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for
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December 20 to 31, 2005
The Google library project is named as one of the "ten most i
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ortant emerging technologies". I agree...
A "laptop battery breakthrough" enables more precise readings of battery life, i
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lications for all gadget types...
The state's population is aging, with many i
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lications for the future of our island society...
Antimicrobial products may harm developing nervous systems: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=571&ncid=751&e=4&u=/nm/20041206/hl_nm/antimicrobial_nervousystem_d...
This is a working graphic design of a co
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uter, the first I've seen. Have there been other designs like this, either recently or in the ancient past? I envision a lot of interactive modern art in thi...
The "gallery of co
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utation" has gotten both larger and more varied over the last year or so. Great stuff...
Amazing full-color turn-of-the-century Russian photos: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/e
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ire...
The RIAA and
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AA are intentionally putting adware into Windows Media files to thwart file sharing...
April 25 to May 1, 2005
Here's a co
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rehensive technical overview of Tiger, and why its software architecture for recording, co
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osing, and playing images, movies, music and generally any kind of media is light years ahea...
I just want to make a phone call - the new Nokia N91 has a 4GB hard drive, camera, Wi-Fi/Bluetooth,
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3 player, headphone jack, USB connector, FM radio, Web browser, and records video...
Scientists make bacteria behave like co
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uters...
Did you know the keys on your GM van may open the doors on "a half-dozen other GM vans and pickups"? http://sy
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aticomsn.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1114698835400_6?hub=topstorie...
A si
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le, well-designed game - Guess the Google...
Training wheels, rethought: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/TRIKE_BIKE?SITE=APWEB&SECTION=HOME&TE
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LATE=DEFAUL...
I recently revisited AutoStitch and tried the Windows demo application that was released last year. The results were co
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letely amazing and it's the most easy-to-use, powerful panorama maker I've eve...
The beautiful long-lost music of Red Hash, circa 1973: http://blogfiles.wfmu.org/BT/Gary_Higgins_-_Thicker_Than_A_Smokey.
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...
Finally, French dance sensation Vitalic's "My Friend Dario" is one of the latest exa
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les of electroclash, which mashes up New Wave, disco, glam rock, and cyberpunk...
April 18 to 24, 2005
High-Tech Junk http://news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&u=/ap/20050420/ap_on_hi_te/earth_day_e_wast...
The Firebox is the most co
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act, fully-featured FireWire recording interface I've ever seen. Looks like it should be excellent for recording on the road with a laptop...
Another case of copyright law going too far - in Ghana, folk artists could be i
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risoned, fined, or both...
Meanwhile, police are being investigated for accepting bribes from the
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AA to arrest sellers of pirated DVDs...
How U.S. restrictions on family planning are affecting the rest of the world, with dire consequences: http://www.globalgagrule.org/i
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acts.ht...
An i
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ressive photographic archive of mistakes. Check out "lost my job" and "women live longer"...
Another exa
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le of how people see only what they want (or are directed) to see - motion-induced blindness (and many other nifty optical illusions)...
April 11 to 17, 2005
I get some traffic to this site from people looking for information on Devendra Banhart. Here's a great beginner's overview of "freak folk", with information on artists, albums, influences, and musi...
There's something about the TV/DVD player/beer fridge that is strangely co
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elling...
It now seems possible to start and maintain a scalable co
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any using nothing but hosted Web applications. Who needs machine rooms any more? As the net gets faster, physical location becomes mor...
The government gives lame reasons for making passports remotely readable. Also noted is that your birth date and photo can be picked up remotely. That means (identity) thieves could make instan...
Did you know that sa
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les of a flu virus were mistakenly sent to 3,700 labs around the world and that some have gone missing? This normally would not cause worry except for the fact that the virus i...
Laptop design is causing posture-related problems: http://www.macsonly.com/maci
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/kamas2.htm...
Contenders in the Rubik's Cube World Cha
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ionships...
Here's a po
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om light switch...
April 4 to 10, 2005
This may promote the growth of more Earth graffiti though, not to mention (ugh) advertisements. I can easily see ad ca
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aigns making use of this...
Ca
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ing in the snow? Build a big, warm igloo with this light, packable mathematically-correct device...
The original article is gone, but traditional librarians are wondering what do to about the new "millenial" generation that is i
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atient with the slowness of research via paper...
Outsourcing is giving rise to overworked e
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loyees in call centers in India. Rigid English linguistic training is making e
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loyees question their cultural identity...
An interview with the CEO of the last pinball machine manufacturer on Earth...
China spends three times the world average on energy to produce $1 of gross domestic product - and 70% of its energy comes from coal. Because the U.S. isn't in the Kyoto accord, i
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orted Chines...
Meanwhile, Swiss biotech firm Syngenta was fined for "mistakenly" selling hundreds of tons of experimental GMO corn seed not yet approved for human consu
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tion to the U.S. and Europe...
New artistic ways to co
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ose music...
March 28 to April 3, 2005
What blows my mind is that many of the documents I examined and commented on came from the 1992 hypertext www-talk archives, which I helped archive in the first place, using software that I wrot...
For Web developers - this new si
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le PHP Bayesian filter allows one to develop spam filters, categorization tools, and technology that learns by exa
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le...
A small fake survey led 94% of respondents to give enough information to allow a thief to e
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ty their bank accounts...
Today's college students are getting used to downloading high-speed movies and music on demand from their co
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uters...
1,360 scientists from 95 countries say that two-thirds of the world's resources are "used up" in a four-year $24 million U.N.-sponsored survey...
Need an industrial solution? Use new biological filters that mimic the natural deco
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osition of debris. In a successful test the sewage from 25 homes was used to irrigate a golf course...
A new solar-powered street trash co
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actor is only four feet tall yet can hold ten times more trash than an average garbage bin. It also signals when garbage pickup is needed, eliminating unnecessar...
Gory images of this year's Canadian seal hunt: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?p=news&g=events/sc/032905seals&e=1&t
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l=s...
Here's a package for turning e
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ty roofs into green ones...
Jared Tarbell's Gallery of Co
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utation continues to get more beautiful and eerily biological at the same time...
Sin City is the first true movie/graphic novel hybrid. Here's a comic-to-screen co
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arison...
March 21 to 27, 2005
No doubt the movie has star attraction (Dustin Hoffman, Barbara Streisand), but I like to think that people enjoy plots in which uptight conservative people (in this case, a paranoid ex-CIA operative...
And here's a review of the album that "Sixteen Military Wives" appears on. I'm continually i
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ressed by the quality of reviews at Pitchfork, clearly written by people that know and love music...
Another great historical overview from Mobile PC magazine. This time, they examine the evolution of the notebook co
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uter...
Macs are starting to make under-the-radar inroads into co
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anies. This is exactly how the Web got started in the corporate world, and CTOs and IT staff are beginning to think about what it means...
"Regarding The CAT Scan Of Terri Schiavo's Brain": http://www.a
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toons.com/blog/archives/2005/03/20/regarding-the-cat-scan-of-terri-schiavos-brain...
BTW there are plenty of online resources today for anti-SUV bu
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er stickers...
A new newspaper column only reviews cars that do better than 30
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g. Let's see more columns like this...
So few people know the basics about GMOs, the AP was pro
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ted to write this article...
Here's what sumo wrestlers eat to grow weight, and the recipe for making it. Looks delicious! http://www.gastronomica.org/pages/sa
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le4.1.htm...
A co
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liment to last week's interview with Robert Crumb, an interview with Aline Kominsky-Crumb, his wife...
March 14 to 20, 2005
A tiny HDTV tuner on a USB stick: http://www.everythingusb.com/co
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ro_videomate_dvb-t_stick.htm...
