Google Wave

Not nearly as cool as they think it is, but still one of those "finally!" moments for the internet.

http://wave.google.com/help/wave/closed.html

The world is ending!

The world seems to be going completely crazy, as evidenced by the following:

Reason 1: GMail is experiencing a complete outage, including POP and IMAP servers. Fucking weak.

Reason 2: Alberto Gonzales agrees with the investigation into abuse of prisoners by US personnel.

Reason 3: I was accepted into The New School's MS in Economics program.

Apple versus Microsoft.

I can't sleep, so naturally I am splitting time between television and videos on the Internet. I laughed out loud quite a few times watching this ad for a new smartphone that "runs Windows Vista and connects to the Internet through AOL!":


In the interest of a small amount of fairness:

Improved technology.

A new method of storing bicycles (I am not sure this will ever become widespread because of: 1. Complications related to the use of underground space in large cities; and, 2. The negative environmental impact associated with the use of the motors in the parking unit, which offsets at least part of the benefits of riding a bicycle.):


Improved delivery of ketchup and mustard:

Alice in Wonderland.

Check out these pictures of the Mad Hatter, the Red Queen, and the White Queen from Tim Burton's upcoming interpretation of Alice in Wonderland. The characters are played by Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, and Anne Hathaway, respectively. (Images taken from HuffPo.)

I am worried that this movie will be disappointing in the same way that Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was, but I have to admit that these images give me some hope. Between these visuals and the fact that the film will be shown in 3-D I will likely end up going to see this in theaters despite my reservations. Does anyone know anything else about this project? Any early reviews of the script and casting?

Video dump.

Rather than a bunch of annoying little posts I have decided to bug you with only one longer one filled with short videos.

Fenway cameraman tells you about his camera and shows you how it is controlled:

Fenway HD Camera - Sony HDC-910 - Canon 75x from Tom Guilmette on Vimeo.

The da Vinci surgical system:


Escalator spinning:


The walking table:


LSD tested on a British army group:

The biggest drawing in the world.

Eric Nordenanker decided to draw the biggest drawing in the world by sketching a self-portrait on a world map and then paying DHL to fly a GPS tracking device around the world to these locations. But, you may be saying, what about those ridiculous loops in the middle of the ocean? Well, for any points that were un-named Nordenanker provided DHL with the latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates. Check out the list of locations here (.pdf). The continuous line of the drawing "[...] passed through 6 continents and 62 countries, thus becoming 110664 km long." (To save you the trouble: 110,664km= 68,763.4216 miles (according to Google's conversion mechanism).)

The video that first introduced me to this project:

Biggest Drawing in the World - Click here for the funniest movie of the week

And you think Twittering is rude???

No longer will our lawmakers be obliged to voice complaints through text alone as they listen to the president! In the future these oppressed people will be allowed to use their voices without even having to physically talk. National Instruments is working on the device in the above video, which intercepts signals sent from the brain to the vocal chords and translates these electrical signals into speech. The system currently has only 150 recognized words, but the creators compare this limited vocabulary to early speech-recognition systems. Current applications focus on those who have lost the ability to speak naturally (e.g. those with severe ALS), but someday soon let's hope that our lawmakers will be able to bitch publicly before the president even finishes speaking! Think of the possibilities: Boehner could criticize Barack via Twitter while having a call-in conversation with Hannity about how poor the speech is without ever moving his lips!

Maybe the bright side of this is that soon lawmakers will wear their collars more publicly, perhaps exposing some of the currently-hidden leashes that so dramitcally impact legislation.

Stupid people.

• Sony Pictures Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton announced that Internet is pure evil. More specifically he said, “I’m a guy who doesn’t see anything good having come from the Internet. Period.”
• Florida prison guards, in an apparent effort to keep the retirees happy and the children docile, stun-gunned 43 children last week during ''Take Your Sons and Daughters to Work Day.'' Three prisons stun-gunned children while another facility chose to tear-gas them instead. Three firings, two resignations, and sixteen disciplinary actions have resulted so far.
• The National Inquirer is stopping to (possibly?) new lows. A freelance writer working for The Inquirer checked Brooke Shield’s demented mother out of her nursing home and drove her around hoping to prompt the confused woman to tell a juicy secret of her daughter’s.
• Two Yellowstone Park workers were fired after a web cam caught them peeing into a geyser. They also face charges.

