...more recent posts
Slashdot has a poll today asking how people like their steak. I am pleasantly surprised to find "I don't eat meat" is actually in the lead (25% to 22% for "medium rare.") I knew that junk food and caffeine were staples of the geek diet, but I have never heard anything about vegetarianism. Anyway, in the comments that follow the poll, somebody posted this short sci-fi story vaguely related to the topic. Very amusing. (This post largely stolen from rasterweb.)
testing
testing 123....
this is a test...
IBM announced today their new SOI (Silicon on insulator) chip technology. This is a long sought after step in the ever shrinking chip wars. IBM has clearly established itself as the technological leader. This will not only speed up the speed of chips, but also reduce size, heat dissipation, and energy requirements. We'll see these new chips in large IBM systems first, but the sfgate article (link above) quotes IBM as saying that the new chips "will appear in a portable device this year." Since IBM doesn't make chips for the Wintel world, I've got to think this means Apple. Go IBM. This could not only break through the speed plateau that the G4 seems to be stuck on, but also solve the heat problems with putting these things into the Powerbook. If Apple can ship a +700 mhz g4 powerbook before Jan (especially in a graphite ibook like shell) I doubt they could make enough to satisfy demand.
Slashdot has this link to a german magazine (link is to english translation) which is reporting that the EU is set to lift all export restrictions on encryption software. The U.S. is traditionally against this, and is reportedly upset by the decision.
I'm very interested in the EU, but unsure how to get more information. I guess traveling is one good way. Seems to me like they (the EU government(s)) are much more clued in than the US, but people are always telling me that freedoms are much greater here. I'm not sure, but the Netherlands and Switzerland (to name two) seem much more open. (Although I've never been to either place, so my opinion probably isn't worth much.) Simply comparing the percentage of the population incarcerated between the US and the EU (or Russia, or China, or South Africa) would lead one to believe that either a) US citizens are somehow a priori more likely to commit criminal acts, or b) the US has less freedom. What's the deal?
The folks at Temple ov thee Lemur have built a stripped down web server run on the electircal current generated by potatoes. Nice. Today's picture shows the power supply. Apparently, it takes about a dozen potatoes to run the thing, and they change the potatoes "every few days." You can get served an actual page from the spud server at http://152.78.65.48:2300, but since slashdot is running the story right now you probably won't get through. I remember doing experiments in science class when I was young where we would hook up potatoes to power a tiny lightbulb. I remember wondering why we don't power everything this way since you can just grow the things in the ground (and then eat them when they run out of power,) and I have to admit that I am still wondering the same thing.
Thanks to V & S for their weekend hospitality. With all this rain, Long Island is LUSH. Nice to get away from the keyboard for a day and a half. Hey, my hands don't hurt today!
I didn't mean for this page to only be about privacy/security issues, but these seem to be the most important things going on right now. Here's the latest. Real (makers of the Realplayer which allows you to view streaming audio and video compressed in the real formats - file type: .rm) has a nifty new way to spy on you. I don't use any Real products after the last privacy fiasco, but undaunted by that bad press, they're back with an even more intrusive scheme. Installing the new Real software now places a program called Download Demon on your computer. This program, without any warning, is installed as the DEFAULT Download manager for your browser (strike one.) If you use your browser for FTP connections, the Download Demon quietly records the URL and filename of every file you download (strike two) and (again quietly, without any prompting) connects to Real and uploads this info to the mothership (strike three - please delete all Real products from your computer.) This is according to the very reliable TBTF. I'm not going to test this myself, but I will continue to follow the story. I almost think this couldn't possibly be true, as it seems illegal at best, but stranger things have happened... I mean, sure, the FTP connection is monitored already, but I don't need additional monitoring from the private sector. Big business is free to PAY me for my personal data (if I accept their offer, which I won't,) but really this is getting ridiculous.
Whoops. I've been away for 2 days and the place is falling apart. Seem to have lost a few threads (although everything is there in the database.) Not sure what the deal is, but probably has something to do with those changes I made (and didn't really test too much) before I left. I'll get it sorted first thing in the morning. Sorry.