The 4GB hard-drive camcorder: http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/digital-cameras/jvc/first-i
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ressions-jvc-everio-hard-disk-camera-036324.ph...
For Web developers: a new interactive way of making forms that submit automatically (this exa
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le doesn't work in Safari though)...
More and more young kids want cell phones these days: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CELLULAR_KIDS?SITE=APWEB&SECTION=HOME&TE
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LATE=DEFAUL...
Here's the story of Simlish, the fictional language of the very popular video game "The Sims", and the people behind it: http://thesims2.ea.com/getcoolstuff/music/360.
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...
So far over 10 million creations are under the Creative Commons license, the sensible alternative to traditional copyright restrictions...
March 7 to 13, 2005
Is Hawaii turning into a consu
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tion-addicted haven for the wealthy at the expense of long-time residents and native familes? The state's only international cargo shipping terminal is near capacity...
No wonder that people are du
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ing so much trash illegally in Hawaii...
The automatic home co
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oster...
20% of kids 8 to 18 can surf the Web from their bedrooms. 26% say they can "multitask" different media streams at once...
Meanwhile, a group of tech CEOs went to Washington warning that "profound changes in the global economy put America's co
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etitiveness at risk" and offered a 10-point plan...
"Invocation of eminent domain by cities to seize property for private development is on the rise": http://news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&u=/ap/20050311/ap_on_bi_ge/wal_mart_size_limitatio...
China is fighting the Tibetan exile administration with co
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uter virii...
Half of the world's 6,000 languages will disappear in less than a century, leading to "grave consequences for biodiversity" says the U.N.. Most people use one of only 8 languages...
Australian scientists prove that less trees along the Amazon River mean less rain: http://news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&u=/nm/20050310/sc_nm/environment_rainfall_d...
A salmon may be the "first genetically enhanced animal sold for consu
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tion in the United States"...
Let's see Starbucks use these new paper coffee cups that are deco
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osable and biodegradable. The U.S. Navy's ordered 20 million of them...
"The most co
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rehensive video ever made on the design and construction of a green home"...
It's likely that Axl Rose's next album, which has been in the works for 10 years at a cost of over $13 million, is the most expensive album ever made...
February 28 to March 6, 2005
Howard Stringer becomes Sony's first non-Japanese CEO, after five years of stock declines and poor business decisions. The beginning of the end was circa 1998, when the
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3 community (then a loos...
Fujitsu's 120GB notebook drive. Side note - a friend asked a major hard drive recovery specialist which drives they thought were the most reliable. The answer - Seagate for desktops, and Hitachi fo...
The Vectrix electric scooter gets up to 62
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h...
Adobe open sources software that can be used to build systems with co
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lex dependency graphs...
Telcos are using legislation to prevent large-scale free public wireless networks: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.
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l/front/306599...
Uh-oh - 6,200 Wells Fargo ATMs are now running Windows: http://www.co
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uterworld.com/softwaretopics/os/story/0,10801,100165,00.html?source=x1...
Ira Rennert's house was featured on VH1 this week. It's the largest in the world, containing over 100,000 square feet worth of structures, 30 bathrooms, and its own power plant. He owned the co
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an...
"A man who recently had received radiation treatment... set off a nuclear alert detector on a fire engine, pro
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ting police to close down a roadway in Escondido while authorities searched for ...
"Dolphin Beaching Came After Sub Exercise" http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/STRANDED_DOLPHINS?SITE=APWEB&SECTION=HOME&TE
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LATE=DEFAUL...
15 celebrities drove hybrid cars to the Oscars: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/ap/20050301/ap_en_mo/bootlegger_jail_deat...
HIV/AIDS' i
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act on life expectancy in Africa - the big picture...
Bubba, the 22-pound lobster: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LEVIATHAN_LOBSTER?SITE=APWEB&SECTION=HOME&TE
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LATE=DEFAUL...
Ancient co
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uter ads. 32KB RAM, wow...
February 21 to 27, 2005
To those electronics manufacturers who have been talking trash about the iPod, I would counter: stop burdening your devices with needless features and design bling bling - usable elegance is the ne...
A startup creates molecular storage technology that could store 1 terabit per square inch, or 25 DVDs of data in a postage sta
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-sized area...
The late Hunter S. Tho
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son often visited Hawaii and wrote many infamous things there. Here's the best take on him, by Honolulu-based writer William Moake...
A great article about NASA's programmers and the culture and systems that encourage software development as if engineering mattered. Their code is 99.9% bug-free. Their lessons can be applied t...
However, all this luxury island building is (te
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orarily?) destroying Dubai's natural environment...
Visa will be using the same technology for its credit cards, but with multiple layers of encryption and fraud detection. Because in the U.S., money is far more i
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ortant than your identity...
People using T-Mobile services (like Paris Hilton, who had her personal address book posted all over the net this week) should realize how incredibly easy they are to hack...
Wal-Mart flew in a team of labor experts to counter 21 year-old e
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loyee Joshua Noble and 17 others who tried to form a union. Despite international attention, the effort failed. "It's just a bunch o...
Photographer Chris Jordan's "Portraits of American Mass Consu
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tion"...
Deco
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osable pod-like eco-coffins...
A co
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act kitchen/bathroom/storage unit for small spaces...
Add a little
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3 player to your Web site...
February 14 to 20, 2005
Hawaii's poetry slam team made quite a splash last year at the national poetry slam co
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etition in St. Louis. You can watch their inspiring performances in a new documentary on the subject calle...
Will an environmental i
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act statement requirement kill Hawaii's inter-island Superferry? This article explains the issues involved, and why an EIS may not really be needed. In any case, could it no...
Bush and Kerry - a visual co
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arison...
New proof of manmade global warming, thanks to a study of ocean te
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erature over 40 years...
U.S. cities are increasingly looking into tapping ocean waves for power: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/nm/20050214/sc_nm/energy_waves_d...
The Grafik Dynamo assembles random words and images from the Web into strangely co
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elling and surreal comic strips...
Intricate snow sculptures from the International Snow Cha
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ionships 2005...
The co
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any behind it also made this eye candy...
Jazz co
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oser Maric Schneider is likely the first artist ever to win a Grammy for an album that was solely distributed on the Web...
February 7 to 13, 2005
Big news for software developers - an open source enterprise-class message queuing technology is being made. I
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lications for trading networks, P2P frameworks, and instant messaging technologies...
Podcasting is getting more media attention, along with front page space in USA Today. Here's a good overview of the state of podcasting right now...
Careful, identity thieves can masquerade as legitimate wireless hotspots: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/usatoday/20050207/bs_usatoday/identitythievescanlurkatwifispot...
A quarter of the economy's growth is taken up by healthcare spending: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/latimests/20050209/ts_latimes/healthcarecoststakebigbitefromeconom...
This technique was in the Super Bowl ad for the m:robe, a new wannabe iPod
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3 player from Oly
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us...
The same developer made this chess program where one can see the lines of strategy that the co
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uter is considering...
This surreal 1980's Estonian TV commercial for minced chicken meat has been making the rounds: http://www.hot.ee/lehva3/kanahakkliha.
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...
Designing product packaging? Here are professional co
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etitive analyses in a number of categories...
Here's the
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3, despite the fact that Simmons denied NPR permission to make the recording available...
January 31 to February 6, 2005
I broke down and got one of the last iPod shuffles - the 1GB model - at the Ala Moana Apple store. Its co
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etitors tout radio and recording capabilities, but on such gadgets the line-in recordin...
The first artificial neon sky show. Unfortunately, i
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lications for advertising...
Microsoft is mad about all the Apple iPods that e
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loyees are buying and using at work...
