Urchin writes "The quality of sunlight varies depending on where you live, but off-the-shelf solar cells are all identical. A new solar cell designed by UK firm Quantasol is easily tuned to adapt to the local light conditions, which boosts its long-term performance. Its short-term performance isn't bad though — the single junction solar cell has a peak efficiency greater than any previous device, beating a world record that's stood for 21 years."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Urchin writes "The quality of sunlight varies depending on where you live, but off the shelf solar cells are all identical. A new solar cell designed by UK firm Quantasol is easily tuned to adapt to the local light conditions, which boosts it's long term performance. It's short-term performance isn't bad though — the single junction solar cell has a peak efficiency greater than any previous device, beating a world record that's stood for 21 years."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

This is the second post in a series of posts looking at the question of intellectual property rights in both China and India. We'll be adding new posts to this series each week for the next few weeks.

To fully understand why increased intellectual property in China and India is unnecessary and objectionable, it helps to understand the relationship intellectual property has with economic development. Historically, intellectual property has generally increased with economic development, but the relationship is not straightforward. Although there is no reliable cross-country index of intellectual property policy, in large part due to the difficulty of quantifying concepts like enforcement quality, some trends are discernable. When a country is poor, IP is unnecessary for a host of reasons, not the least of which is the limited access to productivity enhancing technologies that intellectual property brings and the domestic inability to innovate in a commercially viable manner. But instead of constantly increasing with wealth, IP actually falls with an initial increase in wealth before dramaticaly growing (Maskus 2000). As a country develops, it obtains imitative abilities that make legal prohibition on copying foreign technologies an artificial obstruction to economic growth. However, with further global integration and increased domestic innovative capabilities, patent protection tends to increase. However, China and India have both realized that their relative poverty makes access to technology a more pressing concern, justifying relaxed IP standards.

India's On-Again, Off-Again Relationship With Intellectual Property

India' colonial status brought with it patent legislation, so by 1911 India's IP regime conformed with developed world status (Graff 2007). However, seeking to develop a domestic pharmaceutical industry, in 1970, India abolished patents on pharmaceutical products. This allowed domestic firms to imitate and adapt foreign therapeutic inventions. The policy was a success: the 2,237 licensed drug manufacturers in 1969-1970 grew to 16,000 by 1991-1993, production of drugs grew at an average rate of 14.4% per year from 1980 to 1993, India became a net exporter of pharmaceutical products, and the market share of foreign multinational corporations (MNCs) dropped from 80-90% to 40% (Fink 2005). In 1995, six of the top ten pharmaceutical firms in India were domestic, and employment in the sector had reached half a million people (Lanjouw 1997).

However, to gain access to the global market enabled by the World Trade Organization, India had to ratify the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), the most influential treaty on global intellectual property. Doing so included introducing full product patents on pharmaceutical innovations, extending all patents from 5-14 years to 20 years, and accepting limitations on compulsory licensing (Abramson 2007). Observers noted that this was likely to lead to a loss of consumer surplus (Chaudhuri et al.). However, the government agreed against its wishes to TRIPs for the additional benefits of WTO membership (Lanjouw 1997). Under TRIPs regulations, patenting has accelerated in India (Dahlman 2005).

China As The Late Bloomer

China was a latecomer to intellectual property. Its first patent law came into effect in 1985, followed by a copyright law in 1990 (Graff 2007). However, since then, the pace of progress has been rapid; it has now joined all major international IP treaties (Maskus 2005). Its patenting activity is increasing rapidly, too, with domestic firms nearly doubling the number of patents they received in the past four years (“Chinese firms…”). China’s Patent Office now leads the world, reviewing 800,000 applications in 2008, and in 2009, domestic firms are poised to receive more patents than foreigners for the first time ever (“Battle of Ideas”). Chinese firms are also receiving more patents abroad: in 1999 they only won 90 patents in America, but by last year they had increased that number to 1,225, demonstrating a desire to use their inventions globally (“Battle of Ideas”).

Chinese intellectual property, however, is still frequently critiqued. Enforcement is notoriously weak with the United States citing “rampant counterfeiting and piracy problems.” Strikingly, according to the USTR, China was the origin for 67% of seizures of counterfeit goods at the American border in 2008. In response to these and other concerns, China has recently updated its patent laws, increasing statutory damages and expanding the investigative power of the patent office (Lim 2009).

In the next post, we'll take an extended look at the case made for stronger intellectual property in China and India. 

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Other posts in this series:

• Do China And India Really Want Stronger Intellectual Property?
• A Brief History Of Intellectual Property In China And India

Kevin Donovan is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Kevin Donovan and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Europe sleeps while I write this.

I arrived in Chicago a short while ago, it's 6:30PM here and 1:30AM back where I came from. In about four hours I will have been up for 24 hours. Given my state of burnout I'll avoid saying anything challenging. Simply: It's always good to be back in the USA.

At this moment in an overseas trip I always play California Girls by the Beach Boys.

Also: All my gadgets work here. MyFi, and data roaming on my iPhone.

The neatest thing on the SAS flight from Copenhagen -- they have cameras pointing out the cockpit and toward the ground from under the plane. Pretty neat for takeoff and landing. Unfortunately there were clouds almost the whole way up over Sweden into Iceland and Greenland and northern Canada.

One more flight, a sprint from Chicago to SFO and then a cab to Berkeley. I get in so late that BART isn't running that late. Yeah I know, it isn't really a mass transit system. Rub it in.

coondoggie writes "Looking to help eliminate the dangerous and inefficient hodgepodge of communication and network technology used by emergency response personnel, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) today said it had picked 14 groups from across the country to pilot an ambitious Multi-Band Radio project. In 2008, the DHS Science and Technology Directorate awarded a $6.2 million contract to Thales Communications to demonstrate the first-ever portable radio prototype that lets emergency responders--police, firefighters, emergency medical personnel and others--communicate with partner agencies, regardless of the radio band they operate on."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Over at Against Monopoly, Alistair Kelman, points out yet another quirky problem with copyright law. He's discussing a book by Ron Rosen, who was the attorney for famed composer John Williams in fighting a copyright infringement claim saying that Williams copied a phrase in the score for the movie E.T.. The book is called Music and Copyright, and (according to Kelman) is quite a worthwhile read in thinking about some of the modern legal issues that will be faced thanks to mashups and other musical compositions that run up against copyright questions.

Kelman's one issue with the book, is that it would really be aided quite a bit by being able to hear the actual music in question, rather than just seeing the musical notation. So, the suggestion was, why did Rosen put up an online video lecture, playing the music samples so that people could better understand the issues at play. The answer, it turns out, is copyright law. Rosen wrote Kelman, noting:

"...about the need for aural examples, that is something we wanted to do for this edition, but as a new publication, the need for licenses and the budget foreclosed our doing so."

So even though this is a somewhat scholarly effort to look at these issues, apparently Rosen can't even demonstrate his points with music, because copyright forbids it, and requires hefty licensing fees. If ever there were a case where "fair use" should apply, this would seem to be it -- but I'm sure some would argue against that point since this book is a "for-profit" endeavor. Of course, whether something is commercial or not is only one of the four fair use factors, and it seems that if it's just a snippet of the music, a strong fair use case could be made (especially since it's hard to see how this could possibly harm the market for the music itself). However, as copyright system defenders love to point out on a regular basis, they see fair use as a "defense, rather than a right" and thus, the only way to prove that this is fair use would be to go to court -- something that is expensive and time consuming. What an unfortunate state of affairs.

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The New Ecology of Things Lab at Art Center's graduate Media Design Program has released a new version of their NETLab Toolkit. This is a system for more easily connecting microcontrollers to computers, especially targeted at those who may be new to hardware and programming. In this video, Professor Philip van Allen of the Media Design Program shows how you can use NETLab to easily connect a a sensor to an Arduino and to Flash on a desktop machine.

Here's the basic product description:

The NETLab Toolkit is a free set of software tools that enable designers to easily "sketch in hardware". With no programming at all and working in the familiar environment of Flash (or Processing or MAX/MSP), designers can hook up a physical sensor (e.g. a knob) and immediately get that knob to control a motor or a video projection. The toolkit works with a wide range of sensors, wireless sensors, input from the Wii Remote, controls motors and LEDs, communicates with MIDI devices, controls sound, graphics, and video in Flash, and communicates with DMX computer controlled lighting equipment, all with a simple drag-and-drop interface (of course, programming hooks are provided as well).

NETLab Toolkit

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avxo writes "Bruce Schneier covers a new cryptanalytic related-key attack on AES that is better than brute force with a complexity of 2^119. According to an e-mail by the authors: 'We also expect that a careful analysis may reduce the complexities. As a preliminary result, we think that the complexity of the attack on AES-256 can be lowered from 2^119 to about 2^110.5 data and time. We believe that these results may shed a new light on the design of the key-schedules of block ciphers, but they pose no immediate threat for the real world applications that use AES.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

It's no secret that I have tremendous problems with Nathan Myhrvold's Intellectual Ventures, which many have described as the world's biggest patent "trolling" operation. The company has raised a ton of money and uses it to buy up thousands of patents. While it hasn't sued anyone, Myhrvold has made clear that's always an option. The company has remained incredibly secret, but it has somehow convinced some big companies to pay hundreds of millions to IV. Due to the secrecy, the details aren't clear -- and some of the deals apparently are a mix of "licensing" and an equity investment. But, still, the numbers are stunning. The latest, as pointed out by Stephen Kinsella is that Intuit has apparently paid $120 million to IV. For what? The right not to get sued. Think about that for a second. This is a pure dead weight net loss to society. It's $120 million that Intuit could have put towards further innovating, or to pay off investors via a dividend. Instead, it goes towards nothing productive, in terms of actually creating new products. It will now likely be used to buy up more patents so that IV can get similar black hole money grabs from other companies, as well. It's like a black hole where real innovation goes to die.

