Dick Tracy runs a series on Piracy. Feel is MPAA inspired. Starts 8-14 and the story is still

HAHA! The chick's name is "Laptop"

Comics Page: Dick Tracy

Suppose a robotic surveyor on Mars has to navigate harsh terrain, looking for rocks that might contain fossils, and then send new photos of them back to Earth—a 10- to 12-minute trip at best. If it were a node on a TCP/IP network, the robot would have to keep a copy of that data in its limited memory banks until it got a confirmation that the data had been received on Earth. Such a notice would take at least 20 minutes to arrive—more if a direct connection weren't available. DTN, on the other hand, would require the surveyor to keep the data only until they were received by the first node—probably a nearby relay satellite.

An interesting article on network protocol design issues in Space. Interestingly, Cerf seems to be backing an alternative that sounds a bit like FidoNet.

I strongly object to the suggestion that IP is going to be easier to secure because security tools are readily available. The last thing you want in space is a worm, and thats exactly what you are going to get if you make it really convenient for people to just plug their everyday laptop into the system and talk to stuff in orbit.

My fear is, however, that IP will win out regardless of being completely unsuited for the task simply because its pervasive and easy.

IP in Space?

The password administration used to configure filters was on the back of the laptops. The students took advantage of it. NOW:

"The information we have received indicates that out of the ~300 boys in grades 9 - 12, 80-100 were involved with the "unauthorized access" and 1 out of every 20 boys in grades 9 to 11 was charged with a felony. This reflects a terrible system failure. The administration needs to admit their responsibility in the breakdown of security and discipline during the rollout of this experimental laptop program."

Young students face felony charges for computer trespass

I don't know which one I'd prefer to show off with... the Bling Ringer or the Laptop Lowrider. Make sure that the next time you take a shower in a hotel or another person's home that they haven't installed an R. Kelly Golden Showerhead.

Gangsta Gadgets

The system melds the best elements of high- and low-tech, combining the immediacy of store rentals with the information and marketing of online services. Customers can see what's available and check for special offers online at Redbox. They can find locations, get maps and driving directions and, through a partnership with Yahoo, link to movie reviews. They can sign up for special offers by e-mail.

But even the digitally clueless won't have trouble finding participating stores. They'll have only to look behind the Playland posters or under the roof banners -- or in some cases the 68-foot inflatable vending machines perched above the golden arches. Think of it as a variation on the giant doughnuts and colossal hot dogs of Googie architecture.

Rentals are primarily the top 40 new releases, cost $1 a night for each (paid by credit card only) and are due by 10 p.m. the following day. If a customer keeps the disc, they are charged $1 a day until the disc is returned or 25 days have passed, when the renter becomes the owner.

Blockbuster could learn something from this late-return policy, however I am curious about what possible financial gain could result from putting $1 on your credit card to pay for them...don't the credit card companies charge ~5% of sales just to tap into their system? Shouldn't cash be encouraged? I'm not entirely sure how it works, however I do know a liquor store that has different prices for cash vs credit purchases.

At any rate, long live laptop DVD players.

-janelane

Wired News: Order Your Big Mac and DVD to Go

] In the wide world of dating, there are many options. Do
] you go for the flashy guy with the smooth smile, or the
] dude in the corner typing away on his laptop? The
] following are reasons why I think my fellow females
] should pay more attention to the quiet geeks and nerds,
] and less attention to the flashy boys.

As a flashy boy, I... oh wait.

Why Geeks and Nerds Are Worth It...

ibenez wrote:
] The more secure a system, the less usable it is.

That is not necessarily a direct relationship.

Closer, and what your example was talking about:

The more secure a system, the less accessable it is.

I have a great secured machine -- poured concrete blocks it from
even being plugged in. Worthless as a computer. I have a fairly
secure machine -- a laptop in a safe deposit box. Value of its
data doesn't change day to day; might as well be one of the stock
certificates stored with it. I have a desktop with a firewall and
a net connection -- every day it becomes just a little bit more
important to me. Straightforward relationship and trade off.

However, researchers have tried to demonstrate that usability is
critical for security -- see "Why Johnny Can't Encrypt" as an
example. Security at the consumer level, at least, which is what
we're talking about in the context of Longhorn. The
value of a consumer-focused system is that which is created
by the user. If the user can't use it for value creation,
the security becomes less significant.

