Lawrence – Page 2 – Digital-Lifestyles

Free Mobiles; Technology Terror?; RIAA Boycott – Teenage Tech News Review

Handy… Literally!
Engadget has a story on how Montclair State University in New Jersey is handing out free phones to it’s students to enable them to easier communicate with each other. The handsets feature software which allows them to receive “channels” of information, which users sign up for. These channels include things like the dinner menu and the location of the university’s shuttle buses, as well as channels students have set up of their own.

I can admit I am actually kind of jealous of this: I would love the ability to be able to do this at school, checking up on when holidays are, what’s on the menu, and what my time-table’s like. Sadly, I think my school would have some difficulty in preventing the chavs from selling them on eBay, which of course is an entirely different issue.

This is the problem with technology like this: Those most likely to adopt it are, by default, young people, who therefore can’t afford it. Give it to them instead then, and a select few will take advantage of that. Technology like this, for now, is only for older people I think. This isn’t to say it isn’t exciting though: I still find socio-technological implementations, usually referred to as MoSoSo (Mobile Social Software), fascinating, as although there isn’t yet much of a market for these sorts of services, there will inevitably be, and when there is, it could well change the way we communicate with each other forever.

SMS Text Message Sounds nasty!
Everyone over here in Europe likes to text, or “txt” for short. I’m not entirely sure how popular the practice is over in the US, but in the UK it’s used mainly by teenagers, although others use it too, because of it’s extremely low cost in comparison to making voice calls.

The New York Times is reporting that apparently, using SPAMming techniques, it should be possible to flood a cities GSM infrastructure by sending as little as 165 text messages a second into the network. This is made possible because text messages use the same communications infrastructure and network that voice calls are made to as well. Imagine what could happen if someone flooded a network, so that no calls could be made, and then at the same time a co-ordinated terrorist attack occurred. People would be unable to call the emergency services, and wide-spread carnage and destruction would occur.

This is particularly scary for me, as I would be at a loss in an emergency without my phone: It’s central to how I find people and communicate with them, and when I really need to get in touch with them, I wouldn’t be able to. This reliance and taking for granted of technology is something that most of my generation are likely guilty of, and when everything does kick off and there’s no electricity, phones or water, I would have severe doubts that a lot of them would be able to cope with it.

It was only really recent events (London bombings) that brought this to my attention, but it has made me realise that reliance on technology could be very turned around and be used against us.

RIAA That lot again
Yes, that’s right, the RIAA are at it again: A short time ago, a case against a mother on her daughter’s behalf of file sharing was dismissed in court. Now, the RIAA are back, but this time, they’re not suing the mother but her 14-year old daughter.

People like the RIAA make me so, so angry: At 14, no-one really knows what they’re doing. So a little girl downloaded some of her favourite songs from the Internet. That little girl was probably a paying customer as well, but her pocket money just wasn’t enough, and she just wanted to hear one more song by her favourite artist, but couldn’t afford it. Her friend said “you can get it for free from here”, and so that’s what the girl did. Next thing she knew, the very company she was a customer of, was sending threatening letters to her, demanding thousands of dollars in compensation.

Is this the right way of treating your customers? I know for sure it is one great way of driving them away. If you are in my position at the moment, of having a good few thousand songs you enjoy, then stop buying music unless it is from your local bands or from an independent label. It might sound an unrealistic expectation, but I have found so many great bands on the Internet and locally at pubs and other music venues, that I am quite confident I will never be giving another penny to those greedy folks over at the RIAA.

You can do something about it though, by going to www.boycott-riaa.com. Every little helps!
That would be my rant for the day, have a nice weekend :-)

Google Is 7; Asteriod Impacts; Blackberry 8700 – A Teenage Tech News Review

Google's Seventh Birthday Happy Birthday!
Here’s a news item that probably slipped through the mesh, as it was quite low-key: Google is now 7 years old! This came as a bit of a shock to me in a way, and it probably will to you too: Nowadays, I would find it impossible to live and work as I do without Google. In fact, this one corporation has a pretty good monpoly on my life. I use Google on my mobile to find anything from street directions to the meaning of the word “vehement”. I get my email from them, and of course I use it to browse the Internet. It’s hard for me to imagine, then, that seven years ago, people managed to survive without Google.

