Software Piracy: A Growing
Problem
For Science, Nanotech Poses
Big Unknowns
An anti-nanotechnology movement is brewing, sparked by
health and environmental fears that industry advocates claim
are mostly fueled by popular fiction. The nanotech industry
and the government are trying to understand why the public is
so distrustful of nanotech through ...
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Technology and Worker
Efficiency
Common wisdom dictates that technology is chiefly
responsible for the American economy's productivity gains over
the last few years. Current research indicates, however, that
the productivity gains are not so much attributable to
technology but its integration with organization capital, ...
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IETF Closes in on Linking
Geographic Info, Presence
The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is nearing the
final stages for approval of a privacy standard for
geography-aware presence technology. Instant messaging first
introduced presence technology several years ago, and the
concept has matured since then with nuanced status messages
such as ...
[read more]
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Vulnerable Servers
Warned
The Federal Trade Commission has teamed up with government
agencies from 26 countries to press owners of Internet servers
to close any open relays or open proxies. As part of Operation
Secure Your Server, the government agencies will email tens of
thousands of server owners to check their ...
[read more]
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Mood Ring Measured in
Megahertz
Sandia National Laboratories' Mentor/PAL program uses
off-the-shelf sensors and face-recognition software to provide
an environment in which collaborators are kept apprised of
their own--and each other's--moods and performance levels in
order to optimize decision-making in high-risk ...
[read more]
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Is the Superworm a Mere
Myth?
Security experts such as Harvey Mudd College's Geoffrey
Kuenning believe a superworm attack against the
cyber-infrastructure of the United States is an inevitability,
given the growing frequency and extent of worm and virus
outbreaks in 2003. Kuenning cited last year's massive blackout
as proof ...
[read more]
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More Scary Tales Involving
Big Holes in Web-Site Security
The market for Web application security is heating up due
to several high-profile security flaws that have been
discovered in corporate Web sites. These flaws open the door
to incidents of industrial espionage and identity theft, as
hackers can use the flaws to gain access to customer ...
[read more]
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New Software Helps Lift
"Fog of War"
The "fog" that often hinders military operations could be
lifted with the help of a software system developed by
University of Buffalo researchers that integrates and shares
data collected by air and ground sensors to monitor and
anticipate the movements of friendly and unfriendly forces,
...
[read more]
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Memory Evolution: Survival
of the Smallest
Flash memory cards are becoming more spacious, smaller in
size, cheaper, and more numerous as their market grows
rapidly; but the constitution of that market is expected to
change over the coming years as the former frontrunner
CompactFlash format falls behind the more technically flexible
...
[read more]
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Flexible Display Screens
Readied for Production
Flexible electronic displays are finally starting to edge
toward mass production, starting with Royal Philips
Electronics' rollable screen that could be fabricated at a
rate of 1 million units a year by the end of 2005, according
to Bas J.E. van Rens of Philips' Polymer Vision division. The
...
[read more]
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Giving Robots a Human
Face
Most robotics experts frown at the idea of building robots
that closely resemble human beings, on the grounds that they
will not be accepted because of the "Uncanny Valley" maxim,
which posits that machines with increasingly human-like
features will make people uncomfortable. This ...
[read more]
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Nanotech's Big Challenge:
Getting to Market
Julie Chen, director of the National Science Foundation's
nanomanufacturing program, must shepherd nanotechnology
projects out of the research and development phase and into
the business sector. It is a heavy responsibility: Though many
nanotech applications may not be ready for the ...
[read more]
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The Future of U.S. Tech
Employment
America needs to boost its federal research and development
and create regional strategies for countering globalization,
says National Innovation Initiative co-chairman Wayne Clough.
Along with co-chairman and IBM CEO Sam Palmisano, Clough is
charged with formulating ways to keep the United ...
[read more]
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Researchers on a Roll With
Flexible Computers
Televisions and screens that can be rolled up instead of
folded could become a reality thanks to a flexible organic
light emitting device (FOLED) developed by University of
Toronto engineers. Materials science professor Zheng-Hong Lu,
with the assistance of post-doctoral fellow Sijin Han and ...
[read more]
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Dancing the Quantum
Dream
A quantum computer carries such promised capabilities as
ultrafast database searches and a "virtual lab" where the
behavior of materials can be predicted without actually
fabricating them, but a practical quantum computer must be
immune to decoherence, in which computations are undone ...
[read more]
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Dealing With the Darker
Side
Plans by Benetton and Wal-Mart to monitor inventory with
radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags were met with
strong protest by privacy advocates worried that the
technology could be abused by criminals and the government by
keeping track of product purchases without consumers' ...
[read more]
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Software Piracy: A Growing
Problem
The Business Software Alliance estimates that the illegal
copying and distribution of software in the United States
added up to 105,000 lost jobs, $2 billion in lost revenue,
$5.3 billion in lost salaries, and over $1.4 billion in lost
tax revenue in 2002 alone; despite this and worries of ...
[read more]
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