sharing...)</em> "It all comes out of this tiny little box, and it's pretty amazing." <em>(Editor's note: No more purchases, all rental-model -- this is a big, big shift.)</em><p><br />
"This is by far the best implementation of Netflix ever... easy to use. Quality's great." <em>(Demo of photo-surfing features...)</em> "We can surf AirPlay devices using Apple TV. So I have a movie on my computer, <em>Up</em>, and I'm going to play it on Apple TV. I can decide where to stream it to<em> (which device in household, out of multiple screens)</em>, and I'm going to select Apple TV."<p><br />
"You're going to be able to come home, select a movie on one device, and then choose to watch it in your living room on your Apple TV. Select a photo on your iPhone, then view it on Apple TV. Previous model was $229 price range, consumers weren't willing to experiment with that. Lowering the price today to $99. New Apple TV will be available in about 4 weeks, and you can pre-order today. "<P><br />
"Let's review: strongest lineup of iPods ever. Beautiful nanos, fantastic for athletics... Shuffle... iPod Nano now so small and compact that it's wearable without an armband, clip and go. And new iPod Touch includes Facetime, not just between iPod Touches but iPhones and iPod Touches. Strongest line up of iPods we've ever had. And, we announced a new iTunes, with iTunes Ping, a social network for music. We think it's gonna be really popular very fast. Because 160 million people can turn it on today. And, IOS 4.2: HDR photos, Game Center, and more. And Apple TV: a phenomenal way to watch movies and TV shows in your living room whenever you want, and stream content from Netflix or your own computer right on your TV. They're all rolling out starting today."<p><br />
<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/xeni/4949120574_b0b4d1ed4d_o_c9a3.jpg" align="left"><br />
"Now... we started iTunes because we love music. And whenever we have music events we like to remind ourselves why we do this. No better way to do this than to ask one of our favorite musical artists to perform... Coldplay. We asked Chris Martin and he graciously accepted."<br />
<p><br />
<em>(Chris Martin takes the stage, acoustic, accompanied only by piano)<p><br />
</em>Martin: "Wow, this is the toughest closing gig ever. I don't have any products to announce, and we haven't had nearly as many downloads... I'll just play a song, maybe another, until you feel like lunch." <p><br />
<em>(Martin's first number is "Yellow," and his second number is "Viva La Vida," the "Rule the World" song widely featured in Apple ad campaign. He relates a story of how their record label didn't think it was much of a hit song, and says perhaps they were right... but it became one after the Apple campaign. Directing his comment to Apple, he says...) </em> "Your marketing people can sell anything."<p><br />
Martin is wearing a Flaming Lips t-shirt. He goes into a schtick about his next album... "It will be called Coldplay 2.6... even our closest rivals have no idea about our song design... this is in the chord of iMinor." <em>(He's sounding great. Odd to think of an Apple press event as an intimate performance environment, but there you go.)</em><p></p>
<p><img alt="photoeventapple.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/photoeventapple.jpg" width="600" height="803" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;border:3px solid #001;" /><p></p>
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<img src="http://boingboing.net/images/apple0810/8.jpg"></p><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/apple-event-septembe.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/apple-event-septembe.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Xeni Jardin on September 02, 2010 01:11 AM · permalink
Over on <a href="http://www.credit.com/">credit.com</a>, I wrote an article about making ginger ale (from a recipe that <a href="http://sierraclub.typepad.com/sierra_club_radio/">Orli Cotel</a> told me about). Here's an excerpt:
<blockquote>
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/201009010922.jpg" height="382" width="300" border="0" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt="201009010922" />
Because I was unsure about the amount of fizziness the ginger ale would have, I put the bottle in the sink before uncorking it. With one hand over the top of the bottle to serve as a splash guard, I lifted the lever. A powerful jet of frothy ginger ale whooshed from the bottle, rebounding off my hand and splashing forcefully into the sink. The hissing fountain lasted for several seconds. The atomized beverage, strong with the essence of ginger, stung my eyes and my lungs. When the eruption subsided there was just a few ounces of liquid remaining in the bottle. I poured it into a glass and took a sip. There was no sweetness, and curiously, not much of a ginger taste either. I asked my wife to sip it and she almost gagged. She said it had an intolerable sulfur smell and taste. I hadn't noticed it but when I tasted it again I could sort of convince myself that there was a sulfurous tang.
<p>I figured I'd used too much yeast, so for the next batch I used just an 1/8 of a teaspoon for one half gallon of ginger ale. I also used plastic screw top bottles instead of the lemonade bottle. I used a cup of sugar and about one-and-a-half times as much ginger as before.</blockquote>
<br clear="all"><P>
<strong>UPDATE:</strong> Mark C posted what looks like a really good and safer <a href="http://www.creditbloggers.com/2010/08/save-money-and-have-fun-making-ginger-ale-at-home.html?cid=6a00d83451724269e2013486a5969a970c#comment-6a00d83451724269e2013486a5969a970c">ginger ale recipe</a>.
<p><a href="http://www.creditbloggers.com/2010/08/save-money-and-have-fun-making-ginger-ale-at-home.html">Save Money and Have Fun Making Ginger Ale at Home</a><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/make-your-own-ginger.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/make-your-own-ginger.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Mark Frauenfelder on September 02, 2010 12:48 AM · permalink
ruby2ruby provides a means of generating pure ruby code easily from RubyParser compatible Sexps. This makes making dynamic language processors in ruby easier than ever!
Changes:
1.2.5 / 2010-09-01
4 minor enhancements:
- Added braces to hash args surrounded if in a binary method call.
- Added rewrite_resbody to double check structure and freak if necessary.
- Added stress task
- rewrite_rescue now detects rescue with multiple arguments.
2 bug fixes:
- Fixed dstr/dregex/d* roundtripping problem
- Fixed up call arg processing to be more correct and to work with the new sexp form
- http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:37 AM · permalink
<p><strong>The term ‘South Asia’ is an attempt to appropriate the Indian subcontinent’s geography while denying its composite civilisational history</strong></p>
<p>At a seminar a couple of weeks ago, one of the organisers argued that the “South Asian identity” has made inroads across the world. He supported this argument with an example. Many universities in the United States, he said, now have bhangra and garba troupes, often consisting of people of entirely non-South Asian backgrounds. </p>
<p>I nearly fell off my chair. </p>
<p>There is nothing ‘South Asian’ about bhangra and garba, just as there is nothing ‘South Asian’ yoga, ayurveda or tandoori chicken (when was the last time you went to a North South Asian restaurant?). Actually, there’s nothing South Asian about qawwals, ghazals or the Multani raga (when was the last time you went to a South Asian classical concert?). In fact—and you might think, I’m stretching it—there’s nothing South Asian about Nepal, Bhutan, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. If you measure Asia north to south, roughly along the 120°E longitude from the Siberia’s Arctic coast to Indonesia’s southern islands, you’ll find the subcontinent more or less in the middle. Geographically, if there is a South Asia, then the self-confessed ‘South Asians’ are neither in it nor from it. R<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://in.news.yahoo.com/columnist/nitin_pai/9/we-are-not-south-asian">ead the rest at Yahoo! India »</a></p>
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:36 AM · permalink
<p>Apple <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/live-blog-apples-digital-media-event/">announced on Wednesday</a> a cornucopia <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/apple-launches-new-ipod-touch/">of new hardware</a> <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/itunes-10-out-with-the-cd-in-with-the-social-network/">and software</a>: sleek iPods, <a href="http://newteevee.com/2010/09/01/how-could-cheap-itunes-rentals-change-television-online/">a brand new Internet-enabled video streaming device</a> and <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/airplay-like-airtunes-only-more-so/">new versions of its iOS software</a> and iTunes 10. However, <a href="http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/09/01itunes.html">the most impressive to me by far was Ping</a>, the music-only social network that Apple is opening up its 160 million existing iTunes users.</p>
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-152821" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/pingfuture-of-social-commerce/10itunes_artistprofile2/"><img title="10itunes_artistprofile2" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/10itunes_artistprofile2.jpg?w=604&h=407" alt="" width="604" height="407" class="" /></a></p>
<p>No, I’m not blown away by the 160 million number. What I’m impressed by is the thinking behind <a href="http://www.apple.com/itunes/ping/">Ping</a>.</p>
<p>Ping may function like a cross between Facebook and Twitter for iTunes by allowing you to follow celebrities, create social cliques and get artist updates via an activity stream. I think it could have tremendous impact on social sharing and commerce.</p>
<p>From a content perspective, there are three different types of media we love to talk about: movies we see, music we listen to and books we are reading. These are accepted social norms. In fact, many relationships are made on the basis of collective love of a movie and many friendships have started with mixed tapes.</p>
<p>It makes perfect sense for a music service to be social. I’m not alone: The popularity YouTube, the fast-growing MOG and the sadly defunct iLike and Imeem show that people gravitate towards music as a common, collective experience. <span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">A recommendation from friends on Last.fm often resulted in me buying many-a-few music tracks. My friends who listened to <a href="http://www.thieverycorporation.com/">Thievery Corporation</a> turned me on to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadway_Project">The Broadway Project</a> and <a href="http://chrisjoss.free.fr/">Chris Joss</a>, which I ended up buying on the iTunes store or via Amazon’s MP3 store. </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">This click-and-go-somewhere-to-download model of affiliate links can never match a unified experience. Amazon, for example, encourages bloggers and others to link to things they like and then get a piece of the action. This separates social from commerce and treats them as two discrete activities. On the post-Facebook Internet, I don’t think anyone can afford to keep these two actions distinct. </span></p>
<p>Ping, from what little I saw during Steve Jobs’ demo, allows a similar level of social interaction. It can tell me who my friends think are cool and the top 10 favorites of people in my social graph. Some of my friends are famous deejays. Others just have eclectic musical tastes. They can collectively sift through over 10 million songs and help with the discovery of music. <span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">This social-powered discovery is part of the biggest theme of our times: serendipity. About two years ago, when I wrote <a href="http://gigaom.com/2008/07/14/can-serendipity-make-you-rich/">about serendipity</a>, I said:</span></p>
<blockquote><p>The problem is that there’s too much data coming online too quickly, and the traditional method of search that involves first finding and then consuming the information is not going to work for much longer. There just won’t be enough time for us to do that and still have a life. It’s a problem, and therefore solving it is an opportunity — a very big opportunity.</p></blockquote>
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/screen-shot-2010-09-01-at-10-50-57-am.png"><img title="Screen shot 2010-09-01 at 10.50.57 AM" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/screen-shot-2010-09-01-at-10-50-57-am.png?w=300&h=171" alt="" width="300" height="171" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-152643" /></a>My belief has only been affirmed by growth in the amount of data available. With 12 million songs and 250,000 apps, the best way for Apple to enhance the iTunes store – aka its shopping experience — is through the use of social. Back in 2007, <a href="http://gigaom.com/2007/02/05/are-social-networks-just-a-feature/">I argued that social networking was merely a feature that had to be embedded into applications to enhance their value</a>. Apple has done a great job of that, but it’s also gone one step further, not only by adding a social networking layer to iTunes, but by meshing it with its commerce engine, the iTunes Store. And it’s made this experience available on both the desktop and its devices.</p>
<p>Apple received much of this social capability with the acquisition of Lala, an online music service, <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/04/30/lala-to-go-the-way-of-the-dodo/">which as a standalone company</a> used sharing of social objects to drive folks <a href="http://gigaom.com/2007/06/04/lalas-big-gamble/">towards paid music downloads</a>. Now Apple is only closing the loop by further sharing what users bought. I wouldn’t be least bit surprised if sales of music on the iTunes store rocket upwards, thanks to social discovery.</p>
<p>Amazon, <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/07/27/amazon-connects-with-facebook-but-doesnt-kiss-and-tell/">which recently started experimenting with Facebook Connect</a>, has similar ideas, but its implementation leaves a lot to be desired. On Amazon, I’m reduced to reading reviews from absolute strangers for music. I have a handful of friends who have impeccable taste in non-fiction business books, are all members of Amazon, and they already use email to share new book suggestions with me.</p>
<p>What if they too could share their likes and dislikes via a social layer inside Amazon.com? Or what if I could follow my favorite authors and get updates on their books? Much like Apple, Amazon owns book-based social service, Shelfari, and should find ways to embed the social layer inside of all Amazon products and connect its tens of millions of users.</p>
<p>Like Apple, Amazon too has a lot more data about its customers and their behaviors and could create a compelling discovery experience. I believe with tens of thousands of products in its store, the retail giant needs to figure out ways to surface content and other offerings smartly.</p>
<p><strong>Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d)</strong>: <a href="http://pro.gigaom.com/2009/10/why-google-should-fear-the-social-web/">Why Google Should Fear the Social Web</a></p>
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Posted by Om Malik on September 02, 2010 12:32 AM · permalink
ruby_parser (RP) is a ruby parser written in pure ruby (utilizing racc--which does by default use a C extension). RP's output is the same as ParseTree's output: s-expressions using ruby's arrays and base types.
As an example:
def conditional1(arg1) if arg1 == 0 then return 1 end return 0 end
becomes:
s(:defn, :conditional1, s(:args, :arg1), s(:scope, s(:block, s(:if, s(:call, s(:lvar, :arg1), :==, s(:arglist, s(:lit, 0))), s(:return, s(:lit, 1)), nil), s(:return, s(:lit, 0)))))
Changes:
2.0.5 / 2010-09-01
1 minor enhancement:
- Started merging like lexical cases to try to squeeze some optimization out
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:25 AM · permalink
<p>While perusing the <a href="http://www.stealthcopter.com/wordcube/stats.php">statistics</a> of <a href="http://www.stealthcopter.com/wordcube">wordcube</a>, I was wondering how many 9 letter words have multiple anagrams (using all the letters in a single word) and what was the maximum number of anagrams. So I wrote a quick and dirty python program to find out. I will first show the results as they are interesting followed by my coding and methods to improve the efficiency of it. </p>
<p><strong>Results</strong><br />
Here are all the nine letter words with more than 2 anagrams:</p>
<ul>
<li>1. auctioned cautioned education</li>
<li>2. beastlier bleariest liberates</li>
<li>3. cattiness scantiest tacitness</li>
<li>4. countries cretinous neurotics</li>
<li>5. cratering retracing terracing</li>
<li>6. dissenter residents tiredness</li>
<li>7. earthling haltering lathering</li>
<li>8. emigrants mastering streaming</li>
<li>9. estranges greatness sergeants</li>
<li>10. gnarliest integrals triangles</li>
<li>11. mutilates stimulate ultimates</li>
<li>12. reprising respiring springier</li>
</ul>
<p>I only found 12 sets of 3, there may be more with a larger dictionary. I was also disappointed that there were no words with 4 anagrams yet not entirely unsurprising. My personal favourite is number 10</p>
Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.
