Dear ACM TechNews Subscriber: Welcome to the December 15, 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 583 Date: December 15, 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 Monday, December 15, 2003: http://www.acm.org/technews/current/homepage.html "Criticism of Electronic Voting Machines' Security Is Mounting" "In India, a High-Tech Outpost for U.S. Patents" "NASA Takes the Internet Into Space" "Renovating E-Mail With Identity in Mind" "High Tech's Government Dilemma" "China Tries to Establish Homegrown Tech Rules" "Will Open Source Be Forced to Go Proprietary?" "A New Standard for Fabric Intelligence" "Electronic Voting No Magic Bullet" "World ICT Rankings: US Stays at Top, UK Falls to 15th" "Cluster Crunchers Take the Biscuit" "Hard Disks Go Home" "Beyond Wi-Fi: A New Wireless Age" "How Will Web Services Ultimately Change Business?" "Seeing the Road Ahead" "Contagious Media" "More Than Videoconferencing" ******************* News Stories *********************** "Criticism of Electronic Voting Machines' Security Is Mounting" Controversy continues to simmer over how secure direct recording electronic (DRE) voting machines currently being deployed or planned for deployment in various U.S. states are. Spurring these installations is the Help America Vote Act of 2002, in ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item1 "In India, a High-Tech Outpost for U.S. Patents" U.S. technology companies are increasingly investing in Indian research and development operations, with the total number of internationally employed engineers in India expected to double in the next 18 months, according to personnel experts. As thousands ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item2 "NASA Takes the Internet Into Space" One of the experiments carried out on the ill-fated Columbia mission in early 2003 could pave the way for Internet communications in space: The Communications and Navigation Demonstration on Shuttle (CANDOS) project employed a low-power ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item3 "Renovating E-Mail With Identity in Mind" Internet firms are beginning to coalesce around a technical solution to spam that would involve setting up an identity verification scheme, possibly tied to a reputation rating. Yahoo! recently proposed a system called DomainKeys that would ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item4 "High Tech's Government Dilemma" Michael Kanellos writes that a dichotomy about the government is pervading the high-tech community: Some technologists and CEOs view federal legislators as bunglers who ruin innovation and promising new technologies because of their failure to understand ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item5 "China Tries to Establish Homegrown Tech Rules" China is attempting to break away from its reliance on Western technology standards--and the royalties Chinese companies must pay--by establishing domestic tech specifications in diverse areas, much to the chagrin of American and other Western ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item6 "Will Open Source Be Forced to Go Proprietary?" Open-source's mainstream adoption requires interoperability with proprietary applications, and such a development is taking place; as this trend continues, there are worries that open source could be forced to abandon its openness in response to competitive ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item7 "A New Standard for Fabric Intelligence" The multi-vendor fabric application interface standard (FAIS) promises to allow enhanced storage services that are simple to manage from the user's standpoint. Virtualization and other services using FAIS hide complexity from the user and embed ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item8 "Electronic Voting No Magic Bullet" Election officials are encountering flaws in high-tech electronic voting equipment, even though many have supported e-voting as a way to get past the voting debacle of the 2000 presidential election. With problems occurring this year in California, ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item9 "World ICT Rankings: US Stays at Top, UK Falls to 15th" The World Economic Forum's Global Information Technology Report assesses the impact of information and communications technologies on economies around the world, and its Networked Readiness Index measures how prepared each economy is to benefit ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item10 "Cluster Crunchers Take the Biscuit" According to the latest supercomputing TOP500 speed chart, NEC's Earth Simulator in Japan--a dedicated machine used to simulate climate with unmatched detail--is the most powerful supercomputer on the planet. But just two places below the Earth Simulator is ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item11 "Hard Disks Go Home" Consumer electronic devices that accommodate hard disks are experiencing rapid growth: InStat/MDR estimates that about 9 million such units were sold last year, with almost 90 million expected to be sold by 2007. The increasing appropriateness of ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item12 "Beyond Wi-Fi: A New Wireless Age" Intelligent network technologies under development at academic, corporate, and military research facilities aim to improve the range, efficiency, and services of Wi-Fi and allow wireless innovators to access the mostly vacant radio spectrum they need ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item13 "How Will Web Services Ultimately Change Business?" Web services will not only allow computer systems to share a common language, but also enable them to create solutions independent of humans: This ability promises to change how companies operate in ways unforeseen today, almost certainly ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item14 "Seeing the Road Ahead" Road safety could be dramatically improved with in-vehicle augmented reality (AR) systems that keep motorists aware of road conditions and other vehicle positions despite poor visibility, and an Australian-designed prototype system promises such ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item15 "Contagious Media" John Patrick claims that blogs can reinvigorate corporate knowledge management with their potential to "deliver the grassroots discussions and knowledge-sharing that top-down, corporate-sponsored efforts never could." The Attitude president ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item16 "More Than Videoconferencing" Hewlett-Packard Labs research fellow Norm Jouppi is developing the Surrogate, a remote-controlled robotic technology designed as an alternative to videoconferencing that could have further applications outside a conference environment. The ... http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1215m.html#item17 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- To review the Friday's issue, please visit http://www.acm.org/technews/articles/2003-5/1212f.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