Information Technology News Blog

Spinning a good tale: Economist

2008-10-21T03:01:00.000-07:00

Quantum mechanics may hold the key to a hand-held biology laboratory

BIOTECHNOLOGISTS have long dreamed of creating a “lab on a chip” that would pack the power of a full-scale analytical laboratory into an object as small and as easy to use as the hand-held scanners familiar to fans of science fiction. Such a device might detect biological weapons, run genetic tests or sniff out contaminants. Staff at clinics could use it to screen people for infectious diseases. Police could perform on-the-spot drug tests; paramedics, roadside diagnoses.

Many designs have been proposed for such a device, but none has really taken off. The latest, though, sounds promising. It uses a quantum-mechanical effect called giant magnetoresistance (GMR), which is also the basis of a computer’s hard drive. And prototypes made in laboratories in Europe and America have indeed been able to detect everything from deadly toxins to illegal drugs and markers of disease.

Giant magnetoresistance relies on devices called spin valves. These are made by interleaving thin sheets of magnetic and non-magnetic metals to form a sandwich composed of layers mere nanometres (billionths of a metre) thick. If a nanoscale sandwich is exposed to a magnetic field, the quantum spin of its electrons, and thus its electrical resistance, will change in a way that is easily detectable—which is why they are used in the heads of hard-disk readers.

In 1998, however, it occurred to David Baselt of the United States’ Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC, that spin valves might also make excellent biosensors. Biological materials themselves are not usually magnetic, but they are often chemically specific. To Dr Baselt this suggested that tiny magnetic particles might be attached to molecules using either antibodies (which will bond to proteins, sugars and so on) or single-stranded DNA (which will bond to a complementary DNA strand to form the famous double helix). To search for a target molecule, then, all that would be needed would be to sprinkle a sample thought to contain it with magnetic nanoparticles coated with the appropriate antibody or DNA and then run it over a spin valve.

A simple idea. It has, though, taken Dr Baselt and his colleagues, along with researchers in several other organisations, ten years to turn his insight into a practical technology. Now that they have, things are about to go mainstream.

Though the details of the prototypes differ, the principles are similar. Both the spin valves and the paraphernalia of channels needed to feed a sample to them are built onto silicon wafers using the same techniques employed to make microprocessors. The wafer is then cut up into chips.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Spinning a good tale: Economist

How your laptop will just keep getting faster: CNN

2008-10-19T03:18:00.000-07:00

(PopSci.com) -- Since the invention of the transistor, silicon semiconductors have been king. But now silicon-based transistors are nearing the limit of their potential. Excess heat and manufacturing hurdles are impeding the development of ever-faster and smaller processors.

Advances in materials and chip design to resist extreme heat and move huge amounts of data, quickly, will be crucial. Experts are exploring three technologies to overcome these challenges: spintronics, graphene and memristors. They are what will someday make ultra-energy-efficient supercomputers small enough to fit anywhere -- even in the palm of your hand.
Rebuilding RAMMemristors will store large amounts of data and could make your computer boot instantly
Accessing data, whether stored in a spinning hard drive or in flash-based memory, is a time-suck and a power hog. The dynamic RAM that rapidly delivers data to the processor is almost maxed out.
"Both technologies for the magnetic hard disk and D-RAM are within a few generations of hitting brick walls," says R. Stanley Williams of HP Labs's Information and Quantum Systems Lab. He believes that circuits called memristors could be the solution. Memristors recently joined the resistor, capacitor and inductor as the fourth fundamental circuit element.
But unlike the others, a memristor has the unusual ability to remember the last resistance it held, even when the power is turned off. When the current starts up again, the resistance of the circuit will be the same as it was before, providing instant-on computers. After the memristor had spent some 30 years as a theory, Williams and his team designed the first one earlier this year. Five years from now, he says, the chips could sit in computers between D-RAM and hard disks to eliminate the boot-up process. Further down the road, memristors, which have higher storage densities than the best flash memory and faster write times than D-RAM, could supplant both technologies in one fell swoop.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: How your laptop will just keep getting faster: CNN

