Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the October 24, 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 562 Date: October 24, 2003 Top Stories for Friday, October 24, 2003: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "Senate Votes 97-0 to Restrict E-Mail Ads" "Plumbing Depths of Data Mining" "Carnegie Mellon to Launch New Initiative to Ensure Cybersecurity" "Usability Studies Take Field" "Is the Age of Desktop Linux Approaching?" "Smart Servers as Watchdogs for Trouble on the Web" "CSIRO's Future Web Beats MP3s" "Spammers Clog Up the Blogs" "Ex-Cybersecurity Czar Clarke Issues Gloomy Report Card" "Body Network Gains Speed" "Slipping Into a New Shell" "Robot Skin Stretches to the Task" "Managing the Data Handbag" "Nanotechnology Could Play Big Role in Fighting Terror" "Xerox's Tech Revolution" "What Users Want From Linux" "3D TV As You've Never Seen It" "Jobless Recovery" "Pretenders to Power" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Senate Votes 97-0 to Restrict E-Mail Ads" The Senate yesterday unanimously passed an anti-spam bill from Sens. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), after amendments were made that clear the way for the establishment of a national no-spam registry similar to the do-not-call list. The ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item1 "Plumbing Depths of Data Mining" A panel of legislators, civil libertarians, researchers, and others gathered in Washington, D.C., by the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies on Oct. 21 failed to reach an accord on the best strategy for employing data-mining technology to uphold the ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item2 "Carnegie Mellon to Launch New Initiative to Ensure Cybersecurity" The expertise of over 50 researchers and 80 students from Carnegie Mellon University's College of Engineering, School of Computer Science, H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management, and the CERT Coordination Center will be combined ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item3 "Usability Studies Take Field" Usability engineering, a field dedicated to the improvement of human-machine interfaces through analysis of Web design, software-interface design, ergonomics, and other factors, is a major area of study at the University of Washington. The field ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item4 "Is the Age of Desktop Linux Approaching?" Linux advocates and vendors at the Enterprise Linux Forum Conference and Expo on Oct. 22 said that Linux will not end Microsoft Windows' domination of the desktop with a single stroke. "The question is, how do we get from 1 percent to 2 ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item5 "Smart Servers as Watchdogs for Trouble on the Web" An upgraded Internet that can detect worms, traffic bottlenecks, and other network problems before they become serious may one day be within reach thanks to the efforts of PlanetLab, an academic-industrial consortium that has created a virtual testbed ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item6 "CSIRO's Future Web Beats MP3s" The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) of Australia is using open-source media codecs as part of its Continuous Media Web project, aimed at allowing Web users to access media segments directly instead of as a whole. Using the ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item7 "Spammers Clog Up the Blogs" A recent spate of aggressive spamming on Weblogs (blogs) has raised questions about what tradeoffs bloggers may be willing to accept to rid their sites of this growing nuisance, and what strategies they can employ to stave it off. Blog-spamming often ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item8 "Ex-Cybersecurity Czar Clarke Issues Gloomy Report Card" Former White House cybersecurity czar Richard Clarke recently warned that the severity and frequency of cyberattacks will continue to increase exponentially. Speaking at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2003, Clarke said a confluence of trends have ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item9 "Body Network Gains Speed" The ElectAura-Net prototype developed by researchers at Japan's NTT Docomo Multimedia Labs and NTT Microsystem Integration Labs is a wireless indoor Ethernet network that harnesses the bioelectric field of the human body to transmit data at 10 Mbps. ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item10 "Slipping Into a New Shell" Computer enthusiasts throughout Europe, Asia, and the United States are finding new ways to combine functionality and aesthetics by building stealth computers, in which their system hardware is bundled into plush toys, lampshades, and other ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item11 "Robot Skin Stretches to the Task" Princeton University electrical engineers Sigurd Wagner and Stephanie Lacour plan to unveil an elastic, conducting skin for robots during next week's robot conference in Las Vegas, Nev. Developing skin for robots that stretches has proven to be ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item12 "Managing the Data Handbag" Data storage systems are akin to handbags: The larger they are, the more things people find to fill them. Research firm International Data (IDC) says storage capacity in Australia will grow by 43.6 percent this year, reaching 14,480 TB in size; by ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item13 "Nanotechnology Could Play Big Role in Fighting Terror" Nanotechnology researcher Mark Ratner and his son, tech entrepreneur Dan Ratner, have co-authored a book detailing how nanotech will be an important component of U.S. homeland security. Dan Ratner expects the first anti-terror nanotech ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item14 "Xerox's Tech Revolution" Xerox researchers recently gathered in San Francisco to show off potentially revolutionary technologies under development. Xerox wants to boost the page output of printers by a factor of 10 using wax-based inks, and is investigating how a ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item15 "What Users Want From Linux" Discussions with over a dozen network professionals and Linux enthusiasts has yielded a 10-item list of the open-source operating system's most desired features. The most sought-after feature is tools that can automatically monitor and coordinate ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item16 "3D TV As You've Never Seen It" 3D technology has generated periodic interest without enjoying solid mainstream success, but over 120 computer and electronics companies are banking on the hope that the technology has at last begun to mature by forming a consortium dedicated to moving 3D ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item17 "Jobless Recovery" The IT sector has not added any new jobs in 2003, according to data aggregated over nine months by the U.S. Census Bureau, using eight business-technology job categories instead of the traditional three. The average monthly IT jobless rate is 5.8 ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item18 "Pretenders to Power" Fuel cells are unproven as a commercial technology despite their promise to replace lithium batteries, but initial fuel-cell rollouts from Motorola, Smart Fuel Cell, and others in 2004 could help spur the battery-to-fuel-cell transition if technical, ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1024f.html#item19 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review Wednesday's issue, please please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1022w.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