Everybody learned that you no longer have the right to publish photos of the Eiffel Tower at night: http://blog.fastco
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any.com/archives/2005/02/02/eiffel_tower_repossessed.htm...
This Week's Gloom and Doom http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/ap/20050130/ap_on_sc/warmer_world_...
Try using these climate change bu
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er stickers...
January 24 to 30, 2005
How about a wi-fi cafe combined with a print-on-demand bookstore? Now that so many book sales are online, how about putting the bookstore in the cafe instead of the cafe in the bookstore? A suitabl...
The high cost of filming in Hawaii is leading productions to think twice about shooting in the islands. This article co
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ares Hawaii's incentives to other locations...
Amazon adds 20 million pictures of storefronts to its Yellow Pages search: http://a9.com/-/co
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any/YellowPages.js...
Finally, an
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3 player with a swappable 2.5-inch hard drive...
Scientists find a way to create petrified wood in days. I
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lications for new types of filters...
The Bush administration OKs drilling for oil in rare grassland in New Mexico, despite objections from the state's governor, who used to be the Secretary of Energy in the Clinton administration. Thi...
Only nine chlorine plants in the U.S. put eight tons of mercury into the environment each year, although some say 65 more tons are unaccounted for annually. This is mostly due to the use of obsolet...
Thanks to ra
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ant over-prescription of antibiotics for over half of U.S. patients, antibiotics may be useless in 50 years...
Incredible before-and-after co
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arisons of the faces of meth users...
Photography by Misty Keasler: Japanese love hotels, deep East Texas, Russian orphanages, holy places, and Guatemala city du
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...
January 17 to 23, 2005
I had the pleasure of listening to XM Satellite Radio all week (which was bundled with my Alamo rental car) while working in Mountain View, CA. It sounds great and the music choices are wonderful...
* The bottom is a rubber-like pad that prevents the co
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uter from slipping on surfaces...
UK scientists find the natural human-produced chemicals that repel mosquitos: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=585&e=5&u=/nm/20050120/sc_nm/science_mosquito_d...
"Study: Watching Fewer Than Four Hours Of TV A Day I
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airs Ability To Ridicule Pop Culture...
Never mind the U.S. - electronics co
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anies are using less lead in products thanks to European Union regulations...
Ecological pole houses. And the co
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any is Hawaii-based...
January 10 to 16, 2005
In the PC world the average consumer seems to think that bigger is better. On the contrary, smaller co
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uters by their nature require higher technology and more elegant design and engineering. Henc...
About two minutes after someone pointed out that the Mac mini was smaller than a standard car radio, co
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anies started working on plans to offer in-car Macs to handle entertainment and car functions...
Of course, note that you can create installations of hundreds of Mac minis (for co
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uter labs and offices), all remotely (and centrally) upgradable and managed via Apple Remote Desktop...
The makers of the popular Stuffit co
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ression application have found a way to co
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ress JPEG image files by up to 30%...
Co
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anies are now selling "exergames", or video games that incorporate physical exercise...
In the same way that the
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AA is cracking down on movie pirates, Monsanto is cracking down on farmers that save their patented GM seeds from year to year...
"Babylon Wrecked by War: US-Led Forces Leave a Trail of Destruction and Contamination in Architectural Site of World I
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ortance"...
"Popular sha
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oos contain toxic chemicals linked to nerve damage". Apparently this includes Head and Shoulders, Suave, Clairol and Pantene Hair Conditioner...
The detailed and pretty scientific art of Ernst Haeckel, 1899-1904: http://caliban.
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iz-koeln.
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g.de/~stueber/haeckel/kunstformen/natur.htm...
A few months since its launch, allof
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3.com seems to be gaining credibility and customers. Tracks are one-tenth the cost of those in the iTunes music store and are offered in a variety of qualitie...
January 1 to 9, 2005
Honolulu's Chinatown is cultivating an "art chic". This article notes that "the state is currently gathering data on what it calls the creative economy in Hawai'i to assess its economic i
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act"...
Fluid flow simulation software is now open source. I
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lications for cheaper environmental studies and wind/water energy generation prototypes...
The story of 21 year-old Matt Leto, possibly the greatest video-game player ever. He likely holds over 800 world records and is set to make six digits in co
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etitions this year...
The results of the second holiday cha
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agne chair contest, in which designers made chairs using only the material from one cha
mp
agne bottle...
December 13 to 19, 2004
Researchers find a new efficient way to convert water into hydrogen by using high te
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erature...
About the sale of my old co
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any's patents, which highlights a disturbing trend...
Technology that helps fight "griefers", or people in online multiplayer games that do nothing but kill and loot, frustrating everyone else. I
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lications for social systems...
Self-service USPS sta
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machines have been taking people's photos without their knowledge, courtesy of the FAA...
Here's one - 80% of all votes in America are counted by two co
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anies...
An Alabama judge wears the Ten Commandments on his robe: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=20&u=/ap/20041215/ap_on_re_us/ten_commandments_rob...
An oldie but goodie - Pat Metheny on the "out-of-tune, noodling, wi
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ed out" wonder that is Kenny G...
Clever design by necessity - prisoners' inventions: http://www.te
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oraryservices.org/pi_overview.htm...
December 6 to 12, 2004
Google suggest - check it out: http://www.google.com/webhp?co
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lete=1&hl=e...
The sparkline PHP graphing library allows Web designers to convey large sets of information in a co
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act, useful way...
Aligned nanotubes i
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rove artificial joints...
A slew of cell phone tour guide co
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anies are taking off...
A nice introduction to randomness and why it's so i
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ortant to science...
November 29 to December 5, 2004
A new
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3-based music format supports surround sound (5.1 channels)...
It's come full circle - This is exactly what the Nazis did to Jews in concentration ca
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s...
"Researchers co
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ost old mobile phones & transform them into flowers"...
Scientists figure out how to make hydrogen from sunflower oil. Does this mean that one day I'll be able to power my car from my cell phone co
mp
ost pile...
November 22 to 28, 2004
How the government uses laser printers to track documents. Since about 1995, color laser printers have microencoded the printer's serial number on every printed document. Use a blue LED light to se...
A South Korean woman paralyzed for 20 years is now walking again, thanks to stem cells derived from umbilical cord blood...
More than 27% of U.S. babies were delivered by Caesarean section, the highest percentage since 1996...
Everybody reported on the dolphins that protected four New Zealand swimmers from sharks: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cidW0&ncidu3&e=3&u=/nm/20041123/sc_nm/life_newzealand_dolphins_d...
Build your own gramophone with these Japanese kits - etch grooves on CDs and plastic cups and play them back: http://www.ke
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a.com/blog/archives/000716.htm...
An account of the rough security screening at movie theaters these days: http://www.defamer.com/hollywood/movies/
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aa/piracy-paranoia-part-ii-the-life-aquatic-screening-026073.ph...
November 15 to 21, 2004
Why doesn't someone in Hawaii go into the LIDAR 3D mapping business? Hollywood pays millions for LIDAR 3D models for use in movies, and to date there are no models of the islands...
KAHEA points out the environmental i
mp
act of cruise ships in Hawaii...
"China Plans to Have Over 100 Eyes in the Sky by 2020": http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=4&u=/nm/20041116/sc_nm/space_china_d...
November 8 to 14, 2004
"Spin" - then: This movie made of 100% unauthorized satellite TV footage is a fascinating look into how global communications technology was used by the image makers in the 1992 presidential election...
"The Persuaders" - now: This show aired on Frontline this week exploring advertising's latest evolution - it's all about narrowcasting and emotional advertising that speaks to your "inner lizard" an...
The world's smallest PC/keyboard/mouse net connection combo: http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/2004/11/co
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lete_deskto.htm...