Fraudsters’ bugs transmit credit card details to Pakistan: Daily Times

2008-10-16T02:52:00.000-07:00

* UK customer details cloned with help of new sophisticated bugs planted in supermarket card readers
* US counter-intelligence official says bugs transmit information via wireless technology to Lahore
* US National Security Agency is tracking case because of its links to Pakistan

Daily Times Monitor

LAHORE: Detectives are investigating a sophisticated credit card fraud against customers of some of Britain’s biggest supermarkets that may be linked to extremists in Pakistan, a Sunday Times report said. Fraudsters have targeted more than 40 stores in Britain, including those of Asda, Tesco and Sainsbury’s, in an elaborate scam that police say involves tiny devices inserted into the stores’ ‘chip and PIN (personal identification number)’ credit card readers, according to the report.

Specialists say the technology is the most advanced they have seen and is being used in supermarket chains across Europe. The devices, which are reported to have been made in China, are reading and storing selected customers’ Mastercard and personal identification numbers as the cards are inserted into readers at supermarket checkout tills.

Pakistan: The bugs transmit the information by wireless technology to Lahore, Pakistan, according to a senior American counter-intelligence official. Customers’ cards are then cloned and used to steal money from their credit and current accounts and to pay for items such as airline tickets on the Internet.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Fraudsters’ bugs transmit credit card details to Pakistan: Daily Times

Commies in Washington?: Economistan

2008-10-15T01:28:00.000-07:00

FREE MARKETS:Trend of nationalization and government intervention in free markets is eroding consumer confidence.


END OF FREE MARKETS
By Saad Sarwar Muhammad
Monday, September 22, 2008

When Pakistan’s central bank blocked foreign currency accounts to control the flight of capital to foreign banks in the aftermath of nuclear tests that it conducted, it was considered as interventionist and the measures were considered anti-economy and opposed to what free markets were all about. A similar thing happened again early this year when Pakistan’s main stock market shed more than $36 billion dollar of market capital in a very short span, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan put a floor on the points to curtail flight of money. Pakistani rupee also suffered at the hands of the flight of capital and the exchange rate fell from roughly Rs. 60 to a dollar to Rs. 78 to a dollar within a span of a few months. All these measures were criticized around the world because of the interventionist policies of Pakistani institutions who wanted to keep the economy in check.

The collapse of the investment banks like Lehman brothers and Meryl Lynch and firms like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac along with the imminent fall of the US insurance giant AIG put the global markets in a tailspin. UK responded with a ban on short selling of stocks to arrest the fall of FTSE its main index. The US followed suit with the ban on short selling of stocks for a month. Short selling is speculative in nature with investors betting on a company’s stock to fall driving the whole market down. Even profitable investment banks like Morgan Stanley were feeling the pinch because of the short sale. The measures worked and the stock markets around the world recovered within a day with a long and wayward week coming to an end. In the process, the Fed also ended up bailing out the insurance company AIG for a big sum of $85 billion dollars and it is estimated the cost of the Fed’s intervention to the US taxpayer might amount to $700 billion dollars overall driving the domestic debt even higher to upwards of $11 trillion dollars. All these measures, with no clear and definitive answer to whether they will work or would be enough to save the ailing US economy.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Commies in Washington?: Economistan

Shake it all about: Economist

2008-10-15T01:19:00.000-07:00

How to use your laptop to locate an earthquake

IF YOU drop your laptop computer, a chip built into it will sense the acceleration and protect the delicate moving parts of its hard disk before it hits the ground. A group of researchers led by Jesse Lawrence of Stanford University are putting the same accelerometer chip to an intriguing new use: detecting earthquakes. They plan to create a network of volunteer laptops that can map out future quakes in far greater detail than traditional seismometers manage.

