Monthly Archives: August 2013

Julian Assange on Google and the NSA: Who’s holding the ‘sh*t-bag’ now?

"Google started out as part of Californian graduate student culture around San Francisco’s Bay Area. But as Google grew it encountered the big bad world. It encountered barriers to its expansion in the form of complex political networks and foreign regulations, it started leaning heavily on the State Department for support, and by doing so it entered into the Washington DC system. A recently released statistic shows that Google now spends even more money than Lockheed Martin on paid lobbyists in Washington. That Google was taking NSA money in exchange for handing over people’s data comes as no surprise. When Google encountered the big bad world, Google itself got big and bad." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingJulian Assange on Google and the NSA: Who’s holding the ‘sh*t-bag’ now?

Calvin & Hobbes Creator’s Life Lessons Become Beautiful New Comic

"As much as I'd have loved it if comic-creator Bill Watterson had kept working forever, there's something bittersweet about the fact that Calvin & Hobbes is no more. While Calvin and his pet tiger may never go on a new adventure, we can continue to learn lessons from Watterson and his creations, as evidenced by this new comic by Zen Pencils artist Gavin Aung Than. The comic below is Than's rendition of an excerpt from Bill Watterson's 1990 speech at Kenyon College (site of David Foster Wallace's famous 'This Is Water' speech, as it happens). It is just lovely. Read it, and prepare to feel emotions." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingCalvin & Hobbes Creator’s Life Lessons Become Beautiful New Comic

Researcher: Facebook spammers make $200 million just posting links

"Spammers posting links on Facebook fan pages to send people to third-party scam sites are earning $200m every year, according to calculations by a team of Italian security researchers who have investigated hundreds of thousands of posts on the social network. Trying to catch and get rid of the spammers is a growing problem for Facebook. The revenue that the spammers do not form part of Facebook’s revenue, but instead piggyback on the success of the social network, which now has more than a billion users worldwide. In April, the Italian team uncovered the multimillion-pound business of selling fake Twitter followers, estimating then that as many as 20m were created by spammers." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingResearcher: Facebook spammers make $200 million just posting links

Cold call victim forces telemarketers to pay him by using premium number

"A British man fed up with cold calls from telemarketers set up a premium phone number in November 2011 and has made £300 by accepting calls and keeping the annoying marketers on the line as long as possible. Lee Beaumont, who works at home in Leeds, UK, was getting calls at all times of the day. 'I thought there must be a way to make money off these phone calls,' he told the BBC. He set up an 0871 line (equivalent to a 900 line in the US), which forces people who call him to pay 10p per minute. Of that, he receives 7p (about 10.9¢). He now gives out his 0871 line to any business that might cold call him, while giving friends and family a different number." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingCold call victim forces telemarketers to pay him by using premium number

Skype confirms it is developing 3D video calls

"Skype has confirmed it is developing 3D video calls – but said it could be many years before we can use the technology. The Microsoft-owned internet telephony firm revealed it is experimenting with 3D video calls on its 10th anniversary. In an interview with the BBC, Mircrosoft’s corporate vice-president for Skype, Mark Gillett, said: 'We’ve done work in the labs looking at the capability of 3D-screens and 3D-capture. We’ve seen a lot of progress in screens and a lot of people now buy TVs and computer monitors that are capable of delivering a 3D image. But the capture devices are not yet there.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingSkype confirms it is developing 3D video calls

Activision R&D Real-time 3D Character Demo

"This animated character is being rendered in real-time on current video card hardware, using standard bone animation. The rendering techniques, as well as the animation pipeline are being presented at GDC 2013, 'Next Generation Character Rendering' on March 27. The original high resolution data was acquired from Light Stage Facial Scanning and Performance Capture by USC Institute for Creative Technologies, then converted to a 70 bones rig, while preserving the high frequency detail in diffuse, normal and displacement composite maps. It is being rendered in a DirectX11 environment, using advanced techniques to faithfully represent the character's skin and eyes." Continue reading →

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Radio wave-treated water could change agriculture as we know it

"A groundbreaking new Irish technology which could be the greatest breakthrough in agriculture since the plough is set to change the face of modern farming forever. The technology – radio wave energised water – massively increases the output of vegetables and fruits by up to 30 per cent. Not only are the plants much bigger but they are largely disease-resistant, meaning huge savings in expensive fertilisers and harmful pesticides. Extensively tested in Ireland and several other countries, the inexpensive water treatment technology is now being rolled out across the world. The technology makes GM obsolete and converts excess CO2 into edible plant mass." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingRadio wave-treated water could change agriculture as we know it

Ambient Backscatter Energy Harvester

"Ambient Backscatter transforms existing wireless signals into both a source of power and a communication medium. It enables two battery-free devices to communicate by backscattering existing wireless signals. Backscatter communication is orders of magnitude more power-efficient than traditional radio communication. Further, since it leverages the ambient RF signals that are already around us, it does not require a dedicated power infrastructure as in RFID." Continue reading →

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Energy harvester that creates power from ambient vibrations comes to market

"MicroGen’s energy harvester, dubbed Bolt, provides power like a battery — but uses a very different means to get there. Housing a piezoelectric microelectromechanical system (MEMS) inside the casing pictured above, the unit creates energy from vibrations in the surrounding environment. Ambient vibrations cause a flap on the device (pictured below) to move back and forth, which in turn creates a current that dumps energy in to either a capacitor or a thin rechargeable battery next to the flap. The Bolt requires a source vibrating at around 120Hz in order to charge, and an LED on the outer casing will blink to let you know it’s full." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingEnergy harvester that creates power from ambient vibrations comes to market