<p><strong>Python</strong></p>
<p>I recycled an anagram checking function that I have used before:</p>
<pre name="code" class="python">
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
# Anagram checking function
def anagramchk(word,chkword):
for letter in word:
if letter in chkword:
chkword=chkword.replace(letter, '', 1)
else:
return 0
return 1
</pre>
<p><strong>First program</strong></p>
<p>Firstly I created a dirty program that created a loop to cycle through the 9 letter word dictionary and another loop nested inside to check against every word in the dictionary again. This is a terrible and inefficient method and will create duplicates, I will follow with a more efficient method.</p>
<pre name="code" class="python">
g=open('eng-9-letter', 'r')
for l in g:
wordin=l.strip()
f=open('eng-9-letter', 'r')
count=0
w=""
for line in f:
line=line.strip()
if anagramchk(line,wordin):
count+=1
w+=" "+line
f.close()
if count>2:
print wordin, count, "(",w,")"
g.close()
</pre>
<p>This program took <em><strong>80.42s</strong></em> to find the 12 solutions. On the path to better coding I decided to load the dictionary into memory, this sped the code up about 20s to <em><strong>63.88s</strong></em>. </p>
<pre name="code" class="python">
# Load dictionary into memory
dic=[]
f=open('eng-9-letter', 'r')
for line in f:
dic.append(line.strip())
f.close()
</pre>
<p>I then attempted to create a method that loops over and removes words from the dictionary as it loops, however I don’t know the correct way (if there is one?) of modifying the loop variable while inside the loop without causing problems.</p>
<pre name="code" class="python">
for word in dic:
if ....:
dic.remove(word)
</pre>
<p>If anyone knows a good method of doing this please let me know! I did managed to hack together something using slices so that I could modify the dictionary each time, however I imagine this is still quite inefficient.</p>
<pre name="code" class="python">
for word in dic[:]:
w=""
count=0
for word2 in dic[:]:
if anagramchk(word,word2):
count+=1
dic.remove(word2)
w+=word2+" "
if count>2:
print w
</pre>
<p>Even so this method now avoids duplication of results and completes in <em><strong>31.87s</strong></em> (machine running at 3.15Ghz). Please let me know of any improvements you think can be made and I’ll happily benchmark to see how much better it is.</p>
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:06 AM · permalink
<img src="http://craphound.com/images/4920504408_19539a00f7_z.jpg" class="right" align="right">
Michael sez, "The Merry Cemetery is a cemetery in north-east Romania (the Moldovan region). I visited it with my wife and parents-in-law this summer. nstead of a sombre and sad approach to death the Merry Cemetery celebrates life with colourful painted oak 'headstones' engraved with a picture and story of the life of the deceased."
<p>
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mfoord/sets/72157624859189568/"> The Merry Cemetery </a>
(<i>Thanks, <a href="http://www.voidspace.org.uk/">Michael</a>!</i>)
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/08/10/great-caesars-ghost.html#previouspost">Great Caesar's Ghost: Dery on Rome's Cemetery of the Capuchins ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/07/02/german-cemetery-nixe.html#previouspost">German cemetery nixes sexualized tombstone for sex-worker ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/11/17/cemetery_20_networke.html#previouspost">Cemetery 2.0: networked tombstones</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2004/04/13/highgate-cemetery-ph.html#previouspost">Highgate Cemetery photos</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2005/10/25/pet_cemetery_dug_up_.html#previouspost">Pet cemetery dug up to clear way for Hampton Inn</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2008/08/23/writer-who-photograp.html#previouspost">Writer who photographed HP Lovecraft's headstone ordered to delete ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2007/12/11/walt-disneys-grave.html#previouspost">Walt Disney's grave</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 02, 2010 12:06 AM · permalink
Maoists have killed Abhay Kumar Yadav, one of the four kidnapped Bihar policemen, following a decision taken by the 'people's court' after the deadline given by the Left-wing extremists to the state government expired.Avinash, a self-proclaimed Maoist spokesman, has confirmed that Maoists killed Yadav, a sub-inspector in the state police. "We killed him and warned the state government to release our comrades till 10 am on Friday morning," he said.
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:01 AM · permalink
New Zealand's Test win over Pakistan in 1994 has come under the scanner following the recent match-fixing allegations levelled against Pakistani players during their England tour.
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:01 AM · permalink
Three Pakistan cricketers implicated in a match-fixing controversy have asked not to play in the team's remaining matches in Britain, the Pakistan High Commissioner said in London on Thursday.
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:01 AM · permalink
<p>Palitana is a town of temples. The entire local economy is centred around the constant stream of pilgrims throughout the year. The new cars mingle freely with the horse carriages - it is a mirror of an India which exists in multiple decades simultaneously.</p>
<p>Part of the charm lay in the dharamshala we stayed at. The facilities were excellent. Many Jain dharamshalas tend to compromise on the basic hygiene and facilities, but not this one. Abhishek and I got plenty of time together to play - Uno, a bit of Chess, and Name-Place-Animal-Thing. And he used the floor of our room to make his own bus depots, trains stations and airports with his toys.</p>
<p>There are few other places on Earth than can provide solitude and inspiration for less than Rs 500 a day. It will probably, as it was for Bhavana and her family in her childhood, become an annual pilgrimage destination for me, too.</p>
Posted by rajesh on September 02, 2010 12:00 AM · permalink
ParseTree is a C extension (using RubyInline) that extracts the parse tree for an entire class or a specific method and returns it as a s-expression (aka sexp) using ruby's arrays, strings, symbols, and integers.
As an example:
def conditional1(arg1) if arg1 == 0 then return 1 end return 0 end
becomes:
[:defn, :conditional1, [:scope, [:block, [:args, :arg1], [:if, [:call, [:lvar, :arg1], :==, [:array, [:lit, 0]]], [:return, [:lit, 1]], nil], [:return, [:lit, 0]]]]]
Changes:
3.0.6 / 2010-09-01
1 bug fix:
- fixed requires (e-tobi)
- http://www.zenspider.com/ZSS/Products/ParseTree/
- ryand-ruby@zenspider.com
Posted on September 02, 2010 12:00 AM · permalink
sexp_processor branches from ParseTree bringing all the generic sexp processing tools with it. Sexp, SexpProcessor, Environment, etc... all for your language processing pleasure.
Changes:
3.0.5 / 2010-09-01
2 minor enhancements:
- Added in_context to clean up code.
- optimize inspect to avoid needlessly caching @line
Posted on September 01, 2010 11:57 PM · permalink
itwbennett writes "Starting this month, mobile carriers in China are requiring people who set up new mobile phone accounts to register with their real names as part of a new government measure to reduce anonymity among the country's 800 million mobile users. And within 3 years, the carriers must also register the real identities of all existing users, said China Telecom spokesman Xu Fei. The new policy comes as China has been pushing users to register with their real names online. In August, online gamers had to begin real-name registration under regulations that are meant to protect minors from Internet addiction and 'unhealthy' content."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
<iframe src="http://slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?op=discuss&id=1773986&smallembed=1" style="height: 300px; width: 100%; border: none;"></iframe>
Posted by samzenpus on September 01, 2010 11:57 PM · permalink
<object width="600" height="475"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/epgooeTt7Bk?fs=1&hl=en_US&start=90"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/epgooeTt7Bk?fs=1&hl=en_US&start=90" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="600" height="475"></embed></object>
<p>I'm with my friend and senior editor of bOING bOING (the zine) Gareth Branwyn and he is showing me funny videos posted by people who think the world is ruled by reptilian humanoid shapeshifters (basically, the nonsense that David Icke perpetuates). The videos show politicians and other powerful people's tongue flicks, hisses, strange head tilting, and membrane eyelids that move sideways.
Commentary from video above:
<blockquote>'HISSSING' at 1:35...HEAD TILT at 1:38...how many times have you seen a human tilt their head like a freakin animal?...look at her nose...it flatens an the nostrils are larger and farther apart...near complete morph...
<p>Notice everyone, body language? She points to her face. The middle man tries to cover it up.... His voice tone gives it away. The Reptile even gives a Freudian Slip.... "the whole thing feeds on itself."...and are those the twin towers in the background?...more subliminal reptilan sh*t</blockquote>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=reptilian&aq=f">Reptilian shapeshifter videos on YouTube</a><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/videos-that-prove-th.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/videos-that-prove-th.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Mark Frauenfelder on September 01, 2010 11:54 PM · permalink
<a href="http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-09/undergrads-colorado-kick-school-week-crashing-satellite">Undergrads at the University of Colorado sent a NASA satellite to its fiery demise</a> on August 30th. But don't worry. They are not in trouble. In fact, they were specifically tasked with the job of decommissioning the satellite—figuring out where and when to send it screaming through Earth's atmosphere so as to ensure that any leftover bits land someplace where they won't do much damage—as part of a class. An incredibly awesome class.<br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Maggie Koerth-Baker on September 01, 2010 11:51 PM · permalink
With a new social network called Ping, Apple plans to add a way for its customers to discover new music inside iTunes. It's like Facebook and Twitter, with users opting in to "follow" the music habits and comments of friends and artists of interest.
Posted by Geoffrey A. Fowler on September 01, 2010 11:49 PM · permalink
<p>ruby2ruby provides a means of generating pure ruby code easily from
RubyParser compatible Sexps. This makes making dynamic language
processors in ruby easier than ever!</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>1.2.5 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>4 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added braces to hash args surrounded if in a binary method call.</li>
<li>Added rewrite_resbody to double check structure and freak if necessary.</li>
<li>Added stress task</li>
<li>rewrite_rescue now detects rescue with multiple arguments.</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p>2 bug fixes:</p>
<ul>
<li>Fixed dstr/dregex/d* roundtripping problem</li>
<li>Fixed up call arg processing to be more correct and to work with the new sexp form</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://seattlerb.rubyforge.org/">http://seattlerb.rubyforge.org/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb">http://rubyforge.org/projects/seattlerb</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 01, 2010 11:37 PM · permalink
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/201009011627.jpg" height="352" width="500" border="0" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt="201009011627" />
<br clear="all"><P>
<a href="http://blog.makezine.com/">Over at Make</a>: Online Gareth Branwyn writes about the latest issue of <em>Model Cars Magazine</em>.
<blockquote>I've never been a "car guy," but it was really fun to go through the issue (from January 2010) and see what the car model kit industry and hobby are up to these days. As in other areas of modeling, specialty kits are big, vintage kit comebacks, impressive scratch building, and stunning levels of finishing and detailing of kits, are all in evidence.
<p>In this issue, one of the articles I got the biggest kick out of was on the AMT Ford Levacar kit, a promo kit version of the late 1950s Ford concept car that was straight out of The Jetsons. The Levacar kit even levitated! It had plastic tubes that you blew into to raise the car. The model, packaging, everything is to die for. Here's the page about the Levacar kit from <a href="http://www.fantastic-plastic.com/FordLevacarPage.htm">Fantastic Plastic</a>.</blockquote>
<p><a href="http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2010/08/texttool_model_cars_magazine.html">Model Cars Magazine</a>
<p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/ford-levacar-model-f.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/ford-levacar-model-f.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Mark Frauenfelder on September 01, 2010 11:33 PM · permalink
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-152769" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/how-your-cloud-dream-is-becoming-a-security-nightmare/3035796_37df2c6d12_z/"><img title="3035796_37df2c6d12_z" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/3035796_37df2c6d12_z.png?w=300&h=200" alt="" width="300" height="200" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-152769" /></a></p>
<p>After extracting a deal from Research In Motion that appears to <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703369704575461412584650600.html">give state authorities the ability to monitor messages</a> sent over the company’s BlackBerry network — similar to a deal that <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-08-07/rim-saudi-arabia-reach-deal-on-blackberry-ap-says.html">RIM agreed to</a> with the government of Saudi Arabia — the Indian government has suggested that it <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-01/india-asks-rim-google-skype-to-set-up-local-servers-update1-.html">may go after both Google and Skype</a> in an attempt to get similar kinds of security concessions.</p>
<p>India’s threat means that this is no longer just about Research In Motion and its specific network or security controls; it’s about gaining widespread and potentially unlimited access to a whole range of cloud-based services. In other words, it means that our growing use of the “cloud” — whether it’s web-based email or web-based voice calls such as <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/call-phones-from-gmail.html">those recently launched by Google</a>, or mobile email and data from companies such as Research In Motion — is colliding headlong with the demands of foreign governments to control those services and applications, or at least their demands to monitor them whenever they wish.</p>
<p>It’s not just India and Saudi Arabia making these kinds of moves either. Lebanon, Algeria, Indonesia and several other countries are <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/sep/01/blackberry-india-rim">said to be watching closely</a> what’s been going on with RIM, with an eye towards pursuing similar deals with the company, and with other web and mobile service providers. There have also been unconfirmed reports that RIM has <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/BlackBerry-server-in-China-India-wants-a-monitoring-unit-too/articleshow/6230540.cms">already handed over some form of monitoring</a> ability to the federal authorities in both Russia and China, although it’s not clear what level of access those governments have received. If India goes after Google and Skype for access to its email, instant messaging or other communications, China and plenty of other countries are almost certain to demand the same kinds of access.</p>
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-152799" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/how-your-cloud-dream-is-becoming-a-security-nightmare/4137166768_8257bf4745_z/"><img title="4137166768_8257bf4745_z" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/4137166768_8257bf4745_z.png?w=275&h=212" alt="" width="275" height="212" class="alignright size-full wp-image-152799" /></a></p>
<p>India has focused on targeting Skype because of the government’s belief that terrorists and other anti-government forces <a href="http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/BlackBerry-blinks-after-2-yr-delay-Google-Skype-next-in-line/articleshow/6308088.cms">routinely use the VoIP service as a way of communicating</a> without having their phones tapped — something that could also be a risk with the new voice services that Google has launched. According to reports from Bloomberg and other news sources, the government wants both Google and Skype to set up servers in that country that can be monitored by security agencies, or to provide a means for tracking voice and instant messaging data.</p>
<p>The U.S. government has the authority to <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE67B1RY20100813">subpoena content from the BlackBerry network</a>, but it doesn’t have explicit decryption boxes running on RIM servers inside corporate premises, which is what it sounds like India and Saudi Arabia want: to be able to simply turn on their eavesdropping devices and collect whatever they wish. Will India or Saudi Arabia or China abide by the same rules as the U.S., and provide full legal justification for doing this if and when it happens? Perhaps. Or they might just conveniently forget about such niceties (although the U.S. sometimes <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/16/us/16nsa.html?_r=2&sq=NSA&st=cse&scp=2&pagewanted=all">goes outside the legal boundaries</a> as well).</p>
<p>Either way, your data could be at risk. If you send messages over the BlackBerry network, use Skype to call overseas, or send email or use the new voice-calling options from Google, theoretically what you say could be monitored by a foreign government, if India gets its way. There’s no reason to believe that these efforts are going to stop with India, or with just RIM or Skype or even Google; Amazon, Facebook and others could be the next to face such government demands for access to their servers and the information stored there. Living our lives in the cloud is appealing in many ways, but how much freedom do we have to give up in order to do so?</p>
<p><strong>Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):</strong> <a href="http://pro.gigaom.com/2010/01/as-cloud-computing-goes-international-whose-laws-matter/">As Cloud Computing Goes International, Whose Laws Matter?</a></p>
<p><em>Post and thumbnail photos <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en">courtesy</a> of Flickr users <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/21372046@N00/3035796/">AndyRob</a> and <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/14465295@N05/4137166768/">Chrissy575</a></em></p>
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Posted by Mathew Ingram on September 01, 2010 11:30 PM · permalink
<p>ruby_parser (RP) is a ruby parser written in pure ruby (utilizing
racc--which does by default use a C extension). RP's output is
the same as ParseTree's output: s-expressions using ruby's arrays and
base types.</p>
<p>As an example:</p>
<p>def conditional1(arg1)
if arg1 == 0 then
return 1
end
return 0
end</p>
<p>becomes:</p>
<p>s(:defn, :conditional1,
s(:args, :arg1),
s(:scope,
s(:block,
s(:if,
s(:call, s(:lvar, :arg1), :==, s(:arglist, s(:lit, 0))),
s(:return, s(:lit, 1)),
nil),
s(:return, s(:lit, 0)))))</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>2.0.5 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>1 minor enhancement:</p>
<ul>
<li>Started merging like lexical cases to try to squeeze some optimization out</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://parsetree.rubyforge.org/">http://parsetree.rubyforge.org/</a></p></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 01, 2010 11:25 PM · permalink
<p>In the September/October<br />
The Costco Connection magazine,<br />
entrepreneur turned venture capitalist<br />
Robert Harjavec<br />
talks about his secrets to success.</p>
<p>“Success is the million little things<br />
you do every day.<br />
It’s the way you answer your phone,<br />
how clean your office is,<br />
how shiny your shoes were<br />
when you went to make that presentation. </p>
<p>That’s what makes business hard;<br />
it’s not a one-time thing you do,<br />
but a lot of stuff<br />
that you have to keep doing every day.<br />
But that’s how you build a successful business -<br />
with a million well-considered actions and decisions.”</p>
<p>Yep, the small stuff<br />
REALLY does count.</p>
Posted by k on September 01, 2010 11:19 PM · permalink
United Airlines threw nine high-ranking Pakistani military officers off a Washington-Tampa flight on Sunday and turned them over to Dulles security, who detained and grilled the men. The officers were on a junket in the USA, and had been travelling extensively; one of them said words to the effect of, "I hope this is my last flight." This was interpreted as a terrorist threat by a flight attendant. Dulles security did not let the men contact their embassy or the US military officials who were hosting them.