Seismometers are large, expensive beasts, costing $10,000 or more apiece. They are designed to be exquisitely sensitive to the sort of vibrations an earthquake produces, which means they can pick up tremors that began halfway around the world. By contrast, the accelerometer chips in laptops, which have evolved from those used to detect when a car is in a collision and thus trigger the release of the airbags, are rather crude devices. They are, however, ubiquitous. Almost all modern laptops have them and they are even finding their way into mobile phones. The iPhone, for example, uses such a chip to detect its orientation so that it can rotate its display and thus make it easily readable.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Shake it all about: Economist

Virtual carnivores: Economist

2008-10-15T01:06:00.000-07:00

Struggling to protect privacy behind the great firewall

UNTOLD legions police the internet in China to block information deemed politically threatening. But the world’s biggest online population still has a wild streak. Worries are growing about internet vigilantes who mount “renrou sousuo”, or “human-flesh searches”, to ferret out perceived wrongdoers.

Zhou Zhenglong, a peasant in the north-western province of Shaanxi, began a 30-month jail term on September 27th after internet-users exposed his faking of photographs of a rare Chinese tiger in the wild. Senior Shaanxi officials, eager to attract tourists to the area, had backed the pictures’ authenticity for several months. They were eventually fired amid an internet outcry. Some posters on Chinese bulletin boards and blogs have argued that Mr Zhou was perhaps merely a hapless tool in a hoax perpetrated mainly by bureaucrats.

In the absence of a free press in China, the internet, despite attempts at censorship, can sometimes put the brakes on official abuses of power. But it can also go too far. As the state-run news agency, Xinhua, put it, “You may find yourself up before a kangaroo court of angry netizens and receive a virtual lynching.” “Human-flesh searching” is known less dramatically in English as “crowdsourcing”—using inputs from a large number of people (usually internet users) to solve problems. But often in China the practice involves mobilising people online to hunt down ordinary citizens whose only alleged sin is that of being objectionable.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Virtual carnivores: Economist

China 'spying on Skype messages': BBC

2008-10-15T01:01:00.000-07:00

China has been monitoring and censoring messages sent through the internet service Skype, researchers say.

Citizen Lab, a Canadian research group, says it found a database containing thousands of politically sensitive words which had been blocked by China.

The publically available database also displayed personal data on subscribers.

Skype said it had always been open about the filtering of data by Chinese partners, but that it was concerned by breaches in the security of the site.

Citizen Lab researchers, based at the University of Toronto, said they discovered a huge surveillance system which had picked up and stored messages sent through the online telephone and text messaging service.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: China 'spying on Skype messages': BBC

Know-alls: Economist

2008-10-14T06:51:00.000-07:00

Electronic snooping by the state may safeguard liberty—and also threaten it

Kobal Collection

IF A Muslim chemistry graduate takes an ill-paid job at a farm-supplies store what does it signify? Is he just earning extra cash, or getting close to a supply of potassium nitrate (used in fertiliser, and explosives)? What if apparent strangers with Arabic names have wired him money? What if he has taken air flights with one of those men, with separate reservations and different seats, paid in cash? What if his credit-card records show purchases of gadgets such as timing devices?

If the authorities can and do collect such bits of data, piecing them together offers the tantalising prospect of foiling terrorist conspiracies. It also raises the spectre of criminalising or constraining innocent people’s eccentric but legal behaviour.

In November 2002 news reports revealed the existence of a big, secret Pentagon programme called Total Information Awareness. This aimed to identify suspicious patterns of behaviour by “data mining” (also known as “pattern recognition”): computer-driven searches of large quantities of electronic information. After a public outcry it was dubbed, perhaps more palatably, Terrorism Information Awareness. But protests continued, and in September 2003 Congress blocked its funding.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Know-alls: Economist

Footloose capitalism: Economist

2008-09-15T00:15:00.000-07:00

China’s largest Brazilian community enjoys the benefits of globalisation

IN DONGGUAN, a city of some 7m people situated 90km (56 miles) north of Hong Kong, factories abound producing everything from furniture to car parts, helping to fuel China’s economic boom. But take a closer look and you may spot something rather less familiar: a thriving community of Brazilians, estimated to number 3,000, most of them working in the footwear industry.

