http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10082013-38.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5
President Obama? Web sites bet it's a done deal
Posted by Declan McCullagh November 4, 2008 5:00 AM PST
After the votes were tallied on Election Day four years ago, the big winners turned out to be the betting Web sites that predicted George W. Bush's re-election.
U.K.-based Betfair correctly predicted that Bush would stay in office and gave him 2-to-1 odds of beating his Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry. The odds at Dublin-based Tradesports.com were similarly accurate, giving Bush a 58 percent chance to win and Kerry a 42 percent chance.
For my fellow paranoids...
http://www.pogowasright.org/article.php?story=2008110312032561
Hundreds of Thousands of Voter Records Found Scattered on Highway in Florida
Monday, November 03 2008 @ 12:03 PM EST Contributed by: PrivacyNews
Hundreds of thousands of pages of voter documents were found scattered along a highway in Hillsborough County, Florida, Monday morning. Two empty cardboard boxes were found near the documents, suggesting they may have fallen from a truck or been purposely dumped along the highway.
The documents, which filled nine plastic bags when collected, contain names, addresses, phone numbers and party affiliation of Hillsborough County voters.
It appears, however, that the documents aren't the county's voter registration applications since they also contain the voters' registration numbers, precincts where they are registered to vote and a check box next to each voter's name indicating their choice of Barack Obama or John McCain in the presidential election and whether they need a ride on Election Day, according to the Tampa Tribune. The latter would not be on a county voter record. [Interesting that they think only the last piece is not on the county records... Bob]
Source - Threat Level Related - Associated Press
[From the AP article:
The elections office says the information in the documents is public record.
Related – and this one would work too...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/03/phony-virgnia-flier-culpr_n_140739.html
Phony Virginia Flier Culprit Found
RSS stumble digg reddit del.ico.us news trust mixx.com
AP November 3, 2008 08:57 PM
State elections officials have identified the person responsible for a phony election flier that told Republicans to vote on Tuesday and Democrats to vote a day later.
Cloud Computing Considerations Tactically brilliant but strategically dumb.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10081498-16.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5
Is openness a second-order purchasing consideration?
Posted by Matt Asay November 3, 2008 3:07 PM PST
Nick Carr writes a fantastic piece--"Openness is not enough"--which highlights how far Microsoft has gone in the cloud, and whether anyone cares about lock-in. The answer to the first question is "shockingly far," and the answer to the second question is "not yet."
... [I]n this early stage of the cloud's development, openness means little to the buyer (or user).... What they care about right now is security, reliability, features, compatibility with their existing systems and applications, ease of adoption, stability of the vendor, and other practical concerns. In the long run, they may come to regret their lack of stress on openness, but in the here-and-now it's just not a major consideration. They want stuff that works and won't blow up in their faces.
... Now, it's absolutely true that openness is not necessarily the reason to buy, but rather can be the reason a prospect even knows you exist (e.g., they downloaded your product). But Carr is onto something here. Some grouse about the iPhone being proprietary, but even at open-source Red Hat I saw an increasing number of iPhone users. Why? Because it works, and it works well.
Very interesting on several levels. 1) Check the comments 2) Didn't the Air Force scrap their Cyber Command? 3) Will they be looking for Hacker Consultants? (They won't want these guys in uniforms...)
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/11/03/1750248&from=rss
Air Force To Rewrite the Rules of the Internet
Posted by CmdrTaco on Monday November 03, @01:59PM from the because-they-can dept. The Internet The Military
meridiangod writes
"The Air Force is fed up with a seemingly endless barrage of attacks on its computer networks from stealthy adversaries whose motives and even locations are unclear. So now the service is looking to restore its advantage on the virtual battlefield by doing nothing less than the rewriting the 'laws of cyberspace.'"
I'm sure that'll work out really well for them.
[From the article:
An upcoming Air Force doctrine calls for the service to have the "freedom to attack" online. [What stops them today? Bob]
Funny it's not more widespread...
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/11/03/2254229&from=rss
Privacy Concerns Over Google On the Rise In Germany
Posted by kdawson on Sunday November 02, @08:22PM from the not-being-evil-we-promise dept. Privacy Google
An anonymous reader writes
"After protests from several sources, major German news site Spiegel Online has dropped Google Analytics. 'Google gathers so much detailed information about its users that one critic says some state intelligence bureaus look "like child protection services" in comparison,' they say. Spiegel Online no longer uses Google Analytics. 'We want to ensure that data on our users' browsing patterns don't leave our site,' says Wolfgang Büchner, one of Spiegel Online's two chief editors."