<blockquote>
The Pakistanis were finally released after police at Dulles determined they did not pose a threat. But instead of proceeding to Tampa, the delegation was ordered to return to Pakistan by their military superiors in Islamabad, in protest of their treatment, the Pakistani official said, adding that they were "verbally abused." The group of officers spent the next 48 hours in Washington, waiting for the next available flight home, and were scheduled to depart the United States on Tuesday evening.
<p>
The Pakistani officers were originally en route to U.S. Central Command headquarters in Tampa to attend the annual conference of the U.S.-Pakistan Military Consultative Committee, said Maj. David Nevers, a Central Command spokesman. He said Centcom officials hoped to reschedule the conference.
</blockquote>
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/31/AR2010083106133.html">Pakistani officials leaving in protest</a>
(<i>via <a href="http://consumerist.com/">Consumerist</a></i>)
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/03/11/is-inflight-videocha.html#previouspost">Is inflight videochat in the US illegal? United Airlines thinks so ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/07/08/united-breaks-guitar.html#previouspost">United Breaks Guitars, the complaint anthem</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/04/16/united-airlines-want.html#previouspost">United Airlines wants to charge large people for two seats - Boing ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2004/04/28/united-airlines-hono.html#previouspost">United Airlines' honorific overload</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 11:16 PM · permalink
<img src="http://craphound.com/images/mongoliadDefault-Portrait.jpg" width="275" class="right bordered" align="right">
The Mongoliad is live! This is the collaborative, participatory shared-world project from Neal Stephenson, Greg Bear, and pals. It's an epic fantasy novel about the Mongol conquest, told in installment form, with lots of supplementary material (video, stills, short fiction, etc), and a strong audience participation component in the form of a Wikipedia-style concordance, fanfic, etc. You can read the free samples without registration, but you need an account to edit the "Pedia."
<p>
For $5.99 you get a six-month subscription to the main body of fiction; $9.99 gets you a year (you retain access to the fiction after your subscription expires, but don't get any new material until you renew, which is a major plus in my view -- much fairer than most online "subscriptions" that lock you out once you let your sub lapse).
<p>
The first (paid) chapter went up yesterday, and I've just read it. The word here is <em>epic</em>, a swashbuckling swordplay novel with the sweep, charm and verve of the major Stephenson epics, such as <em>System of the World</em>. A very strong start and well worth the price of admission. This is a great experiment in new fiction business-models that welcome audience participation and work in a way that is native to the net.
<blockquote>
These men were likely knights of the Shield Brethren--the ones she had been instructed to find.
If there was anything to their reputation, they would have responded within days to the Khan's
unlikely invitation. The Shield Brethren were scattered all about, but their closest branch was in
Petraathen, an ancient crag-fort in the mountains south of Kraków, just a few days journey from
here. Their instinct--the reverse of the Mongols--was to camp in the woods, and their scouts had
spied this old monastery, long since abandoned. To her, it had the look of a converted pagan
temple--perhaps Mithraic. Long ago, many of her people had been Mithraic. Now, it was an
impromptu chapter house, a sanctuary where they could wait and train, while they reconnoitered
the territory around the blood-soaked battlefield of Legnica and the great, stinking tent city that
Onghwe had built there.
<p>
A horseman emerged from behind the graveyard wall riding a big blue roan stallion. Cnán
flinched at the sight of a Mongol-style bow, striped and jointed like the leg of an insect, held out
in the man's hands. But this was no Mongol: his hair was brown, long and full, and below his
sharp nose drooped a luxuriant moustache. He pivoted his mount and galloped along the curve
of outbuildings, then pivoted again and rode back and forth through the grass. His apparently
aimless movements made no sense until she understood that he was practicing archery. When his
eye fell on something that looked like it might serve as a target, he loosed an arrow from the
bow, sometimes galloping past, sometimes away, or jerking his horse up short and shooting from
a standstill.
<p>
She did not know these knights other than by reputation, but she saw the rider as one who had
suffered under the power of the Mongols and had learned from them, adopting and adapting their
weapons.
</blockquote>
<a href="http://mongoliad.com/">The Mongoliad</a>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 11:14 PM · permalink
<img alt="hdmd.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/hdmd.jpg" width="528" height="400" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" />
<p><a href="http://voices.washingtonpost.com/local-breaking-news/crime-and-public-safety/discovery-building-being-evacu.html?wpisrc=nl_natlalert">A gunman has taken at least one hostage </a>at <a href="http://www.theawl.com/2010/09/discovery-hq-being-evacuated">Discovery Communications </a>headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland.</p>
<p>There's no official police statements about who the gunman is or what he wants, but there's<a href="http://anna.crepinc.com/discovery_demands.txt"> a list of demands </a>circulating on Twitter—said to be the gunman's manifesto. <em>(Edit: The original site is now down, I'm linking to a version one of our readers saved.)</em> I'm not sure what the original source of this list is, yet, but I'll let you know if/when I find out. The demands are centered around a proposed new programming lineup for The Discovery Channel, pushing Malthusian ideas on population and Daniel Quinn's "My Ishmael" pages 207-212. Seriously. This would be almost funny if it weren't for the whole hostage thing.</p>
<p>The Discovery Communications building is being evacuated. Here's hoping everybody makes it out safely.</p>
<p><strong>UPDATE:</strong> <a href="http://dcist.com/2010/09/developing_police_situation_at_disc.php">According to DCist,</a> the list of demands apparently dates to 2008, and is linked to James Jay Lee, a man arrested that same year for disorderly conduct while protesting at the Discovery Communications building. No one has any idea who the gunman is at this point, so it's unknown whether this is the same guy. WUSA9 TV in Washington D.C. first tweeted the old demands as being linked to the current gunman, but it's unclear how they came to that conclusion.</p>
<p>For now, let's assume they aren't linked.<a href="http://www.mediaite.com/online/hostage-situation-currently-unfolding-at-discovery-channel-headquarters/"> It's worth noting </a>that Discovery Networks have received a lot of threats recently because of Animal Planet's <em>Whale Wars</em> show, which follows the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society as it attempts to deter Japanese whaling ships.</p>
<p><strong>UPDATE #2</strong>: Law enforcement officials are now saying that they believe the gunman is that 2008 protester, <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38957020/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/">James Jay Lee</a>. </p>
<strong>UPDATE #3:</strong> Police have <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/09/01/maryland.discovery.channel/index.html?hpt=T1">shot and killed Lee</a> and freed the hostages.<p>
<em><p>Image of gunman <a href="http://yfrog.com/2mhdmdj">taken by a colleague of Discovery employee Jason Divenere</a> That colleague is now safely out of the building.</p></em><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/gunman-at-discovery.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/gunman-at-discovery.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Maggie Koerth-Baker on September 01, 2010 11:12 PM · permalink
<p>ParseTree is a C extension (using RubyInline) that extracts the parse
tree for an entire class or a specific method and returns it as a
s-expression (aka sexp) using ruby's arrays, strings, symbols, and
integers.</p>
<p>As an example:</p>
<p>def conditional1(arg1)
if arg1 == 0 then
return 1
end
return 0
end</p>
<p>becomes:</p>
<p>[:defn,
:conditional1,
[:scope,
[:block,
[:args, :arg1],
[:if,
[:call, [:lvar, :arg1], :==, [:array, [:lit, 0]]],
[:return, [:lit, 1]],
nil],
[:return, [:lit, 0]]]]]</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>3.0.6 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>1 bug fix:</p>
<ul>
<li>fixed requires (e-tobi)</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/parsetree/">http://rubyforge.org/projects/parsetree/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://www.zenspider.com/ZSS/Products/ParseTree/">http://www.zenspider.com/ZSS/Products/ParseTree/</a></li>
<li><a href="mailto:ryand-ruby@zenspider.com">ryand-ruby@zenspider.com</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 01, 2010 11:00 PM · permalink
<p>sexp_processor branches from ParseTree bringing all the generic sexp
processing tools with it. Sexp, SexpProcessor, Environment, etc... all
for your language processing pleasure.</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>3.0.5 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>2 minor enhancements:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added in_context to clean up code.</li>
<li>optimize inspect to avoid needlessly caching @line</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/parsetree/">http://rubyforge.org/projects/parsetree/</a></p></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 01, 2010 10:57 PM · permalink
<img src="http://craphound.com/images/big-pencil3.jpg"><br>
These Woody Guthrie-themed pencils are emblazoned "This Machine Kills Fascists," the motto Guthrie famously inscribed upon his guitar. Not sure how they compare to <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/08/27/first-impression-of.html">Blackwings</a>, though!
<p>
<a href="http://www.youandmetheroyalwe.com/prod-facistpencils.html">These machines kill fascists</a>
(<i>Thanks, Sara the Teacher!</i>)
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2008/06/03/short-film-with-smil.html#previouspost">Short film with smiling giant pencil and a girl</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/08/09/sharpie-liquid-penci.html#previouspost">Sharpie liquid pencil</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2007/09/14/review-of-35-blackwi.html#previouspost">Review of $35 Blackwing 602 pencil</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/08/23/the-return-of-the-bl.html#previouspost">The return of the Blackwing pencil</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/08/27/first-impression-of.html#previouspost">First impression of the new Blackwing pencil</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/08/30/others-weigh-in-on-n.html#previouspost">Others weigh in on new Blackwing pencil</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/07/06/can-any-pencil-repla.html#previouspost">Can any pencil replace the Blackwing 602?</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:57 PM · permalink
Dora Lyakhovetsky, a gardner from Northbrook, IL, is fighting her village Board of Trustees for the right to keep tomatoes and flowers in her front yard instead of turf. The local code prohibits growing anything but grass out front, even though Lyakhovetsky's back yard is overshadowed by big trees and can't be used to grow anything.
<p>
Lyakhovetsky showed up at the Board meeting with a basket of tomatoes for her neighbors and asked them to reconsider.
<blockquote><img src="http://craphound.com/images/1283354032_2c32.jpg" class="right" align="right">
"This isn't a garden dispute -- this is a neighborhood dispute," said Goodman, who had circulated a petition in the neighborhood trying to drum up support for Lyakhovetsky's front yard garden on the 2700 block of Shannon Drive.
<p>
Somewhat of a community activist, Goodman told the board his petitioning job had never been so easy. The two people who objected most strenuously to Lyakhovetsky's garden, he said, did so because they did not like her.
<p>
Had someone else planted the garden, perhaps they would not have minded its prominent placement, he said.
<p>
"I know you think you can solve this by writing a new law," Goodman said.
<p>
But he said that wouldn't work because people would just find something else to complain about. Plus, he said, residents clearly don't want the village to do so.
</blockquote>
<a href="http://triblocal.com/Northbrook/detail/214078.html">Northbrook front-yard gardener brings some of her crop to Village Board </a>
(<i>Thanks, JArmstrong via <a href="http://boingboing.net/submit">Submitterator</a></i>)
<p>
(<i>Image: Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune</i>)
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/08/29/homeowners-associati.html#previouspost">Homeowners' associations: hives of petty authoritarianism - Boing ...</a></li>
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<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/05/04/woman-accuses-cop-ne.html#previouspost">Woman accuses cop neighbor of forging "Come get all my stuff for ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2008/12/04/unusual-house-additi.html#previouspost">Unusual house addition in Boulder, Colorado</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/12/09/woman-spray-paints-o.html#previouspost">Woman spray-paints own house with Hitler graffiti </a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2008/07/10/boulder-man-faces-20.html#previouspost">Boulder man faces $2000 fine/day for guerilla garden fencing ...</a></li>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:57 PM · permalink
Space enthusiasts who follow information coming out of NASA with excitment should download the free NASA HD app for the iPad right now. This app aggregates all of the happenings at NASA with a gorgeous interface that is tailored for touch operation on the iPad.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=gigaom.com&blog=14960843&post=152812&subd=gigaom2&ref=&feed=1" width="1" height="1" /><hr /><p>
<a href='http://gigaom.com/sponsor/alcatel-lucent/?utm_source=RSS&utm_medium=Banner&utm_campaign=RSS%2BLucent'>
<img src='http://a.gigaom.com/feed-injector/img/lucent-2010-05-17.gif' alt='Alcatel-Lucent NextGen Communications Spotlight — Learn More »' border='0' />
</a>
</p><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by James Kendrick on September 01, 2010 10:56 PM · permalink
Dr. Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick (Ohio State) and Matthias Hastall, (Zeppelin University, Germany) have published an article in the <em>Journal of Communication</em> with their research showing that old people love to read stories about young people doing stupid things because it makes them feel better about being old. The study was conducted using 178 German adults aged 18 to 30 and 98 between 55 and 60. I have no idea if this is a valid statistical sample, but since it confirms my own feelings about old people, I will trust its results.
<blockquote>
All the adults in the study were shown what they were led to believe was a test version of a new online news magazine. They were also given a limited time to look over either a negative and positive version of 10 pre-selected articles.
<p>
Each story was also paired with a photograph depicting someone of either the younger or the older age group.
<p>
The researchers found that older people were more likely to choose to read negative articles about those younger than themselves. They also tended to show less interest in articles about older people, whether negative or positive.
<p>
But younger people preferred to read positive articles about other young people.
</blockquote>
<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100831/od_nm/us_elderly_news">Older people enjoy reading negative stories about young</a>
(<i>via <a href="http://slashdot.org">/.</a></i>)
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:56 PM · permalink
Want to start reading some science fiction, but aren't sure where to begin? This introductory sci-fi literature syllabus is just for you.
Posted by io9 on September 01, 2010 10:52 PM · permalink
A new proposed federal journalist shield law is under debate in the USA, which sounds like a great idea, except that the traditional press have agreed to amendments that would exempt Wikileaks from any protection for its confidential sources, on the grounds that Wikileaks isn't journalism (ORLY?).