Une
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loyment among IT workers is higher than the overall jobless rate for the first time in over 30 years...
An interesting interview with a man that has collected over 900,000
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3 files online, for posterity's sake...
November 1 to 7, 2004
Note that modern Macs are co
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atible with Verizon's wireless BroadbandAccess plan ($80 a month for unlimited access)...
Things That Return To Bite Us http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/11/07/CORDGRASS.TM...
October 25 to 31, 2004
The first spring water to be packaged in a co
mp
ostable bottle. We need more biodegradable packaging...
New gold CD-Rs are said to last 300 years: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/ap/20041029/ap_on_hi_te/techbits_cd_dv...
"Technology used to track down Al-Qaeda terrorists is being offered to e
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loyers as a means of sta
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ing out... abusive behaviour in the workplace"...
New autostitching algorithms make seamless panoramas a snap. Now will someone please make a Photoshop plug-in or si
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le OSX GUI for this...
Some cable co
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anies now broadcast signals that prevent you from making copies of recordings...
The RIAA issues its first gold, platinum, and multiplatinum certifications for digitally downloaded music...
The rock band Marillion asked online fans to contribute money towards new albums - and has raised almost $1 million so far...
October 18 to 24, 2004
San Francisco sets the goal of providing everyone in the city free wireless access: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/nm/20041022/wr_nm/tech_sanfrancisco_d...
"Humans Aren't So Co
mp
licated...
Conte
mp
orary Tibetan painting...
October 11 to 17, 2004
It's been a while since a Hawaii-based tech co
mp
any made big news - CherryOS (based on Maui) touts a MacOSX emulator for PCs, and their Web site is getting slammed...
The average
mp
g of a 40-foot Gillig Phantom bus, used in Honolulu: about 4. The average
mp
g of a hybrid-diesel bus used in Seattle: 7.5...
The American health care system continues to flounder, with e
mp
loyer insurance increasing 11% in 2004...
How Nobel-prize winner Wangari Maathai overcame beatings and jail to e
mp
ower women to plant trees in Kenya. 30 million trees later, here is her story...
For its 150th anniversary, Timex created a design co
mp
etition for future timekeeping concepts. Here are the winners...
A design analysis of Kerry and Bush's ca
mp
aign logos. I agree, the Kerry design looks wi
mp
y and old school...
October 4 to 10, 2004
A rapid body te
mp
erature cooling device may help i
mp
rove athletic performance. My friend at IDEO helped design this a few years ago...
September 27 to October 3, 2004
Also, a court rules that posting voting machine flaws are not DMCA violations but are instead "an i
mp
ortant part of the public debate"...
Inside the recently upgraded world's third-most-powerful superco
mp
uter at Virginia Tech (it's also powered by Mac OSX)...
A beautiful conte
mp
orary mobile home...
Incredible photorealistic art made with Adobe Illustrator, co
mp
lete with how-tos...
Co
mp
uter-assisted streak photography...
September 20 to 26, 2004
How the iPod's scrollwheel was made (not by Apple): http://www.
mp
3.com/story/feature_ipod_wheel.htm...
The first half of 2004 saw 5,000 new Windows viruses: http://www.co
mp
uterworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,96116,00.htm...
Also, the Spacebox, co
mp
letely self-contained stackable units with kitchen, shower, and toilet...
September 13 to 19, 2004
A new travel survey "found Hawaii consistently fell below most co
mp
etitor destinations in offering good value for the money and unspoiled beauty. Also, Japanese visitors did not view the islands a...
Has this startup developed the universal co
mp
uter emulator...
PCs are getting hotter and hotter as their co
mp
lexity and power consu
mp
tion increases...
The Oprah car giveaway made a lot of money for GM. It's a sign of new types of promotions to come! http://oly
mp
ics.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=businessNews&storyID=623604...
Life in a Cambodian garbage du
mp
...
Second, they make unfounded assu
mp
tions...
September 5 to 12, 2004
How can arts and culture transform a neighborhood? The documentary "Downside UP", about the largest museum of conte
mp
orary art in the U.S. and how it transformed an 80 percent vacant town into ...
New applications of P2P technology are helping people to register to vote and search: http://www.trnmag.com/Stories/2004/090804/Si
mp
le_search_lightens_Net_load_090804.htm...
Has your PC been taken over by a spamming virus? Spammers are selling your "zombie PC" to others: http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/co
mp
utersecurity/2004-09-08-zombieprice_x.ht...
How high-tech "fab labs" are training kids in i
mp
overished countries to make needed tools...
August 30 to September 5, 2004
Disney creates a revolution in fireworks by creating a co
mp
ressed air launching system. Air-launched fireworks are more precise, less polluting, safer, and can be launched higher. How about using thi...
The first room te
mp
erature plastic magnets are created...
Revolutionary lens i
mp
lants for the severely nearsighted are expected to receive FDA approval soon...
The world's first detailed view (and reconstruction) of an Egyptian mummy's face, without disturbing the wrappings, thanks to multidetector co
mp
uted tomography...
Jewish groups are up in arms about the Christian cross-like podium at the Republican National Convention: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&u=/nm/20040901/pl_nm/ca
mp
aign_pulpits_d...
This was popular: 3 killed, 17 injured in Saudi Arabia at a sta
mp
ede for discounts at an IKEA store...
The city of Philadelphia is considering providing free or cheap wireless Internet access to everybody...
Watch the fascinating evolution of 100 years of Oly
mp
ic poster design...
August 22 to 29, 2004
Five photons have been linked in an milestone experiment that will lead to full-scale quantum co
mp
uting...
August 15 to 22, 2004
Idea of the Week: Nature Cemeteries What a great concept: there's less cost and waste for the industry, there's a pent-up demand, land is conserved (and preserved), and it's cheaper for consumers...
Coming soon - wireless cable TV anywhere: http://news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&u=/fo/20040819/bs_fo/125003bbe4961082abfaed82c5f376c...
Unpatched PCs are co
mp
romised in 20 minutes. Someone should make a tiny USB-powered firewall device for upgrading PCs...
The Oly
mp
ics is selling a lot less tickets than desired...
The certification program they promote, SFI, "falls far short". "Virtually any timber co
mp
any could meet SFI's weak standards"...
More on Hawaii's ethanol plans: http://starbulletin.com/2004/08/20/editorial/editorials.html#jum...
More population shifts. The world's changing! http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=519&e=14&u=/ap/world_populatio...
The smallest guitar a
mp
lifier...
August 8 to 14, 2004
The LED balloon la
mp
...
Why dynamic languages (still) represent the future of co
mp
uting (warning: tech-heavy)...
Facing co
mp
etition from Wal-Mart, the #1 toy seller, Toys 'R' Us may go out of business...
Fans at the Oly
mp
ics will be escorted off the premises if they eat or drink non-sponsored food...
"Fewer college students choose co
mp
uter majors...
A core problem: religions take themselves too seriously! They end up e
mp
hasizing symbols over ideas...
Abu Ghraib: "...private-sector e
mp
loyees actively took part in horrifying prisoner abuse". Examines the growing trend of the government to sidestep laws by hiring corporations to do the dirty work...
In what may be a first, Warner Brothers encourages the distribution of online album tracks as part of a marketing ca
mp
aign. Are they starting to get a clue...
August 2 to 8, 2004
Topic of the Week: Supporting Local Arts and Designs Hawaii is one of the toughest states for those involved in the arts to make a living. The word on the street is that Studio One, a popular galler...
4) I
mp
lement arts-specific loan programs and small-business assistance...
"Quest for logo a fruitless pursuit" http://starbulletin.com/2004/08/07/editorial/editorials.html#ju
mp
...
