Shaping the Future
Keeping Watch Now Goes Both
Ways
Experts at ACM's Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference
in Seattle this week discussed the merits of "sousveillance,"
University of Toronto professor Steve Mann's concept of
individual citizens recording their activities on video to
counter surveillance ...
[read more]
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Fate of $25M E-Voting
System in Miami-Dade Dangling
Florida's Miami-Dade County spent $25 million to buy and
install 7,200 iVotronic touch-screen voting machines from
Election Systems & Software, but persistent glitches that
led to vote miscounts in local elections--including one in
March in which hundreds of votes went ...
[read more]
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Linux Distribution Tames
Chaos
An Australian programmer's Linux distribution links
networked computers to perform password cracks or other
complex mathematical calculations. The Chaos Linux
distribution takes up just 6 MB, and can be booted on a PC
either via the network or from a CD-ROM so that the networked
machine's ...
[read more]
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Putting Teeth Into U.S.
Cybercrime Policy
Cyber Security Industry Alliance (CSIA) executive director
Paul Kurtz, a former member of the President's Critical
Infrastructure Protection Board, explains in an interview that
the CSIA's purpose is to give the federal government all the
relevant information it needs when considering new ...
[read more]
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Tricks on the
Eyes
Researchers led by professor Oliver Staadt of the UC Davis
Institute for Data Analysis and Visualization are developing a
virtual-reality wall that can support 3D imagery using a
combination of rear-screen digital projectors, special
eyewear, and algorithms. The technology will be used ...
[read more]
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Prying Eyes Are
Everywhere
The commercial availability of high-tech spying tools such
as hidden cameras, global positioning system devices, and
software that monitors computer activity is allowing average
citizens to conduct clandestine surveillance on their spouses,
children, friends, and neighbors. And the ...
[read more]
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New Chips Pose a Challenge
to Software Makers
Forthcoming multicore chips from Advanced Micro Devices
(AMD) and Intel will force software companies to repurpose
their software to take full advantage of the new
semiconductors. Chip manufacturers are moving away from
ramping up clock speed to boost processor performance, as such
an ...
[read more]
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Eclipse Project Takes on
Parallel Computing
Greg Watson, a scientist with Los Alamos National
Laboratory's Advanced Computing Lab, believes it is high time
that parallel computing development tools caught up with
computing industry development tools, and he has started an
Eclipse technology project to help realize this vision. The
...
[read more]
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Pulling the Plug on
Science?
Institutional researchers in the United States worry that
cutbacks in funding for basic research could seriously harm
the nation's international competitiveness, especially since
other regions are quickly building up their research capacity.
NASA is pulling support from several projects in ...
[read more]
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Faster Handoff Between
Wi-Fi Networks Promises Near-Seamless 802.11
Roaming
University of California, San Diego (UCSD) researchers have
created software that dramatically speeds up connection
handoffs between Wi-Fi access points so that the transition is
imperceptible to users. The SyncScan software does not require
any hardware upgrades or changes to the ...
[read more]
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China, India Can Lead
Global IT, Says Chinese Premier
Chinese political leaders continue to tout the growth
opportunities for the IT industries of China and India, if the
two markets work more closely together. Wen Jiabao, the
premier of China, renewed the theme earlier in the month
during his four-day official trip to India, which included a
stop ...
[read more]
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Surveillance Works Both
Ways
University of Toronto professor Steve Mann put his concept
of "equiveillance through sousveillance" in action when he led
about 24 attendees of ACM's Computers, Freedom, and Privacy
(CFP) conference in Seattle to a local shopping mall to film
or take pictures of surveillance ...
[read more]
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Building the City of
Tomorrow
ACM's 2005 Computer-Human Interaction conference sent teams
of designers out into different Portland, Ore., neighborhoods
to think up ways technology could increase interactivity
between the city and residents. The "Engaging the City: Public
Interfaces as Civic ...
[read more]
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In Touch With the Latest
Virtual Surroundings
Angelika Peer of the Munich University of Technology says
the goal of the IST-funded Touch-Hapsys project is "to create
the technological basis for engineers to conceive and build
better systems for direct interaction with humans through
touch, thus overcoming apparent limitations of existing ...
[read more]
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Laptop Design Can Be a
Pain in the Posture
Laptops, with their closely positioned keyboards and
display screens, are forcing users into postures that can lead
to back, shoulder, wrist, and neck pain, warn doctors and
physical therapists. Tom Albin with Human Factors and
Ergonomics Society says it is impossible for a laptop user to
...
[read more]
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Dot-What Redux--ICANN
Still Searching for Answer
ICANN Chairman Vint Cerf says he has some doubts about the
organization's ability to add domains to the Internet
smoothly, even though ICANN just approved two new top-level
domains, .jobs and .travel. Cerf says the organization "ran
into a lot of very interesting problems" when it approved ...
[read more]
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Bulletproof
Storage
IBM plans to offer storage systems that IT departments do
not have to touch for up to three years. By including
redundant software and hardware systems, the storage systems
will be able to keep operating smoothly even as software
errors are made or discrete components fail. IBM says ...
[read more]
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A Conversation With Guy
Steele Jr.
Association for Computing Machinery 1998 Grace Murray
Hopper Award recipient and 1994 ACM Fellow Guy Steele Jr. won
the 2005 Dr. Dobb's Journal Excellence in Programming Award
for his numerous contributions to software development. His
many credits include co-creation of the Scheme ...
[read more]
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Shaping the
Future
Society's leaders often focus on solving short-term rather
than long-term problems because of a paralysis borne out of
scientific uncertainty that not even the most cutting-edge
assessment can completely overcome. It is difficult for
traditional analysis to evaluate near-term steps for ...
[read more]
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