<blockquote>
More generally, Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee, criticized WikiLeaks as "not journalism."
<p>
"It's data dissemination, and that worries me," she told Time magazine. "Journalists will go through a period of consultation before publishing sensitive material. WikiLeaks says it does the same thing. But traditional publishers can be held accountable. Aside from Julian Assange, no one knows who these people are."
</blockquote>
Wait, what? You don't want to give confidential source protection to Wikileaks because Wikileaks has confidential sources? [Boggle].
<p>
<a href="http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/commentary.aspx?id=23303">Trying to exclude WikiLeaks from shield law stinks </a>
(<i>via <a href="http://slashdot.org/">/.</a></i>)
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2008/02/18/california-judge-shu.html#previouspost">California judge shuts down wikileaks</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/08/25/wikileaks-publishes-3.html#previouspost">Wikileaks publishes CIA "Red Cell" memo on risks of US perceived ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/rape-case-re-opened.html#previouspost">Rape case re-opened in Sweden against Wikileaks founder Assange ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/05/17/wikileaks-founders-p.html#previouspost">Wikileaks founder's passport confiscated</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/07/31/wikileaks-volunteer.html#previouspost">Wikileaks volunteer detained</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/07/25/wikileaks-releases-c.html#previouspost">Wikileaks releases classified Afghanistan war logs: "largest ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/04/20/wikileaks-founder-ju.html#previouspost">Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to keynote 2600's HOPE conference ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/04/05/wikileaks-video-of-u.html#previouspost">Iraq: Wikileaks video of US military killing journalists</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/07/25/wikileaks-releases-c.html#previouspost">Wikileaks releases classified Afghanistan war logs: "largest ...</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:50 PM · permalink
I just found out about <a href="http://bitbucket.org/gregmalcolm/python_koans/wiki/Home">Python Koans</a> by Greg Malcolm (thanks dude) after listening to the <i><a href="http://frompythonimportpodcast.com/">from python import podcast</a></i> podcast (which I find amusing, thanks guys).<br /><br />It's an awesome way to learn Python. Instead of just reading tutorials and/or books you learn Python by coding.<br /> <br />The interactive <i>tutorial</i> is built around unit-tests and you advance and gain new skills by passing tests and it's really funny. You do learn a lot about the Python language when doing the Koans so I recommend it even if you've been using Python for a while.<br /><br />Another cool thing is that you learn how to do unit testing in Python, if you're not already familiar with it.<br /> <br /> <br /> <br /><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width="1" height="1" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/7970464356958190643-8714195959889462272?l=pysnippet.blogspot.com" alt="" /></div>
Posted on September 01, 2010 10:48 PM · permalink
<p>Inline allows you to write foreign code within your ruby code. It
automatically determines if the code in question has changed and
builds it only when necessary. The extensions are then automatically
loaded into the class/module that defines it.</p>
<p>You can even write extra builders that will allow you to write inlined
code in any language. Use Inline::C as a template and look at
Module#inline for the required API.</p>
<p>Changes:</p>
<h3>3.8.5 / 2010-09-01</h3>
<ul>
<li><p>1 bug fix:</p>
<ul>
<li>Added DLDFLAGS to compiler flags to fix OSX linking on 1.9.2</li>
</ul></li>
<li><p><a href="http://rubyforge.org/projects/rubyinline/">http://rubyforge.org/projects/rubyinline/</a></p></li>
<li><a href="http://rubyinline.rubyforge.org/RubyInline/">http://rubyinline.rubyforge.org/RubyInline/</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.zenspider.com/ZSS/Products/RubyInline/">http://www.zenspider.com/ZSS/Products/RubyInline/</a></li>
<li><a href="mailto:ryand-ruby@zenspider.com">ryand-ruby@zenspider.com</a></li>
</ul>
Posted by zenspider on September 01, 2010 10:45 PM · permalink
IO9's Annalee Newitz has posted a great <a href="http://io9.com/5626861/a-syllabus-and-book-list-for-novice-students-of-science-fiction-literature">syllabus and book list for novice students of science fiction literature</a>, filled with good suggestions for getting started in the field.
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:45 PM · permalink
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<p>
Here's more wonderful stuff from <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2009/12/03/exploding-clockwork.html">Brett Dickins</a>, AKA MechanicalSculptor, who makes wall-hung mechanical clockworks that explode/disintegrate/transform and reform. I'm absolutely besotted by the self-sawing piece around 1:55.
<p>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGB4HvwuzpY"> Kinetic Wall Sculptures - Dizzy </a>
<div class="previously2">
<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2010/02/16/mechanical-sculpture.html#previouspost">Mechanical Sculpture by Aaron Ristau</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/12/09/wasp-sculpture-from.html#previouspost">Wasp sculpture from junk mechanical parts </a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/09/15/motor-attached-to-se.html#previouspost">Motor attached to series of reduction gears - final gear fixed in ...</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/08/27/laughing-flywheel-dr.html#previouspost">Laughing, flywheel-driven mechanical bellows robot</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/03/27/reuben-margolins-kin.html#previouspost">Reuben Margolin's kinetic wave sculptures</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/09/17/blind-juggling-robot.html#previouspost">Blind juggling robot</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/11/16/the-senster---roboti.html#previouspost">The Senster - robotic sculpture from the late 1960's</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
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Posted by Cory Doctorow on September 01, 2010 10:43 PM · permalink
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-152652" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/more-people-are-choosing-the-freelance-lifestyle/elance-chart-3x2/"><img title="Elance-chart-3x2" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/elance-chart-3x2.png?w=300&h=200" alt="" width="300" height="200" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-152652" /></a></p>
<p>Freelance work is on the rise, according to a new survey by <a href="http://elance.com">Elance</a> — a service that helps freelancers connect with employers for part-time employment — and more workers are <em>choosing</em> to live the life of a freelancer, as opposed to finding themselves in the position while looking for a “real” job. The Elance report, which will be released in full next week, found that 70 percent of freelancers surveyed are happier working independently than when they were full-time employees, and more than 60 percent said they would prefer to remain a freelancer rather than take a full-time job. Over 60 percent also said their income has increased in the last year.</p>
<p>According to the Elance report, the economic downturn is no longer the primary force driving professionals to start a freelance career. Less than 5 percent of those surveyed said they were working as a freelancer until they could find a full-time job, and less than 25 percent said they became freelancers after a layoff. Over half of those who responded to the survey said they began freelancing to be their own boss and work on projects they loved, and almost 80 percent of respondents said the ability to have control over their own work schedule was their favorite part of working independently.</p>
<p><a rel="attachment wp-att-152658" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/more-people-are-choosing-the-freelance-lifestyle/elance-screenshot/"><img title="Elance-screenshot" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/elance-screenshot.png?w=604&h=451" alt="" width="604" height="451" class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-152658" /></a></p>
<p>The typical online freelancer is between 25 and 54 years of age, Elance says, and is more likely to be female and educated. About 80 percent of freelancers surveyed by the company have a professional degree or designation of some kind, while just 4 percent have only a high-school diploma. About half of those who took part in the survey (which sampled more than 700 freelancers who have connected with employers through Elance) said freelancing was their sole means of income, while about 30 percent said they do part-time work online in addition to other full-time or part-time employment.</p>
<p><strong>Related posts from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):</strong> <a href="http://pro.gigaom.com/2009/09/career-opportunities-in-the-newnet/">Career Opportunities in the New Net</a></p>
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Posted by Mathew Ingram on September 01, 2010 10:30 PM · permalink
wiredmikey writes "Think you can bust out some silly fresh rhymes on the subjects of hacking, identity theft and computer viruses? In a somewhat untraditional partnership, Snoop Dogg and Symantec's Norton want you to show off your their lyrical skills on the subject of cybercrime and enter the 'Hack is Wack' cybercrime rap contest. If you have the skills and bust out the phattest rap, you'll receive round trip airfare for two to Los Angeles along with two days and two nights' hotel stay to meet with Snoop's management, learn more about his business. You'll also get two tickets to a Snoop Dogg concert and a new laptop pimped out with Norton Internet Security 2011."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by samzenpus on September 01, 2010 10:22 PM · permalink
<p>A while back I needed to be able to use SSL connections in async_chat, but I found it to be horribly incompatible. After quite a bit of investigation I found a suitable solution.</p>
<div class="wp_syntax"><div class="code"><pre class="python"><span>import</span> <span>asynchat</span>
<span>import</span> <span>socket</span>
<span>import</span> ssl
<span>import</span> <span>errno</span>
<span>class</span> async_chat_ssl<span>(</span><span>asynchat</span>.<span>async_chat</span><span>)</span>:
<span>""</span><span>" Asynchronous connection with SSL support. "</span><span>""</span>
<span>def</span> connect<span>(</span><span>self</span>, host, use_ssl=<span>False</span><span>)</span>:
<span>self</span>.<span>use_ssl</span> = use_ssl
<span>if</span> use_ssl:
<span>self</span>.<span>send</span> = <span>self</span>._ssl_send
<span>self</span>.<span>recv</span> = <span>self</span>._ssl_recv
<span>asynchat</span>.<span>async_chat</span>.<span>connect</span><span>(</span><span>self</span>, host<span>)</span>
<span>def</span> handle_connect<span>(</span><span>self</span><span>)</span>:
<span>""</span><span>" Initializes SSL support after the connection has been made. "</span><span>""</span>
<span>if</span> <span>self</span>.<span>use_ssl</span>:
<span>self</span>.<span>ssl</span> = ssl.<span>wrap_socket</span><span>(</span><span>self</span>.<span>socket</span><span>)</span>
<span>self</span>.<span>set_socket</span><span>(</span><span>self</span>.<span>ssl</span><span>)</span>
<span>def</span> _ssl_send<span>(</span><span>self</span>, data<span>)</span>:
<span>""</span><span>" Replacement for self.send() during SSL connections. "</span><span>""</span>
<span>try</span>:
result = <span>self</span>.<span>write</span><span>(</span>data<span>)</span>
<span>return</span> result
<span>except</span> ssl.<span>SSLError</span>, why:
<span>if</span> why<span>[</span><span>0</span><span>]</span> <span>in</span> <span>(</span><span>asyncore</span>.<span>EWOULDBLOCK</span>, <span>errno</span>.<span>ESRCH</span><span>)</span>:
<span>return</span> <span>0</span>
<span>else</span>:
<span>raise</span> ssl.<span>SSLError</span>, why
<span>return</span> <span>0</span>
<span>def</span> _ssl_recv<span>(</span><span>self</span>, buffer_size<span>)</span>:
<span>""</span><span>" Replacement for self.recv() during SSL connections. "</span><span>""</span>
<span>try</span>:
data = <span>self</span>.<span>read</span><span>(</span>buffer_size<span>)</span>
<span>if</span> <span>not</span> data:
<span>self</span>.<span>handle_close</span><span>(</span><span>)</span>
<span>return</span> <span>''</span>
<span>return</span> data
<span>except</span> ssl.<span>SSLError</span>, why:
<span>if</span> why<span>[</span><span>0</span><span>]</span> <span>in</span> <span>(</span><span>asyncore</span>.<span>ECONNRESET</span>, <span>asyncore</span>.<span>ENOTCONN</span>,
<span>asyncore</span>.<span>ESHUTDOWN</span><span>)</span>:
<span>self</span>.<span>handle_close</span><span>(</span><span>)</span>
<span>return</span> <span>''</span>
<span>elif</span> why<span>[</span><span>0</span><span>]</span> == <span>errno</span>.<span>ENOENT</span>:
<span># Required in order to keep it non-blocking</span>
<span>return</span> <span>''</span>
<span>else</span>:
<span>raise</span></pre></div></div>
<p>It should fit in place of typical use of asynchat.async_chat. In order to specify that you're wanting to use SSL, just set the flag in:</p>
<div class="wp_syntax"><div class="code"><pre class="python">connect<span>(</span>host, use_ssl=<span>True</span><span>)</span></pre></div></div>
<p>It would be nice if SSL support with asynchat.async_chat worked by default. Hopefully I'm not the only one who finds the above solution useful.</p>
<p>And as always, if you see any errors above, I encourage you to post a comment explaining the it!</p>
Posted on September 01, 2010 10:02 PM · permalink
<p>Have you ever wondered what the panhandlers you see on the street would do if you actually gave them a bunch of money to spend? Like many people, I generally give my pocket change to anyone who asks. I figure that if they have to ask, they probably need it more than I do. (Yes, I know that there are just as many folks who think this is ridiculous, and who never give anything to folks on the street. What can I say? The empathetic J.D. almost always get his way over the logical J.D. Exception: I <i>never</i> give to aggressive panhandlers.)</p>
<p>Last weekend, the <i>Toronto Star</i> featured <a href="http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/854018--how-panhandlers-use-free-credit-cards">a fascinating article from Jim Rankin</a> about a little experiment he conducted. He actually decided to give a few handlers <i>more</i> than just pocket change:</p>
<blockquote><p>
Over the past two weeks, I wandered Toronto’s downtown core with five prepaid Visa and MasterCard gift cards, in $50 and $75 denominations, waiting for people to ask for money.</p>
<p>When they did, I asked them what they needed. A meal at a restaurant, groceries, a new pair of pants, they said. <b>I handed out the cards and asked that they give them back when they’d finished shopping.</b> I either waited at a coffee shop while they shopped or — in the case of those who could not buy what they needed nearby or were reticent about leaving their panhandling post — I said I’d return on another day to pick up the card. That’s when I would reveal that I was a journalist.</p>
<p>Some were unbelieving at first. All were grateful. Some declined the offer. Some who accepted didn’t come back, but those that did had stories to tell.
</p></blockquote>
<p>As you might expect, different people did different things with the gift cards Rankin gave them.</p>
<ul>
<li>With a $50 card, Jason spent $8.69 at McDonald’s before returning the card.</li>
<li>Mark used his $50 card to buy a $21.64 meal at a local restaurant and then spent $15.50 at the liquor store. He didn’t return the card.</li>
<li>Rankin gave Joanne a $75 card, which was stolen by an ex-boyfriend. He used it to spend $24.95 at McDonald’s and $38.35 at the liquor store.</li>
<li>Al took a $50 card, but never used it and never returned it.</li>
<li>With her $75 card, Laurie bought $74.61 in food, cigarettes, and telephone minutes. She returned the card.</li>
</ul>
<p>Though there’s no real Big Message to be taken from this feature, I think it’s fascinating. Most of the time, homelessness is used to polarize people on one side or another of a political issue. But sometimes we forget that panhandlers are <i>real</i> people who have stories behind their predicaments. Rankin’s project was a clever way to get at some of those stories.</p>
<p>[<i>Toronto Star</i>: <a href="http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/854018--how-panhandlers-use-free-credit-cards">How panhandlers use free credit cards</a>]</p>
<p>---<br />Related Articles at Get Rich Slowly:<ul><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/04/27/credit-card-index/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Credit Card Index">Credit Card Index</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2007/01/18/i-do-not-use-credit-cards/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: I Do Not Use Credit Cards">I Do Not Use Credit Cards</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/05/16/discussion-forum-highlights/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Discussion Forum Highlights">Discussion Forum Highlights</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2007/08/12/video-credit-cards-in-the-blender/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: Video: Credit Cards in the Blender">Video: Credit Cards in the Blender</a></b><li><b><a href="http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2007/08/08/a-quick-trick-for-tracking-credit-card-expenses-in-quicken/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link: A Quick Trick for Tracking Credit Card Expenses in Quicken">A Quick Trick for Tracking Credit Card Expenses in Quicken</a></b></ul></p><br />
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Posted by J.D. Roth on September 01, 2010 10:00 PM · permalink
A furor has broken out among biologists over ant specialist E.O. Wilson's latest attack on a concept used to explain the origins of self-sacrifice in the dog-eat-dog world of evolution.
