I'd like their “You might be a
domestic terrorist...” jokes if they were in fact jokes.
Welcome
to Minority Report IRL: Police armed with pre-crime detection tools
The terrorist threat as perceived since
9/11 has enough intelligence agencies on the hunt, so the Aspen
Institute Homeland Security Group recommends that DHS now focus
on domestic extremist, aka homegrown terrorists, via federalizing the
police to bring them deeper into the intelligence apparatus and
thereby reflect "a transition in how Americans perceive national
security."
… Such mission creep is not new,
but is alarming in light of the ridiculous
FBI list topped only by the ridiculous
DHS list of what can qualify a person as a
potential domestic terrorist.
This is not for the “let's block
everything” countries, this if for the “Stop that guy from
whistle blowing” countries... Where do you live?
"In a blog
post on Thursday, Twitter announced that it
can now block
individual Tweets in specific countries, while leaving them
visible in other countries. 'We try to keep
content up whenever and wherever we can, and we will be transparent
with users when we can't,' the blog said. Twitter will publish
requests it receives to block content through its partnership with
Chilling Effects."
Integrity is rare...
"The EU
ACTA chief has resigned, saying, 'This agreement might have major
consequences on citizens' lives, and still, everything is being done
to prevent the European Parliament from having its say in this
matter. That is why today, as I release this report for which I was
in charge, I want to send a strong signal and alert the public
opinion about this unacceptable situation. I
will not take part in this masquerade.' 22 EU
members signed
the controversial ACTA treaty Thursday in Tokyo."
Would you ask DoJ to explain the
involvement of RIAA, MPAA and other organization?
Pirate
Parties Organizing Lawsuit Against FBI Over Megaupload Takedown
The
Megaupload troubles make for interesting discussion because there
is much to be said on both sides. Whether the illegal aspects of the
network “outweigh” the legal aspects is a question that will be
discussed for months and perhaps years.
But one thing can’t be disputed:
after the two-year investigation by the FBI, the site’s takedown
was swift and perhaps over-thorough. Thousands and thousands of
users who had legitimate and often critical files hosted on the site
have been left behind, their legal files hosted on a simple
file-hosting service. A coalition of Pirate Party organizations, led
by Pirates of Catalonia, are
planning to sue the FBI
over what they say are “huge personal, economic and image damages
to a vast number of people.”
The group leading the charge contends that the FBI may have
violated Spanish Law, and at any rate,
Regardless of ideology, or opinions on the legality or morality of
those running Megaupload, actions such as the closure of this service
cause huge damage to lawful users of the sites and are unacceptable
and disproportionate violations of their rights.
Imagine all of your online data
interpreted by an algorithm that nags you in the most annoying voice
possible...
January 25, 2012
ACLU
Lens: Google's New Privacy Policy
ACLU:
"Yesterday evening, Google announced a new
privacy policy effective March 1. The new policy is consistent
across the vast majority of Google products...the new privacy policy
makes clear that Google will, for the first time, combine the
personal data you share with any one of its products or sites across
almost all of its products and sites (everything but Google
Chrome, Google
Books, and Google
Wallet) in order to obtain a more comprehensive picture of you.
And there’s no opting out. This comes
on the heels of Google’s new Search,
plus Your World, a feature combining search results from the
public web with private information and photos you have shared (or
that have been shared with you) through Google+ or Picasa... The
head of Google’s privacy for product and engineering explained on
Google’s
blog that integrating an individual’s profiles across Google’s
sites will help Google “figure[e] out what you really mean when you
type in Apple, Jaguar or Pink,” provide more relevant ads, “provide
reminders that you’re going to be late for a meeting based on your
location, your calendar and an understanding of what the traffic is
like that day” (thanks, Mom), and “ensure that our
spelling suggestions, even for your friends’ names, are
accurate...this data aggregation is not just about what ads you see,
but as ACLU of Massachusetts
describes, it creates an even larger treasure
chest of personal information ripe for government picking."
Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me.
We pillage plunder, we rifle and loot.
...and now we can steal your prototype
right along with the description!
The
Pirate Bay now offers a way to download 3D objects
File sharing is certainly a disruptive
technology and The Pirate Bay took this a step further this week by
announcing a section for “physibles,” where
users can download files used to make 3D objects.
So... Is this good or bad? Shouldn't
DHA account for 85% of prosecutions?
January 26, 2012
TRAC
Report - DHS Referred Most Federal Criminal Prosecutions in October
2011
TRAC: "The latest available data
from the Justice Department show that during October 2011 the
Department of Homeland Security's efforts to enforce immigration and
customs laws accounted for 59% of all federal criminal prosecutions.
The government reported 8,038 new prosecutions for these DHS matters
as compared with a total of 13,628 from all sources. According to
the case-by-case information analyzed by the Transactional Records
Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), this number is up 9.3 percent over the
previous month.
Another good “bad example?” I
could have my Excel students try to answer some basic questions this
data does not: What is the average small business income per state,
for example...
January 26, 2012
2011
Small Business Profiles for the States and Territories
- "The economic condition of small businesses in the United States is captured in the latest edition of the Small Business Profiles for the States and Territories. This annual publication from the Office of Advocacy provides information on the demographics of business ownership, employment, industry composition, and small business income, for each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The publication provides available limited data on the U.S. territories The value of this publication is the detail it provides about small businesses at the state level. An Excel spreadsheet containing all of the data in the profiles is also available. The state and territory profiles are in Adobe PDF format."
Geeky stuff Still not the system to
let me replace the monopoly for my neighbors, but it might be perfect
for a school or business...
"Lucky residents of Wilmington,
N.C., will be the first in the nation to have access
to a 'Super Wi-Fi' network. Officials from New Hanover County,
N.C., announced Thursday that they had become the first in the United
States to deploy a mobile data network on so-called 'white spaces'
spectrum that the FCC first authorized for
unlicensed use in 2008."
Soon, all my geeky friends will be
crooks... (Okay, not a big change)
"Back in July 2010, the United
States government approved a few exemptions in a federal law which
made jailbreaking/rooting of electronic devices (iPhones and Android
devices) legal. The court ruling stated that every three years, the
exemptions have to be renewed considering they don't infringe any
copyrighted material. The three-year period is due to expire and the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is looking
to get the exemptions renewed. In order to do so, they have
filed a petition which aims at government to declare jailbreaking
legal once again. In addition to that, EFF is also asking for a
change in the original ruling to include tablet devices."
This hints at the direction of “for
profit” schools and universities...
January 25, 2012
West
LegalEdcenter and NALP Foundation Release Study of Law Firm
Professional Development
News
release: "The majority of law firms in the United States and
Canada expect to increase their reliance on
electronic forms of lawyer development in the next 24
months, although associates in those firms say they
prefer mentoring and on-the-job training to hone their skills.
Details regarding this important disconnect, along with other key
findings about the landscape of professional development inside law
firms, are available in a first-of-its-kind research report published
by the NALP Foundation in partnership with West LegalEdcenter, a
Thomson Reuters business. The report, “Leading Law Firm
Professional Development: A Comprehensive Study of Professional
Development Staffing, Resources and Program Delivery Modes,”
examines the perspectives of more than 200 law firm administrators
responsible for professional development functions and nearly 1,500
associates from firms ranging in size from less than 10 lawyers to
more than 1,000 lawyers. The data for this study was collected in
late 2010 and early 2011 from online questionnaires."
More tools than Apple is offering...
Friday, January 27, 2012
Yesterday, the Google Apps for
Education team published a new
ebook (PDF) titled A
New and Open World for Learning. A New and Open World for
Learning is all about using Google's products and services in
education. The ebook is clearly a marketing vehicle
for Google Apps for Education, but you will find some good
examples of and ideas for using Google apps in your school.