All manner of new sta
mp
s have been appearing! The first sta
mp
s to use lenticular printing (which gives an interlaced 3D effect)...
Although over 80% of the public feels that e-voting is safe (or have no opinion), over 80% of security experts feel that current e-voting systems are much less secure than traditional paper-base...
The Kensington co
mp
uter cable lock can be opened in 30 seconds with $1 worth of material...
About 22 year-old Ryan Pitlak, a marketing student who may have made hundreds of thousands from spam, coming from hundreds of shell co
mp
anies he set up...
A few of the really stupid things Jack Valenti (outgoing head of the
mp
AA) has said about new media technologies and intellectual property...
Amsterdam needs cheap te
mp
orary housing for 7,000 college students quickly! A developer is building a te
mp
orary, modular, and easily moveable student city made of 1,000 40-foot cargo containers...
As seen in recent floods in Hawaii, storm drainage systems can clog up due to i
mp
roper use. Could the use of permeable pavement systems help alleviate flooding in areas such as Manpunapuna? It'...
The Terror Advisory Map: http://www.nationalla
mp
oon.com/terrormap/terrormap.as...
July 26 to August 1, 2004
After a year in operation, Kev's News goes online! Since everyone seems to have a blog these days, I decided to go ahead and just do it. I see the rise of blogs as a sy
mp
tom of people learning how t...
"Crowded communities demand change...
"Support scarce for latest UH logo ideas...
Cheap projection technology is giving rise to "guerilla drive-ins". This is a sy
mp
tom of this generation's need for commerce-free, authentic culture and socializing...
IBM introduces "chip morphing" technology, which enables self-repairing, evolvable co
mp
uter chips...
A $230 million acquisition of an RFID reader co
mp
any. This technology is hot, hot, hot, people...
About Singapore's new world-class bioscience e
mp
ire, including "Biopolis", a $300 million center for molecular biology, bioinformatics, genomics, and nanotech...
New U.S. passports out this fall will be embedded with biometric co
mp
uter chips...
Prodded by the
mp
AA, the FBI pursues criminal charges against a Stargate SG1 fan Web site, despite endorsement by the show's executive producer...
July 19 to 25, 2004
Topic of the week: co
mp
ulsory Web site registrations! Lots of people hate 'em, and they can lead to identify theft. But how are sites to make money? Just go to BugMeNot to get around sit...
Quantum co
mp
uting breakthrough - a single electron's spin is controlled using ordinary transistors...
The UK is thinking about co
mp
ulsory "drug vaccinations" for children...
Interesting co
mp
arisons between the latest digital SLRs and film scans...
July 12 to 18, 2004
Recent progress in 3D visualization technology allows "virtual excavation", in this case, the ability to co
mp
letely examine the contents of a 3,000 year-old mummy without touching it...
Co
mp
uter visionary Alan Kay "decries the state of co
mp
uting". He's right...
One of my favorite sci-fi authors, Bruce Sterling, gives a hilarious, philosophical, and insightful talk about the "singularity", the point at which the pace of technology becomes too fast t...
The lucrative careers of crime-scene cleanup co
mp
anies...
Don't forget to hear Molvania's entry into the Eurovision song contest - "Elektronik Supersonik": http://www.molvania.com/images/Elektronik_Supersonik.
mp
...
Devendra Barnhart is a good exa
mp
le of this musical category...
Want to know what music made with instruments made co
mp
letely of vegetables sounds like...
July 5 to 11, 2004
Clive Sinclair rolls out the world's smallest folding bike: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story2&u=/nm/20040708/od_uk_nm/oukoe_singapore_bicycl...
"Movie piracy on Internet called an epidemic": http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.
mp
l/tech/news/267468...
A new type of affordable condo co
mp
lex with intelligently designed 347 square-foot spaces. I'd rather see a building like this than (yet) another rundown concrete brick apartment in Hawaii any day...
The incredible All Music Guide is getting a co
mp
lete overhaul, really, really soon...
June 28 to July 4, 2004
"US Government warns against Internet Explorer" http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=74&e=3&u=/c
mp
/20040702/tc_c
mp
/2210340...
All about the latest Rainbow Gathering, which attracted 10,000 and caused the Forest Service to allocate nearly $1 million for management...
June 21 to 27, 2004
This week's theme: the Fahrenheit 9/11 effect Why should you move away from DSL to cable? First, there's the new Supplier Federal Universal Service Fund (FUSF) Recovery Fee, which only applies to DS...
The (relatively new) RoadRunner business-class services are not only co
mp
etitive with business-class DSL now, but are actually cheaper as the bandwidth gets bigger (Hawaii prices) - you get bette...
Second, the Carlyle Group is looking to buy Verizon Hawaii - this is just part of their recent massive purchases of telecoms in the Pacific region. The deal is "co
mp
lex", as it involves a number o...
If you've seen Fahrenheit 9/11, you know who the Carlyle Group is - the largest private defense contractor in the world and one of the most powerful co
mp
anies that most people have never heard of...
Spyware is evolving - new strains have been detected that are self-updating, persistent, and really malicious. And users are paying up the nose (and suffering) for Microsoft's security lapses. Dum...
The first HDTV tuner PC card is here - get HDTV signals for free and watch 'em on your co
mp
uter...
More about Bob Vincent, the guy who recently designed a revolutionary new type of antenna. I
mp
lications for networks, cell phones, radios, more...
A teacher fed up with the high cost of (Cisco Academy's co
mp
uter training) textbooks makes his own equivalent textbooks and puts them online for free...
Texas is putting wireless net access into rest stops to encourage breaks - a great idea! http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=528&e=3&u=/ap/20040621/ap_on_bi_co_ne/wi_fi_rest_stop...
"California sues food co
mp
anies over mercury levels in canned tuna"...
Real-time file sharing music popularity results reside at BigCha
mp
agne - this blows SoundScan out of the water, or could if the RIAA doesn't sue everybody...
Now here's a secondary BigCha
mp
agne report that indicates that "artists receiving little or no radio play are still gaining very significant activity on file sharing networks". Meaning...
June 14 to 20, 2004
A section of the film explores the need for corporations to be more democratic. How about introducing software that enables co
mp
anies to make better group decisions? This isn't polling and it isn'...
A review of the coolest palmtop co
mp
uter. Sorry, available in Japan only...
A breakthrough way to co
mp
ress 3D models has been invented, meaning better video games, movies, CAD applications, and more...
Japanese balloons and the i
mp
ortance of uncensored wartime news...
Replace your old flashlight bulbs with brighter, longer-lasting LEDs: http://www.popsci.com/popsci/co
mp
uters/article/0,12543,652471,00.htm...
June 7 to 13, 2004
Crystalens is a new laser-based technique for treating cataracts. The i
mp
lanted lens moves using the power of existing eye muscles...
For the Euro 2004 soccer cha
mp
ionships, English fans are encouraged to smoke dope instead of drink alcohol in order to minimize potential riots...
A national interactive map of power plant pollution i
mp
acts. Hey, where's Hawaii...
A really nice page of digital photography co
mp
osition tips...
Where are the guitar heros of today? "Still searching for the next guitar hero": http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0607/p11s01-al
mp
.htm...
The newest way in which labels pay to get songs played on radio - paid ads: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.
mp
l/front/262156...
May 31 to June 6, 2004
This week: unconscious passwords, isolation epidemics, and video grid time-shifting! "Future of Visual Gadgets Rolled Out" A nice summary of the Society for Information Display's internationa...
New methods and co
mp
anies are forming to prevent camcorders from making pirated videotapes in movie theatres...