They trace their roots to southern Brazil, which was the bustling centre of their country’s shoe-export business until the early 1990s, when a sharp reduction of Brazil’s trade barriers, an appreciating currency and pressure from cheap Chinese labour combined to cause exports to stagnate. In 2007 Brazil exported 177m pairs of shoes, 12% below the early-1990s peak of 201m. Many firms that survived moved north, to parts of the country where labour costs less. Meanwhile China powered ahead, with its share in world shoe exports, already the largest, doubling to two-thirds over the same period. Dongguan is now China’s footwear capital, exporting 600m pairs a year. And many more are made elsewhere in China on behalf of Dongguan firms.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Footloose capitalism: Economist

Warning sounded on web's future: BBC

2008-09-15T00:10:00.000-07:00

By Pallab Ghosh Science correspondent, BBC News

The internet needs a way to help people separate rumour from real science, says the creator of the World Wide Web.
Talking to BBC News Sir Tim Berners-Lee said he was increasingly worried about the way the web has been used to spread disinformation.
Sir Tim was speaking in advance of an announcement about a Foundation he has helped create that he hopes will improve the World Wide Web.

Future proof

Sir Tim talked to the BBC in the week in which Cern, where he did his pioneering work on the web, turned on the Large Hadron Collider for the first time.
The use of the web to spread fears that flicking the switch on the LHC could create a Black Hole that could swallow up the Earth particularly concerned him, he said. In a similar vein was the spread of rumours that the MMR vaccine given to children in Britain was harmful.
Sir Tim told BBC News that there needed to be new systems that would give websites a label for trustworthiness once they had been proved reliable sources.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Warning sounded on web's future: BBC

Touching the future: Economist

2008-09-15T00:04:00.000-07:00

Computing: Touch screens are becoming an increasingly popular way to control mobile phones and other devices. How does the technology work, and where is it heading?

THE proliferation of touch screens in electronic devices over the past two or three years has been so rapid that you may have found yourself trying to press an on-screen button or icon when sitting at your computer only to realise, much to your frustration, that it is not a touch screen. Many mobile phones, most famously Apple’s iPhone, now have touch-screen interfaces, as do satellite-navigation systems and portable games consoles. Confusingly, however, most computers do not—so far.

But that may be about to change. Microsoft has already demonstrated a prototype of Windows 7, the next version of its flagship operating system, based around “multi-touch” capabilities, which allow a touch screen to sense more than one finger at once. As well as being able to press buttons, tap icons, call up menus and scroll windows, users will be able to rotate and stretch on-screen objects using two fingers at a time, as they already can on the iPhone. For its part, Apple is rumoured to be working on new versions of its desktop and laptop computers with touch screens. It has already taken a half-step in this direction by putting multi-touch trackpads into its laptop computers.

So the touch screen could be on the verge of becoming a standard part of computer interfaces, just as the mouse did in the 1980s. Many people thought that would never happen: surely switching between keyboard and mouse would slow people down and make them less productive? In fact, mouse-driven interfaces can be far more efficient, at least for some tasks. The same seems likely to be true of touch-screen interfaces. The touch screen will probably not replace the mouse and keyboard, but will end up being used for some tasks.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Touching the future: Economist

Thanks for the memory: Economist

2008-09-14T23:57:00.000-07:00

A mathematical trick may allow people to scatter their computer files across the world's hard disks

IF YOU have lots of unused storage space on your hard disk, then why not share it with others on the internet? The benefit could be distributed storage for your own files, making them available any time via the web, even if you are nowhere near your computer—indeed, even if your computer is switched off. That desideratum is what a Zurich-based firm called Caleido is aiming to provide, with a free online storage service known as Wuala that was recently introduced to the public.

Though the idea underlying it is simple, Wuala requires some nifty technology to make its distributed system work reliably. In particular, its developers, Dominik Grolimund and Luzius Meisser, have used a clever mathematical trick to compensate for the fact that the participating computers will come and go from the internet in an unpredictable way.