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Diane from the World Science Fiction Convention sez, "Just wanted to drop you a quick note to say that the voting deadline for the Hugo awards is this Friday. Eligible voters must vote online by July 3rd, 23:59PM EST. People should vote as early as possible in case of computer problems and to ensure their ballot is received before the deadline."

You get a vote if you're signed up to attend the WorldCon (it's in Montreal this year). It's one of the best Hugo ballots I've seen in all my years as an sf reader. And yes, I'm eligible twice, once for best novel (Little Brother) and again for best novella (True Names, with Ben Rosenbaum).

Final Ballot for the 2009 Hugo Awards and John W. Campbell Award

eric.brasseur writes "The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has entered lunar orbit in perfect shape. From a height of 50 km, it will image the Moon in high resolution. The hardware left by the Apollo missions will be clearly visible. The Soviet automatic probes will also be photographed. Previous best images were made by the Japanese probe Kaguya and showed a white patch where the dust had been blown away by the blast of the LM engine."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

In 1978, the Museum of Cartoon Art hosted an exhibit on Dick Tracy. The Mike Lynch Cartoons site posted fantastic pages from the back of the exhibition catalog, a gallery of "200 Characters from Dick Tracy 1931-1977." (via Drawn!)

• Lisa took a first look at GDGT, the newly-launched social network and gadget database.

• There was a curious rainbow-flicked LED life mask.

• Steven found a bag that inspires patriotic beer swilling.

• Sony's $1,000 iPod dock is so pretty it's almost worth the price tag.

• Craftsquatch makes RSS Pillows -- and more besides.

• Artist David Hockney has taken to iPhone fingerpainting.

• Mnemosyne is the strangest thumbdrive on earth. And it costs as much as 7 Sony iPod docks.

• Smalltalk got its own issue of Byte Magazine in August 1981.

Discuss these stories and more at BBG.

Al writes "Technology Review discusses what a US carbon trading scheme could learn from the flawed European experience. Advocates of carbon-trading schemes like to point to Europe's cap-and-trade program as a model worthy of emulation, but the reality has been less than perfect. A glut of pollution credits, distributed without cost during both the first, transitional phase of the program and the current working phase, drove down the value of the EUAs. As a result, Europe's carbon dioxide emissions remain priced well below 20 euros per ton. With the price of pollution so low, economists say, industries that generate and consume energy have no incentives to change their habits; it is still cheaper to use fossil fuels than to switch to technologies that pollute less. Establishing a carbon price in the U.S. system now, and tightening the system later could send a dangerously wrong signal to financial markets looking to invest in new energy technologies."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

One of the things that got a lot of attention with the announced sale of The Pirate Bay to GGF was the claim that the new owners would launch new business models that would compensate copyright holders. Many took this to mean that it would stop offering tools where people could freely exchange content themselves -- but that's not what GGF said. It just said it would compensate copyright holders. That could involve a variety of different business models, as surely they recognize that trying to charge directly would simply lead to mass abandonment of The Pirate Bay. And, indeed, it appears that GGF isn't planning to charge users at all. Instead, it's actually trying out a business model based on BitTorrent's original purpose: making sharing files more efficient by breaking up the pieces so that a single source doesn't bear the brunt of the bandwidth costs. GGF's argument is that they can use the community at The Pirate Bay to reduce congestion for ISPs and bandwidth costs for other service providers. On top of that, GGF claims that rather than having users' pay, its plan is to pay users for providing a service to those who have files to distribute. In an interview with the BBC, GGF's Hans Pandeya explained the plan:

"More than half of all internet traffic is file sharing and P2P [peer-to-peer] traffic and buying Pirate Bay gives us one of the biggest sources of traffic.

"We can then use this massive network of file-sharers to help [internet service providers] reduce overload.

"Let's say a popular song comes out. Rather than a million downloads from a site - which would cause a considerable strain on that ISP - we can take that song and put it out on P2P.

"The copyright holder still gets paid, the users still get their file, the ISP doesn't have a million people all grabbing a file and - for the users who share that song - a payment for putting that file on the P2P network."

This is the sort of thing that sounds good in theory, but that the entertainment industry will never go for. GGF is right, in some ways. The fact that individuals are sharing the content via BitTorrent actually is helping decrease the distribution costs, but as we've seen, the entertainment industry likes to ignore that, and assume that the entire value is in the content, not in the distribution. I can't see the entertainment industry seeing this as a viable solution, even if it makes some amount of sense (distribution is expensive, GGF can use TPB to reduce distribution costs, that seems like a service worth paying for). I just don't see the industry buying into it.

Separately, I have to take issue with one comment from GGF:

Mr Pandeya said that one of the biggest hurdles in overcoming illegal file-sharing was that there was zero cost to the users, while legitimate sites required users to pay for content. The only way to make something more attractive than free was to pay users to share files.

On this, he's fundamentally wrong. There are many ways to make something more attractive than free without paying users. In fact, there are many cases where paying users actually makes something less attractive than free because they're doing things for non-monetary reasons, and the money actually changes the equation significantly. Yes, paying users is potentially one way to make something more attractive than free, but it's hardly the only way, nor is it always the best way.

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By way of fellow papercraft enthusiast Cory Doctorow comes images of this incredible castle, posted on Tokyobling. Tokyobling explains:

I had the immense opportunity to see this wonderful paper craft art installation by a genius of the name of Wataru Itou, a young student of a major art university here in Tokyo. The installation is hand made over four years of hard work, complete with electrical lights and a moving train, all made of paper! Clearly, this man must have created one of the most stunning examples of Paper Craft in the world? At the exhibition you will also have the chance to see a video showing Mr. Itou at work in his studio, cutting and folding piece by piece. The exhibition is called Umi no Ue no Oshiro (A Castle On the Ocean ), ??????. It is exhibited at Uminohotaru, a place which in itself is a major attraction: a service area in the middle of the ocean, right between Tokyo City and Chiba Prefecture.

A Paper Craft Castle On the Ocean [via Boing Boing]

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A grand piece of thinking from ex-CIA Michael Scheuer who told Glenn Beck: "The only chance we have as a country right now is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States." Scheuer is the former head of the Bin Laden unit at the CIA under Clinton and Bush.

Michael Scheuer on US Security

tnok85 writes "I started a new job ~7 months ago at a very large company working a 12-hour night shift (7PM-7AM) in a fairly high volume NOC. Our responsibilities extend during the night to basically cover everything but the most complex situations regarding UNIX/Windows/Linux/App administration, at which point we'll reach out to the on-calls. I live 1.5 hours away as well, so it turns into 4-5 15 hour days a week of sitting still — throw in almost an hour to get ready to leave, and a bit of time after I get home to unwind and I'm out of time to work out. Unfortunately I'm pretty sure I have a very slow metabolism, ever since I was a pre-teen I would gain weight fairly quickly if I didn't actively work out, regardless of how much or what I eat. (Barring starving myself, I suppose...) So, how does somebody who works a minimum of 60 hours over 4 days, often adding another 12 another day, and sometimes working 7-10 days straight like this, stay in shape? I can't hold a workout schedule, (which every person I've talked to in my history says is necessary to stay in shape) and I can't 'wake up early' or 'work out before bed' because I need sleep. Any thoughts/opinions/suggestions?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Bookride, a dryly funny and informative blog about the rare books trade, has a good entry about using the Web to check the value of a book.

The mistake most people make when valuing books on the web is to take their price form the highest or the mid range. None of the books listed have sold and if you had to buy one you would choose the cheapest in decent condition; only a mad man would choose to pay more than necessary. Take your price from the low end of books in comparable condition.

...

Who are these guys with absurdly high prices? Generally they have had unhappy childhoods, uncles who drank, boorish parents or have been educated at unpleasant and expensive schools.

I've noticed the same inflated thinking with comic books. When I worked at a comic book store as a teenager, people would come in with old comics that had torn or missing covers and be flabbergasted to learn that we would give them about 1/100th the amount they'd get for the same comic in near mint condition. A good rule of thumb for people who think they have a valuable collectible is, "if it's not in perfect condition, it's worthless to a collector."

Checking book values on the Web

The twice-monthly Lost Knowledge column explores the possible technology of the future in the forgotten ideas of the past (and those just slightly off to the side). Every other Wednesday, we look at retro-tech, "lost" technology, and the make-do, improvised "street tech" of village artisans and tradespeople from around the globe. "Lost Knowledge" was also the theme of MAKE, Volume 17

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This week, we look at the largely-lost Medieval art of timbrel vaulting structures and the related, more modern (late 19th century) system of interlocking terracotta tiles which create what are known as Guastavino domes, after their inventor, Rafael Guastavino.

Low-Tech magazine has an excellent introduction to timbrel vaulting and Guastavino domes, called "Tiles as a substitute for steel: the art of the timbrel vault." Here's an excerpt:

The method of timbrel vaulting was developed in the 14th century around the Mediterranean, although its precise origins are unknown. The timbrel vault is also known as a "masonry vault", "Catalan vault", "tiled vault", "laminated vault", "flat vault" and "layered vault" (derived from Spanish, French, Italian and Catalonian descriptions).

A roof of tiles

Timbrel vaulting differs substantially from the Roman method of arch building, which relies on gravity. A Roman vault consists of a single layer of thick, wedge-shaped stones (see below).

The timbrel vault does not rely on gravity but on the adhesion of several layers of overlapping tiles which are woven together with fast-setting mortar. If just one layer of thin tiles was used, the structure would collapse, but adding two or three layers makes the resulting laminated shell almost as strong as reinforced concrete.

The result defies common sense, because a timbrel vault is very thin compared to a Roman vault, while at the same time it is capable of bearing much higher loads. This of course enables wider spans and gentler curves.