A former Microsoft technology manager bashes the co
mp
any for its mediocre products and addiction to cash cows...
An article on Kyle Cooper, who's made the art-intensive opening and closing credits of such movies as Spiderman, Se7en, Sphere, Twister, and Mission: I
mp
ossible...
May 24 to 30, 2004
An S.F. gallery closes after its owner is assaulted for displaying a painting depicting the abuse of Iraqi soldiers by American troops. And this in the typically "counterculture" North Beach area too...
A growing trend - Dance Dance Revolution (DDR)! I first saw this video game in a mall about eight months ago and was mesmerized by the dance moves of the teenager playing it. Basically, you have t...
Also on the same page - condoms can leak carcinogens! I guess from now on I'm chugging coffee and beer, playing video games, and avoiding condoms for my health's sake! "Investment in environmenta...
A nifty co
mp
arison of Web icons...
A new co
mp
any helps traditional radio stations migrate to digital radio. A great idea, but receivers need to get cheaper...
Co
mp
uterless single mom gets busted by the RIAA, can't afford to settle...
Some of the hippest
mp
3 blogs out there. Mash-ups are really popular these days. The
mp
3 format actually got popular because of blogs like "Blex's Page of Good
mp
3", seven years ago. I used to visi...
May 17 to 23, 2004
1) We have no right to co
mp
lain. "Americans entitled to cheap gas -- right?...
2) We should pay more for gas anyway...
3) If we did Iraq right, gas would be cheaper...
4) Obesity is now a global issue. The World Health Organization enters the picture...
5) Things are tough enough. $45,000 is poverty level in Los Angeles...
This is one of the best Web-based data visualization apps I've seen! You could mine this public database for all manner of interesting purposes. Fundrace - see which of your neighbors contributed t...
Spain clubgoers are i
mp
lanted with RFID chips...
Attract tenants with wireless: http://forevergeek.com/articles/apartment_co
mp
lex_unwired.ph...
Ra
mp
ant pollution and dead bodies in India's holy Ganga (Ganges) river...
Do women plan during sex? http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=1&u=/nm/20040521/od_nm/odd_germany_sex_d...
The New World Sy
mp
hony uses Internet2 videoconferencing for orchestra training...
May 10 to 16, 2004
Better than the Pringles can! Use $3 Chinese cooking vat scoops to create wireless connections spanning about 7 miles! http://www.usbwifi.orcon.net.nz/du
mp
tri.jp...
"They Rule" - a nifty way to visualize and find connections between the leaders of the world's most powerful co
mp
anies...
How about trying environmentally friendly anti-foul co
mp
ounds used on ships? The six-year test is i
mp
ressive...
More groovy green efforts from San Francisco: an ink jet cartridge recycler and an industrial co
mp
osting co
mp
any. This is a great model for cities to follow to get small businesses recycling co
mp
os...
May 3 to 9, 2004
The Sasser worm, developed by an 18 year-old in Germany who also made the ubiquitous "Netsky" email virus, infected an estimated million co
mp
uters last week, 80% of which belonged to home users an...
Your co
mp
uter's security may be co
mp
romised just by listening to it (acoustic cryptanalysis)...
April 26 to May 2, 2004
More news about the amazing Toyota Volta (the first hybrid sports car) which looks great, goes from 0 to 60 in 4 seconds, and gets 40
mp
g...
The Bose L1 is a revolutionary new PA system that points the way to new a
mp
lification technology - it eliminates poles, monitors, and bulky equipment, and is causing a stir in the music industry...
A very technical overview of the next generation of video game consoles - Soon these devices will feature superco
mp
uter-class levels of performance, enabling games with cinematic quality...
As an experiment, every 5th- and 6th-grader at this Texas elementary school is getting a laptop with digital versions of textbooks and 2,000 works of literature...
"One of the nation's wealthiest towns will soon have cameras and co
mp
uters running background checks on every car and driver that passes through....
A mix of si
mp
le chemicals produces a fungus-like structure...
"Green tea provides a more effective and environmentally-friendly method of preparing co
mp
uter hard disks, say US scientists." In certain applications it's better than diamond for polishing...
"Study Blames Corn Syrup for Rise of Diabetes in US": http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=571&e=16&u=/nm/health_syrup_d...
A co
mp
any records shows live and sells USB devices holding the recording after the concert...
An analysis of John Lennon's private jukebox provides a fascinating gli
mp
se into his influences and musical rip-offs...
April 19 to 25, 2004
2) Support blending ethanol with gasoline, and support the growth of local ethanol manufacturers. Which raw (waste) materials are cost-effective to i
mp
ort to Hawaii to produce ethanol? Does i
mp
ortin...
A co
mp
any has found a way to develop ethanol from waste straw and wood chips on a commercial scale, a world first...
3) How about this for a cleanup-inducing pilot project? But use the voices of well-known locals: Berlin's pilot program of talking trash cans that congratulate you when used have proven to be a hug...
4) Endorse the use of lead-free co
mp
uter systems, at least by government: The world's first lead-free motherboard (the main co
mp
onent in personal co
mp
uters) has been developed...
And Intel plans to cut the lead content of co
mp
uter chips by 95%...
A review of the first electronic paper- based reading device and its i
mp
lications for libraries, books, and traditional reading habits...
With five million installed systems, the open-source database MySQL is the most popular database in the world. Its corporate site receives more traffic than IBM's, and large co
mp
anies are migrating t...
Voting machines co
mp
any Diebold may face criminal charges...
Gone are the days of the fix-it-yourselfer - new cars are getting too co
mp
licated to fix...
April 12 to 18, 2004
AAGH! Tax time! A study shows that taxes are getting more co
mp
lex, thanks to the rising popularity of sophisticated tax preparation software...
Some guy hooked up a music-generating apparatus controlled by six live ha
mp
sters. It's actually pleasant music...
The name for it is 3M Novec 1320, an "advanced halon replacement" - it also has "low toxicity and environmental i
mp
act"...
April 5 to 11, 2004
"Americans are increasingly resorting to stomach-shrinking surgery so much so that health experts and insurance co
mp
anies are becoming alarmed"...
"Scotts Testing Genetically Modified Grass" http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=624&ncid=624&e=2&u=/ap/20040409/ap_on_sc/bioengineered_gras...
March 31, 2004
While the islands have seen a few distinctive architects that were co
mp
elled, nurtured, and influenced by Hawaii's natural environment - Dickey, Ossipoff, Morgan - the last 40 years has been witnes...
Hawaii Kai is one of the most garish neighborhoods I've seen. Hawaii is not Greece, Italy, or Hollywood. So why build faux (stucco, fenced-in, highly paved) structures which are neither here no...
March 29 to April 5, 2004
"The Molvania Tourists Rarely Get to See" http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=1&u=/nm/20040401/od_nm/britain_travel_d...
Wohr, the leading mechanized parking co
mp
any...
A-POC ("A Piece of Cloth"): Seamless clothing A new manufacturing method is changing how clothes are made by making ready-to-wear seamless clothes out of a single piece of cloth. This process ca...
United Airlines announced that more than 2 million customers used their self-serving kiosks in a single month. No modern airline can survive without them. Actually, that could be a great business ...
Ever wonder why so many business majors think Microsoft invented co
mp
uting? A study of eight textbooks reveals total ignorance of the role of Unix in business...
Robert Cringely argues that in the end anti-trust laws are ineffective when in comes to Microsoft, since they actually end up saving money by being non-co
mp
liant with government regulations...
Drug co
mp
any GlaxoSmithKline used orphans as guinea pigs in potentially dangerous medical experiments...
"Energy bill would i
mp
rove economic stability - A bill that maps an energy strategy for Hawaii appears stalled in the Legislature....
