Conversational
Computers
Senators Question E-Voting
Paper Trail
Senators Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) and Trent Lott
(R-Miss.) both expressed opposition to establishing a paper
trail for election ballots by hooking printers up to direct
electronic recording machines (DRE). Lott is principally
concerned with the increased chance of the election day ...
[read more]
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Women's Share of IT Jobs
Plunges
A new report from the Information Technology Association of
America shows a severe decline in the percentage of women in
the IT workforce. Women held just 32.4 percent of IT jobs in
2004, a proportion that represents a 41 percent drop since
1996. The report also highlights a disproportionately ...
[read more]
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9/11 Response Hurting
Science, ACLU Says
A new report from the American Civil Liberties Union,
"Science Under Siege," accuses the Bush administration of
developing policies in response to the 9/11 attacks that
threaten U.S. scientific enterprise and the nation's technical
superiority. The report notes a dramatic increase in ...
[read more]
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Gov't. Collected Airline
Passenger Data
In direct violation of a congressional mandate, the
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has been
gathering personal information about U.S. citizens who flew
commercially in June 2004. Under the guise of the program
Secure Flight, designed to screen for terrorists, the TSA's
...
[read more]
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Software Patents: EU
Parliamentarians Adopt Council of Ministers'
Line
The European Parliament's Committee on Legal Affairs voted
Monday to propose sweeping limitations on the patentability of
software. The close vote decided what will be debated and the
terms that will be used to discuss it, in the July 6 plenary
session concerning the Directive on the ...
[read more]
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New Supercomputers Overhaul
Top Ranks
IBM once again highlights the list of the 500 fastest
supercomputers released this week at the International
Supercomputing Conference in Heidelberg, Germany, building six
of the top 10 systems and 259 of the top 500. The list ranks
computers by how many trillions of algebraic ...
[read more]
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Engineer's Tiny Chip
Changed the World
Jack Kilby, inventor of the integrated circuit, died Monday
of cancer at the age of 81. The 2000 Nobel Prize recipient
held over 60 patents, though none were more influential than
the microchip technology that launched the microelectronics
industry. Kilby's central innovation was the combination ...
[read more]
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HLRS Director: HPC Users
Need Quality, Not Quantity
Michael M. Resch, director of the High Performance
Computing Center (HLRS) in Stuttgart, outlined in an interview
his belief that the best supercomputers are designed with the
end product in mind, and that technologies need to be
adaptable to the industries they serve. The Center ...
[read more]
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In Chess, Masters Again
Fight Machines
The celebrated defeat of Garry Kasparov, world chess
champion at the time, by the Deep Blue computer in 1997 will
not be the final word in the battle between man and machine
for preeminence in the chess world. More and more top ranked
players are taking on matches against computers, such as the
...
[read more]
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Taking a Virtual View of
the World
Six partners from France, Germany, and Italy have developed
software that enables users to browse data collected from
satellites and aerial vehicles in three dimensions. "Using
Vplanet Explorer, anyone can set off on a journey to discover
new regions in 3D, rather than staring at a flat map ...
[read more]
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Snoozing About
Security
The two-year-old Department of Homeland Security (DHS)
cybersecurity division has gone through three cyberczars and
millions of taxpayer dollars with no progress in the quest to
control the increasing number of worm and virus attacks,
writes CNet executive editor Charles Cooper. In an Internet
...
[read more]
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Gadget Firms Start to
Notice the Gals
Consumer electronics companies are starting to recognize
women as an under-appreciated audience in the packaging of
their products. The Consumer Electronics Association reports
that in the $100 billion per year industry, women are involved
in 89% of the purchase decisions, and ...
[read more]
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NSF Backs Next-Gen
Internet Plans
MIT senior research scientist David Clark has received a
National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to begin preliminary
research on developing a new architecture for the next
Internet. The NSF is funding Clark's work as the first step in
a larger program of blueprinting a successor to the current
...
[read more]
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Careers: Hiring Is Up But
Salaries Are Flat
Information technology staffing company Robert Half
Technology found in a recent survey of over 1,400 company CIOs
that 17 percent will make changes to their current IT staff
levels in the next quarter. Of these, 82 percent intend to add
more employees, while the rest expect to reduce staff levels.
...
[read more]
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Common Criteria or Common
Confusion?
The process of certifying the security of commercial
software is not necessarily flawed, but the two dimensions of
the Common Criteria results in some confusion, according to
Mike Wolf, general manager of the advanced products
engineering group at software vendor Green Hills. Common ...
[read more]
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Seeing Tech's Future
Now
The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy
(OSTP) is taking an active role in the research and
development (R&D) of future technology initiatives.
Richard Russell, associate director of technology for the
OSTP, says one of its main responsibilities is to track
innovative ...
[read more]
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Technology That Imitates
Nature
Engineers are looking increasingly toward nature as an
inspiration for technological innovation. The field of
biomimetics will soon be more accessible to engineers, as
scientists at the Centre for Biomimetic and Natural
Technologies at the University of Bath in England are
developing a ...
[read more]
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Conversational
Computers
Industrial and academic researchers are attempting to
better understand the elements that constitute speech in order
to make synthesized speech systems capable of sounding more
human; such abilities are essential as computer-generated
voice transactions become commonplace. The most ...
[read more]
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