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Malcolm Gladwell is an interesting guy. He's an amazing writer and storyteller -- perhaps the greatest storyteller of this generation. And, as such, he's amazing at taking complex ideas or research and making it seem simple and easy to understand. I have to admit that I really enjoy reading almost anything he writes for the pleasure of seeing how it's written. That said, I've found his books to be unsatisfying in the end. Great, fun reads at the time, but I kept feeling like I was waiting for more. I was waiting for the actual substance to back up the amazing thesis. It's amusing then, to see him basically suggest the same thing about Chris Anderson's new book, Free in his review of the book in the New Yorker. That review has kicked off quite an online conversation -- with a response from Chris, and other "luminaries" like Mark Cuban and Seth Godin weighing in as well (Godin agrees with Chris, Cuban doesn't).

A few people asked me if I was going to respond to Gladwell's review, and at first I wasn't sure if it was worth digging in to it, but at the same time, I did want to put up something of a review of Free myself. So, I might as well kill two birds with one stone here. First: a bit of disclosure: I know Chris. Not well, but we've been known to email and talk on occasion, and we sat down and got lunch a year and a half ago when he was first planning out this book, during which I made some suggestions (some he took, some he didn't) though I doubt my words really had that much of an impact (I'm sure he heard similar things from others, and that they were much more clear and eloquent than I was). Also, Chris does mention me in the acknowledgments section of the book, noting that my daily writings here "informed and inspired" the book. Thus, take anything I say with a grain of salt.

There have already been some attacks on Free that have really missed the point. There are plenty of points to attack, but it seems that the problem is that (once again) people get stopped by the big zero, and forget to keep working through the rest of the details. Like I said last time, it's as if our brains have a "divide by zero" error message that prevents all additional thinking on the subject. Nearly all of the attacks on the concept of free seem to focus on the fact that not everything is free (this is what Cuban does, for example). Except... no one ever claims that everything is free. The whole point is that "free" is simply a part of a larger business model, and the fact that you charge for some stuff doesn't take away from the idea of embracing "free" where it makes sense as a part of that business model.

Gladwell, to his credit, stays away (mostly) from this type of mistake, but he makes a few other ones in the process. For example, in responding to Anderson's recognition of the value of non-monetary rewards as a part of the larger economic ecosystem where some business models involve "paying people to get other people to write for non-monetary rewards," Gladwell's retort is:

That said, it is not entirely clear what distinction is being marked between "paying people to get other people to write" and paying people to write. If you can afford to pay someone to get other people to write, why can't you pay people to write?

The answer to Gladwell's question is simply one of economic efficiency. You can pay people to write -- just as Encyclopaedia Britannica does. Or you can get other people to write for non-monetary rewards -- as Wikipedia does. The latter is a lot more efficient a solution, and the difference in productivity and output is quite evident. It's not saying that there is no business in paying people to write, but it's a very different business than the indirect business model, and it's the economic efficiencies that come into play.

Money, at times, is a transactional lubricant. It helps us make transactions faster than bartering three pigs for two trees, a goat and a bushel of corn. At other times, though, money can be friction. It can limit transactional effectiveness by acting as a kind of crutch. That's where non-monetary benefits can suffice (or do a much better job) in rewarding people for their actions. In those scenarios money gets in the way and actually makes a transaction less efficient.

A more efficient solution is a good thing. It helps enlarge markets, increase productivity and make the net of society better off. Much of what Chris discusses in the book is that end result. The process may be messy, but economic growth through efficiency is undeniably a good thing -- and Gladwell seems to miss that point entirely.

That said, Gladwell's comment actually does bring to light my biggest complaint with Anderson's book. I think it's a fantastic read, and quite educational and (at times) thought provoking. But I don't think it goes far enough in diving into the meaty details, which is where folks like Gladwell are led astray. So while I think that Anderson is correct, I'll also say that Gladwell is correct in suggesting that Anderson doesn't clearly answer that question. That doesn't mean that Anderson cannot or that the failure to answer that question means that Anderson's thesis is wrong, even though Gladwell implies the failure to answer such questions calls the entire work into question.

My second issue with the book is related to this, in that while it outlines why "free" is so important and how it's being used and how it plays out in other areas, it really doesn't explain much of what to do about it. This, too, is echoed in Gladwell's questions. He feels that there should have been more about how do you actually apply such things -- and I agree that the book comes up short here as well, though I believe it is on purpose. It lists out examples and business models that are certainly useful to read about, but does little to suggest how you actually apply them. This is speculation on my part, but I remember in our discussion before he started writing the book, Chris explained his goal was to make the book more descriptive than prescriptive, recognizing the difficulties in making a prescriptive book on a topic where there are so many other factors that it's often difficult to outline specific prescriptions. I recognize that challenge, but it does leave the book open to many attacks from people who read it and are left saying "ok, but what do I do about this?" On that, I think the book comes up a bit short -- though, it should provide plenty of consulting fodder for Anderson (and other consultants who jump on the bandwagon, probably without understanding it too much).

The big problem here is that not only will people among the critics misinterpret the lessons of the book, but so will businesses. They'll implement bad business models that have "free" as a component, but that won't be economically sound. No one claims that "free" solves everything, but some will undoubtedly interpret it this way. Then, when they fail, they'll blame "free" and claim that it was wrong, rather than the fact that they implemented a bad business model. This, in fact, is what happened in some areas with The Long Tail, Chris' earlier book. They assumed it said stuff it did not, and then got upset when their improperly created business models failed.

From there, however, Gladwell then goes on to bring up some other criticisms that don't pack much of a punch. He knocks Anderson for using YouTube as an example of using "free" as a part of a business model, noting that YouTube is losing money (though, Gladwell relies on debunked numbers to assert those losses). Similarly, he talks about how the WSJ can charge, Apple can charge for iPhone apps, and cable TV can charge -- but his mistake here is taking a static picture and (often) removing the context. The WSJ can charge, but there are questions about whether that strategy really can last -- and the publication has been opening up more and more stuff as "free" to try to draw people in to that subscription model. The Apple example is quite misleading as well. Estimates suggest that Apple makes very little on iPhone apps, but has really nice margins on the iPhone.

But beyond shoddy research by Gladwell, the bigger issue is not recognizing the dynamic nature of these things at work. Using a little game theory economics wouldn't hurt. By looking at how business models play out when goods have a marginal cost of zero, you quickly learn how opportunities to be more efficient via a well-placed use of free expands the size of certain markets. The trick is recognizing that things that are "free" stop being products that are sold, and become resources -- inputs -- into other products... for free. Thus, you get markets where increasing marginal returns carry the day, rather than diminishing marginal returns. This seems especially odd, given that Gladwell's claim to fame is his ability to pick up on trendlines. To then look at Chris' book and compare it to a static picture of the world is quite unconvincing.

Furthermore, it misses the main point of the book: which is that competition happens, and when it does, price gets driven to marginal cost. You might not like it. You might wish it didn't happen, but arguing against the fact that it's how markets work is like arguing that the sun won't rise tomorrow. No one said that it didn't make economic sense when other businesses had margins squeezed. Yet when that big "zero" shows up, people seem to forget that it's just a number and the basic lessons of the book aren't new or radical -- but the same economics we've always known. It's just that it's applied to markets where marginal cost is zero, something that's become more common thanks to technology.

Gladwell's review, then, does Anderson's book a disservice. It criticizes it because it doesn't answer questions the book didn't set out to answer, and then attacks the picture today without acknowledging the trendlines and the direction that they're moving in. And, finally, it ignores the actual nature of the argument (this is happening) with a moral discussion (is this good?). That's unfortunate. Where Chris' book shines quite frequently is in laying out these trendlines clearly and in a way that will get you thinking. It may not answer all the questions about free, but it should certainly help those who don't stop thinking at the zero to at least recognize the trendlines and get them thinking about how to deal with them. And that is, unquestionably, a good thing.

As Chris did with The Long Tail, he's taken complex economic theory and made it easy to understand in a compelling and highly readable format. While my own personal complaint (above) concerns how much of that economic theory may have been left on the cutting room floor, that's a critique that probably only applies to folks like myself who spend way too much time reading, talking and thinking about these issues. I'm guessing the mass audience this book is targeted for doesn't care so much about understanding the deeper economics, even if it answers the basic questions raised by Gladwell. If you read Techdirt frequently (and enjoy it), then you're quite likely to enjoy reading Free. It certainly complements and adds to the material we write about here frequently, and presents it in a great package.

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I did want to bring up one separate issue, because I get the feeling it will be raised in the comments. There was a lot of attention paid recently to charges of plagiarism in the book. Chris has admitted to the basics of the charges, and explained it as sloppy editing in an effort to deal with concerns about how to cite online content. I have to admit that sloppy editing seems like a weak excuse here, and a bit disappointing. It seems a bit lazy.

That said, I've discussed at great length my position on "plagiarism" in the past -- and, amusingly, much of it is inspired by Malcolm Gladwell's own discussion on plagiarism, where he recognized that someone taking his own work and adding value to it and doing something different wasn't such a bad thing after all, and that it could actually represent an inspiration. So if I were actually "plagiarized" by Chris or anyone else (and I don't believe I was), I'd actually find it something of an honor to have my works as a part of something better and more interesting. I don't think it takes away from the quality of the overall work at all. I would have preferred that such mistakes in attribution did not happen, mainly because it's a distraction, but the issue is a minor one. If Chris can take the works of others and make it into something more valuable, aren't we all better off because of it?

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CNETNate writes "The tests prove it: It's the third-fastest browser in the world, and over twice as fast as Firefox 3. In terms of Javascript performance, Firefox 3.5's new rendering engine places it squarely above Opera 10's beta and Internet Explorers 7 and 8 (based on previous benchmarks), plus it's getting on for being almost as quick as the original version of Google Chrome. Also, the new location-awareness feature was testing in central London, and pinpointed yours truly to within a few hundred meters — easily enough for, say, a Starbucks Web site to tell you where your nearest Starbucks is."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I wrote another book. It's called Handcrafted CSS: More Bulletproof Web Design, and it'll be published by New Riders next month.