A copycat science Friday

Thank you, Chris, for giving me an excuse to get rid of some of the tabs I have had open for the last week. Here are some of the most interesting science articles (and one video) that I have found recently. Though each is summarized, I do recommend you check out the articles because in some cases I have had to drastically simplify, or as in the case of the camera and the video, completely omit a meaningful explanation of the achievement.

Lip-reading computer: Scientists at the University of East Anglia in Norwich (UK) have developed a lip-reading computer that can automatically transcribe and translate silent videos of people speaking in a number of languages. One potentially important use for this computer is as an aide to police investigating crimes caught on silent CCTV cameras.
Quantum computers (and hackers!): Quantum computers and encryption are very slowly coming into use in the real world (the results of the State of Geneva election were secured using a quantum system), and (academic) hackers are doing a pretty damn good job keeping pace.
The world’s fastest camera: “[The] camera snaps images less than a half a billionth of a second long, capturing over six million of them in a second continuously.” Enough said.
Wolfram Alpha: Unfortunately this is not a person’s name (the developer’s name is Stephen Wolfram), but rather a web tool designed to answer questions that are asked in modern English. In Wolfram’s words, "Like interacting with an expert, it will understand what you're talking about, do the computation, and then present you with the results.”
”Anatomy of a crash”: In its efforts to improve the safety of the Ford Falcon, Ford engineers decided that to make the (economically, not absolutely) safest possible car they needed to first research crashes in more detail. Their results show, in milliseconds, the general progression of a car crash. Scroll to the bottom for the breakdown.
Dr. Quantum explains the double-slit experiment: This video is a great introduction to the basis of quantum theory, and goes into great detail explaining this experiment, which I can't even begin to summarize here.

Racecar-Driving Swedish Anti-Terrorist-Unit Busted!

[Credit for this story goes to my younger brother, Leland.] I have not finished this whole story, but it starts with the above well-known wreck of a Ferarri Enzo on the Pacific Coast Highway (check out the Wrecked Exotics page dedicated to this crash) and (so far) involves:

• Gizmondo, a failure of a videogame company;
• A bus company police force calling itself the San Gabriel Valley Transit Authority and worked on counter-terrorism;
• Illegal gun purchases;
• Illegal car importantion;
• A mystery man named Dietrich;
  
• etc.

I have no idea how this story will end, but I think it will be worthwhile to get to the end. The story somewhat reminds me of the identity theft article that was posted a while ago.

"Do We Need a New Internet?"

Not quite sure what to say about this, mostly because I know nothing about internet security. I don't like the idea of trading privacy for safety (in any context), but maybe I should be more worried about security in this case...?

Free online backup program

Once I find a new job I plan on buying a new computer shortly thereafter, allowing me to convert my current computer into my backup external hard drive. Until that time I am stuck debating about how to best back up my information without spending a bunch of money. A few days ago I found a program named Dropbox that offers 2GB of free online storage and syncs your information automatically. I currently have Dropbox syncing my pictures, documents, and desktop and still have quite a large percentage of my space remaining. Oh, and Dropbox syncs across different platforms and multiple computers. Also, you can access it via the online interface if you are on an unlinked computer.

There are a two major drawbacks:

1. Space- 2GB really is not that much space. For $100 per year you can have 50GB, but I think if I were paying that much I would expect significantly more storage space and would end up looking for a different program.
   
2. Currently the program only backs up files that you actually move to the Dropbox folder on your hard drive. There was no way in hell I was rearranging my file structure for this so I looked for a workaround. What I found is that by using symbolic links you can trick Dropbox into syncing other folders and files. The Dropbox Wiki has a writeup of how to sync folders and files outside of the Dropbox folder using symbolic links. Mac users should check out the section "OS X Specific: Automator," which provides a very simple way of doing this. If you are on a PC I wish you luck in your efforts to make this happen.
   

Articles!

A quick article dump to start the day’s blogging activities.