The article covers a wide swath of German concern over Google's data-collecting and -handling policies, including a local rebellion against Google's Street View survey vehicles that threatens to go national.
Why physics is cool.
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/11/03/2229248&from=rss
New Type of Particle May Have Been Found
Posted by kdawson on Monday November 03, @07:33PM from the outside-the-pipe dept. Science
An anonymous reader writes
"The LHC is out of commission, but the Tevatron collider at Fermilab is still chugging along, and may have just discovered a new type of particle that would signal new physics. New Scientist reports that the Tevatron's CDF detector has found muons that seem to have been created outside of the beam pipe that confines the protons and anti-protons being smashed together. The standard model can't explain the muons, and some speculate that 'an unknown particle with a lifetime of about 20 picoseconds was produced in the collision, traveled about 1 centimeter, through the side of the beam pipe, and then decayed into muons.' [Interesting. An undetectable particle decays into a detectable one. Bob] The hypothetical particle even seems to have the right mass to account for one theory of dark matter."
Save the rainforest, fuel the Hummer!
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/11/rainforest-fung.html
Rainforest Fungus Naturally Synthesizes Diesel
By Alexis Madrigal November 03, 2008 7:15:49 PM
A fungus that lives inside trees in the Patagonian rain forest naturally makes a mix of hydrocarbons that bears a striking resemblance to diesel, biologists announced today. And the fungus can grow on cellulose, a major component of tree trunks, blades of grass and stalks that is the most abundant carbon-based plant material on Earth.
Niche, but interesting for those used to reading PDFs online and perhaps to import into your Kindle...
http://www.killerstartups.com/Web-App-Tools/tabbloid-com-turn-your-feeds-into-a-magazine
Tabbloid.com - Turn Your Feeds Into A Magazine
Tabbloid is a web-based service that serves one specific purpose: turning all your favorite feeds into a personal magazine that can be read as a PDF document.
The mechanics of the site are actually quite simple. To begin with, you have to enter as many RSS feeds as you wish. Starting lists are also provided just in case, and these deal with aspects such as “Technology”, “Politics” and “Business”. Then, you must set down the delivery options that suit you best. You can choose the frequency and the time along with the day from a series of provided drop down boxes. Once this has been dealt with, you will receive the print-ready PDF at the frequency you have just stipulated.
This service is not only practical and easy to implement, but it is actually rendered at no cost whatsoever. In addition to that, there is no registration process to be complied with – you simply follow the “Get started” link which is featured and set down the aforementioned criteria.
I'll make a selection of music to sooth my students during testing: Cry me a river, My Way (the end is near...) -- come to think of it, there are very few Happy Test-Taking tunes...
http://www.killerstartups.com/Video-Music-Photo/streamdrag-com-listen-to-music-online
StreamDrag.com - Listen To Music Online
A service which has clearly been set up with practicality and ease of use in mind, StreamDrag will enable you to look up music files which are part of YouTube videos and arrange and create playlists that can be listened to whenever you wish.
The site revolves around a basic search tool that has the distinct advantage of being very fast. For instance, I tried looking up “The Who”, one of my best-loved bands and 50 different results were produced almost instantly. These included classic performances of My Generation and Pinball Wizard along with monumental recent performances like Baba O’Riley at the Concert for New York City and Won’t Get Fooled Again at the Live 8.
All in all, a service like this stands as a versatile (not to mention inexpensive) way of listening to your favorite music wherever you are, and also as a viable way of recommending your favorite artists to friends and acquaintances when you don’t have a CD or your MP3 player at hand.
To hell with the mice, give us a T-Rex!
Cloning from the grave: Scientists create new life from a mouse that has been frozen for 16 YEARS
By David Derbyshire Last updated at 7:49 AM on 04th November 2008
Scientists have created clones of a mouse that had been dead and frozen for 16 years.
... The Japanese researchers say their work will benefit mankind - and could be used to bring back extinct animals such as the woolly mammoth or sabre tooth tiger.
But ethical watchdogs branded the experiment disturbing.
Critics say it brings the world closer to the day when people try to clone long- dead relatives stored in cryopreservation clinics.
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