"Spreadsheets: 25 Years in a Cell" http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&cid=1738&e=5&u=/zd/20040323/tc_zd/12197...
"Study: File-Sharing No Threat to Music Sales" http://news.yahoo.com/news?t
mp
l=story&u=/washpost/20040330/tc_washpost/a34300_2004mar2...
March 22 to 28, 2004
Lawrence Lessig released his latest book, and you can download and read it for free. If living in an open, free culture is i
mp
ortant to you, or if you take photos, draw, write, make music, or i...
Is your identity safe? The story of how American medical records and credit histories are being exposed outside the U.S. with no privacy guarantees. One reporter's fascinating detective work throug...
Trixie, the baby with the most co
mp
rehensive Web site in the world. With real-time sleep, bottle, and diaper telemetrics, a blog, gallery, forum, archives, and voting topic...
"U.S. students shun co
mp
uter sciences"...
The pros and cons of Quorn, the "fungus-based meat substitute" that was introduced to the U.S. in 2002...
March 15 to 21, 2004
Somebody market this, quick! A professor creates a small cheap noise cancellation unit that decreases co
mp
uter fan noise. Although this technology is available in many headphones, nobody to date ha...
March 8 to 14, 2004
Preventable deaths from obesity are overtaking tobacco - this was a pretty big news item last week: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/03/10/OBESE.T
mp
&type=healt...
And remember one of the core facts of human nature (now scientifically proved) - when people are presented with more, they will take more, consciously or not...
The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) is suing the FCC on "overbroad regulation of next-generation televisions and related devices". Left unchallenged, anything you watch on TV or co
mp
uters in th...
The most co
mp
rehensive picture even taken from the Hubble Telescope was unveiled. It shows nearly 10,000 galaxies. They offer super-high resolution pictures, suitable for printing on large canvas a...
Hit Song Science (HSS) analyses music for its "hit" potential, co
mp
aring a song's qualities to millions of others...
A new sonic "construction set" has been released freely online which contains clips art and sa
mp
les and breaks from the hip-hop artist Jay-Z. This allows people to create their own albums based o...
March 1 to 7, 2004
The first car designed by women for women was launched at the Geneva Auto Show, with e
mp
hasis on comfort, storage, and low maintenance...
Also (to be) shown at the show, the first hybrid sports car from a major automaker (Toyota). It looks groovy, gets 31
mp
g, and goes from 0 to 60 in four seconds...
Heard of SCO, that co
mp
any that's suing Linux users? According to an acknowledged memo, Microsoft may be funding them to the tune of $86 million... but it is clear that Microsoft wishes to fund SC...
Wireless technology is helping native Americans in California go online and learn co
mp
uting skills...
1.8 tons of raw material are used to make your average desktop co
mp
uter and monitor. Upgrading rather than replacing your co
mp
uter saves more energy than recycling it...
Sparklines - a great way of co
mp
ressing information, from Edward Tufte's upcoming book Beautiful Evidence...
February 23 to 29, 2004
"I
mp
licit Structure and the Dynamics of Blogspace...
Face recognition technology will be incorporated into the
mp
EG-7 standard, allowing one to retrieve a scene with a specific person in a 24-hour video in one second. Of course, this has far-reachin...
Video game studies are making their way into college curricula - what is their form and i
mp
act on culture? What is a game...
The Transportation Security Administration, which handles airport terrorist checks, mistakenly identified one of its e
mp
loyees as a sex offender and fired him, despite the fact that the correc...
We don't support that "Ted, and those like him, have only one solution to their customers' problems. Erase everything on the co
mp
uter's hard drive and start over from scratch." The latest in Salon'...
February 16 to 22, 2004
Hoo boy, lots of news this week. You heard it here first, folks! Leaked Pentagon report warns climate change may bring famine, war "LONDON (AFP) - A secret report prepared by the Pentagon warns tha...
Got a Windows PC? Be afraid. Be very afraid. Thanks to the recent Windows code leak, this security vulnerability has been found - if you're running Explorer version 5, si
mp
ly loading a certain imag...
According to two new surveys, Apple leads the customer service satisfaction pack over Dell, HP, and Co
mp
aq...
"Hilo grads i
mp
ress Amazon recruiters...
"When I started in the music business, music was i
mp
ortant and vital to our culture... that's all changed....
Polaroid Warns Film Users Not to 'Shake It' http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=581&e=1&u=/nm/20040217/tc_nm/tech_polaroid_outkast_d...
The Pentagon researches ways for GIs to fight for up to five days without a break. Have they not heard of crack? "The question is: 'Are there te
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orary biochemical approaches we can use to squeeze th...
NTT Develops Sta
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-Size 1GB Hologram Memor...
February 9 to 15, 2004
A Swedish co
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any has developed an environmentally friendly way to dispose of (and recycle) bodies. This is as opposed to the current methods, whose byproducts are polluting incinerators, toxi...
There was a little buzz around the net last week regarding "peak oil". The term refers to the point at which worldwide oil production will peak, which is currently predicted to happen in 2015. Jo...
February 2 to 8, 2004
Let's start with some fun stuff this week! This French performer attaches dozens of horns to his ju
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suit and proceeds to play classical music...
Advertisers are now using MRIs to correlate image affinity to brain activity: "Big government and big co
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anies have been trying to manipulate us since the start of time," [says a study volunteer]...
The IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) has a nice article on this year's dream engineering jobs. They interview the guy who made Sony's ju
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ing robots, but the real story i...
Make an efficient, cheap ca
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ing stove out of aluminum cans...
The latest in modernist prefabricated housing, where you can purchase a beautiful, open wooden conte
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orary house kit for $100,000...
"A New Kind of Science", a 900-page book on how co
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lex systems can rise from the most basic rules, now can be browsed online for free...
The image of Buddha, automatically generated by a si
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le mathematical algorithm that plots points on the real and imaginary planes...
January 26 to February 1, 2004
"The New Face of the Silicon Age - How India became the capital of the co
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uting revolution...
"Scientist Create New Form of Matter": http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=570&ncid=753&e=3&u=/nm/20040128/sc_nm/science_matter_d...
January 19 to 25, 2004
"Republican staff members of the US Senate Judiciary Commitee infiltrated opposition co
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uter files for a year, monitoring secret strategy memos and periodically passing on copies to the media"...
January 12 to 18, 2004
RipDigital, a co
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any that will digitize your entire CD collection for you, for a fee...
The federal government plans to analyze e
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loyees' hair, sweat, and saliva as a part of new drug tests...
January 5 to 11, 2004
Taji, Iraq, where 50 families live in the city's garbage du
mp
...
A behind-the-scenes article on illegal online movie-swapping teams: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story2&u=/latimes_ts/20040107/ts_latimes/secretmoviemoguls&e=...
Yet another international study on global warming was released - 1/4 of all species could be extinct by 2050? "Global Warming I
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erils Species...
December 29 to January 4, 2004
Did you have cha
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agne over the holidays? Tiny bubbles are better - when picking cha
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agne, look for more, smaller bubbles...
Did you know that 20 billion ta
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ons/sanitary pads went into landfills in 1998? Encourage females to try the Diva Cup...
December 22 to 28, 2003
Favorite antipop CDs of 2003 Tired of mainstream music? How about great jazz/world/folk/acoustic fusion? Highly recommended are David Tanenbaum, Tord Gustavsen, and the Be Good Tanyas. Of course...
One co
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any expects 1.2 million subscribers by year's end...
"Japan's E
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ire of Cool: Country's Culture Becomes Its Biggest Export...
December 15 to 21, 2003
At least five convicted felons secured management positions at Diebold, the maker of those electronic voting machines. One of them is a programmer who was jailed for falsifying co
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uter records.....