I had help this time. The unstoppable Ethan Marcotte contributed an absolute gem of a chapter on the fluid grid. And I think it's worth the cover price for the pages he authored alone. You might remember Ethan's recent article on the subject over at A List Apart, and his chapter builds quite a bit on that, while tying it back into the book's case study. And fellow beverage aficionado and bon vivant, Brian Warren, handled the technical editing.

The book is largely a culmination of the talks I've been giving around the world over the last year or so. In some ways, it's a continuation of Bulletproof Web Design, in that it was convenient to be able to jump right into examples and the core of what I wanted to write about. There are a lot of CSS books out there, and the last thing I wanted to do was just write another general overview.

So this one gets specific rather quickly. And the timing seemed right. The browser landscape is changing rapidly. Browsers are implementing new and evolving standards faster. It's an exciting time to be designing for the web. Firefox 3.5 has just been released, and with it came a goodie bag of CSS3 properties that can now be utilized between Mozilla and Webkit-based browsers (as well as Opera). I'm using the term "progressive enrichment" to describe advanced CSS and CSS3 properties that work in forward-thinking browsers today. And that's a heavy focus of the book.

A single case study for the fictional "Tugboat Coffee Company" was used as a common thread throughout the entire book, where progressive enrichment, reevaluating past methods and best practices and flexible, bulletproof concepts are stressed. Part of being a craftsman of the web is paying attention to the details that matter most, and the book is an attempt to share a collection of those details using current methods.

In addition to the book, I also recorded a DVD. A video crew from Peachpit came and set up here at the BitCave in Salem, and the result is Handcrafted CSS: Bulletproof Essentials. It covers concepts from my previous book and the new one, while relating all of it to the Tugboat design. There was also a ukulele hanging around the office and I managed to put it to good use as a background score. The video acts as a unique bridge between the two books, and either comes bundled in a Video Edition of Handcrafted CSS or by itself.

More info can be found at the book + DVD's companion website and Twitter account, where Ethan and I will be announcing another exciting aspect of this project in the next day or so. Stay tuned.

Drawger's "Museum of Forgotten Art Supplies" is a delightful place where "tools of the trade that have died or have just about died a slow slow death are cheerfully exhibited." Museum of Forgotten Art Supplies (Thanks, Tara McGinley!)

Kathmandu's Tribhuvan airport has banned pants with pockets for employees. Authorities hope it will help prevent bribes. From BBC News:

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) said it had sent a team to the airport to "observe the growing complaints about the behaviour of airport authorities and workers towards travellers".

"We discovered that the reports were true," spokesman Ishwori Prasad Paudyal told the AFP news agency.

"So we decided that airport officials should be given trousers with no pockets."

Nepal bans airline staff pockets (Thanks, Carlo Longino!)

An anonymous reader writes "AeroVironment, Inc. was awarded a Phase II contract extension in April from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to design and build a flying prototype for the Nano Air Vehicle (NAV) program. As part of this program AV has accomplished a technical milestone never before achieved: the controlled hovering flight of an air vehicle system with two flapping wings (video) that carries its own energy source and uses only the flapping wings for propulsion and control. Two wings for propulsion and control, nothing else."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ed Hebb, a volunteer at the Henry Ford Estate, shows how to start and drive a Ford Model T. Now I know. (via BB Gadgets)

Eric Goldman alerts us to an appeals court ruling finding against a guy who claims that his firing was gender discrimination after the hospital he worked for found that he had been surfing porn and "hacking" sites. The guy's entire case seems like a huge stretch. In the department he worked for, there was one computer shared between 7 people, with this guy, David Farr, being the only guy. While each employee had a separate login, apparently whoever logged in first usually just stayed logged in all day. When it was discovered that a number of porn sites were listed in the favorites, the hospital did what sounds like a decently thorough investigation, and found it quite likely that it was Farr who visited the sites (one of the days the activity occurred was a Saturday where he was the only one there). He eventually admitted to visiting 17 of the 31 sites in question, but then later claimed that he had visited sites that installed malware on the computer that added the bookmarks to the porn sites. But then... when confronted again, admitted to visiting the 17 sites.

He claimed that it was gender discrimination, since he was the only guy, there was an automatic assumption that he had visited the porn sites. Yet, the court points out that (1) he failed to show that a female employee wouldn't have been treated in the same way and (2) the hospital was incredibly thorough in investigating the issue, especially after he denied visiting some of the sites. They didn't just jump to a conclusion and fire him, but apparently went into quite a lot of detail in making sure that he had actually been visiting those sites. On top of that, the court notes that his employment was at-will, so the hospital had every right to fire him. It's difficult to see how he thought a gender discrimination claim would get very far given that he admitted to visiting some of the sites, as well as the amount of investigation that was done by the hospital. But, these days, people seem to think that anything they don't like that happens to them must be against the law.

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Scientific American surveys new research on whether playing videogames might be good for our brains. For example, one recent study by University of Rochester cognitive scientist Daphne Bavelier that I've blogged about previously suggests that games can exercise and enhance certain core vision functions. From SciAm:

It is appealing to envision video games being utilized in the rehabilitation of patients and the prevention of cognitive decline, promotion of brain fitness, and development of fundamental skills. However, more careful studies like those of Bavelier and colleagues are needed to realize such a goal. To date, much of the claims around this rapidly growing area of technology-supported medical interventions are insufficiently supported by scientific data.

In this context, a major advantage of video games is the fact that they can be made entertaining and engaging. Motivation is a powerful driver of brain plasticity. The highly realistic and engaging nature of these games allows the gamer to immerse themselves and “feel” like the simulation is really real (e.g. the intensity of combat). Such realistic engagement and the resulting enjoyment promotes brain changes.

Of course, a video game is not the same as the real thing. The motor plan to throw a football accurately (e.g. grip strength, depth perception, tracking the running receiver) versus the right sequences of touches on a game console are two different things. The development of systems that more realistically simulate motor actions and responses will probably be important.

It is likely that the functional impact of the brain plasticity induced by greater technology dependence will be different for different behaviors. For example, playing video games will train certain visuo-motor skill but also affect social development and interpersonal relation skills.

"Take two video games and call me in the morning"

A neighborhood group in the UK has been videotaping people who litter and posting the videos on YouTube with a request for information about the "litter louts." My favorite part of these videos is where they repeat the act of littering in slow motion. (I think the videos need an ominous music soundtrack, however, like the kind used for the Diff'rent Strokes opener.) (Via Arbroath)

stoolpigeon writes "Microblogging service Twitter has undeniably been a hit, with growth rates that were at times in excess of 1400%. The growth was rapid enough that the site became well known for its periodic, and, at times, extensive downtime. Even with these issues, the service continued to grow rapidly, and with celebrities getting into the mix Twitter was quickly on the radar of mainstream media. The ubiquity of twitter and ever-increasing coverage of 'tweets' has also brought the inevitable backlash. As with anything that gains high-profile popularity, there are plenty of Twitter haters out there, though the role Twitter has played in the recent Iranian elections seems to have brought more legitimacy to Twitter in the eyes of many. With popularity come books, and quite a few are already out there about and for Twitter, but my favorite so far is The Twitter Book by Tim O'Reilly and Sarah Milstein." Read below for the rest of JR's review.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Kemeno writes "Blizzard has announced that they will be dropping LAN support for Starcraft II, citing piracy and quality concerns. Instead, all multiplayer games will be hosted through their new Battle.net service. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by this move, but wasn't LAN play how the original Starcraft became popular? Blizzard said, 'More people on Battle.net means more even more resources devoted to evolving this online platform to cater to further community building and new ways to enjoy the game online. World of Warcraft is a great example of a game that has evolved beyond anyone's imagination since their Day 1 and will continue to do so to better the player experience for as long as players support the title. ... We would not take out LAN if we did not feel we could offer players something better.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

I've seen this thing referred to as an "Ocean Mat," a "Prolong Knot," a "Ladder Mat," and a "Sailor's True Love Mat." Whatever you want to call it, it's a noble expression of the manly art of knot-tying, and this tutorial at the UK's Scullion Enterprises will show you how it's done.

More:

• Rope bending
• Make knots - Alaska museum of fancy knots
• How-To: Tie a double fisherman's knot
• Star knot tutorial
• Val ties the canoe
• The forgotten Zeppelin knot
• Knot reference wallet card

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Just posted! Our waterproof camera group test. Summer time means visiting the seaside, riverside, or your local pool - these are times for fun in and out of the water. And your camera should be able to keep up with you every step of the way. In our latest group test we look at five waterproof cameras to see which is the most deserving of your hard-earned cash so you can enjoy a summer of worry-free shooting.

A Royal Air Force parade was recently cancelled in Lincolnshire, England when a possible bomb was found in a telephone booth. The bomb turned out to be an air freshener. From BBC News:

A BT spokesman said air fresheners had been installed in enclosed phone boxes for years without problems...

The BT spokesman said: "We do put air fresheners in some phone boxes - we like to make the environment as pleasant as possible for people using a payphone to make a call.

"Some people have been known to use phone boxes for reasons other than wanting to phone someone.

Air freshener disrupts RAF parade (via Fortean Times)

There's a pretty simple rule of thumb in figuring out if a new business doesn't know how to approach its market. It's when it claims something along the lines of "well, this is an $x billion market, and we just need y% to be successful." That's someone taking a top down wishful thinking approach. It's a recipe for failure. What you want to hear is the bottom up explanation: how is this business going to get the first customer to sign up, and then the second and third and so on. Claiming you just need y% of a market makes it sound "easy" to get customers, rather than recognizing you have to work at getting customers and actually provide them with something of real value.

So, while we were already really skeptical of Stephen Brill's Journalism Online venture, where he's trying to get people to pay for online news, consider us even more skeptical after hearing that he's going around telling people that he's hoping to get 10% of today's news readers to start paying. Of course, as is noted at that link, most studies have shown you're lucky if you can get 2% of people to pay for something that was previously free. So the 10% number is pure fantasy. But the bigger point is that Brill seems to be making the "we just need y%" mistake, rather than giving anyone a reason to buy.