The challenge is how to minimise the number of copies of the same file that have to be distributed. Copying costs participants both storage space and bandwidth. Yet there have to be enough copies to ensure that there is at least one available most of the time. If, for example, each computer is online 25% of the time, then a quick calculation shows that you would have to copy each file to 100 different computers to ensure that 999,999 times out of a million there is at least one copy available when a user looks.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Thanks for the memory: Economist

Postmodern wriggle: Economist

2008-09-14T23:51:00.000-07:00

To save Microsoft, Bill Gates adjusts his shorts

THE self-appointed marketing experts of the blogosphere immediately pounced on the opening shot of what will probably be this year’s most discussed advertising campaign. Microsoft, the huge but boring software company that has been pummelled by the advertisements of its smaller and cooler rival, Apple, is fighting back. How? By having Bill Gates, its co-founder, chairman and arguably its personification, buy shoes with Jerry Seinfeld, a comedian, as his adviser. Just look, the bloggers are screaming: further proof, if any were needed, that Microsoft just doesn’t get it.

Admittedly, the first television spot of the campaign is bizarre. All that Messrs Gates and Seinfeld seem to talk about is, well, shoes. How they “run tight”. How best to stretch them. Windows and Office, Microsoft’s ubiquitous flagship products, are not mentioned at all. The word “Microsoft” is mentioned exactly once. Computers come up only insofar as Mr Seinfeld wonders whether they might someday become “moist and chewy”. Mr Gates replies with a subliminal hint, a subtle wriggle of his boxer shorts. What does any of this, the critics ask, have to do with the purpose of the ad campaign, which is to salvage the reputation of Vista, the latest version of Windows?

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Postmodern wriggle: Economist

Pakistan's Energy Crunch: American Chronicle

2008-09-14T23:45:00.000-07:00

Saad Sarwar

Cheap and reliable sources of energy are the driving force for any economy. In the current climate of the world where the limited supply of fossil fuels and the high energy demands is already causing havoc to the world economy, it is about time we thought of alternate sources of energy as the only real option left.

A developing country like Pakistan can ill afford to ignore the importance of alternate sources of energy and the role hydel power can play for Pakistan if harnessed properly. Pakistan is naturally blessed with a terrain that boasts some of the highest mountain ranges in the world which also serve as the sources for all of its rivers. Pakistan possesses K2 which is the second highest point on the earth with the water going all the way to sea level through a course of hundreds of miles. Water coming from such high sources serves as huge repositories of potential energy which can be harnessed not only to produce cheap energy but also as water conservation projects for agriculture. Right now millions of cusecs of water is wasted in our rivers and thrown out straight to the sea without much use. It is high time Pakistan thought of constructing small dams and water reservoirs for electricity production and agricultural purposes all over the country. Even rain water should be conserved in special reservoirs purpose built for the monsoon season which can also serve to make deserts and vast areas of Baluchistan green. Pakistan should go all out for these energy projects so that none of the industrial units or houses and businesses in Pakistan are ever out of energy. Pakistan should set its energy target as double its actual needs in order to be the best growing economy in the world. Which it could easily be, if the cost of factors of production are lowered. Pakistani textile industry always complains of power outages and high costs of energy. If we use hydel power and alternate sources of energy we can even lower cost of utilities for all Pakistanis and give something back to our populace through better energy management thereby becoming a true welfare state.

Pakistan should also think about requiring all vehicles operating in Pakistan to run on electric power by the year 2010. Many countries have started initiatives of using electricity to power vehicles. In Nepal many companies have mushroomed that offer vehicles run on electricity using multiples of car batteries. Britain has submarines that are powered by batteries. Honda has introduced its very efficient Fuel Cell Vehicle that utilizes alternative fuel technologies. Pakistan should set itself a target of being oil free by the year 2020. If steps are taken right now for generating hydel-power along with alternate sources of energy, being oil free by 2020 is not too much to ask for.

Alternate sources of energy like wind and solar power have been exploited by many countries. China even offers a full range of wind turbines, from home turbines of various production capacities to industrial wind turbines. Pakistan can easily import and employ these on mass level to help the local populace develop energy for home use in their very own homes. Some can even sell excess capacity of electricity to the government like is done in the United States thereby lowering costs of production for the government. Most wind turbines only require sustained winds at low wind speeds which are suitable for many areas in Pakistan.