Google as it was seven years ago I found a screenshot of what Google used to look like on the Internet archive, and although it does obviously look a little old-school, it’s still much the same interface-wise as it is today:

That was at a time when Google was still hosted on the Stanford University servers and had a staff of two. All I can say is that they’ve come a long way.

For me, this is a reminder that I am a part of the generation that has grown up at the same time as consumer technology: The children of tomorrow will grow up taking things like Google and the Internet for granted, and will never be able to experience a world without technology, and so will never fully appreciate it. I personally don’t think that technology will continue to evolve as fast as it has done so far, simply because I don’t think that there is anywhere for it to go. Off the top of my head, there isn’t anything that I can think of that I would really like, but can’t have, because it’s simply not technically possible. Still, time will tell, and I suppose in 70 years time I will be the one saying to a group of grandchildren while they mock me: “In my day, we had to look through books to find what we wanted you know!”

There’s a fascinating history of Google available on their corporate history page here.

It’s in Space, it’s got to be cool. Oh, actually, no nukes, so forget it
In a development reminiscent of the movie Deep Impact”, scientists have revealed a few ideas about what to do in case of an imminent asteroid impact. Their ideas just aren’t as cool as those in the movie though in my opinion: I mean, come on, you need a few nukes in there to make it look cool! Ah well, never mind, I just hope that in case of there being any danger of an impact, the scientists responsible will find some way of saving us. There have, afterall, been a fair few objects that have come close in history, and the dinosaurs can surely (or rather not) testify that sometimes, these things do actually hit Earth.

“Batman’s Blackberry”, but I still want one!
The story on the new Blackberry 8700, due to be released “in the neighborhood of December of this year or very early 2006,” hit this week. Having previously reviewed a Blackberry 7100v, I am very keen to have a play with the new phone. Apparently, it sports a 312mhz processor, which will hopefully make the browser a viable option for browsing anything but the most minimal of Web pages. We shall see, now all I have to do is get my hands on one ;-)

Admittedly, the styling does remind one of a phone tailor-made for Batman, but then it’s kinda cool anyway, and the screen looks like it’s going to be great! The screens on the 7100 and the 7200 were already some of the best seen on mobile phones, and so I have high hopes for the 8700. I bet Robin’s already got one, lucky sod! The rest of us will have to wait until December.

Pixel Ads; gWiFi; WoW Plague – Teenage Tech News Review

Neat Idea!
A UK student has thought up a unique way of financing his way through university: Selling online advertising space. That on its own isn’t unique, but the twist he has applied to it is: He is selling it by the pixel on his “Million Dollar Homepage”.

This guy is getting so much media attention as a result of the novelty value of his site that a lot of companies are getting interested in buying pixels from him. The going rate is $1/pixel, and there are 1,000,000 up for grabs… I wonder if he can make it to a million bucks?

This revenue concept started me thinking about what I could do to finance my way through University… I have just under 3 years to come up with something, and it better be good! It seems that finding a niche in the market for something unique and not actually that useful, and then attracting a load of media attention to give it artificial value is a good way of making cash on the Internet. Look out for me following suit in a few year’s time!

Wifi They’ve done it again
Done what? I hear you ask. Google have launched a Beta version of their Wi-Fi service following a host of rumours since an article mentioning a possible Google Wi-Fi appeared in Business 2.0 back in August.

The service is only available in selected parts of San Francisco Bay (well two locations) for now, but knowing Google I am sure that it will spread relatively quickly.

Part of the evidence is a new product, for free download, that basically works as a VPN client and encrypts all data sent over the Google Wi-Fi hotspots to secure it. Only downside with this is that this application could cause privacy concerns, as Google will apparently record data about people’s Web-browsing habits. Still, it has to be paid for somehow and recording the sites people visit fits in with their analysis of the Web so as to aid its online advertising business, Ad-sense. A link to Google’s FAQ about their Secure Access product can be found here.