Posted by Susan Milius on September 01, 2010 10:00 PM · permalink
Apple avoided any problems with the name of its Ping social network for music -- by making sure that it had an agreement with the golf company that holds the Ping trademark beforehand.
Posted by Jennifer Valentino-DeVries on September 01, 2010 09:48 PM · permalink
<div id="attachment_152240" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 310px"><a rel="attachment wp-att-152240" href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/could-cisco-peddle-skype-as-its-gateway-drug/125252690_95192e6b96/"><img title="The right message for Skype?" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/125252690_95192e6b96.jpg?w=300&h=225" alt="" width="300" height="225" class="size-medium wp-image-152240" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Free? Forever? Hmm.... Credit: Malthe Sigurdsson</p></div>
<p>Skype is <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/08/29/is-skype-up-for-sale/">apparently</a> up for sale, with Cisco the likely buyer. True or false, Cisco makes a great deal of sense as a buyer, because it can monetize Skype’s user base in a way that Skype never could. With 560 million registered users (124 million of which are active), but only 8.1 million paying customers, Skype could use some help.</p>
<p>This may sound like heresy to acolytes of Silicon Valley economics. After all, the new economics of software go something like this: Give great stuff away, then charge for advanced features for the few who need them. In open source we call it “Open Core.” For Silicon Valley Web entrepreneurs, it’s “freemium.”</p>
<p>In both cases, it’s sub-optimal.</p>
<p>No, it’s not because of <a href="http://www.opensources.com/2010/08/24/open-core-naysayers-celebrate-proprietary-software/">skewed ideas</a> of user freedom, but because it ends up being difficult talking out of both sides of one’s mouth. A marketing message that reads “This is a great product! (Just not for you…)” is tough to articulate and maintain.</p>
<p>Yes, it can be done. However, it’s very hard.</p>
<p>Now consider Cisco and Skype. Cisco doesn’t have any problems getting paid for its software, hardware, and services. It sold $40 billion worth of both last year. What Cisco doesn’t have is a low-cost/free option to drive adoption of its technologies.</p>
<p>Enter Skype.</p>
<p>Skype, as stated, has <em>lots</em> of user adoption. While Skype is no chump at $406 million in annual sales — and it <a href="http://seekingalpha.com/article/222901-will-cisco-swoop-in-to-buy-skype-pre-ipo">seems to be getting better</a> at up-selling its user base– it will be easier for Cisco to negotiate an “upgrade to x” deal than it will for Skype with its <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/08/30/skype-connect/">new Connect services</a>.</p>
<p>At Alfresco, my previous employer, the company was highly distributed, and we used Skype extensively to connect our home workers and remote offices. While I paid to use SkypeOut when I needed to call home while in London, I may have been the only one in the company to pay Skype any money.</p>
<p>Net income to Skype for our company of 100 employees, all of whom were active users of Skype? Maybe $2.00 per month.</p>
<p>Skype was good enough for 99 percent of the employees, so why would we pay?</p>
<p>Cisco can offer plenty of reasons. Companies like Alfresco grow up. When they do, they need more sophisticated video and phone conferencing solutions than Skype can provide. Cisco has them covered. Start with Skype, then move to Cisco gear.</p>
<p>It becomes even more interesting if Cisco finds a way to integrate Skype calls with its more expensive hardware and software solutions: something like <a href="http://vidyo.com/">Vidyo</a>, which does just that. (Another possible acquisition, Cisco?)</p>
<p>This blending of free services, both open- and proprietary, with separate, paid offerings is <strong>the winning business model</strong> going forward. <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-9819669-16.html">Google does it</a>. Facebook does it. Red Hat does it.</p>
<p>Cisco looks likely to do it, too, with a Skype acquisition. Cisco-plus-Skype appears to be the perfect example of how to accelerate a business using a free complement. “Free” can mean a great deal of cash, done right.</p>
<p><strong>Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub req’d):</strong></p>
<p><a href="http://pro.gigaom.com/2010/08/report-videoconferencing-unleashed/?utm_source=gigaom&utm_medium=editorial&utm_campaign=related"><strong>Report: The Enterprise Videoconference Lanscape, 2010 – 2015</strong></a></p>
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Posted by Matt Asay on September 01, 2010 09:45 PM · permalink
The Fed will co-host a conference on the future of housing finance this fall amid intensifying efforts by policy makers and bankers to address a root cause of the financial crisis.
Posted on September 01, 2010 09:41 PM · permalink
<img alt="ping1.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/ping1.jpg" width="600" height="336" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" />
Apple's name for its new social network, <em>Ping</em>, is interestingly generic. With a long association to the sport of table tennis and a computer networking utility whose function resembles it, it carries a natural association with communication, responsiveness, and so on. But like many generic terms, if you <a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=login&p_lang=english&p_d=trmk">do a search for "Ping" at the trademark office's website</a>, you'll find many, many entries. Most recent filings are from Karsten Manufacturing Corporation, which makes golf gear. Interestingly many of its filings go beyond the sticks to include computer and internet-related stuff.
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4009:8031r8.2.18">This mark</a>, for example, is for goods and services concerning "Communications software for electronically exchanging data." Though filed on April 7, 2010, it's already been abandoned. Most of the "Ping" trademark filings from Karsten, however, remain live.
<a href="http://www.ping.com/">Ping.com</a> is a well-manicured corporate site that touts the corporate twitter account. It even <a href="http://itunes.apple.com/app/ping/id364265187?mt=8">has an iPhone app</a>.
Then there's <a href="http://ping.fm/">Ping.fm</a>, a bona-fide social networking tool even closer to Apple's new thing. Owner Seesmic.com don't seem to have filed for any related trademarks.
Here's some of Karsten's trademark filings for Ping:
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:654jb7.2.1"> 85003420 </a>Wireless communication devices for voice, data or image transmission.
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:654jb7.2.2">85010415 </a>Computer software, namely, file sharing software; communications software for electronically exchanging data, and graphics accessible via a computer network, etc.
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:654jb7.2.3">85009569 </a>Computer services, namely, providing search platforms to allow users to request content from and receive content to a mobile device or a computer; Providing user-defined generated content, etc.
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:654jb7.2.6">85014001 </a>Entertainment and educational services ... Providing an internet website for dissemination of historical information and current news relating to golf etc.
<a href="http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4008:654jb7.2.7">85003420 </a> Broadcasting of video and audio programming over the Internet ... Electronic mail; Providing on-line communications links which transfer the web site user to other local and global web pages .. Providing an on-line forum relating to the subject of sports; Consumer telecommunication services, namely, communications services for electronically exchanging data and graphics via telecommunication networks, including mobile and wireless networks.
<strong>UPDATE</strong>: There's a deal between the two companies. Press release follows after the jump! <em>Thanks, Kristopher!</em><p><br />
<blockquote><br />
PING Golf Announces Trademark Agreement With Apple</p>
<p>PHOENIX, Sept. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- PING and its parent company, Karsten Manufacturing Corporation, announced today that they have entered into an agreement with Apple under which Apple will use the PING trademark in connection with Apple's innovative new social music discovery feature in iTunes. Apple introduced the iTunes PING feature today.<br />
Founded in 1959, PING is a famous premium brand that holds more than 1000 trademark registrations around the world, many related to golf equipment. The company also owns trademark rights in PING for social networking and other online services.<br />
This announcement involves two companies that were founded by visionaries who created products that greatly impacted their industries. Karsten Solheim invented the PING® putter in his Redwood City, California garage and went on to revolutionize the golf equipment industry. The groundbreaking first Apple® computer was developed in nearby Palo Alto in 1976.<br />
"We are pleased to enter into this agreement with Apple," said John Solheim, Chairman and CEO of Karsten Manufacturing Corporation and PING. "Like PING, Apple carries a reputation for innovation and quality. I have always had great respect for companies that have changed and improved the ways things are done and I continue to model PING along those lines. Apple is a truly great example of this kind of enterprise."<br />
About PING<br />
PING designs, manufactures and markets a complete line of golf equipment including metal woods, irons, putters and golf bags. The family-owned company was founded in 1959 in the garage of the late Karsten Solheim, a mechanical engineer with an extensive background in the aerospace and computer industries. His frustration with his putting inspired him to design his own putter, which created a "pinging" sound when striking a golf ball. This sound was the source of the name now synonymous with innovation, quality and service throughout the world of golf. Solheim and his company are credited with numerous innovations that became industry standards, including perimeter weighting, custom fitting and the use of investment casting in the manufacturing of golf clubs. His insistence on adhering to strict engineering principles and tight manufacturing tolerances raised the level of product performance and quality throughout the golf industry. Solheim is the only person to be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame as a golf club manufacturer. Today, the Phoenix-based company is under the direction of Solheim's youngest son, John A. Solheim. PING game-improvement products can be found in more than 70 countries. For more information, visit www.ping.com.<br />
PING is a registered trademark of Karsten Manufacturing Corporation. Other trademarks mentioned are properties of their respective owners. <br />
Source: PING<br />
</blockquote></p><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/ping-trademarks-file.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/ping-trademarks-file.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Rob Beschizza on September 01, 2010 09:35 PM · permalink
There might not have been a new “magical,” transformational gadget like the iPad at this week’s Apple event, but there certainly was a ton of information.
Posted by Jennifer Valentino-DeVries on September 01, 2010 09:34 PM · permalink
We know — the new Apple TV is really small, and cheap and easy-to-use. That's all good, but still not knocking our socks off despite being the ripest area for expansion by a company that has already firmly established itself on the computer, phone, portable media player and tablet. Here are five reasons Apple TV is still boring.
Posted by Eliot Van Buskirk on September 01, 2010 09:32 PM · permalink
An anonymous reader writes "The manifesto of the man holding the Discovery Channel hostage with a bomb has been released. He has fired shots and taken hostages. His main complaints are about overpopulation, religion and civilization. He wants them to avoid encouraging people to produce more 'disgusting human babies,' to get people to accept 'Malthus-Darwin science,' reject civilization and its 'disgusting religious-cultural roots,' and to stop 'ALL immigration pollution.'" The man has now been shot by police, and the hostages have been freed.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by samzenpus on September 01, 2010 09:31 PM · permalink
<p><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/apple-tv-moves-to-rental-model-drops-price-to-99/">Apple TV Moves to Rental Model, Drops Price to $99</a> is a post from <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com">Chris Pirillo</a></p><p><img src="http://chris.pirillo.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/10appletv_remoteandtv.jpg" alt="Apple TV" /></p><p><em>DISCLAIMER: I thought the first Apple TV was relatively useless.</em></p><p>Today, Apple announced <a href="http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2010/09/01appletv.html">significant changes to Apple TV</a> at the press event held in San Francisco (which, by the way, was streamed LIVE for the world to watch). The new Apple TV, available by the beginning of October, comes in at 1/4 the size of the original. It’s smaller than a sandwich. You can use a Tupperware container as your carrying case now – provided you’ve cleaned it first.</p><p>But there are tastier details to sink your teeth into!</p><p>There’s no media to keep track of anymore (through klutzy synching processes and whatnot) – everything will stream live into the tiny slice of digital heaven through either a network cable or WiFi (802.11n). As someone who hates storing media, this change is most welcomed. There’s a reason I use and love both <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-play-internet-radio-and-pandora-without-a-computer/">Pandora</a> and <a href="http://go.tagjag.com/rhapsody">Rhapsody</a> for my music, and why I’ve taken to <a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/is-a-hulu-plus-subscription-worth-paying-for/">Hulu</a> for available TV show viewing. And on that note…</p><p>Once you’ve set up your new Apple TV, you’ll be able to “choose from the largest online selection of HD movies to rent, including first run movies for just $4.99, and the largest online selection of HD TV show episodes to rent from ABC, ABC Family, Fox, Disney Channel and BBC America for just 99 cents.” That’s quite a competitive price for legally-attainable media in conjunction with a convenient interface and service. Not sure I’ll take advantage of this part of the Apple TV, though; I’m not into à la carte media consumption.</p><p><a href="http://coupons.lockergnome.com/click-coupon?id=356">Netflix</a> subscribers (like myself) have access to the entire streaming library of Netflix videos. If the video is in your instant queue, you’re just a few clicks away from watching it with Apple TV. You can also view streaming media from <a href="http://youtube.com/chrispirillo">YouTube</a> and <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/lockergnome/">Flickr</a> – plus watch your favorite podcasts (like a <a href="http://feeds.pirillo.com/ChrisPirilloShow">certain someone’s</a>) and access streaming media and images on the computers in your home.</p><p>Job(s) well done.</p><p>Oh, did I remember to tell you that the price of this sophomore effort has also been cut by 66%! That brings the Apple TV price point to US$99 – a great impulse buy for gadget geeks and mediaphiles. I’ll buy one, pick up a few extra HDMI and power cables, then tote a single unit around the house with me.</p><p>While I never considered purchasing the original Apple TV (not once), <strong>I can’t wait for this to ship</strong> (available in about four weeks to consumers in the US, Canada, the UK, France, Germany and Australia).</p><p>Am I alone with being impressed?<ul class="related_post"><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-download-720p-high-definition-youtube-videos/" title="How to Download 720p High Definition YouTube Videos ">How to Download 720p High Definition YouTube Videos </a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/high-definition-dvd-wars/" title="High Definition DVD Wars">High Definition DVD Wars</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-view-media-on-the-ipad/" title="How to View Media on the iPad">How to View Media on the iPad</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/do-you-embed-my-videos-or-pictures/" title="Do you Embed my Videos or Pictures?">Do you Embed my Videos or Pictures?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/gogo-inflight-problem/" title="Gogo Inflight Problem">Gogo Inflight Problem</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/attack-of-the-unsubscribers-at-youtube/" title="Attack of the Unsubscribers at YouTube?">Attack of the Unsubscribers at YouTube?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/apple-special-announcement-event-on-september-1st/" title="Apple Special Announcement Event on September 1st">Apple Special Announcement Event on September 1st</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/youtube-increases-max-upload-length-to-15-minutes/" title="YouTube Increases Max Upload Length to 15 Minutes">YouTube Increases Max Upload Length to 15 Minutes</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/what-is-a-day-in-your-life-like/" title="What is a Day in Your Life Like?">What is a Day in Your Life Like?</a></li><li><a href="http://chris.pirillo.com/popscreen-helps-you-discover-headline-making-videos/" title="PopScreen Helps You Discover Headline-Making Videos">PopScreen Helps You Discover Headline-Making Videos</a></li></ul>
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Posted by Chris on September 01, 2010 09:16 PM · permalink
While it can take a mere one or two strokes to hit the green, every golfer knows the torture of a four or five-putt adventure once they get there. So whether you're trying to get your golf game back on track or trying to become a Putt-putt superstar, head for the practice green.