Pakistan is also blessed with plenty of sunshine which can be harnessed to produce solar energy. The first and foremost use of solar panels apart from home use in Pakistan could be the conversion of all the street lights with those powered by solar panels. Installing a solar panel with each street light would not only reduce the burden of the government to produce energy but would also result in saving costs associated with wiring of the street lights as lights with solar panels do not require an exorbitant amount of wiring due to the distance between the source(solar panel) and use(light) being small. Pakistan's main artery, motorway M-2 is already fitted with solar panels that power emergency phones every few kilometers.

With the way the oil prices are rising everyday the day is not far away when we would be driving solar cars on highways lighted by solar energy into homes powered by alternate sources of energy like wind and solar power. The sooner Pakistan recognizes the potential of wind,hydel and solar power along with electric powered vehicles, the sooner Pakistan would become a world class economy whose citizens would enjoy cheap power and the country would rid itself of high current account deficits associated with high oil imports costs and low exports due to high utility costs.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Pakistan's Energy Crunch: American Chronicle

The second browser war: Economist

2008-09-08T03:37:00.000-07:00

Google's new web browser is its most direct attack on Microsoft yet

SEVERAL years ago, Silicon Valley was rife with rumours that Google, then primarily a search engine, might be building a new web browser to rival that of Microsoft, called Internet Explorer, or even an operating system to rival Microsoft's Windows. Google mocked those rumours and they died down. But if Sergey Brin, Google's co-founder, is to be believed, the speculation itself made him think that "maybe it's not a bad idea". And so this week Google did launch a new browser, called Chrome, that is also, in effect, a new operating system. The rumours, says Mr Brin cheekily, "just happened to migrate from being false to being true".

Chrome amounts to a declaration of war—albeit a pre-emptive one, in Google's mind—against Microsoft. So far, Google has been coy about admitting the rivalry (whereas Microsoft, especially its boss, Steve Ballmer, is obsessed with it). In web search and advertising, Google dominates—roughly as Microsoft does in operating systems and office applications. To the extent that Google has challenged Microsoft's core business, it is through Google Docs, its online word-processing, spreadsheet and presentation applications. But these, so far, have few users.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: The second browser war: Economist

How secure is your card info?: BBC

2008-08-08T10:25:00.000-07:00

By Maggie Shiels
Technology reporter, BBC News Website, Silicon Valley

In light of the biggest identity theft case ever prosecuted in America, the spotlight is being turned on just how secure is our credit and debit card information?

The question is a simple one but the answer might appear to be a bit harder to pin down.

VeriSign, a firm that secures websites for e-commerce, told the BBC that credit and debit card information is "vulnerable" but they are working with retailers to change that.

"Credit and debit card information is just not incredibly secure," said Perry Tancredi, VeriSign's senior product manager for fraud detection.

"But it is counterbalanced by the amount of fraud losses due to cheque fraud and direct debit fraud which is much greater than credit card fraud."

Mr Tancredi said: "Regardless of how strong the security measures, and how vigilant, the weak part of the chain is there is always a human who is responsible and who has overall control over the information."

He suggested the best bet was for all consumers to "assume that there will be some sort of fraud on your account sooner or later" and put in place a plan to deal with it.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: How secure is your card info?: BBC

The computer says no: Economist

2008-08-08T09:48:00.000-07:00

Image processing could help to identify artists by their brushstrokes

THE ability of computers to analyse complex digital images is growing rapidly. Robots are being fitted with powerful vision systems that allow them to recognise and hold things. Satellite images of the Earth can be scanned for tiny features, or pictures from deep space searched for strange objects. Medical images can be analysed to find out what might be going on inside a human body. Now digital imaging is learning how to spot art forgeries too.

Scientific methods have long been used to help authenticate works of art: for instance, paint can be dated from its chemical composition or canvasses X-rayed to reveal what lies below the surface. In recent years, however, the art itself has come under more scientific scrutiny, especially through the analysis of brushstrokes. The idea is to establish the equivalent of an artist’s “handwriting” to help experts attribute paintings.