From the point of view of a teenager like me, this sort of service is very good: I don’t personally mind giving up a small amount of my privacy to be able to use a service that I could no way afford if it wasn’t free. Hell, at 16 I’m not even legally allowed a credit card with which to pay for commercial Wi-Fi services!

As regular readers, Mike caught this story earlier on in the week.

World of Warcraft It’s like the Middle Ages all over again!
This story is quite apt as I am currently suffering from the current real-life equivalent of the virtual plague documented by The Register. Yes, that’s right, I’ve caught the flu :-(

Anyway, according to The Register, World of Warcraft, a popular massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG), has been hit by a plague. Blizzard, the company behind the hugely succesful game, introduced a new god character to their game called Hakkar. What’s special about him is that he carries some sort of disease, similar to HIV, that spreads to some of the people that he attacks. These people then spread the disease further and further, which has resulted in a large quantity of the World of Warcraft servers becoming infected by it.

It’s a new concept and just brings us even closer to where we start blurring the line between reality and virtual reality. It also shows that virtual reality can have all the nasties that the real world does too.

Anyway, I am off to bed, forget World of Warcraft, I’m ill and need to go to school tomorrow. Just hope I don’t spread the “plague”>

Barmy Ballmer; Cracking Mobile Theft; Flogging A Dead Horse On eBay – Teenage Tech News Review

Steve Ballmer looking scarily like Shrek It’s funny, laugh!
Couldn’t believe this one when I read it. Well, almost couldn’t believe it. Following on from the earlier story, Steve Ballmer is now apparently denying ever having thrown a chair across a room in anger and claiming he would “f—ing bury” the executive, Mark Lukovsky, who told Ballmer he was leaving Microsoft for greener pastures offered to him by Google.

Ballmer told the Telegraph: “I’ve never thrown a chair in my life,” which The Register says might raise the idea that he got someone else to do it for him. I probably would if I was as rich as he is!

Lastly, am I the only one who thinks that Steve Ballmer has a certain resemblance with Shrek?

Phone Theft Ew… That’s not nice!
According to The Register, a Romanian woman has tried to evade being caught thieving a mobile phone by sticking it where, well, the sun doesn’t shine.

Police when they caught her were puzzled by their inability to find the phone, but quickly solved this problem by ringing the phone, which, well, pin-pointed the phone’s position and the woman was escorted to the police station to have the device removed. The phone was then given back to its rightful owner after being sprayed down with detergent.

Horse Flogging a dead horse… Literally
Apparently, there was someone selling a dead horse on eBay not so long ago. I do have my suspicions about the sincerety of the auction, seeing as the only details present in the auction were:

Dead horse for sale
Please email me with any questions.

Sadly, the original listing has now been removed from the site

These ridiculous auctions remind me of a lovely list of auctionable tid-bits including:

24 Children
A Linux Geek
And last but not least Nine used toothbrushes

iPod Nano; Rollable Screen; Koran Virus: Teenage Tech News

Nano-ipod Cool, I want one!
Apple has unveiled a new iPod. Why is this news? Because the new device is miniscule and uses flash memory as opposed to a hard drive. This confirms the rumours that Apple were buying 40% of Samsung’s flash memory.

I think that Apple has unveiled a real killer here: It has a decent capacity, is small, cute and features a colour screen. And of course, Christmas is coming up (Shouts “Dad!”).

Rollable Screen Ooh, Shiny, new and it rolls up!
Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, we are still in 2005 and not 2020. Even so, Phillips has managed to come up with a prototype roll-up screen. What’s special about this screen is, surprise surprise, that it is possible to roll it up as you would a sheet of paper.

At the moment, the model they have is only a prototype, and can only display four shades of grey, but when it gets better to support more colours, I’m sure it will be an instant hit with makers of Mobile Phones and other applications where a large display and a small size is an advantage.

I personally thought the fact someone had finally developed something like this was pretty neat, very futuristic, and a useful invention. I, for instance, would love to have a small phone simply because it’s, well, small. I can’t currently get one however, because the ones that are the size I would like have tiny displays and no features. Hopefully this will now change.