Posted by How-To Wiki on September 01, 2010 09:15 PM · permalink
There's a lot to say about the new Apple TV that Steve Jobs presented today. But I'm not going to talk about the tiny little box. I'm not going to talk about your TV, either ... much. Instead, I’m going to talk about that remote.
Posted by Tim Carmody on September 01, 2010 09:14 PM · permalink
<p>Got mad web engineer skills? Comfortable with HTML5, CSS3 & PHP? Built any mobile apps? Want to work at Yahoo! and lead the global social bookmarking battle? You might be the perfect fit for the Delicious engineering team.</p>
<p>As you know, Delicious continues to lead the way in Social Bookmarking. And with some exciting new features and opportunities coming soon, we need a new teammate to join the crew and help create new experiences for our users. We’re a small team that still iterates like a start-up – we just happen to do it within a big company. This gives the Delicious team a tight family vibe but access and support from a leading global internet company.</p>
<p>If this sounds like something you want to be a part of, jump on <a title="Yahoo! Careers" href="http://careers.yahoo.com/" target="_blank">careers.yahoo.com</a>, search for ‘foosball’ (don’t ask) and look for Req# 32524.</p>
<p><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Psst! If that sounds like too much effort, feel free to click <a title="Software Apps Engineer" href="http://careers.yahoo.com/jdescription.php?frm=search_results&oid=32524&qs=key=foosball__jcat=jc__city=jl__crumb=y.lT7keKaIj__module=quick_search__submit=submit" target="_blank">here</a> instead… ;)</span></p>
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Posted by nosivadnomis on September 01, 2010 09:12 PM · permalink
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President Richard Fisher said Wednesday the recovery of the U.S. economy "will take quite some time," and that improved regulatory and fiscal policies are needed in order to help the process.
Posted on September 01, 2010 09:00 PM · permalink
The class will be taught by art instructor, illustrator and author Lisa Davis DeMattei, as part of her "Art Made Simple" series of classes for children. No registration required.
Location: Clairemont
Location: Clairemont
Posted by No contact (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 01, 2010 09:00 PM · permalink
During today's press event, Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced that the iTunes store has sold 450 million TV episodes. How will its newly announced 99 cent rental program change the marketplace, especially with Hulu Plus around? It depends on what's on offer. <img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=gigaom.com&blog=14960843&post=152743&subd=gigaom2&ref=&feed=1" width="1" height="1" /><hr /><p>
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Posted by Liz Shannon Miller on September 01, 2010 08:56 PM · permalink
Apple audaciously seems to think the world actually needs another social network — one that you even need special software to be part of, to boot. With the introduction Wednesday of Ping, a music-centered community that exists only within iTunes, they are probably right — and then some.
Posted by Eliot Van Buskirk on September 01, 2010 08:45 PM · permalink
EpicMix, a new RFID-based app for skiers, combines performance tracking with real-time, location-based social networking functionality. (Think Nike+ meets Foursquare.) It'll go live at several Colorado ski resorts in November, and we've got an early look.
Posted by Joe Lindsey on September 01, 2010 08:44 PM · permalink
coondoggie writes "The US military is inundated with video from airborne unmanned aircraft, remote monitoring systems and security outposts. In an effort to speed up the processing and analyzing of all this video, researchers at Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) this week awarded an almost $11 million contract to open source software vendor Kitware to help develop what DARPA calls its Video and Image Retrieval and Analysis Tool (VIRAT) program."
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Posted by samzenpus on September 01, 2010 08:44 PM · permalink
Federal regulators are putting off efforts to regain authority over the nation’s internet providers while they seek renewed public input on net neutrality.
Posted by Ryan Singel on September 01, 2010 08:29 PM · permalink
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/xeni/4948615285/sizes/o/in/photostream/"><img alt="nano1.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/nano1.jpg" width="640" height="478" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" /></a>
Apple <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/apple-event-septembe.html">showed off the latest editions of its iPod lineup and the Apple TV earlier today</a>. The new iPod Nano loses the physical controls and adopts a multitouch display. The iPod Shuffle, however, gets them back.<p><br />
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/xeni/4948647045/sizes/z/in/photostream/"><img alt="4948647045_81b83d5b39_z.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/4948647045_81b83d5b39_z.jpg" width="640" height="478" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" /><br />
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<p>The new Apple TV eschews local storage in favor of streaming HD movies and TV shows from the cloud. Netflix and network TV is on-board -- but only Fox and ABC for now. It'll also play stuff on your home network, via WiFi or Ethernet, piped to the set using HDMI.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/xeni/4948647045/sizes/z/in/photostream/"><img alt="4949243720_001b80584c_z.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/4949243720_001b80584c_z.jpg" width="640" height="478" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" /></a></p>
<p>In a demo hosted by Apple CEO Steve Jobs, the new Nano was depicted at one point as a fancy wristwatch.</p>
<p><img alt="jobso.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/jobso.jpg" width="970" height="724" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" /></p>
<p>Jobs chats with journalists after the new gadgets were announced Wednesday in San Francisco.</p>
<p><img alt="4948659013_3b7b75a267_z.jpg" src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/4948659013_3b7b75a267_z.jpg" width="640" height="478" class="mt-image-center" style="text-align: center; display: block; margin: 0 auto 20px;" /></p>
<p>The new Apple TV is only a quarter of the size of the last one, and about four inches square. At $99, it is less than half its price. </p>
<p>Xeni spent time with the new gear after the announcement, and called in with her findings. Firstly, an Apple spokesperson said that the new Nano and Apple TV <em>don't</em> use iOS, the operating system used on the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. The lightweight tech gets custom software that still (in the Nano's case) incorporates multitouch.</p>
<p>The new TV box has a neat UI, but it is user-friendly connectivity -- with other computer gear as well as the touted HD movie rental/tv services --that holds the most promise. </p>
<p> "The UI is improved, and so is the ability to bounce back and forth from YouTube to your own local video collection, to NetFlix and iTunes," Xeni said. "That freedom of movement and the freedom to view that same stuff on your phone, Apple TV and your computer, was already technically possible but you'd need five different things on five platforms, and nothing really talks to anything else. What Apple can do is put it all together and make it more likely more people will adopt it."</p>
<p>Not everything will go down well, however, especially the loss of local storage options in the Apple TV box itself: "Cloud rental is being pitched as freedom from having to store, but I think there'll be a lot of grumbling because people like owning things."</p>
<p>But Xeni did like the Nano: "It's really sweet, so small. I wanna eat it. It's as big as maybe four keyboard keys. It's like a pill you might swallow. The clip's snug."</p>
<p>Also announced was Ping, a social network tightly integrated with iTunes. "The value of any social network depends on how fast it builds nodes on the network, " Xeni said. "Apple's launching a network with 160 million iTunes users from day one. This bodes well for Apple. That's momentum that is nearly impossible to build organically."</p>
<p>People are pointing out all over the 'net that Apple is making a sharp move on Facebook, but given its tight connection to music, Ping's landgrab lands more on MySpace's turf.</p>
<p>However, you can <em>invite</em> Facebook contacts, with their consent, to join the network, though no details on <em>integration</em> were offered.</p><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/hands-on-with-new-ap.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/hands-on-with-new-ap.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Rob Beschizza on September 01, 2010 08:28 PM · permalink
Apple has refreshed its family of iPod products. The iPod Nano, iPod Touch and iPod Shuffle all received some compelling makeovers that should help Apple stay in the lead in the portable media-player market.
Posted by Brian X. Chen on September 01, 2010 08:24 PM · permalink
As the recently resurrected sci-fi cartoon hits the century mark, executive producer David X. Cohen and voice actors Billy West, Lauren Tom and David Herman look back on their favorite moments.
Posted by Scott Thill on September 01, 2010 08:20 PM · permalink
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/istock-antenna.jpeg"><img title="istock-antenna" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/istock-antenna.jpeg?w=139&h=240" alt="" width="139" height="240" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-152560" /></a>The U.S. Federal Communications Commission is poised to take action on “white spaces” — the wireless frequencies between those used by digital television broadcasters – <a href="http://gigaom.com/2009/11/25/fcc-solicits-applications-for-white-space-database-administrators/">through the implementation of a database designed to prevent interference between wireless device use of white spaces and digital television broadcasts</a>. This could <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704323704575461871091760124.html?mod=WSJ_Tech_LEFTTopNews">remove the final hurdle for use of white spaces</a>, says the Wall Street Journal, enabling wireless hotspots with far greater range and coverage than today’s Wi-Fi networks. Proponents of such unlicensed wireless availability include computer and tech companies like Google, Microsoft, Dell and HP, while the broadcast industry is still concerned about potential interference that white space devices could bring to digital programming.</p>
<p>Part of the FCC’s agreement to allow for white spaces initially included the formation of a central geo-location database of licensed spectrum use by broadcasters around the country. Such a database would help mitigate potential interference between unlicensed spectrum use and licensed broadcasts. Essentially, it would ensure that white space network access on a smartphone, for example, would have zero impact on any digital television broadcasts nearby. Although far more television content is provided by wired methods — think cable and fiber — over-the-air digital television is still watched by many, so the FCC can’t allow for potential interference issues. Other details have to be addressed as well: <a href="http://gigaom.com/2008/09/24/the-devil-is-in-the-details-in-white-space-debate/">The level of transmission power, for example, may require FCC guidelines</a>, else devices become confused by a wireless shouting match.</p>
<p>The white space situation arose a few years ago as part of the transition to digital television in the U.S.; <a href="http://gigaom.com/2007/03/14/700mhz-explained/">certain frequencies were freed up for non-television use</a>. Indeed,<a href="http://gigaom.com/2008/03/20/verizon-and-att-score-in-700mhz-auction/"> the 700 MHz spectrum auction netted nearly $20 billion</a> as Verizon, AT&T and others took advantage of the freed-up wireless resource. However, not all the spectrum is in use, which means there’s opportunity. <a href="http://www.spectrumbridge.com/Home.aspx">Spectrum Bridge</a> (see disclosure below) is one of those seeking to offer unlicensed wireless access with the unused channels and has successfully <a href="http://gigaom.com/2009/10/21/are-white-spaces-the-future-of-mobile-broadband/">trialed the use of a white space network in a rural area of Virginia</a>: a typical place where a cellular 3G signal may not be available. The white space spectrum in this case covers the final few miles from wired backhaul, enabling residents to wirelessly connect to the web over a range wider than that of Wi-Fi. The unlicensed nature means consumers have the freedom to set up their own networks, just as they do today with Wi-Fi.</p>
<p>If the FCC does remove the final roadblocks for white space network use as expected, an entirely new industry could rise, similar to that of the Wi-Fi market over the past dozen or so years. New and updated baseband chips to support such frequencies will be needed for smartphones and notebooks. Municipal wireless projects could see new life because the greater range of white space spectrum could reduce implementation costs of city-wide hotspots. Web-connected devices like e-book readers, media players, smart meters and even vehicles might rely less on 3G or 4G networks for connectivity due to free or lower-cost white space network access. The future isn’t written yet, but white spaces could reduce the hunting and seeking of that short-range hotspot.</p>
<p>(<em>Disclosure</em>: <em>Spectrum Bridge is backed by True Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media. Om Malik, founder of Giga Omni Media, is also a venture partner at True.)</em></p>
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Posted by Kevin C. Tofel on September 01, 2010 08:16 PM · permalink
Introducing drawing to children. Held in the big meeting room. No registration required.
(Ages 5 & up)
Location: Mira Mesa
(Ages 5 & up)
Location: Mira Mesa
Posted by No contact (ek_contact@plymouthrocket.com) on September 01, 2010 08:00 PM · permalink
<p>I’m in the final (but not as final as I would like) stages of preparing for my day-long tutorial at<a target="_blank" href="http://ohiolinux.org/"> Ohio LinuxFest</a>. OLF, as we call it, is a great event, with some good keynotes, interesting talks, and even <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ohiolinux.org/speakers.html#MADDOG">maddog</a>. Not to mention <a target="_blank" href="http://ohiolinux.org/olfu.html">first rate tutorials</a>, such as, oh… “Python for Linux System Administration”.</p>
<p>The <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ohiolinux.org/olfu.html#intropython">morning session</a> I’ll spend on basics – writing scripts that illustrate control flow, lists, dictionaries, strings, etc. from the point of view some basic sysadmin scenarios. I’ll also introduce the basics of the subprocess module to call other Linux tools. </p>
<p>Then in the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ohiolinux.org/olfu.html#python2">afternoon session</a>, we’ll look at some more involved tasks, like traversing files systems, regular expresssions, daemons, using the network, etc. </p>
<p>I’m looking forward to it – I think it will be a blast. </p>
<p>So if anyone has any cool intersections between Python and Linux sysadmin you wouldn’t mind me stealing, or any other suggestions or words of wisdom, by all means let me know. </p>
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Posted on September 01, 2010 07:58 PM · permalink
When Steve Jobs was preparing to introduce the Apple TV, he called it "one more hobby," and based on our first impressions, that's a safe choice of words. The new Apple TV is a major hardware revamp — one quarter the size of its predecessor.
Posted by Brian X. Chen on September 01, 2010 07:51 PM · permalink
An anonymous reader writes "The US press has been pushing for a (much needed) federal shield law, that would allow reporters to protect their sources. It's been something of a political struggle for a few years now, and things were getting close when Wikileaks suddenly got a bunch of attention for leaking all those Afghan war documents. Suddenly, the politicians involved started working on an amendment that would specifically carve out an exception for Wikileaks so that it would not be covered by such a shield law. And, now, The First Amendment Center is condemning the newspaper industry for throwing Wikileaks under the bus, as many in the industry are supporting this new amendment, and saying that Wikileaks doesn't deserve source protection because 'it's not journalism.'"
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Posted by CmdrTaco on September 01, 2010 07:50 PM · permalink
The August factory report is like a shiny holiday gift found lying among depressing lumps of coals.