”Sarah Palin's $159,050 Conflict of Interest” - Todd Palin is currently racing a “snow machine” 1,971 miles across Alaska, during which his “Arctic Cat's powerful two-stroke engine will emit the same amount of hydrocarbons as an automobile driving from Chicago to San Francisco and back 150 times.” Fantastic. And it only gets trashier and more polluting. First, the pollution: “[During the race] Todd Palin will release as many cancer-causing and smog-forming pollutants as a Chevy Malibu driven around the Earth at its equator 28 times.” Now, the conflict of interest: the race is sponsored by “[…] the petroleum giants Tesoro and Conoco-Phillips; State Farm, Wells Fargo, Frontier Airlines, Alaska Airlines and the Alaska First National Bank.” You may be saying, “But you are not being fair. Maybe the Palins do not get a shady benefit from this.” Well, Todd is an annual competitor (seemingly surprising for a race with a field of 40 people willing to do this kind of evil to the environment) who has only one four times. “Once after Sarah was elected to the Wasilla City Council, once after she was elected mayor, the year she was appointed to the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission, and the year she was elected governor.” Okay, okay, maybe I jumped the gun. Sorry for trying to shame such an upstanding family.

“Video Games Are Good For Children – EU Report” - Nothing too surprising here, but it is nice to have confirmation of something I believe: An EU panel determined that "’video games can stimulate learning of facts and skills such as strategic thinking, creativity, cooperation and innovative thinking, which are important skills in the information society.’" Yay! An excuse to play more video games!

Unemployment as stimulus -
“A Novel Approach: Using Unemployment Benefits as a Means for Stimulus” – An interesting plan to maximize the benefits created by unemployment payments: instead of paying out cash to an unemployed person for a set amount of time provide that person with a voucher that subsidizes them as an employee. For example, assume Mr. Doe is unemployed and receives $200 each week in unemployment payments ant that were anyone to hire Mr. Doe it would cost that firm $500 each week, a (made-up) prohibitive amount. The likely outcome here is that he remains unemployed. But if Mr. Doe can suddenly walk into an interview and say, “Instead of costing you $500 each week I will only cost you $300 each week and the money that would have been my unemployment check is now paying the other $200 of the salary.” Obviously this has limitations (e.g. what happens when Mr. Doe’s salary is no longer subsidized?), but in the short term this plan creates a greater overall income, implying a greater overall level of consumption, for the same government investment. At the same time it increases the overall production level of the economy.

“Big Satellites Collide 500 Miles Over Siberia” – This story seems pretty ridiculous at first, though it does highlight the very real concern of the volume of junk orbiting Earth. Apparently a non-functional Russian satellite launched in 1993 and described as “[…] out of control” crashed into a commercial satellite launched in 1997, creating thousands of particles that will now orbit Earth waiting to smash into other man-made satellites. I can’t help but think of this as a case of modern space zombies in which each zombie (read: smashed satellite) spends the rest of its time trying to create more zombies (read: smash other satellites). For perspective on the dangers we are facing from orbiting junk only fifty-two years into man’s era of sending crap into space: “[…] orbital debris is now the biggest threat to a space shuttle in flight, surpassing the dangers of liftoff and return to Earth.” I will now officially swear off space flight until we have orbiting Roombas keeping me safe.

“Letting Scientists Off the Leash” - This is an interesting article written by a researcher at Stanford University who discusses the flaws in the way money for research is distributed. His main point is that the typically conservative review boards that approve funding for grant proposals do not fund very imaginative or risky research. This leads to a situation where most of the ideas we are pursuing are those that we are already sure we can turn into a profit, not those that could have a substantially larger impact but at the same time carry larger risks (in that they are more likely than the boring projects to have an outcome different from that discussed when the grant was proposed). I don’t know too much about this, but I do support the idea of devising a more efficient means of identifying and funding riskier and more creative research.

The computer future

Chris' technology problems (as described in the "I like watching news as it happens" post) actually led me to an interesting question: will the average person of our generation ever choose to buy a desktop again?

As far as I can determine desktops offer no significant advantage to the vast majority of what I'll call our generation (loosely defining "our generation" to mean anyone who remembers the Internet explosion but who is too young to remember the introduction of Atari). Competitive hard drives, video cards, optical disc drives, memory sticks, and ethernet connections already exist for laptops. And as solid-state drives (a.k.a. big flash drives) become more competitive the price of hard-disk drives should fall even further than it has already.