Virus Allah says no
Meanwhile, there’s a new virus out (Windows only, sorry Mac and Linux users) that attempts to block people from surfing pornography Websites. If the virus finds specific sexually-orientated words in a URL, it will minimize the browser window and display a passage from the Koran.

Don’t people realise that you can’t force religion on people? When will people realise that religion is something that comes naturally? People who don’t grasp this concept make me angry, although I can see there is a vaguely humorous element to this virus too.

At least the virus doesn’t damage any of your files!

Virus “Drop the ink cartridge and put your hands on your head!”
We’re told that Lexmark are attempting to outlaw refilling their cartridges. Apparently, as the ink cartridges are patented as one use only, Lexmark think they can enforce this on anyone running a business refilling ink tanks. Luckily, patents don’t apply to non-for profit activities yet, so it’s still safe to refill a cartridge yourself.

I think there should be bans about companies applying terms of use on something that a consumer has actually bought. If it belongs to you, you should be able to do as you wish with it!

Names In Space; IR Transmission; Sporting Computer; Underwater CCTV?

Pluto Send Your Name To Pluto
No, that wasn’t a typo just then: It was actually true! This is the latest in space exploration efforts, and it’s destined for Pluto. With it, will be a list of names, and the space probe is destined to return to Earth in 50,000 years. What names, I hear you ask. Well, any that are submitted here. What a great idea! There’s even a searchable list of all the people who’ve already put their names down on the list. Go look for mine, ‘cos I’m going to Pluto!!

IRDA It’s fast, but why? Nice solution, but where’s the problem?
I personally had all but forgotten Infra-red as a data transmission means: It’s slow and line-of-sight only. Also, everything now has Bluetooth instead or as well as it. That’s why I was so surprised by the announcement by The Infrared Data Association that they have developed and adopted a new high-speed Infra-Red protocol promising speeds of up to 100Mbit/s. While faster is almost always better, it’s got no real-life use anymore in my opinion. Who still wants to precariously line up two devices on their lap in a bumpy train when they can leave one in their rucksack and instead connect to it over Bluetooth? This whole thing left poor little me very puzzled.

That’s… Fast!
The Register has a nice story this week about a start-up company challenging the heavy weights like Dell. Apparently, Azul Systems have released a computer sporting 1,248 processor cores with 800GB of RAM that, when running, only draws 9.1KW of power. To put that in perspective, a typical hair dryer weighs in at about 1.5KW. This means that this computer with 1,248 processor cores has the same electricity requirements as six hair dryers. A comparable Dell machine with the same amount of cores on the other hand would require 37 times more electricity, which equates to 307KW o electricity or 204 hairdryers. This is a lot by the way. So the Dell one might be cheaper, but with a kWh (kiloWatt hour) of electricity currently costing around 7pence, the Dell would be costing over £20/hour (~$36 ~€29) to run, whereas the Azul Systems machine would only cost around 63pence/hour. Over the period of a year, the decreased electricity consumption of the Azul Systems machine would pay off.

Whether this challenging of the big players in a crowded economy is going to work or not will be decided in the future and is impossible to predict now, but I know one thing: When I have US$800,000 kicking around in my pocket, I would like one of these. Imagine the frame rate on Quake3!! (Sorry…)

Big Brother is Everywhere
Here’s an unusual one: An array of cameras in a swimming pool coupled with a state-of-the-art detection system. CCTV? No, this is a way of monitoring swimmers and alerting lifeguards when they’re drowning.

The company making the system are called Poseidon, and they have their systems installed in various pools world-wide. They have some cool images taken by their camera equipment documenting various rescues here.

Happy Birthday Win95; PSP Software Upgrade; 12 Hr Batteries; Mobile Flight Mode – Teenage Tech News Review

It's Tin For Win95 It’s Tin For Win95
Yes, that’s right, Wednesday marked 10 years of vaguely intelligent computing. 10 years ago, Windows 95 was released. It’s weird, because it’s 10 year old technology, but it really doesn’t seem that old: I still remember using it at school on old computers. Makes you wonder why Microsoft are still using a ten year old interface (OK, it’s shiny and got a plasticky look now, but you know what I mean).