As part of the same
announcement in which A New and Open World for Learning was
released, Google also announced a revamped Google
in Education website. The aspects of Google
in Education that are probably of most interest to classroom
teachers are the lesson
plan index and the classroom
tools index. The classroom
tools index provides links to information about each of the
services available to teachers and students. In the classroom tools
index you'll find some tutorial or how-to resources.
Make Billions? Probably not. Make
something that connects you to current information and shows you how
to use that information...
Digital
Textbooks Go Straight From Scientists to Students
A year ago, electronic textbook
publishers turned down David Johnston’s big idea: the first
interactive marine science textbook.
… The first interactive marine
science textbook for the iPad is called Cachalot
(French for “sperm whale”). It’s a free,
app-based book that covers the latest science of marine
megafauna like whales, dolphins and seals with expert-contributed
text, images and open-access studies. Through a digital publication
system called FLOW, the book also offers students note-taking tools,
Twitter integration, Wolfram|Alpha
search and even National Geographic “critter
cam” videos.
FLOW isn’t the first or most
feature-rich publication tool, nor is Cachalot the slickest
interactive textbook on the market (a market in which Apple
just announced its interest). But Johnston’s title is an
easy-to-update, “good-enough” product that didn’t require
millions of dollars and years of effort to create and manage. A
cadre of Duke
computer science graduates, in fact, built the platform in one
semester on a $5,000 budget.
… “Our real hope in the next few
years is to make this a truly cross-platform tool,” Johnston said.
“Theoretically, you could access your science textbook and notes
from any device. Even your web browser.”
… As new scientific knowledge
enters a field, a leading academic could make a quick edit in FLOW to
instantly and seamlessly update a student’s textbook.
… Johnston and McMurray hope to
succeed where free, collaborative “Wikibooks”
textbook efforts have floundered. Those invited the public at
large to contribute; Johnston and McMurray seek expert contributions,
and the final text is rigorously edited and peer-reviewed.
… McMurray and Johnston plan to
develop FLOW into a commercial business that offers help to
universities, government agencies and NGOs looking to develop
textbooks and instructional materials.
… “These guys are building an
incredible proof of concept, something that serves us all in the
pursuit of digital publishing by showing people what’s possible,”
said MacInnis. “But academic projects tend not to make great
business projects. It remains to be seen what happens here.”
(Related) The tools are out there...
"Right now, content publishers
who want to reach readers through dedicated mobile apps have to hire
a separate engineering team to build each app — one for iOS (based
on Objective-C), another for Android (Java), a third for Windows
Phone (C#), etc. Yahoo's Platform Technology Group is working on an
alternative: a set of JavaScript and HTML-based tools that would
handle core UI and data-management tasks inside mobile apps for any
operating system, moving developers closer to the nirvana of 'write
once, run everywhere.' The tools are gradually
being open-sourced — starting with Mojito, a framework for running
hybrid server/browser module-widgets ('mojits') — and Yahoo is
showing off what they can do in the form of Livestand, the news
reader app it released for the iPad in November. In his first
extensive public interview about Mojito and the larger 'Cocktails'
project, Bruno Fernandez-Ruiz, chief architect at Yahoo's Platform
Technology Group, explains how
the tools work and why the company is sharing them."
Apparently there is seed money for
Education Technology... Just remember when you start your company, I
have degrees in both Computers and Business, and I work (relatively)
cheep!
Knewton
Prepares To Take Education by Storm [TCTV]
… I managed to catch Jose Ferreira,
CEO and Founder of Knewton a
startup which is aiming a silver bullet at the education problem with
something that one might even call an audacious platform.
How so? Well, Knewton, a technology
company based in NYC, currently has an application being tested with
10,000 college student in the US and is described as an “adaptive
learning platform”. What does that mean in English? Well, the
idea is that it customises your average educational content to meet
the unique needs of each student.
… Ferreira has raised $54M to
achieve this, which is quite a sum. Despite that, he is openly
critical of VCs who do not think in such word changing arenas as
education.
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