Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the July 2, 2003 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for IT professionals three times a week. For instructions on how to unsubscribe from this service, please see below. ACM's MemberNet is now online. For the latest on ACM activities, member benefits, and industry issues, visit http://www.acm.org/membernet Remember to check out our hot new online essay and opinion magazine, Ubiquity, at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ACM TechNews Volume 5, Number 515 Date: July 2, 2003 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Site Sponsored by Hewlett Packard Company ( ) HP is the premier source for computing services, products and solutions. Responding to customers' requirements for quality and reliability at aggressive prices, HP offers performance-packed products and comprehensive services. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Top Stories for Wednesday, July 2, 2003: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "Multiple Attack Only Hope in Spam Battle" "Pentagon Project Could Keep Close Eye on Cities" "New Law Requires Customer Notification of Data Theft" "Giving Sharers Ears Without Faces" "Heat Becomes Computing's Hottest Topic" "High-Tech Leads Improvement in U.S. Job Market" "Computer Vision Links How Brain Recognizes Faces, Moods" "New Tech Feeds Spectrum Debate" "Debate Rages Over Need for IT Union" "Engineer's Focus: Accessible Technology for All" "USC Researchers Build Machine Translation System--and More--for Hindi in Less Than a Month" "Computers Are Getting Better at Poker" "'Hotspots,' Cold Feet" "Just a Walk in the PARC--33 Years On" "Grokking the Infoviz" "Future Watch: Taming Data Complexity" "6 Myths" "The New Science of Networks" "Interactions in Education: A Conversation With Brenda Laurel" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Multiple Attack Only Hope in Spam Battle" The problem of rapidly growing spam can only be defeated through a multi-pronged strategy, one that combines new technology, new legislation, and user awareness, according to speakers at Britain's first-ever "spam summit" on July 1. U.K. e-commerce ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item1 "Pentagon Project Could Keep Close Eye on Cities" The Pentagon's Combat Zones That See (CTS) project aims to safeguard U.S. troops and enhance battle tactics through a combination of computers and surveillance cameras set up to monitor and study each vehicle moving throughout foreign urban ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item2 "New Law Requires Customer Notification of Data Theft" A new California law is now in effect requiring any company, nonprofit organization, or government agency that even suspects its network has been hacked to immediately inform California-based customers that their personal data may have been ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item3 "Giving Sharers Ears Without Faces" Tools that claim to keep file-sharers anonymous are drawing more attention in the wake of recent lawsuits filed by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) that target individual peer-to-peer network subscribers for allegedly pirating ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item4 "Heat Becomes Computing's Hottest Topic" As semiconductors become more powerful, they also generate more heat and devour more electricity. Increasing heat output can wear chips down faster, while installing cooling systems to deal with the heat can make computing more expensive and complicated. ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item5 "High-Tech Leads Improvement in U.S. Job Market" The high-tech job attrition rate experienced a 13 percent decline between May and June, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas. High-tech job losses were 37 percent lower in June 2003 compared to June 2002, while layoffs fell by 53 percent between April 2003 ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item6 "Computer Vision Links How Brain Recognizes Faces, Moods" Ohio State University researcher Aleix Martinez has developed a computer model that could form the basis for systems that identify authorized users facially via video camera. The computer model is in turn based on a model Martinez worked out on ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item7 "New Tech Feeds Spectrum Debate" The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is developing a cognitive radio technology under its NeXt Generation (XG) Communications Program that could help resolve the debate concerning the best way to allocate wireless spectrum, which is ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item8 "Debate Rages Over Need for IT Union" American IT workers are divided over whether they should unionize, with some saying the industry has irrevocably shifted to cheaper foreign labor and others warning against social stigmas to unionization. Search400.com found in an exclusive ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item9 "Engineer's Focus: Accessible Technology for All" IBM software engineer T.V. Raman, who lost his eyesight to glaucoma in his adolescence, specializes in developing speech technology that is accessible to everyone, not just the disabled. His objective is to create standards for next-generation Web ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item10 "USC Researchers Build Machine Translation System--and More--for Hindi in Less Than a Month" The University of Southern California's Information Sciences Institute (ISI), along with 11 other participating institutions, developed a system that can translate Hindi text into English in 29 days under the aegis of the Defense Advanced Research Projects ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item11 "Computers Are Getting Better at Poker" A research team at Canada's University of Alberta has labored for over a decade to produce a poker-playing computer program, the ultimate goal being one that can beat world-class poker players. Although this objective has yet to be met, the project's latest ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item12 "'Hotspots,' Cold Feet" Analysts warn that the current build-out of Wi-Fi "hotspots" nationwide is leading to a dot-com-like bubble. Many experts see Wi-Fi's promise of providing high-speed, wireless Internet access to millions of mobile users as a key driver to the next stage of ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item13 "Just a Walk in the PARC--33 Years On" The Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) is celebrating its 33rd year, a distinguished history marked by innovation. Ethernet, the personal computer, and the graphical user interface were all invented or refined at PARC, spawning commercial successes such ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item14 "Grokking the Infoviz" Information visualization (infoviz) technology, which is gearing up to penetrate the mass market, is supposed to provide a next-generation user interface superior to the conventional desktop interface by allowing corporate, online, and PC-stored ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item15 "Future Watch: Taming Data Complexity" Carnegie Mellon spin-off Maya Design offers a way to make information in relational databases available to users as they need it. The concept uses data "containers" called u-forms to package information in a pure form, with optional metadata ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item16 "6 Myths" InformationWeek's John Foley and Chris Murphy address six critical misconceptions about the current state of business IT. IT commoditization is not a sign of business technology's declining strategic value: Harris CTO Richard Plane says that ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item17 "The New Science of Networks" The fundamental component of many networks, including social networks, is the "small-world" network, in which each node is no more than six degrees of separation away from any other node, writes consultant Jim Herman. Herman says this is because ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item18 "Interactions in Education: A Conversation With Brenda Laurel" Human Computer Interaction (HCI) expert Brenda Laurel, chair of the Art Center College of Design's Media Design Program, believes HCI can play an essential role in higher education, but such programs should follow a specific philosophy. Central to this ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0702w.html#item19 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review Monday's issue, please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/0630m.html -- To visit the TechNews home page, point your browser to: http://www.acm.org/technews/ -- To unsubscribe from the ACM TechNews Early Alert Service: Please send a separate email to listserv@listserv2.acm.org with the line signoff technews in the body of your message. -- Please note that replying directly to this message does not automatically unsubscribe you from the TechNews list. -- To submit feedback about ACM TechNews, contact: technews@hq.acm.org -- ACM may have a different email address on file for you, so if you're unable to "unsubscribe" yourself, please direct your request to: technews-request@acm.org We will remove your name from the TechNews list on your behalf. -- For help with technical problems, including problems with leaving the list, please write to: technews-request@acm.org