Obama signs on with Facebook, Twitter and MySpace
Whether an attempt to widen the scope of its influence through the digital medium or simply ‘get down wiv da kids’ (or both), the Obama administration has this week expanded the president’s penchant for technology by signing up with not one, not two, but three prominent online social communities.
According to an explanatory post on the official White House blog, the government’s sudden willingness to embrace social networking via accounts with Facebook, Twitter and MySpace is a prime example of what it likes to call “Whitehouse 2.0.” Read more...
Intel to bring 3D transistors to next-generation chips
- 3-D Transistor This image shows the vertical fins of Intel’s 22 nanometer microprocessor using 3-D Tri-Gate transistors.
Intel has advanced its chip manufacturing technology with three-dimensional transistors that could make PCs, smartphones and tablets faster and more power-efficient.
The company said Wednesday that it will implement three-dimensional transistors when making chips using its latest 22-nanometer manufacturing technology.
The new chip technology, called tri-gate transistors, replaces flat, two-dimensional streams of transistors with a 3D structure, said Mark Bohr, an Intel senior fellow. A flat, two-dimensional planar gate is replaced with a thin, three-dimensional fin that rises up vertically from the silicon substrate. Read more...
Isis says carrier-backed mobile payments ‘accelerated,’ not ‘dialing back’
The mobile commerce joint venture Isis has been working for months to engage Visa, MasterCard and other major U.S. banks in smartphone payments with near-field communication (NFC) technology, an Isis marketing executive clarified late Wednesday.
The Wall Street Journal reported early Wednesday that Isis had dropped its plans for its own system, in which carriers collect payments made by smartphone in exchange for a system open to Visa and others. The Isis joint venture includes AT&T, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile USA.
However, Isis Marketing chief Jaymee Johnson told that Isis had formally announced in a press release on April 4 that it was opening its infrastructure to "all merchants, banks, payment networks and carriers." Read more...
CBS Sued For Distributing LimeWire Software
An entrepreneur and over a dozen hip-hop artists are suing CBS over its part in contributing to piracy. The suit, filed by FilmOn founder Alki David in federal court on Wednesday, accuses CBS's CNET arm of exacerbating piracy problem by distributing LimeWire software on its website.
David's FilmOn was sued last year by the major broadcast networks--for allowing users to stream live over-the-air broadcasts. Taking this into consideration, David's suit seems a little retaliatory. Read more...
iOS 4.3.3 Update Fixes Location-Tracking Problem
Apple has released a 4.3.3 update to its iOS operating system with corrections to location tracking on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. The changes could take some pressure off the company.
One change reduces the time that location information is retained from an indefinite period defined by a size limit to one week. The update also ends the automatic transfer of location information when a mobile device is synced with a Mac or PC. And when the Location Services setting is disabled, the location information is deleted. Read more...
Apple updates software to fix tracking glitch
Apple Inc on Wednesday released a software update to fix a problem that enabled its mobile devices to collect and store customers' location data, making good on a promise it made last week.
Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs, who is on medical leave, had promised to adjust the company's mobile software to store less location data after a firestorm broke out over whether Apple was monitoring the whereabouts of its customers. Read more...
Annual Day Against DRM
The music industry may have largely given up on digital rights management, a largely ineffectual set of technologies meant to interfere with the simple and ubiquitous act of copying digital files, but the risks inherent in digital locks are as present as ever. Film studios must think that somehow their application of this technology is different, that this time it will work. As book publishers experiment with electronic editions, they also assume any such digital versions must be locked down to prevent their livelihood from being stolen out from under them.
Thinkers much brighter and more articulate than I am have pointed out that strategies relying on DRM proceed from rather flawed assumptions. Above all other things what the personal computer, and its descendants like smart phones, does best is to make perfect, infinite digital copies. Coding a thin veneer over this is comparable to trying to contain a rabid badger with a cardboard box. It willfully ignores the inherent nature of the situation. Hence business models based on digital technologies would be far better served to embrace the very abundance enabled. Read more...
AppleCrate II doubles the cluster computing fun
Back in 2004, Apple hobbyist/guru [Michael Mahon] built a cluster of Apple IIe main boards dubbed the “AppleCrate” as an experiment in parallel computing. Now that a few years have passed, he is back with a new iteration of the device, aptly named AppleCrate II. AppleCrate II was built to address some of the design limits of his first cluster project as well as to expand his parallel computing capabilities. His gripes with the first model were primarily structural in nature. The new system is organized in horizontal layers, using metal standoffs between each main board, rather than relying on a shaky wooden superstructure to keep things together. He also found his previous 8-processor configuration a bit limiting, Read more...