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Willfro sends in a piece by Evgeny Morozov at the Boston Review about the hyperbole and the reality of "cyber war." Quoting: "At the end of May, President Obama called cyber-security 'one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation.' His words echo a flurry of gloomy think-tank reports. Unfortunately, these reports are usually richer in vivid metaphor — with fears of 'digital Pearl Harbors' and 'cyber-Katrinas' — than in factual foundation. So why is there so much concern about 'cyber-terrorism?' Answering a question with a question: who frames the debate? Much of the data are gathered by ultra-secretive government agencies — which need to justify their own existence — and cyber-security companies — which derive commercial benefits from popular anxiety. Journalists do not help. Gloomy scenarios and speculations about cyber-Armaggedon draw attention, even if they are relatively short on facts."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

As seems to be the case time and time again, indie devs have given us some of the best in surrealist/dreamscape gaming, and the latest -- featured today on Offworld -- is Justin 'CosMind' Leingang's Glum Buster, an intricately constructed PC pixel platformer that is as traditional as it is relentlessly alien -- think Eric Chahi's Another World/Out of this World -- and is being sold via an altruistic charity-ware setup. It'll certainly go down as one of the finest indie developments this year. Elsewhere we took a fantastic look inside Moscow's Soviet Arcade Games Museum via their new Art Lebedev (he of the Optimus Maximus OLED keyboard) designed website that not only gives us near-pornographically beautiful shots of previously unseen 70s era Soviet arcade design, but also recreates a number of the games in Flash to play directly on the site. We also played Noonat's Queens -- a game built for a competition dealing with the theme of 'domestic violence' that manages to cleverly skate the thin ice there, and fell in love with Puit Wars, a micro/massive pixel wargame that proves hiphop emcee Aesop Rock should be making music for games, followed Nintendo DS cult puzzler star Professor Layton on Twitter, and took a new look at the mysteries of SUPERBROTHERS' rustic pixels in his Kurosawa-inspired Alpinist.

By Alden Hart

The "LED Light Brick" project in MAKE, Volume 18 has generated lots of good feedback for us, so we went back and asked Alden to explore a few variations on the theme of the brick casting itself, how you might be creative with it. This article is the result. Be sure to check out the original piece in MAKE, Volume 18, and also the on-line supplement containing specific casting instructions. --SMR

From the pages of MAKE

---

Some Experiments in Mold Making

A lot of the fun of the Light Brick is trying out different molds. Some very different effects can be achieved depending on the mold you make. This post explores some mold making options and experiments.

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Goldman Sachs staff will receive the biggest bonuses in the firm's 140-year history this year. In Matt Taibbi's epic Rolling Stone piece this month, he describes the financial firm as "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity"; and "the planet-eating Death Star of political influence". Sounds about right. Rolling Stone doesn't have a copy online, but there's one here. It's a must-read. (via Bob Lefsetz)

Adam sez,

Lawrence Lessig's new anti-corruption organization Change Congress recently used online ads to shame Sen. Ben Nelson in his home state for opposing President Obama's public health insurance option while taking $2 million from the health and insurance interests that are leading the fight against it. And it worked. After an 11-day public fight, Nelson switched from calling the public option "a deal breaker" to saying he is open to it and promising not to join Republicans in a filibuster against it.

Now, Lessig has set his sights on Sen. Mary Landrieu, who also opposes the public option and took $1.6 million from the same special interests. Today, Change Congress announced a new TV ad targeting Landrieu and they are asking the public to chip in to help air it in Louisiana. Democracy for America and MoveOn.org are also partnering on this ad. It features Karen Gadbois, a local hero who helped root out corruption after Hurricane Katrina -- who shares her compelling personal health care story:

Help us get this ad on the air in Louisiana! (Thanks, Adam!)

An anonymous reader writes "Apparently, since gas consumption is going down and fuel efficient cars are becoming more popular, the government is looking into a new form of taxation to create revenue for transportation projects. This new system is a 'by-the-mile tax,' requiring GPS in cars so it can track the mileage. Once a month, the data gets uploaded to a billing center and you are conveniently charged for how much you drove. 'A federal commission, after a two-year study, concluded earlier this year that the road tax was the "best path forward" to keep revenues flowing to highway and transportation projects, and could be an important new tool to help manage traffic and relieve congestion. ... The commission pegged 2020 as the year for the federal fuel tax, currently 18.5 cents a gallon, to be phased out and replaced by a road tax. One estimate of a road tax that would cover the current federal and state fuel taxes is 1 to 2 cents per mile for cars and light trucks.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

(Ed. Note: We recently gave the Boing Boing Video website a makeover that includes a new, guest-curated microblog: the "BBVBOX." Here, folks whose taste in web video we admire tweet the latest clips they find. I'll be posting periodic roundups here on the motherBoing.)

---

More @BBVBOX: boingboingvideo.com

The Great Internet Migratory Box Of Electronics Junk (Tig-Ihm-Boh-Edge) project is gettting a bit of a facelift. From Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories, this "pay-it-forward style hardware sharing program for electronics" system has had its successes and pitfalls this year, and some adjustments to the system come now after learning what works and what doesn't. New standardized documents to be included in the boxes means everyone who gets one will know what to do with it, and recipients are encouraged to track their boxes even after they send them off to the next lucky hackers. EMSL is also launching new boxes this week, so check out the new and improved project wiki if you're interested in participating.

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Reader jprlk alerts us to the amusing news that Carleton University apparently put a press release on its website with all of the details concerning an upcoming visit by the Emperor and Empress of Japan... and opened it up by saying:

The Government of Japan respectfully requests that media outlets do not report on specific details, including exact times, prior to the events. Thank you for your cooperation.

Someone, apparently, isn't quite aware of the way the web works. When you put that info on the web yourself, Carleton University, you've already "reported on the specific details, including exact times, prior to the event." The University has since pulled the press release, but it's too late, as it's been picked up by the local press. As you can see, the blog post above summarizes the situation nicely:

So I guess the message from Carleton is that they'll put stuff on their website, but SHHHHHH! nobody else is to say anything.

Welcome to the internet, Carleton University.

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From the MAKE Flickr pool

The Arkansasridgerunner pioneers the world of shipping chic with this sensible wine rack built from FedEx tubes. I do believe this would go quite nicely with my packing-peanut chaise lounge!

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angry tapir writes "Mobile carriers may start giving away netbooks for free, and Linux-based application stores could help them profit by doing so, the Linux Foundation's Jim Zemlin argued at a recent forum in Beijing. 'Selling discounted netbooks to users who buy a mobile data subscription would extend a sales strategy widely used for mobile phones. Carriers often sell phones for below retail price and let a user's subscription fees make up for any loss. AT&T already sells subsidized 3G netbooks in the US, and China Mobile has announced similar plans. Carriers worldwide are likely considering the option, which lets them charge for added services like downloads of music, videos and software, said [analyst Jack Gold]. Those downloads could come from platforms like the iPhone App Store that target mainly mobile phones today. Competition could push netbook prices down as more carriers subsidize them, which would make putting Linux on the laptops an attractive way to cut costs, said Zemlin.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

From the MAKE Flickr pool

James' sweetie fabbed a nice piece of edible circuitry for him -

My girlfriend Sarah made this candy circuit board birthday cake topper. Originally she wanted to make a gingerbread MakerBot, but didn't have the time or space.

Instead she was inspired by the iPhone motherboard and went from there. The base is dark chocolate covered with green frosting. The resistors are Tic Tacs!

That rainbow (sour straw?) ribbon cable is a nice touch as well :)

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ozydingo writes "The RIAA has scored a victory in a decision on a copyright case that they filed back in 2007. US District Judge Harold Baer ruled in favor of the music industry on all its main theories: that Usenet.com is guilty of direct, contributory, and vicarious infringement. In addition, and perhaps most important for future cases, Baer said that Usenet.com can't claim protection under the Sony Betamax decision stating that companies can't be held liable of contributory infringement if the device is 'capable of significant non-infringing uses.' Bear noted that Usenet.com differed from Sony in that the sale of a Betamax recorder was a one-time deal, while Usenet.com's interaction with its users was an ongoing relationship. The RIAA stated in a brief note, 'We're pleased that the court recognized not just that Usenet.com directly infringed the record companies' copyrights but also took action against the defendants for their egregious litigation misconduct.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

When the RIAA first sued Usenet.com, we thought it could make for an interesting case. After all, you could make a decent argument that there are a ton of non-infringing uses of Usenet. However, as the details came out, it became pretty clear that Usenet.com dug its own grave, so it should be no surprise at all that a judge was quick to side with the RIAA. There are two main things at issue: first, it appears that Usenet.com may have destroyed evidence -- shades of TorrentSpy. It doesn't matter how the rest of the case shakes out -- if you're caught destroying evidence, you're already at the bottom of a big, big hill. Not only that, but in explaining the destroyed evidence, they gave contradictory explanations suggesting they then lied about the destruction of evidence. Another major no-no. The second issue was that the folks at Usenet.com were incredibly blatant in advertising its services for infringing on copyrighted materials. Whether you agree with the Grokster "contributory" infringement concept or not, it is the rule that the courts need to follow, and there does seem to be rather overwhelming evidence that Usenet.com regularly promoted the fact that it was a better way to infringe on copyrights. So, while the RIAA will again crow about this victory, it's a victory over an egregious player in the space who appears to have gone way over the line.

