Some of the big names in their fields announce changes of opinion including Tim Berners-Lee, Stephen Hawking, and Chris Adnerson of TED. Rob Dunbar talks about ocean acidification. Nicholas Christakis forecasts epidemics from socnet analysis. Problems are being redefined and prioritized. Predictions for next year have begun. New products push the limits of mobility, computation and automation. Weather Waker original scifi can be read on Scribd and Amazon.
Recent links (about forty):
Book reviews:
Cyber War, Richard A. Clarke and Robert K. Knake, 2010
The author discusses govnet, his proposal for private critical infrastructure networks, which the internet architects and privacy advocates were not supportive of. The first third of the book describes the way things are setup and the rest goes into defensive and offensive strategies. The actors are described such as state-run cyber warriors like Russia’s successor to FAPSI, or nationalist hacker groups. Defenses try to promote security by filtering attacks or by disrupting the parts of the network that are required for them to operate. These are non-lethal, but may lead to other types of warfare. There are costs to cyber-crime which demand better counter-measures. There is a speech at the end that sums up the recommendations for a treaty, risk reduction center, and cooperation among victim nations. There are eight chapters and a glossary, but no index. The problems and solutions are ongoing. National servers are used within the cloud framework to protect important data. Countries seek to monitor all types of traffic for security reasons, e.g. Blackberry decryption by India. This becomes sensitive when data may be used for commercial advantage. Other nations may develop their own advancements for private or global networking, such as China’s post-IP efforts.
The Grand Design, Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow, 2010
Philosophy is dead, science makes the discoveries. M-theory is a candidate for a theory of everything. Descartes formulated the concept of rules of nature. Laplace postulated scientific determinism. Brains follow physical causes. Free will is an illusion, yet economics is based on it. Reality is a model and set of rules connected to observations. The book reviews the history of physics, e.g. Feynman, and concludes that the universe is a part of a multiverse, some of which have life, and began from nothing as a quantum event.
Digital Triage Forensics: Processing the Digital Crime Scene, Pearson and Watson, 2010
This process is intended to eliminate the overly busy lab delays between evidence gathering and analysis. It is different from the in-country RCFLs that are also backlogged. It has been used by Weapons Intelligence Teams since 2004 for cell phones and SIM cards which were used as part of tactical operations, activity records for payment, or detonators. Inspection is initially carried out by TALON robot. Photography in the dark avoids white light which may be targeted or interfere with others’ night-vision. Investigator bias is an issue for defense attorneys. The forensics exam consists of preparation, collection, examination, analysis and reporting. A computer BIOS’ clock may be set differently from standard time, so it must be checked and matched by forensic apps. Data on a cellphone can be accessed by other devices over networks or the cloud. There are specialized applications to review, bookmark and copy data from mobile devices and storage cards for investigative reports, e.g. for contacts, messages, call history and content. There is a glossary. Also see mobileforensics.wordpress.com or www.nfstc.org.
Point Omega, Don DeLillo, 2010
The visual mind consists of heat, space, stillness, distance, and time observes the narrator. “We want to be stones in a field” according to the subject of his film about a military analyst named Elster who also says that “The true life is not reducible to words…”. The title derives from their discussion about the evolution of matter and de Chardin’s ideas, a paroxysm, but the subject also desires another war to shape history. They do discuss the meaning of words like rendition. There is a lot of detail about the narrator’s and subject’s impressions of eachother and others. Elster’s daughter visits and the disappearances of she and the caretaker lead to a number of clues including those from his wife. Some disconnected scenes add others. The emotion of foreboding is enhanced by the prologue and epilogue in third person in 2006 where the author describes the viewing, and fateful viewers of, a slow-motion Hitchcock film which he saw several times and was where he got the idea for the novel. The middle four chapters are in first person. This number may be analogous to the stages of matter, humours or seasons referenced in the text. Both narrators discuss concepts of time, words, and film. The settings are NYC and the desert.
automotive
EFuel100, Earth’s First Home Ethanol System, a Product of E-Fuel Corporation
benchmark Kraken JavaScript Benchmark
books
climate
IEEE Spectrum: Pure-form Big Chill Scenario Seems Vindicated
Scientists warn geo-engineering unlikely to curb dramatic sea rise
cloud Strategy Roundtable: 5 Cloud Computing Opportunities for Entrepreneurs
cms Jambok
marketing QR Codes: Are You Ready For Paper-Based Hyperlinks?
metal Neither Pen Nor Pencil: Write Endlessly In Metal | Gadget Lab | Wired.com
mobile
Pew Survey Finds Predictable Trends Among Mobile Phone Users
Internet Founder Tim Berners-Lee Details 4 Concerns About Future of Mobile Web (Nokia World 2010)
multitouch Multi-touch Technologies for Human-Robot Interaction: UMass Lowell Robotics Lab
network 5 Ways Networking is Being Reinvented
ocean YouTube – Rob Dunbar: The threat of ocean acidification
prediction Nicholas Christakis: How social networks predict epidemics | Video on TED.com
robotics
The HRP-4 humanoid robot unveiled
Honda’s Exoskeletons Help You Walk Like Asimo (video) | Singularity Hub
science Chinese science and technology has long way to go, says Russian expert
security
E-Evidence Information Center – Home
Briggs Softworks: Directory Snoop – File Recovery and Wiping Software for Windows
simulation How galaxies are born inside computers
social-media Seven Important Social Media Trends For The Next Year
software Dr Dobbs – Google Relaunches Instantiations Developer Tools; Now Available for Free
surveillance Technology Review: Blogs: TR Editors’ blog: Intel Outlines An Era of Friendly Surveillance
test
Dr Dobbs – Code Coverage, Performance Profiling Tools Released
transportation What happens when you leave a skateboard and a tank alone in a dimly lit room? (video) — Engadget
video YouTube – Chris Anderson: How web video powers global innovation
wearable Looxcie Wearable Camcorder: Capture Unexpected Moments