One of the most comprehensive studies using such methods was published recently in Signal Processing Magazine from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. It involved analysing the paintings of Vincent van Gogh and was carried out by James Wang of Penn State University and his colleagues from other universities. It was done with the help of the Van Gogh and Kröller-Müller museums in the Netherlands.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: The computer says no: Economist

Flock Web Browser Eases Multitasking But Has Drawbacks: WSJ

2008-08-07T09:39:00.000-07:00

PERSONAL TECHNOLOGY
By WALTER S. MOSSBERG

August 7, 2008; Page D1

Even with the advent of tabbed browsing, which allows you to keep multiple Web pages open in the same window, Web multitasking can be a pain. You have to constantly click back and forth among tabs if they contain fast-changing material you check often, like the status of your friends in social-networking services, or updates to news feeds.

Trying to share information with people on your Web-based networks can introduce another layer of digital jujitsu. It can be awkward to snag a photo or a snippet of text from one Web site and send it to a friend in a social network on another, or post it to your own blog.

But I've been testing a little-known Web browser that attempts to solve these problems. It's called Flock, and it bills itself as "the social Web browser." I found that it worked well, but it isn't for everyone, and it has some important downsides.

Flock is a modified version of the excellent Firefox Web browser that tacks on some special features for social networkers and bloggers. It's available free at flock.com in essentially identical versions for Windows, Mac and Linux.

Flock adds a special vertical "sidebar" at the left of the browser that keeps your social networks, photo sites or news feeds visible at all times, regardless of what page you're viewing in the main browser window.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Flock Web Browser Eases Multitasking: WSJ

Say goodbye to the computer mouse: BBC

2008-07-19T15:38:00.000-07:00

By Maggie Shiels
Technology reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley

t's nearly 40 years old but one leading research company says the days of the computer mouse are numbered.

A Gartner analyst predicts the demise of the computer mouse in the next three to five years.

Taking over will be so called gestural computer mechanisms like touch screens and facial recognition devices.

"The mouse works fine in the desktop environment but for home entertainment or working on a notebook it's over," declared analyst Steve Prentice.

He told BBC News that his prediction is driven by the efforts of consumer electronics firm which are making products with new interactive interfaces inspired by the world of gaming .

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Say goodbye to the computer mouse: BBC

Look for the silver lining: Economist

2008-07-18T09:15:00.000-07:00

Jul 17th 2008
From The Economist print edition
Illustration by Claudio Munoz
Piracy is a bad thing. But sometimes companies can turn it to their advantage

"MERCHANT and pirate were for a long period one and the same person," wrote Friedrich Nietzsche. "Even today mercantile morality is really nothing but a refinement of piratical morality." Companies, of course, would strongly disagree with this suggestion. Piracy is generally bad for business. It can undermine sales of legitimate products, deprive a company of its valuable intellectual property and tarnish its brand. Commercial piracy may not be as horrific as the seaborne version off the Horn of Africa (see article). But stealing other people's R&D, artistic endeavour or even journalism is still theft.

That principle is worth defending. Yet companies have to deal with the real world—and, despite the best efforts of recorded-music companies, luxury-goods firms and software-industry associations, piracy has proved very hard to stop. Given that a certain amount of stealing is going to happen anyway, some companies are turning it to their advantage.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Look for the silver lining: Economist

Review: iPhone 3G lives up to the hype: CNN

2008-07-18T02:48:00.000-07:00

By Kent German and Donald Bell
Decrease font Decrease font
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CNET.com

(CNET) -- Just over a year after Apple birthed the first iPhone, the long-awaited, next-generation iPhone 3G has arrived bearing a mildly tweaked design and a load of new features.

With access to a faster 3G wireless network, Microsoft Exchange server e-mail, and support for a staggering array of third-party software from the iPhone App Store, the new handset is the iPhone we've been waiting for.