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Los Angeles art gallery SolwayJones is currently showing a collection of unique acoustic and electronic musical instruments by Reed Ghazala, Nam June Paik and others. Definitely worth checking out if you're in the area - press release + photos on the gallery's site. [via GetLoFi]

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IamTheRealMike writes "It's been a few months since we last checked in on how the Blu-Ray group was doing in their fight against piracy. In December 2008, a new generation of BD+ programs had stopped both SlySoft AnyDVD HD and the open source effort at Doom9. At the start of January, SlySoft released an update that could handle the new BD+ programs, meaning that Blu-Ray discs could not be decrypted for a period of time about the same length as SlySoft's worst case scenario. The BD+ retaliation was swift, but largely ineffective, consisting of a unique program for every Blu-Ray master. Users had to upload log files to SlySoft for every new movie/region. They would then support that unique variant in their next update, usually released a few days later. Despite that, the open source effort never did manage to progress beyond the Winter 2008 programs and is currently stalled completely; SlySoft is the only group remaining. This situation remained for several months, but starting around the same time as Paramount joined Fox in licensing BD+, a new set of programs came out which have once again made Blu-Ray discs unrippable. There are currently 19 movies that cannot be decrypted. It appears neither side is able to decisively gain the upper hand, but one thing seems clear — only full-time, for-profit professionals are able to consistently beat BD+."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

e9th writes "Despite a bump or two along the way, it seemed that compulsory ID cards were a done deal in the UK. Now, the Financial Times is reporting that the scheme has been shelved. Unfortunately, it seems that this was more a matter of convenience than of concern for citizens' privacy."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Our pal Jeri Ellsworth and her crew of restless USTREAM-ing hackers are at it again, exploring light polarization, sparking ions, and reversing time.

The Fat Man and Circuit Girl

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andy1307 writes "Vivek Kundra, the federal chief information officer, announced on Tuesday a new Web site designed to track more than $70 billion in government IT spending, showing all contracts held by major firms within every agency. The (Flash-heavy) site, USAspending.gov, shows detailed information about whether IT contracts are being monitored and budgets being met. The data also show which contracts were won through a competitive process or in a no-bid method (the latter approach is criticized by good-government advocates for excluding firms from business opportunities). Each prime contractor is listed as well as the status of that project; sub-contractors are not yet shown."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

When Tony La Russa sued Twitter because there was a user impersonating him on the site (though, clearly labeled as being fake), we pointed out that La Russa was targeting the wrong party. At first we were afraid the same thing was happening when Digg was running a headline that Miami Dolphins' player Davone Bess was going to sue Twitter over an impostor. Fortunately, it looks like whoever wrote the Digg headline got it wrong. The original story suggests that Bess isn't going to sue Twitter, but whoever set up the fake Twitter account. Of course, even that is probably pretty pointless. Why not just alert Twitter, have the account disabled and be done with it?

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Lisa Katayama writes on Boing Boing Gadgets:

Behind an ordinary door in a nondescript room hosting several printers and copiers at PARC is the world's first Ethernet cable. In 1973, Bob Metcalfe sent an internal memo to his colleagues at Xerox proposing a local system of interacting workstations, files, and printers. The devices would all be linked by one coaxial cable, he said, and would run within a local area network. He called the system an Ether Network, or Ethernet. By 1976, there were over 100 devices linked into Metcalfe's local network, and it was even used to test out the world's first laser printer, which was being developed concurrently in another research facility within Xerox. Metcalfe and his assistant David Boggs published their findings in the Association for Computing Machinery later that year. The rest is history.

Photo and original diagram of the world's first ethernet cable

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Taking advantage of the increased resolution and new autofocus capabilities of the iPhone 3GS to shoot close-up stills has just gotten a little easier thanks to Derrick Story's DIY Copy Stand for the iPhone 3GS. Utilizing a commodity storage container from the local mercantile and repurposing the iPhone's packaging Derrick has created an easy to assemble positioning apparatus that doubles as a light diffuser.

If you've ever tried close-up work with the iPhone, you know you have two challenges. The first is holding the camera steady enough to avoid camera shake. The second is getting the plane of the camera parallel to the plane of the subject to avoid distortion. This little device helps with both, plus diffuses the light for a more flattering rendering.

[via thedigitalstory]

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Olympus has released an update to its Master and Studio image-editing software. Version 2.2 of the Master and v2.3 of Studio enable users to apply Art Filter effects to RAW files, rather than having to choose them as you shoot. It also extends RAW support to the E-P1 and now includes a video editor to edit that camera's HD videos.

The ArduPilot from the Maker Shed is a full-featured autopilot based on the Arduino open-source hardware platform. It uses infrared (thermopile) sensors for stabilization and GPS for navigation. Requires a GPS module and an infrared XY sensor (not included). The autopilot handles both stabilization and navigation, eliminating the need for a separate stabilization system. It also supports a "fly-by-wire" mode that can stabilize an aircraft when flying manually under RC control, making it easier and safer to fly. The hardware and software are all open source. The board comes with all the surface-mount parts already soldered, but requires the user to solder on connectors. Firmware is already loaded, but the autopilot software must be downloaded and loaded onto the board by the user.

More about the ArduPilot

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Last week, Amazon decided to cut off North Carolina affiliates due to proposed legislation that would have affiliates (really, advertisers) be considered as local "employees" for the sake of proving that Amazon had a business "nexus" in the state, and thus need to collect state sales tax there. It appears similar legislation is popping up across a bunch of states, and Amazon is cutting off affiliates one by one. Affiliates in both Hawaii and Rhode Island have been told that they can no longer sell via Amazon over this issue. It'll be interesting to see if any states back down. Pissing off a bunch of small business owners who make money selling products via Amazon probably isn't a particularly wise thing to do in the middle of a recession.

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Do you know why trust has gained so much value in the attention economy? Bombarded by an increasingly complex life, by more news and information, by marketing and sales calls of all kinds, people are increasingly "on-the-move" and with less and less time to devote to anyone specific thing. They are rushing from a website to another, from a conversation to another. And this is why their attention has become more valuable than gold these days. Photo credit: Iurii Davydov In the era of social media, traditional marketing channels are tricky venues to promote your product. Consumers are suspicious of marketing, they don’t trust the buzz, and relationships created ad hoc to sell a product do not work anymore. Today, the relationship must come before the sale, not the other way around. By creating and nurturing your community and by making customers your good friends it is possible to develop new relationships and loyal supporters which can be an invaluable asset for any company in the market today. Once you have a community of passionate fans and followers, it becomes easier to share your commercial recommendations and advice in ways that are more spontaneous, natural and credible. George Benckenstein explains why building trust and relationships with your customers is so important. Inside communities people influence one another. Personal interests become social objects and spread across your network. Are you part of it? Do you help your community and customers learn and relate with each other in ways that augment their attention investment in you? That's what the new Return On Investment is all about. The new ROI is the useful, tangible influence you create rather than the investment you make. Here, in more detail, George Benckenstein's vision:

Return On Influence - The Real ROI

by George Benckenstein
Next time you hear people talking about history repeating itself, I’m hoping you will think about this. None of us remember the era when all commerce was localized - meaning, anyone you did business with lived in your immediate community. There was no such thing as advertising, marketing channels and brands. You did business with people you knew. It was not an “information economy” and nothing was mass produced. It was a Trust Economy. So what am I talking about when I say that history repeats itself? …welcome back to the Trust Economy. When it comes to using social platforms to create awareness for your service, product or brand - you have to remember that this is not your typical marketing channel. As consumers, we are weary of “marketing speak,”suspicious of “buzz” (it can be bought) and we don’t trust strangers. We are back to square one. In a Trust Economy, your market is your community or network, trust is mandatory and influence is king.

Return On Influence - The Basics

If you want to understand how to create trust and affect individuals authentically, imagine yourself moving into a new neighborhood. You’ve just entered a new community. So how do you meet people? This is the exact construct social media platforms emulate. Would you immediately start going door-to-door peddling your product or service to your neighbors? I would hope the answer to that question is NO. But over time, as your community gets to know you, the trust and reputation you have built will no doubt lead to talk about what you do. So keep these things in mind:

• You can’t fake a relationship
• Relationships come before sales
• Business is not the first order of business
• Your personal brand comes first

Leveraging your relationships is a great way to increase awareness of your product, service or brand - but you actually have to become a respected and trusted member of your community and nurture your own network before you can tap into it’s potential.

Work Life Integration

So I just mentioned that your personal brand comes first. For organizations, this logic will seem counter-intuitive and will require understanding of the social construct. However, no matter how you look at it, the lines between our work and our social life are blurring. For example - childhood friends are now being reconnected thru facebook and becoming business associates. Business are invading Facebook like a pack of 4 yr. olds will invade a Chuck-E-Cheese. Corporate recruiters are sourcing talent from LinkedIn, Twitter and even MySpace. In the end, interactions are interpersonal - people do business with people (not brands) and the economic environment we once knew is systematically being turned on it’s head (Judy Martin got me thinking about this).

Personal Interactions = Network ROI

Click to enlarge image So here we are back in a Trust Economy except our localized market is now global. Thru the ubiquity of technology, we are able to have rich, personal interactions and find meaningful connections with others. As always, when it comes to relationships, you get back more than you give. First and foremost, we are creatures here to serve one another. It’s a tried and true principle that is undeniable. We just have more tools to serve each other more effectively and more efficiently.

Attention = Currency

One of the most rare things on earth is a person’s attention. Between email, 30,000 ad messages a day and life in general, our time is our most precious commodity. We have become masters at filtering out anything that is not meaningful to us NOW. So go out and join the conversation. Listen to people. Answer their questions. Be of service without regard and be meaningful to people NOW.

Authentic Influence

Let people get to know you, trust you and befriend you. You will create meaningful relationships that get integrated socially and professionally. The more you give, the more you get. Relationships are back. We are built to affect and influence one another. Your interests will become social objects and awareness of them will radiate thru your network. These authentic alliances are what all relationships are built on. This is not something you can fake. It’s something you must embrace.

Originally written by George Benckenstein for his blog, and first published on May 4th 2009 as "Return On Influence - The Real ROI"

About the author George Benckenstein is a web strategist with lots of experiences as a marketing director and consultant. He's currently manager at Hrtools.com and Administaff Inc. George Benckenstein blogs at www.benckenstein.com.