Granted there exists a small, and possibly growing (?), population of users interested in high-end functionality (e.g. memory-intensive gaming, video editing, audio recording, etc.). These people will always desire the newest technology (as a technological difference in something like video editing capabilities can create wildly different end products), which is usually pretty bulky and cannot be fit immediately into a laptop, so they will usually require a desktop. Basically those in industries that pioneer the usage of new technologies will be chained to desktops, but I cannot imagine a situation in which a laptop with a docking station (including a full-size keyboard, mouse, and monitor) would be insufficient for a typical young computer user.

To take this argument one step further: I imagine that over time cheap, streamlined laptops (e.g. netbooks) with only a handful of features (e.g. web-browsing and text editing) will gain a huge foothold in the US market for computers (I don't have enough experience or knowledge to speculate outside my home country).

In my efforts to prove that I will someday be correct I ended up checking out Amazon's "most popular items in Laptop Computers." When I checked the list (updated hourly) thirteen of the top twenty-five most popular items were netbooks. The top four items are netbooks, and only one laptop was able to crack the top ten. Apparently netbooks, "[...] now account for 7 percent of all portable PCs [...]," a proportion much higher than I thought it would be.

A few quick links.

Let's get the blogging week started with a few interesting pages to check out:

• Nate Silver's writeup of "So Just Who Did Vote For The Bailout?" - A lot of interesting stuff in this one, including a statistical analysis of factors contributing to voting patterns on the first bailout bill last year and a brief discussion of the implications of writing one's own definitions of terms like Progressive.
• The Daily Beast - "The Best of Blago" - He is not only crazy; he has the ability to take legitimate literary quotations and warp them to suit his purposes. Wonderful spin, Rod.
• Bit.ly - An alternative to the Tiny URL service, Bit.ly has all of the same features, but is also copying (in their entirety), cataloging, and organizing all sites that users create shortened URLs for. It will take a while or the benefits to pan out (beyond the link-shortening, that is), but it should be interesting to see what researchers can pull off with that amount of information.
• Red Bull Snowscrapers - On February 5 a bunch of professional snowboarders will be jumping off a 90' ramp built in East River Park. Carly and I drove past this last week and saw the main ramp being built. The ramp is pretty cool, with the main support being provided by stacked shipping containers (see photo below). I kind of want to figure out a way to see this from afar so I don't have to hang out with a bunch of snowboarders to see one person jump this. Check out this site for more pictures of the actual ramps.
  

• Update: I also meant to include the fact that Texas dealt a blow to creationism in a recent schoolboard ruling.
  

It's not that easy being green...

Environmental Working Group just released a report on the efficiency and green-ness of CFL light bulbs. As it turns out many CFLs are not as great as the companies producing them may argue. Skipping the boring stuff, here is EWG's list of the seven best CFLs. There are also some tips for cleaning up broken CFLs, which contain mercury and are therefore poisonous.

CNN to compile massive 3D photo of inauguration

"The most recorded moment in human history"

Interesting Article on Fatal Internet Security Flaw

One can only imagine how much time hacker-types spend fantasizing about everything from wizards to French maids. But imagine being a hacker who found a way to more-or-less take control of the entire internet. One who found a flaw so critical, so fundamental, he could easily get into the email and back account of anyone he wanted, to redirect any internet request as he saw fit.

This is the story of Dan Kaminsky.

Netflix gets more awesome

OK, so I know that the Xbox 360 is not likely to be common hardware among our crowd, but I figured I'd share this nonetheless. When I got on mine the other day (I'm not a big video game player, but I got it on the cheap) I noticed that Xbox Live was doing a cross-promotion thing with Netflix.

So basically the way it works is the movies available for "Instant Watch" I can now watch on the Xbox. I'm excited about this because while instant watch is available for your computer, connecting mine to the TV is kind of a pain, and so I don't really make much of use of it.

The downside: not that many titles are available yet and I did have to buy an Xbox Gold membership ($50 a year allows you to play online - a ripoff, sure, but hey, now I can play Netflix movies and I can play sports games with my friends). And one other thing, which is kind of stupid but mostly hilarious: Mark informs me that Sony Pictures titles are not available for viewing through the Xbox.