Posted on September 01, 2010 07:37 PM · permalink
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<p style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://www.footnoted.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/SyscoEthicsCover.png"><img class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-5323" title="SyscoEthicsCover" src="http://www.footnoted.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/SyscoEthicsCover-224x300.png" alt="" width="224" height="300" /></a>That’s the cover of the new ethics policy at Sysco (SYY), the big food-service company. The company filed it with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday afternoon, several hours after filing its <a href="http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/96021/000095012310082514/h75463e10vk.htm" target="_blank">10-K</a>.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">In the <a href="http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/96021/000091406210000406/sysco8k810.htm" target="_blank">8-K</a> that included the document, Sysco describes its ethics-policy overhaul in dry, lawyerly terms, saying it was intended</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">“to reflect a more principles-based approach. Bright-line rules and numerical limits and thresholds have generally been eliminated in favor of rules intended to foster more thoughtfulness about the relevant facts and circumstances. … The Associates’ Code has also been revised to enhance overall readability and understanding … and is accompanied with learning aids such as frequently asked questions and examples. Notwithstanding these changes, the overriding ethical principles underlying each provision of the prior ‘code of ethics’ remain substantively unchanged.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">And while the policy document (<a href="http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/96021/000091406210000406/sysco8kcode.pdf" target="_blank">PDF</a> or <a href="http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/96021/000091406210000406/sysco8kcode.htm" target="_blank">HTML</a>) goes on for another 23 brightly colored pages after that striking plate-and-slogan cover, the catch-phrase is a recurring theme:</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">“Relationships require a strong foundation of mutual trust and understanding that is nurtured day after day. That trust is earned, not just by following the letter of the law, but also by striving to ‘do the right thing’. … For situations not specifically included in this Code, or in Sysco’s other policies and rules, we still expect that Sysco and its associates will try to do the right thing. …</p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">The “Overall Standard” on page 2 begins: “Always do the right thing.” In an FAQ about handling a “lumper service” that seems to be refusing its employees overtime, the answer concludes: “Do the right thing — talk with your supervisor.”</p>
<p style="text-align: left;">As that suggests, of course, this corporate version of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Rule" target="_blank">Golden Rule</a> actually boils down to following explicit corporate policies — and checking with supervisors or the human-resources department when in doubt.</p>
<blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">From a business perspective, doing the right thing means following our Code, speaking up, getting advice and complying with the law. There is no way to provide rules of conduct that will apply to every possible situation. … Any activity or relationship that presents, or appears to present, a conflict of interest must be reported to your immediate supervisor before you engage in the activity.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p style="text-align: left;">So kudos to Sysco for serving up a bold and eye-catching catchphrase in their ethics policy. But for the shareholders’ sake, we’re glad to see that the nuts and bolts of the policy goes into a little more detail.</p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><em>Image source</em>: Sysco Corp.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;">————</p>
<p><em>See more of what’s in the filings: Check out <a id="d8xi" title="FootnotedPro" href="http://www.footnotedpro.com/">FootnotedPro</a>, where we highlight unusual opportunities and potential problems well in advance of the market. For more information or to inquire about a trial subscription, email us at <a id="umd4" title="pro@footnoted.com" href="mailto:pro@footnoted.com">pro@footnoted.com</a>.</em></p>
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Posted by Theo Francis on September 01, 2010 07:25 PM · permalink
On this leg of his around-the-world drive, our man at the wheel discovers the Wild West is still wild.
Posted by Jeremy Hart on September 01, 2010 07:21 PM · permalink
sanermind writes "Sensing Senators don't have the stomach to try and pass a stand-alone bill in broad daylight that would give the President the power to shut down the Internet in a national emergency, the Senate is considering attaching the Internet Kill Switch bill as a rider to other legislation that would have bi-partisan support."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Posted by CmdrTaco on September 01, 2010 07:08 PM · permalink
After nearly a decade, iTunes is getting a new icon with the release of version 10. Jobs also introduced Ping, a social network Apple created specifically for iTunes. Ping allows users to share activity with their friends, and follow their favorite artists to receive updates.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=gigaom.com&blog=14960843&post=152704&subd=gigaom2&ref=&feed=1" width="1" height="1" /><hr /><p>
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Posted by Darrell Etherington on September 01, 2010 07:06 PM · permalink
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/screen-shot-2010-09-01-at-10-26-15-am-e1283366967969.png"><img title="Screen shot 2010-09-01 at 10.26.15 AM" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/screen-shot-2010-09-01-at-10-26-15-am-e1283366967969.png?w=210&h=140" alt="" width="210" height="140" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-152702" /></a>As expected, Apple today came through with a few major device updates it will be shipping this fall. It revised its entire iPod line, and gave the iPod Touch many features previously only available on the latest iPhone, such as FaceTime video chat and the highly detailed Retina display. The company also added a social dimension to iTunes called Ping (available today) that will help the music software’s 160 million users share songs and artists.</p>
<p>These announcements touch on many of our GigaOM channels, so we had much of the team contributing. Here’s our full coverage:</p>
<ul>
<li>GigaOM: <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/live-blog-apples-digital-media-event/">Blow-by-blow live blog by Om</a></li>
<li>GigaOM: <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/akamai-powering-apple-live-stream-and-i-can-prove-it/">Akamai Powering Apple Live Stream (And I Can Prove It)</a></li>
<li>JKontherun: <a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/09/01/half-of-macs-sold-in-apple-stores-are-to-first-time-buyers/">Half of Macs Sold in Apple Stores to First-Time Buyers</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/apple-challenges-android-on-the-numbers/">Apple Challenges Android On the Numbers</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/ios-4-1-update-next-week-4-2-in-november/">iOS 4.1 Update Next Week, 4.2 in November</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/apple-launches-new-ipod-touch/">Apple Announces New iPod touch</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/itunes-10-out-with-the-cd-in-with-the-social-network/">iTunes 10: Out With the CD, In With the Social Network</a></li>
<li>NewTeeVee: <a href="http://newteevee.com/2010/09/01/tiny-new-apple-tv-costs-99-99-cent-tv-episode-rentals-confirmed/">Tiny New Apple TV Costs $99, 99-Cent TV Rentals Confirmed</a></li>
<li>GigaOM: <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/09/01/why-apples-facetime-is-a-huge-opportunity/">Why Apple’s FaceTime Is a Huge Opportunity</a></li>
<li>NewTeeVee: <a href="http://newteevee.com/2010/09/01/how-could-cheap-itunes-rentals-change-television-online/">How Could Cheap iTunes Rentals Change Television Online?</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/apple-updates-ipod-shuffle-brings-buttons-back/">Apple Updates iPod shuffle, Brings Buttons Back</a></li>
<li>TheAppleBlog: <a href="http://theappleblog.com/2010/09/01/the-new-nano-camera-for-touchscreen-good-trade/">The New Nano: Camera for Touchscreen, Good Trade?</a></li>
<li>NewTeeVee: <a href="http://newteevee.com/2010/09/01/comparison-apple-tv-vs-roku-vs-boxee-box/">Comparison: Apple TV vs. Roku vs. Boxee Box</a></li>
</ul>
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Posted by Liz Gannes on September 01, 2010 07:02 PM · permalink
It's not quite Minority Report, but the L.A. Times reports that the LAPD is working with UCLA mathematicians to pursue a sophisticated form of predictive policing.
Posted by By FREAKONOMICS on September 01, 2010 07:00 PM · permalink
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/TheMessage_mBlk_flat.jpg" height="537" width="600" border="1" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt="Themessage Mblk Flat" />
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/_images_TheMessage_Back_Text_CU.jpg" height="200" width="256" border="1" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt=" Images Themessage Back Text Cu" />
<img src="http://www.boingboing.net/images/_images_Flock_CU.jpg" height="200" width="271" border="1" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="4" alt=" Images Flock Cu" />
<br clear="all">
I'm pleased to announce another co-designed t-shirt from Imaginary Foundation and Boing Boing! We hope you dig it! This design is a play on media theorist Marshall McLuhan's most famous soundbite, "The medium is the message." It's available in small-XXL. The front of the t-shirt is printed with a flock process, giving the blue text a lush texture. The back (above left) is a super soft "discharge" print with the BB and IF logos and the following text:
<blockquote>
"Societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media with which men communicate than by the content of the communication." –Marshall McLuhan, 1969<p>
This design is a celebration of the t-shirt as a medium. We are all media, so we may as well get good at it.</blockquote>
<a href="http://www.imaginaryfoundation.com/index.php?pagemode=detail&type=Mens%20T&uid=F52934">Boing Boing/Imaginary Foundation t-shirt: The Message</a><p><a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/boing-boingimaginary-1.html"><img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http://www.boingboing.net/2010/09/01/boing-boingimaginary-1.html" height="61" width="51" /></a><br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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<img alt="" height="0" width="0" border="0" style="display:none" src="http://segment-pixel.invitemedia.com/pixel?code=TechCons&partnerID=167&key=segment"/><img alt="" height="0" width="0" border="0" style="display:none" src="http://pixel.quantserve.com/pixel/p-8bUhLiluj0fAw.gif?labels=pub.28925.rss.TechCons.7604,cat.TechCons.rss"/><img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~4/-sxR-m2IdUw" height="1" width="1"/>
Posted by David Pescovitz on September 01, 2010 06:56 PM · permalink
The number of Internet users in the top emerging markets is set to nearly double by 2015 -- a pace of growth that sounds enticing but that actually presents plenty of challenges for businesses.
Posted by Jennifer Valentino-DeVries on September 01, 2010 06:50 PM · permalink
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/ios-project-sword.jpg"><img title="ios-project-sword" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/ios-project-sword.jpg?w=210&h=132" alt="" width="210" height="132" class="alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-152673" /></a>Apple today announced that the new iOS 4.1 for iPhone and iPod touch arrives next week, and among the new features is Game Center, Apple’s gaming platform. Aside from the impressive demo of Game Center and a 3-D multiplayer game, Steve Jobs surprised everyone by saying the iPod touch is the number one handheld gaming device in the world. According to Jobs, the touch is now outselling game devices from Sony and Nintendo — combined.</p>
<p>The iPod touch sales figures — it’s the most popular iPod ever for Apple — lend credence to our thought that <a href="http://gigaom.com/2010/07/28/nintendo-3ds-a-broken-business-model/">traditional game powerhouses are facing vastly increased competition</a>. By leveraging its popular mobile products and app store economy, Apple is opening the doors for game developers to target the 120 million current iOS devices in the market. Additionally, with a now-annual refresh cycle, iPod gaming devices are likely to gain new capabilities faster than competing handheld game hardware: a key advantage as developers try to further push the envelope for games.</p>
<p><a href="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/game_center_multiplayer20100901.png"><img title="game_center_multiplayer20100901" src="http://gigaom2.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/game_center_multiplayer20100901.png?w=134&h=140" alt="" width="134" height="140" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-152683" /></a>That envelope is already getting pushed, based on today’s demo of Project Sword from Epic, a game coming soon for iOS devices. Aside from multiplayer matchups with two iPod touches and Game Center, Project Sword offers an immersive 3-D world due to use of the Unreal Engine. Apple’s A4 chip — now in the new iPod touches — handled the high-resolution game flawlessly on the new retina display of the device. Based on the demo, Apple’s handheld runs the Unreal Engine at least as well, if not better, <a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/01/09/nvidia-powered-devices-on-video-including-notion-ink-slate/">than Nvidia’s (s </a><a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/01/09/nvidia-powered-devices-on-video-including-notion-ink-slate/">nvda</a><a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/01/09/nvidia-powered-devices-on-video-including-notion-ink-slate/">) </a><a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/01/09/nvidia-powered-devices-on-video-including-notion-ink-slate/">Tegra</a><a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/01/09/nvidia-powered-devices-on-video-including-notion-ink-slate/"> 2 chip, which I saw first-hand earlier this year</a>, and surpasses performance of any handheld I’ve seen yet.</p>
<p>Another company that might be worried by all this isn’t Sony or Nintendo though; it’s Microsoft and its hopes for Windows Phone 7. <a href="http://jkontherun.com/2010/08/16/windows-phone-7-gets-xbox-live-at-launch/">The new Microsoft mobile platform will leverage the huge Xbox Live user base for similar social gaming aspects</a>, but as I watched Game Center and the software demo, I shook my head. I saw yet another example of Apple beating others by getting a new feature to market, even though, in this case, Microsoft had a lead in this space by a number of years. I’m not predicting the death of Xbox Live, Windows Phone 7 or competing handheld gaming platforms, for that matter. But the ability of Apple to out-maneuver companies in markets they initially established continues to be a key strength for Apple’s future. It’s a game that Apple continues to win.</p>
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Posted by Kevin C. Tofel on September 01, 2010 06:37 PM · permalink
The new Apple TV, which will go on sale at the end of September for $100, is a puny box just one-quarter the size of the previous model. It has an HDMI port, a built-in power supply, an optical audio port, an ethernet jack, and built-in Wi-Fi.
Posted by Dylan F. Tweney on September 01, 2010 06:21 PM · permalink
As part of NIST's SHA-3 selection process, people have been implementing the candidate hash functions on a variety of hardware and software platforms. Our team has implemented Skein in Intel's 32 nm ASIC process, and got some impressive performance results (presentation and paper). Several other groups have implemented Skein in FPGA and ASIC, and have seen significantly poorer performance. We need help understanding why.
For example, a group led by Brian Baldwin at the Claude Shannon Institute for Discrete Mathematics, Coding and Cryptography implemented all the second-round candidates in FPGA (presentation and paper). Skein performance was terrible, but when they checked their code, they found an error. Their corrected performance comparison (presentation and paper) has Skein performing much better and in the top ten.
We suspect that the adders in all the designs may not be properly optimized, although there may be other performance issues. If we can at least identify (or possibly even fix) the slowdowns in the design, it would be very helpful, both for our understanding and for Skein's hardware profile. Even if we find that the designs are properly optimized, that would also be good to know.
A group at George Mason University led by Kris Gaj implemented all the second-round candidates in FPGA (presentation, paper, and much longer paper). Skein had the worst performance of any of the implementations. We're looking for someone who can help us understand the design, and determine if it can be improved.
Another group, led by Stefan Tillich at University of Bristol, implemented all the candidates in 180 nm custom ASIC (presentation and paper). Here, Skein is one of the worst performers. We're looking for someone who can help us understand what this group did.
Three other groups -- one led by Patrick Schaumont of Virginia Tech (presentation and paper), another led by Shin'ichiro Matsuo at National Institute of Information and Communications Technology in Japan (presentation and paper), and a third led by Luca Henzen at ETH Zurich (paper with appendix, and conference version) -- implemented the SHA-3 candidates. Again, we need help understanding how their Skein performance numbers are so different from ours.
We're looking for people with FPGA and ASIC skills to work with the Skein team. We don't have money to pay anyone; co-authorship on a paper (and a Skein polo shirt) is our primary reward. Please send me e-mail if you're interested.