Photo credits: Return On Influence - The Real ROI - Mark Beckwith Return On Influence - The Basics - Kareem Saady Work Life Integration - Antonio Nunes Personal Interactions = Network ROI - George Benckenstein Attention = Currency - Vista Authentic Influence - Sebastian Kaulitzki

There's a missing product in the social networking space. I'm going to try to describe it, but I think it may be hard. But I'm willing to give it a go.

A little over a week ago I got an email from a very good friend in Europe asking if it was true that I was going to Reboot. I replied with an email saying it was. And I thought to myself, I thought by posting that fact to Twitter four or five times that I would have informed him of this. It is not his fault. There's a missing product.

Yesterday, I was trying to figure out what to do with the four hours downtime between flights in CPH, so I posted a note to Twitter hoping someone with some time to spare that was interesting would respond. I got two responses to my blog post, when it was two hours into the downtime. It's not their fault. There's a missing product.

Here's what I think the missing product would do.

It would allow me to make announcements the way companies make announcements. The announcements would have good metadata attached, and would be stored in a database. People who follow me in this system are saying "I want to know everything Dave announces." Key words in that sentence: Know and Dave. I don't just want these facts to stream by in a river. I want Dave's name to go bold in a short list of people I choose to follow. Unlike a river, where I want volume and don't care about missing an item, in this product the oppositie is true. I place high value on not missing anything. I want to know literally everything Dave announces. (Or Paolo or Karin or you get the idea.)

I started to get a clue that such a product was needed when I started the FOD feed on Twitter. It monitors the blogs of people who are so important to me that I never want to miss one of their posts. People like NakedJen, Jay Rosen, Sylvia Paull, Doc Searls, Robert Scoble, Fred Wilson and Michael Gartenberg, and people I don't even know personally like Paul Krugman and Nate Silver. It was a success. It has kept me in these people's loops, and it required them to do nothing special. Now I'm thinking about what comes next when I want other people to do something similar with me.

It may be that just monitoring blog posts is enough. Tweets are too cheap, but keeping track of people through blogs may be just right.

Still thinking about it.

Bridging the gap between the "real world" and your computer, the Arduino Projects Pack takes you further into the world of physical computing. We've included all sorts of cool electronic parts this time that help you delve deeper into the true capacity of the Arduino. You'll experience what the tens of thousands of engineers, designers, artists and hobbyists already know about this awesome and educational prototyping platform.

More about the Arduino Projects Pack

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Hugh Pickens writes "The Telegraph reports that dozens of users of the recently released iPhone 3GS have reported overheating issues, with some iPhone owners unable to pick up the device because the handset gets so hot to the touch, while others say the casing turns pink with the heat. 'I am definitely experiencing issues with the iPhone running warm and quick battery life lost,' writes Tom Goldstein on one discussion board. 'The phone seems to warm up almost immediately if I am doing anything that pulls data over the network.' Some users have said the device has been too hot to put to their ear while making a phone call, and others say the overheating seems to occur when owners are using the iPhone's mapping software, which uses the handset's built-in GPS technology. Melissa J. Perenson writes at PC World: 'I became aware the handset had become very hot. Very, very hot — not just on the back, but the entire length of the front face, too.' Some gadget experts believe faulty batteries could be the cause of overheating and poor battery life. 'My guess is there's going to be a whole lot of batteries affected because these [iPhones] are from very large production runs,' said Aaron Vronko, who fixes iPods and iPhones. 'If you have a problem in the design of a series of batteries, it's probably going to be spread to tens of thousands [of device], if not hundreds of thousands, and maybe more.'"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ricoh has released a firmware update for the CMOS-based CX1 digital compact camera. Firmware v1.24 resolves minor issues pertaining to image orientation data and printing. The firmware is available for immediate download from Ricoh's website.

Another in a continuing series of overnight dispatches from your faithful European correspondent, me!

This time I'm coming to you from the SAS business class lounge at CPH, a real treat. Often on my European travels I end up exiting through Amsterdam or London with time to kill at Schipol or Heathrow, and they are completely chaotic toon-town messes. In comparison, the pace at CPH is leisurely and the Danish of course are great designers, so the place is super-comfortable and pleasing to the eye.

While you, in the US, were asleep -- I left Berlin, and created some memories in a set of photos on Flickr. Click on the picture below to see the set.



In two days in Berlin you can do nothing but scratch the surface of the surface.

Berlin is to Germany what New York and Washington are to the US. It's both the capital and the cultural and business center. The place is bathing in history, and change. Just 20 years ago when the wall came down, the place was very different. Now what remains of the division is in photographs and video. I stayed in what used to be the eastern sector, but you couldn't tell. It was hard to imagine how the plush surroundings had been transformed so quickly. Perhaps the Soviet system wasn't so austere?

I spent all of yesterday afternoon at the German History Museum, listening to the official story of the war and the wall from their point of view. There were some not-so-surprising surprises. They talk about losing the war. Where I come from, we talk about winning. They don't present their soldiers as heroes. How can a society survive that, I wonder. I did see one statue of a WWII era German soldier, just one. It left me with a sick feeling. The memorial to victims of the Holocaust also was very moving.

There also is a Soviet War Memorial in Berlin.

Berlin is indeed where it happened. I don't have any special insights, nothing to offer that hasn't been said a million times before. The only difference is to feel it you have to put yourself inside it.

I followed a Russian tour group for a few minutes yesterday as they soaked in the history of their WWII victory. Some of them seemed old enough to remember. There were many Americans and British and French accents. Seems a lot of other people are curious to see what's in Berlin.

Everywhere you go in Berlin they're rebuilding. Many of the big tourist spots I saw just re-opened three or four years ago. The Brandenberg Gate and part of the plaza behind it were in the middle of the dead zone between the East and the West.

Maybe there will be more conclusions, this all seems quite rough right now.

PS: On a less heavy note, I had a delicious currywurst and last night there was a beautiful sunset.

Richard "God Delusion" Dawkins' foundation has helped fund an atheist/sceptic summer camp that teaches 8-17 year olds how to think critically about the world:

Alongside the more traditional activities of tug-of-war, swimming and canoeing, children at the five-day camp in Somerset will learn about rational scepticism, moral philosophy, ethics and evolution.

Camp-goers aged eight to 17 will also be taught how to disprove phenomena such as crop circles and telepathy. In the Invisible Unicorn Challenge, any child who can prove that unicorns do not exist will win a £10 note - which features an image of Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary theory - signed by Dawkins, Britain's most prominent atheist.

Dawkins funds atheist summer camp (via Wonderland)

My latest Guardian column, "When I'm dead, how will my loved ones break my password?" describes the process my wife and I went through when we drew up our wills and realized that our encrypted hard-drives and our network passwords would go with us if we died or were incapacitated, and how important it was for us to have a secure, long-term solution for decrypting our data if we croak.

I don't want to simply hand the passphrase over to my wife, or my lawyer. Partly that's because the secrecy of a passphrase known only to one person and never written down is vastly superior to the secrecy of a passphrase that has been written down and stored in more than one place. Further, many countries's laws make it difficult or impossible for a court to order you to turn over your keys; once the passphrase is known by a third party, its security from legal attack is greatly undermined, as the law generally protects your knowledge of someone else's keys to a lesser extent than it protects your own.

I discarded any solution based on putting my keys in trust with a service that sends out an email unless you tell it not to every week - these "dead man's switch" services are far less deserving of my trust than, say, my wife or my solicitor.

I rejected a safe-deposit box because of all the horror stories I've heard of banks that refuse to allow access to boxes until the will is probated, and the data necessary to probate the will is in the box.

I pondered using something called Shamir's Secret Sharing Scheme (SSSS), a fiendishly clever crypto scheme that allows you to split a key into several pieces, in such a way that only a few of those pieces are needed to unlock the data. For example, you might split the key into 10 pieces and give them to 10 people such that any five of them can pool their pieces and gain access to your crypto-protected data. But I rejected this, too - too complicated to explain to civilians, and what's more, if the key could be recovered by five people getting together, I now had to trust that no five out of 10 people would act in concert against me. And I'd have to keep track of those 10 people for the rest of my life, ensuring that the key is always in a position to be recovered. Too many moving parts - literally.

When I'm dead, how will my loved ones break my password?

Lawyer Raymond Niro, for whom the term "patent troll" was apparently first coined, has been known to use the fact that he represents a company called Global Patent Holdings (GPH) to his advantage. GPH owns patent 5,253,341, but looking at it there won't do much good. You see, Niro and others claimed that the patent covered pretty much anyone running a web server, leading to quite a few legal battles, including one against a guy, Greg Aharonian, who called it a "bad patent." For claiming that, he got sued for patent infringement. In fighting the patent, it was re-examined, and all 16 of its claims were rejected... but a 17th claim was added and allowed to stand.

Since then the patent has been asserted against a wide range of organizations, including some resort in Florida and the Green Bay Packers. Niro appears to claim that any site using a JPEG image violates the patent. Not only that, but in cases where the patent has been asserted, Niro has been known to go for something of a sympathy play, by noting that the inventors (or the widow of one inventor) named on the patent are "old and feeble" (yes, they called them feeble) and made almost no money in 2006 (even though the filing was in 2008 -- some noted that their 2007 income was conveniently left out).

With so many cases involving this patent underway, the USPTO agreed to re-examine the one claim (claim 17). And, with that re-exam going on, a judge on one of the cases put the case on hold until the re-exam is done. While GPH protested, claiming that the patent had already been re-examined (and that the re-exam process took too long), the judge pointed out that there's only one claim left (so it should be faster) and that this particular claim had never been re-examined, since it was added during the last re-exam.

