Especially for entering passwords using your mouse this is a problem. 2 advertisers are known to use the expoit.
Internet Explorer tracks cursor even when minimised • The Register.
Internet Explorer tracks cursor even when minimised
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Google Gets A Second Brain, Changing Everything About Search | Xconomy
Today, when you enter a search term into Google, the company kicks off two separate but parallel searches. One runs against the traditional keyword-based Web index, bringing back matches that are ranked by statistical relevance—the familiar “ten blue links.” The other search runs against a much newer database of named entities and relationships.
This second brain is called the Knowledge Graph.
It’s based on Freebase. It’s a collaborative database—technically, a semantic graph—that grows through the contributions of volunteers, who carefully specify the properties of each new entity and how it fits into existing knowledge categories. (For example, Freebase knows that Jupiter is an entity of type Planet, that it has properties such as a mean radius of 69,911 km, and that it is the fictional setting of two Arthur C. Clarke novels.) While Freebase now hosted by Google, it’s still open to submissions from anyone, and the information in it can be freely reused under a Creative Commons license.
Metaweb had to break away from the classic relational-database model, in which data is stored in orderly tables of rows and columns, and build its own proprietary graph database. In a semantic graph, there are no rows and columns, only “nodes” and “edges,” that is, entities and relationships between them. Because it’s impossible to specify in advance what set of properties and relationships you might want to assign to a real-world entity (what’s known in database lingo as the “schema”), graph databases are far better than relational databases for representing practical knowledge.
Fascinating stuff on the future of Google Search.
Google Gets A Second Brain, Changing Everything About Search | Xconomy.
Polymorphous Perversity
Very worth reading are the a few reviews bottom right column under: “They have spoken” from big name game blogs. They all treat it very intellectually. The history of what the game is and how it was built are very interesting also.
Very bizarre.
You can download it for free
The other games the author has made are equally bizarre and equally praised…
Have fun!
Polymorphous Perversity: Game.
Ubuntu inserts spyware
Ubuntu, a widely used and influential GNU/Linux distribution, has installed surveillance code. When the user searches her own local files for a string using the Ubuntu desktop, Ubuntu sends that string to one of Canonical’s servers. (Canonical is the company that develops Ubuntu.)
To make matters worse, they also install adware, inserting Amazon promotions in your search results.
Ubuntu Spyware: What to Do? — Free Software Foundation — working together for free software.
Contact Lens LCD Display
Ghent University’s centre of microsystems technology has developed a spherical curved LCD display which can be embedded in contact lenses and handle projected images using wireless technology.
“Now that we have established the basic technology, we can start working towards real applications, possibly available in only a few years,” said Professor Herbert De Smet.
Unlike previous contact lens displays, which are limited to a few small pixels to make up an image, the new technology allows the whole curved surface of the lens to be used.
Text messages direct to your contact lens – Telegraph.
An internet of airborne things
The plan is to use autonomous airborne drones to fly around carrying physical payloads up to 2kg with a network of base stations upon which drones can land and replace their batteries. It’ll be run on the same principles as TCP/IP and allow for intelligent routing of ‘packets’ (aircraft).
Monitor: An internet of airborne things | The Economist.
The Laffer Curve in Action: Two-thirds of millionaires left Britain to avoid 50p tax rate – Telegraph
Two-thirds of millionaires left Britain to avoid 50p tax rate – Telegraph.
This has cost the UK GBP7 billion. They have repealed the laws, but the millionaires are not coming back much.
Dutch gov’t: suspects must decrypt computers
How far can simulations go versus live flying?
This article has links to how the US uses simulators and what their capabilities are. They talk about training for UAV’s, the network centric way in which they’re trying to link up simulators globally, how they’re used to train for large force employments, using them to practice 4 ship formations and of course, the limitations of the system in basic airmanship.
How far can simulations go versus live flying? – The DEW Line.
A-RAM, advanced memory storage
Piracy and Movie Revenues: Box office sales went down after they closed MegaUpload
Exogenous variation comes from the unexpected shutdown of the popular file hosting platform Megaupload.com on January 19, 2012. The estimation strategy is based on a quasi difference-in-differences approach. We compare box office revenues before and after the shutdown to a matched control group of movies unaffected by the shutdown.
We find that the shutdown had a negative, yet insignificant effect on box office revenues
via Piracy and Movie Revenues: Evidence from Megaupload by Christian Peukert, Jörg Claussen :: SSRN.
Megaupload framed by FBI claims Kim Dotcom
Evidence has emerged showing the Department of Homeland Security served a search warrant on Mr Dotcom’s file-sharing company Megaupload in 2010 which he claims forced it to preserve pirated movies found in an unrelated piracy investigation.
The 39 files were identified during an investigation into the NinjaVideo website, which had used Megaupload’s cloud storage to store pirated movies.
When the FBI applied to seize the Megaupload site in 2012, it said the company had failed to delete pirated content and cited the earlier search warrant against the continued existence of 36 of the same 39 files.
Dotcom: We've hit the jackpot – National – NZ Herald News.
China Lands First Jet on Its Aircraft Carrier
And all the experts were saying it would be years before they could do anything with it when it was delivered to the Navy on September 25th. It looks like the Chinese are serious about putting it in operation as soon as they possibly can.
China Lands First Jet on Its Aircraft Carrier | Military.com.
self-filling water bottle
Deckard Sorenson has found a way to coat a surface with hydrophilic and hydrophobic coatings, and then uses a fan to pass air over the surface. The water condenses on the surface and, eventually, Sorenson has created a self-filling water bottle.