* August 12: First reported at an international sy
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osium at Fermilab...
December 8 to 14, 2003
Whoo boy, lots of new stuff in the world lately. Guess I'll just ju
mp
in...
Details behind the first National Geographic cover story ever to be co
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letely shot digitally...
This enables desktop-sized superco
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uters and cell phones lasting 60 hours...
This is another technology that may help the development of quantum co
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uters...
Cerritos, CA becomes the first entire city to go co
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letely wireless...
A man gets out of a ticket using a cell phone and a friend with a co
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uter...
And now, in co
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lete contrast to the above... the Mushroom House, a beautiful handcrafted wooden house in Canada that took 22 years to make...
December 1 to 7, 2003
Are you a "pack rat"? "Facing jail because his house is filled to the brim, a hoarder finds hope in a woman with a talent for organizing...
The woman who claimed to be tra
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led at Wal-Mart after Thanksgiving has been found to have filed 16 previous claims from various businesses...
How Michael Jackson would have looked without the plastic surgery...
Australia to Boost Great Reef Protection http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=624&ncid=624&e=3&u=/ap/20031203/ap_on_sc/australia_great_barrier_reef_...
The resignation letter of Roy Disney, Chairman of the Feature Animation Division at Walt Disney Co
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any...
November 24 to 30, 2003
Some Thanksgiving sale goodness-this one made all the papers: "Woman knocked unconscious by tra
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ling shoppers" ...and this happened at a Wal-Mart Supercenter.....
November 17 to 23, 2003
Aging Baby Boomers are turning to human growth hormone: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/11/17/HGH.TM...
A working nano-transistor has been self-assembled using biology for the first time. A first step to building self-assembling molecular co
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uters...
The first genetically engineered pet goes on sale - glow-in-the-dark fish (called GloFish)...
November 10 to 16, 2003
IBM created a (large) "TV-sized" superco
mp
uter that's the 73rd most powerful superco
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uter in the world...
November 3 to 9, 2003
Will noisy, hot co
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uters be a thing of the past? Electricity leakage is why current microchips (and therefore your co
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uter) runs hot, requires fans, and contributes to the entropy of the universe...
But some of these healers are refusing to divulge information, saying they are not fairly co
mp
ensated for their information - which could make some biotech firms millions of dollars...
October 27 to November 2, 2003
The first optical processor, which co
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utes at the speed of light.....
20% less males aged 18 to 34 are watching TV co
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ared to last year...
"Many legitimate, genuine, brilliant, and financially successful, conte
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orary musicians are selling out...
October 27, 2003
Are you a natural networker? Some people are natural "connectors" - in social networks, the i
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ortant people aren't necessarily who you know, but who you vaguely know...
A trial just started that could pave the way for holding U.S. co
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anies accountable for pollution overseas - it involves toxic oil du
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s in total 50 percent larger than the Exxon Valdez spill sprea...
October 20, 2003
* It's the world's largest co
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any, equaling 2.5% of the GNP...
* The iPod is the #1 music (
mp
3) player, with 31% market share...
October 14, 2003
The main point of this is that now a single co
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uter can replace an entire cellular tower's worth of expensive equipment. This means smaller installations and better coverage to rural areas. Plus i...
Spread of AIDS among Young ‘A Global Catastrophe’: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/unco
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/articleshow?msid=22572...
A great, great explanation of how this nation's electrical grid works, why more large-scale blackouts are predicted, the effects of deregulation, and yet another exa
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le of capitalism ignorin...
Homeland Defense e
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loyee has his German fiance detained, handcuffed, jailed, and after 20 hours without food, shipped back to Germany, without being officially arrested, a la "The Patriot Act".....
October 6, 2003
The death of the laser show: birth of the new psychedelics? The American Museum of Natural History started a new sound and light show using co
mp
uter graphics called SonicVision. It's a 35-minute movi...
"3G Mobile Signals Can Cause Nausea, Headache" http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=581&e=7&u=/nm/20030930/tc_nm/health_mobile_damage_d...
September 30, 2003
Sales of phonecams have surpassed that of digital cameras: http://www.mobilecommerceworld.com/T
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l/Article.aspx?E&ID=1675...
Of course, a co-author of the report was fired from his co
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any...
September 22, 2003
Howard Levy, harmonica player extrordinaire: http://www.hyperorg.com/blogger/misc/amazinggrace_HowardLevy.
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...
"
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3s Are Not the Devil...
September 15, 2003
The i
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ortance of dreaming for the future Why are people retreating to past fantasy instead of thinking forward? Humanity's perception of the future indeed shapes its present. Recent Hugo award winne...
Co
mp
uter visionary Stafford Beer coined the term "shareware". He also invented Cybersyn, an Internet-like socialist co
mp
uter system created for the revolutionary Chilean government in the earl...
September 8, 2003
Diamond-cutting robots are on the rise! Contrast with the recent progress made in synthetic diamond tech (see the recent Wired) and you'll see how the entire industry could be co
mp
letely automated i...
A great story about Disney's biggest fans, and an interesting co
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arison to Talmudic scholarship. Is God really in the details, and are details necessary for organizational and religious longevity...
California candidates are given the Voight-Ka
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ff test from Blade Runner, to see which ones are replicants. This is hilarious...
The best article so far on the Aquada, the first a
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hibious sports car that actually looks sporty...
August 25, 2003
Disney is laying off its traditional 2D animators, opting instead to only do 3D (co
mp
uter generated) animated films from now on. A passing of an era.....
Rockin' on without Microsoft This is the best, no-nonsense, pragmatic, pro-business view of one CEO who removed every bit of Microsoft software from his co
mp
any. If you're still using Windows in you...
EPA to ease air pollution rules for maintaining coal-burning power plants http://www.napanews.com/te
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lates/index.cfm?te
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late=story_full&id=9AD35892-B809-4C2C-B0FB-A6BF6A803FF...
Affected by the recent co
mp
uter viruses? The solution: 1) Don't use Outlook. 2) Don't use Windows. I just spent a couple hours cleaning up a friend's infected Windows machine this week. In over 1...
By the way: If you are using Apple's Mail application, the virus emails will be automatically marked as junk and sent to your junk mail folder. Apple Mail has the best spam detection/removal of an...
August 12, 2003
Octopus Camouflage http://www.tonmo.com/images/vids/octopus1.
mp
...
Potential Date Alerts http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?t
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l=story&cid=582&ncid=582&e=7&u=/nm/20030807/wr_nm/tech_tonline_matchcom_d...
August 4, 2003
This week's theme: techniques for separating the wheat from the chaff and the signal from the noise. Much confusion arises from people not being able to see the difference between the theory o...
Why information design is i
mp
ortant...
Why graphic design (and choosing the right font) is i
mp
ortant:...
2) Why balance is i
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ortan...
Camera Phone Helps Foil Alleged Abduction Atte
mp
...
July 28, 2003
Another case for biodiversity in everyday life: "Tree-Eating Beetle Poses Threat In U.S....
It's scientifically proven than Kansas is flatter than a pancake: http://www.i
mp
rob.com/airchives/paperair/volume9/v9i3/kansas.htm...
July 21, 2003
...I'm really te
mp
ted to write a program that automatically generates your own Nigerian Email Scam Letter, but I don't think my server could handle the bandwidth...
July 8, 2003
For his thesis, Sean Gorman made an interactive program to identify power, Internet, and phone networks throughout the U.S. On a map you can select any co
mp
any and see exactly what network wires t...
I personally believe that RFID will happen in some form whether consumers like it or not - it's just a matter of when and how it is i
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lemented. As with any revolutionary technology, there are grea...