But if the security isn't usable, it won't be used. Why does
everybody use public key cryptography when talking to Amazon, but
not in their email to their family? Usability.

RE: Hack In The Box - Keeping Knowledge Free - www.hackinthebox.org

Brian Greene explains the quintessential example of a "paradigm shift." So don't belittle Einstein by throwing the term around willy-nilly about every Great New Business Idea With A Fabulous Value Proposition.

Physicists call 1905 Einstein's "miracle year" not because of the discovery of relativity alone, but because in that year Einstein achieved the unimaginable, writing four papers that each resulted in deep and formative changes to our understanding of the universe.

With these three papers, our view of space, time and matter was permanently changed.

So the next time you use your cellphone or laptop, pause for a moment. Recognize that even these commonplace devices rely on our greatest, yet most puzzling, scientific achievement and - as things now stand - tap into humankind's most supreme assault on the idea that reality is what we think it is.

One Hundred Years of Uncertainty

Immersion Corporation of San Jose, CA holds 142 US patents, nearly all of which are related to haptic human-computer interfaces.

From a conference call for Immersion shareholders: The case involved Immersion's allegation that Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc. (SCEA) and Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc. (SCEI, the Japanese parent of SCEA) infringed 16 claims in
two of our patents, U.S. Patent Number 6,275,213 and 6,424,333, relating to vibro-tactile technologies. The case was filed on February 11, 2002 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. The case has been pending before United States District Judge Claudia Wilken.

It is worth noting that Microsoft was also named in this case on claims that the Xbox also infringed; they settled out of court.

Here's 6,275,213. It's interesting to note that this isn't even their patent, originally. It was assigned to a company named Virtual Technologies, out of Palo Alto.

Tactile feedback man-machine interface device

Abstract: A man-machine interface which provides tactile feedback to various sensing body parts is disclosed. The device employs one or more vibrotactile units, where each unit comprises a mass and a mass-moving actuator. As the mass is accelerated by the mass-moving actuator, the entire vibrotactile unit vibrates. Thus, the vibrotactile unit transmits a vibratory stimulus to the sensing body part to which it is affixed. The vibrotactile unit may be used in conjunction with a spatial placement sensing device which measures the spatial placement of a measured body part. A computing device uses the spatial placement of the measured body part to determine the desired vibratory stimulus to be provided by the vibrotactile unit. In this manner, the computing device may control the level of vibratory feedback perceived by the corresponding sensing body part in response to the motion of the measured body part. The sensing body part and the measured body part may be separate or the same body part.

U.S. Patent 6,424,333 is a continuation application of prior U.S. application Ser. No. 09/561,782, filed on May 1, 2000 now U.S. Pat. No. 6,275,213, in the name of Marc Tremblay, et al., which is a continuation of prior U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/066,608, filed on Apr. 24, 1998 now U.S. Pat. No. 6,088,017, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/565,102, filed Nov. 30, 1995, abandoned; and all of which are incorporated herein by reference.

From a law.com article in September 2004, here's a description of the alleged infringement:

He said the PlayStation technology in dispute "is a very small subset of vibrations" that occur in a joystick during a small number of events per game.

For example, he said, in "A Bug's Life," the ant in the game must jump first on an acorn, which then turns into a mushroom.

Powers said the vibration in question occurs only when t... [ Read More (1.6k in body) ]

] Mr. Pierce is part of a quiet revolution in music-making:
] the move from professional studios to home recording.
] Making an album used to mean booking a fixed amount of
] very expensive time in a well-equipped but unfamiliar
] room; now, it can be a matter of rolling out of bed and
] pressing a button. Whether it's Mice Parade's indie-rock,
] Aesop Rock's underground hip-hop, the twilit ballads of
] Keren Ann, the mercurial California rock of the Eels or
] sweeping Top 40 contenders from Moby, more and more music
] is emerging not from acoustically perfect
] state-of-the-art studios, but from setups tucked into
] bedrooms and basements or simply programmed onto a
] laptop.

This dynamic also parlays into the vast overabundance of musical content available, and the relatively poor way in which the recording industry has leveraged it.

Home Sweet Studio