Scientist takes inspiration from natural world to create self-filling water bottle | PRI.ORG.
NASA space Internet using the Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) protocol
One of the problems DTN fixes is queueing transmissions, as transmitting to mars at the speed of light incurs an 8 second delay.
NASA fires-up experimental space Internet for robot control.
Razer mice need the internet to work?!
A customer trying to set up his Razer Naga 2012 mouse couldn’t because he had to register with Razer before he could change the settings. The Razer servers were down because of hurricane Sandy. Why on earth would he need to connect to Razer at all to set up his mouse?!
“Why the hell does this mouse need to connect to the Internet?” | Ars Technica.
US lets Apple patent a rounded rectangle
Incredibly the US has managed to let Apple patent this shape. The prior art is allready there for tablets, but couldn’t someone have just shown the patent examiners a table top?
Apple is granted a patent on the rectangle. No, really • The Register.
An insight into CIA burglary
The CIA is not in the habit of discussing its clandestine operations, but the agency’s purpose is clear enough. As then-chief James Woolsey said in a 1994 speech to former intelligence operatives: “What we really exist for is stealing secrets.” Indeed, the agency declined to comment for this article, but over the course of more than 80 interviews, 25 people—including more than a dozen former agency officers—described the workings of a secret CIA unit that employed Groat and specialized in stealing codes, the most guarded secrets of any nation.
The CIA Burglar Who Went Rogue | History & Archaeology | Smithsonian Magazine.
A good explanation of homomorphic encryption
Homomorphic encryption is where one party (Alice) encrypts data and passes it to another (Bob) with an encrypted key. This means that Bob can’t read the data, but can perform computations on it, and pass the encrypted results (which Bob can’t read) to Alice, so that she can decrypt it with her key. This is especially useful in the age of cloud computing, webservices, SaaS and private records.
Alice and Bob in Cipherspace » American Scientist.
Apple’s iPhone Tracking you again In iOS 6
IFA or IDFA stands for “identifier for advertisers.” It’s a random, anonymous number that is assigned to a user and their device. It is temporary and can be blocked, like a cookie.
When you look at an app, or browse the web, your presence generates a call for an ad. The publisher’s site that you’re looking at then passes the IFA to the ad server. The advertiser is then able to know that a specific iPhone user is looking at a specific publication and can serve an ad targeting that user. IFA becomes particularly useful, for instance, if an ad server notices that a particular IFA is looking at a lot of different car sites. Perhaps that user is interested in buying a new car. They’ll likely start seeing a lot of car ads on their iPhone.
More importantly, IFA will allow advertisers to track the user all the way to “conversion” — which for most advertisers consists of an app download. Previously, advertisers had no idea whether their ads actually drove people to download apps or buy things. Now IFA will tell them.
The IFA does not identify you personally — it merely provides a bunch of aggregate audience data that advertisers can target with ads.
IFA: Apple's iPhone Tracking In iOS 6 – Business Insider.
Fortunately you can turn it off this time.
Chris Roberts: Star Citizen / Squadron 42
Chris Roberts is coming out with a whole universe – EVE Online, but FPS / in cockpit. It’s called Star Citizen. There’s a game within a game: Squadron 42. That’s where you enroll in the military and fly around in space. Awesome gameplay videos in the links.
Here’s an Extended Cut of That Dazzling Squadron 42 Trailer.
Beyond light speed – possible in theory using special relativity
University of Adelaide applied mathematicians have extended Einstein’s theory of special relativity to work beyond the speed of light.
Einstein’s theory holds that nothing could move faster than the speed of light, but Professor Jim Hill and Dr Barry Cox in the University’s School of Mathematical Sciences have developed new formulas that allow for travel beyond this limit.
The research has been published in the prestigious Proceedings of the Royal Society A in a paper, ‘Einstein’s special relativity beyond the speed of light’. Their formulas extend special relativity to a situation where the relative velocity can be infinite, and can be used to describe motion at speeds faster than light.
“We are mathematicians, not physicists, so we’ve approached this problem from a theoretical mathematical perspective,” said Dr Cox. “Should it, however, be proven that motion faster than light is possible, then that would be game changing.
via Extending Einstein's theory beyond light speed | Science Codex.
DNA has a 521-year half-life – so no cloning dinosaurs
By comparing the specimens’ ages and degrees of DNA degradation, the researchers calculated that DNA has a half-life of 521 years. That means that after 521 years, half of the bonds between nucleotides in the backbone of a sample would have broken; after another 521 years half of the remaining bonds would have gone; and so on.
The team predicts that even in a bone at an ideal preservation temperature of −5 ºC, effectively every bond would be destroyed after a maximum of 6.8 million years. The DNA would cease to be readable much earlier — perhaps after roughly 1.5 million years, when the remaining strands would be too short to give meaningful information.
DNA has a 521-year half-life : Nature News & Comment.
Software Patents going nuts – Apple & Google spent more on Patent lawsuits than R&D last year
Alchemy! Superman-strength bacteria produce 24-karat gold
the metal-tolerant bacteria Cupriavidus metallidurans can grow on massive concentrations of gold chloride — or liquid gold, a toxic chemical compound found in nature.
Brown and Kashefi fed the bacteria unprecedented amounts of gold chloride, mimicking the process they believe happens in nature. In about a week, the bacteria transformed the toxins and produced a gold nugget.
via Superman-strength bacteria produce 24-karat gold.