Last summer, the USPTO gave an initial (non-final) rejection of the patent, in rather strong language. Not surprisingly, GPH/Niro have pushed back, but in early June the USPTO appears to have smacked down the patent all over again in this rather lengthy ruling, which you can see below: 90008972 The smackdown here is rather complete. On top of reaffirming the 19 reasons for rejecting the remaining claim, the examiner added more reasons to reject it for being obvious and anticipated by other inventions. Also, it appears that GPH/Niro tried to do something similar to last time, in that they also submitted some new claims to be added (claims 18 - 21), but the examiner smacked those down as well, as attempts to "broaden the scope" of the patent. On top of that, the rejects scolds GPH/Niro for mischaracterizing what the patent office has said and even using a "biased" expert witness with "flip-flopping declarations."

This is, still, a non-final rejections, but it doesn't look like GPH/Niro has been able to make up any ground at all on this particular fight, and, in fact, seems to be getting pushed further and further back with each try. This particular patent expires in March of 2011 anyway, so unless Niro is able to pull a proverbial rabbit out of the hat to convince the USPTO that this patent is vaild, it's not looking very good.

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The EU has mandated that, effective from today, European mobile carriers will have to offer a single rate for all of the EU, setting a maximum on the blisteringly high roaming charges. It's a cop-out, though: Orange and T-Mobile and Vodaphone and others have this legal fiction that Orange France and Orange UK are different companies and that an Orange UK customer should pay a premium to connect to Orange France's network. But in reality, Orange is perfectly capable of acting like a single company when it is in their interest. The Commission has set rates at about 10X what I pay for domestic use in the UK (still 60% less than I presently pay to roam) and says it will consider forcing lower rates in future.

"The roaming rip-off is now coming to an end," said EU telecommunications commissioner Viviane Reding in a statement. "Expect the new roaming rules to make it much cheaper to surf the web on your mobile while abroad in the EU."

After years of experiencing high prices for making phone calls abroad - or receiving them - the new tariffs are radically lower: sending a text message, for example, will drop from an average of 28 Euro cents to just 11 cents. The move should end the well-worn fear of opening a huge phone bill when returning from holiday or business abroad.

The new tariffs include the following maximum costs:

- making a call while abroad will cost 37p per minute
- receiving calls will cost a maximum of 17p per minute
- sending a text message from another country inside the EU will cost 10p
- Data transfers will also fall dramatically, with a megabyte of data costing 85p

Mobile roaming charges drop across Europe

Wataru Itou created an immense and breathtaking paper castle, currently exhibited at Uminohotaru in Tokyo. It took Itou, an art student, four years to complete. The pictures are a must-see, do click through.

A Paper Craft Castle On the Ocean

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(via Paper Forest)

Victor sez, "Our documentary on virtual worlds, Second Skin, which premiered at SXSW last year, will finally be coming out in theaters and DVD in August. I produced it with my friend Peter Brauer and it was directed by my brother Juan Carlos. The three of us spent two years racing around the world following gamers who had fallen in love, become addicted, formed enormous guilds, or made their living playing MMOs like World of Warcraft, Everquest and Second Life. From gold farmers to disabled gamers, we tried to get a sense of how integral virtual worlds are to the fabric of life these days. We'd love you to check it out- the first five minutes are available on Current TV- here. The movie's coming to NYC, LA, Austin and Boston in mid-August, and DVD everywhere on August 25th."

I saw Second Skin at the Toronto Film Festival and was blown away -- by turns touching and funny, and always fascinating, this is a loving but clear-eyed look at the relationship of gamers to their games.

Second Skin (Thanks, Victor!)

Over on Boing Boing Gadgets, our Steven's found this delightful old Byte cover, celebrating the release of the Smalltalk programming language; it's part of BBG's tribute to Xerox PARC, the legendary R&D center that invented everything and commercialized practically nothing.

This special issue of Byte Magazine was dedicated entirely to Smalltalk. The image is based on the actual balloon launch at PARC that celebrated the release of Smalltalk.

Byte Magazine, August 1981

Discuss this on Boing Boing Gadgets

The iPlayer is a hardware video-decoder for your Nintendo DS. It plugs into your cartridge slot, and uses its on-board processor to send video in a variety of formats (avi, mov, RealPlayer, wmv, DivX, Flash, 3GP, asf, mpeg) to the screen and speakers. You load the video through a MicroSD card. Haven't tried it, got no idea if it's any good, but the premise is delightful.

iPlayer (via Red Ferret)

Gamasutra has an interesting article about how the push toward realistic graphics and extremely lifelike characters in modern games is making the term "murder simulator" — once laughed off for referring to pixelated dying Nazis — a concept to take more seriously. The author is careful to simply explore the issue, and not come to a specific conclusion; he doesn't say that we should or shouldn't prevent it from happening, only that it's worth consideration. (One section is even titled "Forget the kids," saying that decisions for what children play fall under parental responsibility.) Quoting: "We should start rethinking these issues now before we all slide down the slope together and can't pull ourselves back up again. Or, even worse, before governments step in and dictate what can and can't be depicted or simulated in video games via legislation. ... Obviously, what makes an acceptable game play experience for each player is a personal choice that should be judged on a person-by-person basis (or on a parent to child basis), and I believe it should stay that way. As for me, I'm already drawing the line at BioShock — I can barely stomach the game as it is. Sure, I could play it more and desensitize myself, but I don't want to. And that's just me. It's up to you and a million other adult gamers to decide what's best for yourselves and to draw the line on virtual violence where you feel most comfortable."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Some of the results are in for the Alpha-test Meatcard Challenge, and they are terrific. The rules were to photographically recreate one of several famous Frank Frazetta paintings (without using Photoshop or the like). The winners get business cards made from laser etched beef jerky.

Frazetta Meatcard challenge results

Randy Sarafan's band has got to be set up by now, he built his own droning machine from the movie Eli Eli Lema Sabachthani.

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Yet another data point to suggest the predicted "death of journalism" that we keep hearing from the old school newspaper guys is a bit overblown, online news publisher Talking Points Memo has just announced that it's hiring seven new editorial staff. No, of course that doesn't replace all of the jobs lost at newspapers, but it does suggest that online news organizations are figuring out ways to make money and to grow.

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1sockchuck writes "Yahoo has come up with a data center design called the Yahoo Computing Coop, which it says will make its new data center in Lockport, NY one of the most efficient on earth. The design features 120-foot by 60-foot metal prefabricated facilities with louvers on the side to support free cooling, and a peaked roof to manage the release of waste heat from the hot aisle. Chief Yahoo David Filo said the name was adopted 'because it looks like something chickens live in.' The $150 million data center in Western New York, which was announced earlier today, will run on cheap hydro power from the Niagara River."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

In a world where the traditional lines of "journalism" are becoming increasingly blurred, Justin Rice, over at the Nieman Journalism Lab, discusses how the "media tables are turning in the world of sports, where the subjects of coverage are becoming the creators of coverage." With tools like blogs and twitter, professional athletes are now, more than ever before, able to communicate directly with their legions of fans. The ability to self-publish has strangely drawn the ire of sporting organizations. For example, during the Olympics, the IOC placed burdensome restrictions on the blogging activities of the athletes, rendering many of the athletes mute out of frustration. We've seen in the past that both the MLB and the NFL have tried to copyright facts, something that thankfully, the courts have struck down. Furthermore, the MLB and NFL have limited the length of clips that news outlets can use in their reports.

While Rice correctly points out that these issues are not simply First Amendment issues, since they also involve "contract law, intellectual property law and copyright law." The bigger issue here is that while there certainly is plenty of legal work here to line plenty of lawyers' pockets, what these sporting organizations need to realize is that they are shooting themselves in the foot. Promoting the free distribution of the facts, videos, and stories surrounding their sporting events will only serve to promote those sporting events more. These restrictions merely serve to hamstring any sort of development that may actually deepen fans' relationship with the sporting franchise. It seems completely counterintuitive that if an athlete were willing and able to spend hours of time creating valuable content at no additional cost to anyone, that it would be quashed. If anything, athletes and journalists should be encouraged to share more video, stories and tweets with their fans.

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An anonymous reader sends news from The Washington Post's Security Fix blog of a new Trojan horse program that takes click fraud to the next level. The Trojan, dubbed FFsearcher by SecureWorks, was among the pieces of malware installed by sites hacked with the Nine-Ball mass compromise, which attacked some 40,000 Web sites this month. The Trojan takes advantage of Google's "AdSense for Search" API, which allows Web sites to embed Google search results alongside the usual Google AdSense ads. (SecureWorks' writeup indicates that Yahoo search is targeted too, but the researchers saw no evidence if the malware redirecting Yahoo searches.) While most search hijackers give themselves away on the victim's machine by redirecting the browser through some no-name search engine, FFsearcher "...converts every search a victim makes through Google.com, so that each query is invisibly redirected through the attackers' own Web sites, via Google's Custom Search API. Meanwhile, the Trojan manipulates the victim's PC and browser so that the victim never actually sees the attacker-controlled Web site that is hijacking the search, but instead sees the search results as though they were returned directly from Google.com (and with Google.com in the victim browser's address bar, not the address of the attacker controlled site). Adding to the stealth is the fact that search results themselves aren't altered by the attackers, who are merely going after the referral payments should victims click on any of the displayed ads. What's more, the attackers aren't diverting clicks or ad revenue away from advertisers or publishers, as in traditional click fraud: They are simply forcing Google to pay commissions that it wouldn't otherwise have to pay." If FFSearcher were the only piece of malware on the machine, it would have a better chance of staying under the radar.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The "dark underworld" of online economies is the supposed "gold farmers" often found in countries like China, where people are working in sweatshop like conditions, "playing" video games to generate as much currency or valuable virtual goods as possible, that the gold farm operators can sell for real cash. However, the Chinese government claims it's cracking down on the practice, though it's not entirely clear how they'll stop it from going on. In fact, it's not even clear why the government is trying to stamp out the practice. At best, the claim is that it wants to avoid "possible impact on the real financial system." While any time you have "alternative" currencies, that's certainly a possibility, it's hard to believe that World of Warcraft gold would have any serious impact on China's economy any time soon.

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