It still lacks some basic features but when compared with what the original model was year ago, this device sets a new benchmark for the cell phone world.

With the iPhone 3G, Apple appears to have fixed some call-quality performance issues we had with the previous model--in our initial tests, the volume is louder with less background buzz than before. Music and video quality were largely unchanged, but we didn't have many complaints in that department to begin with.

We're worried about battery life--some early reviews indicate that the iPhone 3G lasts only a day--but we'll run full tests over the next couple of days and report our results on this page.

Price may well remain our largest concern. New AT&T customers and most current AT&T customers can buy the iPhone 3G for $199 for the 8GB model and $299 for the 16GB model. If you don't qualify for that price--check your AT&T account to find out--you'll pay $399 and $499 respectively.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Review: iPhone 3G lives up to the hype: CNN

Enigma variations: Economist

2008-07-17T23:28:00.000-07:00

Kobal

Jul 10th 2008
From The Economist print edition
A device that counts photons will secure optical data networks from prying eyes

REMOVE the outer coating from a strand of optical fibre, bend it and attach a sensor to detect the tiny amount of light that will leak out. Hacking into an optical network like this is the modern equivalent of a wire tap. But now a laboratory in Cambridge, England, has found a way to turn a hacker's screen instantly blank if he infiltrates the network. This is because the data are being encrypted in a new and probably unbreakable way with one of the first practical devices to be developed for quantum information technology.

The idea of using the more arcane aspects of quantum theory to do things that standard information technology cannot manage has been around for a while. One branch of the field is quantum computing. This, if it can be made to work routinely, promises machines that can do lots of calculations in parallel instead of one at a time, and thus solve problems existing computers cannot manage. The other branch is quantum cryptography, which promises unbreakable codes for messages.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Enigma variations: Economist

Mobile web reaches critical mass: BBC

2008-07-15T00:07:00.000-07:00

The mobile web has reached a "critical mass" of users this year, according to a report by analysts Nielsen Mobile.

The US is the most tech savvy nation with nearly 40 million Americans - 16% of all US mobile users - using their handset to browse on the move.

The UK and then Italy come a close second and third in the 16 countries surveyed by the analyst firm.

Indonesia has the lowest take-up with just 1.1% of mobile subscribers using their handsets for surfing the web.

The firm believes the growth of the mobile web is a combination of increasing numbers of user friendly handsets, higher speed networks and unlimited data packages.

"The adoption and the experience are improving at an impressive rate," said Nic Covey, Nielsen Mobile's director of insights.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Mobile web reaches critical mass: BBC

Google must divulge YouTube log: BBC

2008-07-08T00:41:00.000-07:00

Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube, a US court has ruled.

The ruling comes as part of Google's legal battle with Viacom over allegations of copyright infringement.

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the ruling a "set-back to privacy rights".

The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.

While the legal battle between the two firms is being contested in the US, it is thought the ruling will apply to YouTube users and their viewing habits everywhere.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Google must divulge YouTube log: BBC

Free speech is thorny online: CNN

2008-07-08T00:32:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK (AP) -- Rant all you want in a public park. A police officer generally won't eject you for your remarks alone, however unpopular or provocative.

Say it on the Internet, and you'll find that free speech and other constitutional rights are anything but guaranteed.

Companies in charge of seemingly public spaces online wipe out content that's controversial but otherwise legal. Service providers write their own rules for users worldwide and set foreign policy when they cooperate with regimes like China. They serve as prosecutor, judge and jury in handling disputes behind closed doors.

The governmental role that companies play online is taking on greater importance as their services -- from online hangouts to virtual repositories of photos and video -- become more central to public discourse around the world. It's a fallout of the Internet's market-driven growth, but possible remedies, including government regulation, can be worse than the symptoms.

Dutch photographer Maarten Dors met the limits of free speech at Yahoo Inc.'s photo-sharing service, Flickr, when he posted an image of an early-adolescent boy with disheveled hair and a ragged T-shirt, staring blankly with a lit cigarette in his mouth.

For more on this article, please click on the following link: Free speech is thorny online: CNN