Posted by schneier on September 01, 2010 06:17 PM · permalink
<p>With the <a href="http://www1.messe-berlin.de/vip8_1/website/Internet/Internet/www.ifa-berlin/englisch/index.html">IFA Consumer Electronics Unlimited</a> techno-smorgasbord set to open this Friday, there's a lot of buzz going around about upcoming announcements and unveilings. Much of the pre-show buzz is centered around Android-based competition for the Apple iPad.</p>
<p>The IFA traditionally offers an early indication of what gadgets will sell well through Christmas. It's no wonder so much attention is focused on the show with order volume stemming from last year's show reaching nearly $3.8 billion. <br />
<p></p><br />
<h2>Toshiba's SmartPad</h2></p>
<p><img alt="Toshiba SmartPad" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/toshiba_tablet_1-540x397-thumb-180x132.jpg" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />Images of the new Toshiba SmartPad were <a href="http://www.slashgear.com/toshiba-smartpad-tablet-previewed-in-leaked-press-shots-2398506/">recently leaked</a>, but with little concrete information about the device. Some news sources are claiming that the new Android 2.2-powered device will actually be called the Toshiba Folio 100. There may also be a Windows 7 version of the SmartPad as well. Little is available from Toshiba itself other than the device is set to ship in October. This is one of the devices that is expected to be unveiled at IFA.<br />
<p></p><br />
<h2>ViewSonic ViewPad 7</h2></p>
<p><img alt="veiwsonic-viewpad7.jpg" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/veiwsonic-viewpad7-thumb-180x135.jpg" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />With a screen that measures 7-inches across, the ViewPad is jokingly being referred to as the <a href="http://www.techtree.com/India/News/ViewSonics_ViewPad_Packs_in_a_Phone_As_Well/551-112724-615.html">world's largest phone</a>. Featuring both a touchscreen tablet, the ViewPad also provides a slot for a full-sized SIM card that will offer both voice and 3G data. In addition, the ViewPad will feature a 3 megapixel front and back facing camera. The device will run Android 2.2 "Froyo." ViewSonic has not unveiled pricing or availability, those details will probably be announced at IFA, however, industry analyst reports indicate that the device will be around $550 and launch sometime in October.<br />
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<h2>Archos Android Internet Tablets</h2></p>
<p><img alt="archos.jpg" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/archos-thumb-180x137.jpg" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />This week brought the <a href="http://www.archos.com/corporate/press/press_releases/CP_internet_tablet_20100831_us-en.pdf">announcement </a>from Archos that they were launching five new Android tablets, including the first MP3/MP4 available under $100 and the largest screen on the Android market. Positioned directly against the Apple iPad, the line of Archos Internet tablets offer a combination of super-fast web-browsing, games, ebooks, social networking and other applications alongside HD video and music. Prices range from $99.99 for the 4GB ARCHOS 2<small><small>8</small></small> to $349.99 for the 16GB ARCHOS 10<small><small>1</small></small> tablet. Availability for the new models start in September for the ARCHOS 2<small><small>8</small></small> and 3<small><small>2</small></small>, and later this fall for the remaining models.</p>
<p>Of these new devices, the ARCHOS 10<small><small>1</small></small> is the flagship of the new line. Weighing only 15.87 ounces, the 0.47" thick device offers a 10.1” capacitive multi-touch screen. Featuring a 1 Ghz processor and built-in WIFI-n technology, the ARCHOS 10<small><small>1</small></small> offers a PC-like web browsing experience. It even features support for the Adobe Flash 10.1 player. Additional features that make this device appealing include a built-in webcam and the ability to tether the device via Bluetooth or USB for mobile Internet connectivity.<br />
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<h1>Sharper Image Literati</h2></p>
<p><img alt="literati.png" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/literati-thumb-180x218.png" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />Once a common occupant in malls throughout the US and even further recognized a gadget lovers most favored monthly catalog, Sharper Image has fallen on tough times filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in February of 2008. While the only thing that remains of the company is their website, that hasn't prevented them from <a href="http://www.tgdaily.com/mobility-features/51271-sharper-image-touts-literati-e-reader">joining</a> the ereader fray. </p>
<p>Resembling the Amazon Kindle, the Kobo-powered color ereader will launch at a very competitive $160. Featuring a QWERTY keyboard below a 7" screen, the e-reader lacks a web browser and application functionality, clearly putting it in the stand alone ereader category. Expected to arrive in October, the Literati will be available from a number of retailers, including Best Buy, Bed, Bath & Beyond, JC Penney, Kohl's and Macy's.<br />
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<h2>Acer LumiRead</h2></p>
<p><img alt="acer_lumiread_inline.jpg" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/acer_lumiread_inline-thumb-180x180.jpg" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />Trying to build upon their netbook success, Acer recently <a href="http://www.electronista.com/articles/10/08/26/german.launch.in.october/">announced </a>its LumiRead ereader device. Based on a 6-inch E Ink display, the LumiRead will feature a Kindle-style QWERTY keyboard below the screen. When combined with either the 3G or WIFI models, the LumiRead's DLNA compliance makes the ereader capable of streaming music from Acer's clear.fi and 3rd party streaming services. Additional features include an ISBN scanner that lets the device scan book codes to purchase online or build a wish list. Finally, the LumiRead includes a built-in web browser with a “Smart Download” feature. This allows the LumiRead to save local versions of web pages for reading later when the device is disconnected from the Internet.</p>
<p>The LumiRead will come with access to the Barnes & Nobles eBooks store as well as Libri.de, Germany's leading Internet book retailer. While no prices have been announced, rumors suggest the LumiRead will start shipping in October for around $316.<br />
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<h2>SigmaTek eReaders</h2>
<p><img alt="sigmatek-7-inch.jpg" src="http://radar.oreilly.com/assets_c/2010/09/sigmatek-7-inch-thumb-180x270.jpg" width="180" height="132" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 12px 12px;" />The last ereader in our roundup is the <a href="http://www.mobilemag.com/2010/08/27/sigmatek-computer-to-reveal-5-inch-and-7-inch-ereaders-at-ifa/">pair of devices from Sigmatek Computer</a>. Coming in a 5-inch and a 7-inch eReader, both feature a TFT display capable of a 800x480 resolution. however, these new devices are not just dedicated ereaders, they also offer “multimedia” features that include support for AVI, XviD, and MKV video, with MP3, WMA, FLAC, AAC, WAV, and OGG music.</p>
<p>From the start, these eReaders may be playing catch-up because the devices are not equipped with connectivity to any application or ebook store. However, some may see this as an advantage because it means the eReaders will be open for you to grab EPUB, PDF and TXT files from anywhere you choose. In stores in October, the 5-inch model will cost approximately $127 and the 7-inch approximately $153.<br />
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<h2>New Announcements From The World Of EReaders</h2></p>
<p>While all eyes will be pointed towards Germany this weekend, there's still some exciting news happening within the ereader market. First off, Amazon announced that they would extend their distribution of the Kindle to office supplies retail chain Staples. Following on from a similar deal with retailer Target, Staples has agreed to start selling Amazon's Kindle in its stores from this autumn. While expanding the number of channels for selling Kindle devices is key, <a href="http://www.chrisbrogan.com/amazon-and-the-kindle-conspiracy">according to Chris Brogan</a>, Amazon's willingness to port their Kindle application to other ereader platforms may become their most important channel.</p>
<p>According to an <a href="http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/47509/20100830/e-readers-amazon-kindle-barnes-and-noble-nook-flexible-display-lg.htm">SEC filing</a> by electronics manufacturer LG, they could be mass producing 9.7-inch color and 9-inch flexible e-paper displays by the end of the year. According to an analyst at Forrester, the availability of flexible screens could greatly improve the durability of existing readers from Sony, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble. While flexible ereaders from Skiff and Plastic Logic have failed in the past due to heavy pricing competition, a mass-produced display from LG could level the pricing playing field and bring about new ereader innovations. </p>
<p>Finally, as part of a unique, <a href="http://www.southbendtribune.com/article/20100827/THRIVE/100829623/1256/THRIVE">year-long Notre Dame study of eReaders</a>, the university debuted their first class taught entirely using the Apple iPad. The iPad will completely replace the textbook previously used in assistant professor Corey Angst's Project Management course. In addition to each of the students using an iPad, the class will also use an online Wiki discussion group where students can share their ideas. Members of the study are evaluating the iPad with the broader goal of designing an “ePublishing ecosystem.” The study hopes to determine whether this ecosystem can serve faculty, students and staff by making the creation, distribution, sharing, reading and annotation of eMaterials simple and inexpensive.</p>
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Posted by Kevin Shockey on September 01, 2010 06:11 PM · permalink
<object width="599" height="362"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/0I_4wsDKCVA?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/0I_4wsDKCVA?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="599" height="362"></embed></object><br clear="all"><p>
This cyclops turtle sure is a cute critter. <em>(Thanks, <a href="http://www.roqlarue.com/">Kirsten Anderson</a>!)</em><p>
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<ul><li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/01/09/adorable-cyclops-kit.html#previouspost">Adorable cyclops kitten</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/04/06/cy-the-cyclops-kitty.html#previouspost">Cy the cyclops kitty to go on display</a></li>
<li><a href="http://boingboing.net/2006/01/12/cy_has_a_posse_paint.html#previouspost">Cy has a posse -- painting</a></li>
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Posted by David Pescovitz on September 01, 2010 06:02 PM · permalink
<break><br />Over the years, we’ve made many improvements to Google Maps to make it as useful and relevant as possible. From basics like road and street names, to labels for points of interest and landmarks, to panoramic images on Street View, we’re working hard to make Google Maps as reflective of the real world as possible.<br /><br />As part of this effort, we include “places” directly on the map by providing clickable icons that link to the <a href="http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2009/09/one-place-one-page.html">Place page</a> for those locations. When you’re on Google Maps on your desktop or on your mobile phone, this makes it easy to explore the world around you and tap into information on the web that can help you make decisions. For example, you can use the map to answer questions like, “Is there a good place to eat near my business meeting?” or “What shops are on that street two blocks over?” In a pilot program in Australia earlier this year, we further expanded this idea of putting places directly on the map by allowing business owners to <a href="http://google-au.blogspot.com/2010/03/turn-left-at-chemist-and-ill-meet-you.html">brand their locations with their own icons</a> - helping users find familiar brands and helping businesses promote themselves. Interest in this feature has been growing, and today we’re excited to announce the beta of sponsored map icons in the United States.<br /><br />Now, when you zoom in to areas of interest on Google Maps, you’ll more easily be able to spot the locations of companies and brands that are already familiar to you. That’s because we’re working with business owners to enable them to replace the standard icons that appear on the map at their business locations with their well-known company logos. These logos appear directly on the map when you zoom in to see a close-up view of an area. Just like the existing default business icons that appear in grey, these colored logos are clickable and open the Place page for that business. Both large and small businesses can <a href="http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2010/04/introducing-google-places.html">claim their Place pages</a> and enhance them with information including hours of operation, product inventory, photos and videos.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_MR9VMZuXMeY/TH6PrHkS-EI/AAAAAAAAAMI/g6UCTgk1QHM/s1600/HSBC.png"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_MR9VMZuXMeY/TH6PrHkS-EI/AAAAAAAAAMI/g6UCTgk1QHM/s320/HSBC.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5512000964876499010" border="0" /></a><br />By helping users identify popular businesses, we’re making it easier to browse the map and navigate the real world. That might mean fortunately stumbling upon a nearby ATM when you’re looking up the address of the new restaurant where you’re dining tonight, or exploring the neighborhood you just moved into by figuring out where the grocery store is relative to your new apartment.<br /><br />In the coming weeks, we’ll also make these sponsored map icons visible on mobile phones, because more often than not, you want to know what’s around you when you’re on the go. So if you’re rushing to meet friends who are impatiently waiting for you “across from the fast food joint,” you can quickly zoom in on the map to see exactly where that is. Or if you’re on the airport shuttle and just remembered you forgot to pack toothpaste, you can keep on time for your flight by checking out Google Maps and discovering that there’s a retail store just a block away from the hotel where you’ll be staying.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_MR9VMZuXMeY/TH6QBAH4FyI/AAAAAAAAAMQ/2c7aKbFkCbY/s1600/target-mobile.png"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 214px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_MR9VMZuXMeY/TH6QBAH4FyI/AAAAAAAAAMQ/2c7aKbFkCbY/s320/target-mobile.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5512001340835370786" border="0" /></a><br />In addition to helping you find locations for some of your favorite businesses, these recognizable logos also help business owners promote the storefronts of their well-visited locations. Advertisers pay to have their company logos appear on the map, and to help you remember their locations the next time you’re in the area. Sponsored map icons are being offered as a limited beta to companies in the U.S. with multiple locations and a well-known brand. Participation in this beta does not affect visibility on the map; the new feature is only available to businesses that already appear on the map, and whose default icons can be swapped out for their logo.<br /><br />Businesses across a variety of industries, from banking to retailers to self-storage, are participating. We hope you enjoy the ease of finding familiar businesses while browsing new, potentially unfamiliar neighborhoods on Google Maps.<br /><br />Posted by Matthew Leske, Product Manager<br /></break><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/7278262030537194084-6945106053455993283?l=google-latlong.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by Deanna Yick (noreply@blogger.com) on September 01, 2010 06:01 PM · permalink
There are eight million stories of <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/chemistry/comments/d7dqs/lets_hear_some_of_your_lab_horror_stories/">chemistry laboratory disasters</a>. They all end in explosions. (Except for the ones that end in accidentally making mustard gas.) You might think of this Reddit open thread as a public service—one read-through and you will never forget to wear safety goggles ever again. <br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/>
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Posted by Maggie Koerth-Baker on September 01, 2010 06:00 PM · permalink
It’s been 10 years since the first version of Google SketchUp was released, and there are more people modeling in SketchUp now that we ever could have imagined—over a million of you a week, in fact. That’s a pretty humbling number of 3D model makers.<br /><br />People around the world are modeling everything—from a new design for their kitchen to entire cities in Google Earth. For our small part in this global phenomenon, I’m proud to announce that <a href="http://sketchup.google.com/product/newin8.html">SketchUp 8</a>, the next major version of our 3D modeling tool, is available for download today. We’ve added significant new geo-modeling capabilities that leverage Google’s vast collection of geo-spatial data to make it quicker, easier and more fun than ever to build models of the world around us.<br /><br />Head on over to <a href="http://sketchup.google.com/">our website</a> for the whole story, or just grab yourself a new build and get back to modeling.<br /><br /><object height="320" width="525"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/eytIbyXzCMQ?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/eytIbyXzCMQ?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="320" width="525"></embed></object><br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Posted by John Bacus, Product Manager</span><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/10861780-8535046058927275346?l=googleblog.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by A Googler (noreply@blogger.com) on September 01, 2010 06:00 PM · permalink
In the four years that the SketchUp team has been working at Google, we’ve seen an unprecedented collection of user-generated 3D building models spring up all around the world. It is exciting and gratifying to see what you’ve all been able to do with SketchUp, and we’re always looking for ways to make your work more effective.<br /><br />For all of you who are in on the 3D modeling action, I’m proud to announce the release of Google SketchUp 8 today. We’ve added loads of new features specifically designed to make it easier for you to build Google Earth-ready models of the places that matter to you.<br /><br /><a href="http://sketchup.google.com/product/newin8.html" id="internal-source-marker_0.1542812208570269">New features in SketchUp 8</a> include:<br /><ul><li>Major new features for modeling in geospatial context and for creating new 3D building models for Google Earth.<ul><li type="circle">Model directly from Google’s massive collection of earth imagery, including aerial, oblique and Street View photography in addition to detailed geometric terrain and user generated 3D building models.</li><li type="circle">Import and improve models created with Google Building Maker</li><li type="circle">Participate in a community of geo-modelers collaborating on the shared construction of a detailed 3D model of the world.</li></ul></li></ul><ul><li>new “Solid” tools in SketchUp Pro for common additive/subtractive modeling operations<ul><li type="circle">“Outer Shell” to quickly simplify complex models imported from Building Maker</li><li type="circle">“Union, Subtract, Trim, Intersect and Split” to create complex additive and subtractive form from simple components.</li></ul></li></ul><ul><li>additional features in LayOut for documenting models professionally<ul><li type="circle">Custom line styles</li><li type="circle">a simple set of dimensioning and annotation tools</li><li type="circle">native document export to DWG/DXF 2010 format</li></ul></li></ul><br /><br /><object width="525" height="320"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/eytIbyXzCMQ?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/eytIbyXzCMQ?fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="525" height="320"></embed></object><br /><br />SketchUp 8 is available today in English, French, Italian, Spanish and German with more languages to be release in the weeks to come. SketchUp Pro costs $495, upgrades from any earlier version are available for $95. And, of course, there is still a powerful version of SketchUp available for free.<br /><br /><br /><font class="byline-author">Posted by John Bacus, Product Manager<br /></font><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/7278262030537194084-3596996900312119165?l=google-latlong.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div><div class="feedflare">
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Posted by Kate (noreply@blogger.com) on September 01, 2010 06:00 PM · permalink
Hot water discovered around a giant carbon star requires a new theory for the chemistry around stars to be explained. The new theory could significantly alter our understanding of what materials exist in interstellar space, and where water and life could exist in the universe.
Posted by Jess McNally on September 01, 2010 06:00 PM · permalink