The Washington Post has an interesting read on the subject here, basically an announcement they wrote about it at the time. It’s funny to read how some things about marketing campaigns for high-profile software releases have changed nowadays, and what parts have stayed exactly the same. One thing everyone will likely recognise is the hype!

As granddad would say: “It was better in the old days!”

Browse the Web on PSP
Despite only officially being available in Europe from the 1st of September, the software updates for it have finally reached v.2.0. This latest update includes a host of exciting new features, including a Web browser and the ability to play AAC music tracks. These added features for a handheld gaming system that is already looking very promising, serve to make the gadget a must-have for every technology-conscious teen under the sun. Being able to browse the Web on the device, which incidentally has Wi-Fi technology, might even make it a laptop replacement of sorts. Beware though: The device has no keyboard, so typing long emails on it might become a little tiresome, as it uses a virtual on-screen keyboard for text input.

I have briefly played around with a PSP, as a friend of mine was in Japan and brought one back with him. The graphics look awesome, despite the text being Japanese, and I can’t wait to get my hands on one!

Laptop Battery Low Warning
The Register is running a story on how Panasonic and Intel are working together to make a 12-hour laptop battery. Can’t wait for this technology to filter down to phones and other small consumer electronics, as battery technology is the one thing the vast majority of gadgets still seem way behind on. It’s all fine and dandy having a million and one functions in one device, but if the battery only lasts two hours, then to me, it’s no use.

Apparently, the technology works by adding a small amount of Nickel to the standard ingredients of a battery pack.

Remains to be seen how long this will take to mature, but in the meantime, I can always hope for cold fusion to arrive!

Upgrades To Flight Mode
With all the new gismos appearing on phones nowadays, it seems a shame to be unable to use them on a plane, ofcourse with all the wireless features switched off. This is why phone companies started introducing a concept called flight mode.

The theory behind this simple setting on a handset is to allow users to utilize all the features on their phones, when they’re not allowed to have anything that transmits radio signals. What, then, is the use of this if you’re not allowed to use it? I recently came back from holiday, was sitting there in the plane, minding my own business, trying to reply to some mail on my Blackberry, when a member of the flight-crew and asked me to switch it off. I tried to explain that a) it was in flight mode, and so wasn’t going to harm anyone, and b) that I had some work to do, so could he please leave me alone.

The flight attendant then stated that it was company policy to make people turn their phones totally off at all times, adding that I could use my laptop instead if I so wished. Now bear in mind the stupidity of this statement: My laptop has GPRS, 3G, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connections, and would likely broadcast the hell out of anywhere, and the flight attendant would rather I use it than my phone which is innocently sitting in there flight mode, not bothering anyone. Trying to explain this resulted in a rapid degrading of his ability to speak English and ended with him just pointing to my laptop and sticking his thumbs in the air. The airline, which shall remain nameless for now as I don’t want to stir up any trouble, will not be receiving my custom again. When will airlines realise that they have to be nice to people and move with the times a bit more to receive their custom? In these days of cut price travel, it’s all about value-added services, and this certainly is one of them.

I was interested then because of this, about what I read regarding the Consumer Electronics association trying to make it possible to easily determine whether a phone is in flight mode or not. Can’t wait to see some results, but I fear it may then still be a case of training flight crew to know what it means.

Traffic Hacking, Mac Madness, Cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev , .xxx interference – Teenage Tech News Review

Traffic Light Hacking
Traffic Hacking, Mac Madness, Cosmonaut Capers, .xxx interference - Teenage Tech News Review We’ve had hackers doing all sorts of naughty things in the past, but one thing I heard about recently is new to me: Hacking traffic lights. You heard right: traffic lights. However, these traffic lights aren’t used to harvest credit account numbers of passers-by or to spam traffic: They are simply used to enable people to get to work that bit faster, if a little less legally. These hackers use technology originally intended for use with emergency vehicles and mass-transit systems. The way it works, is that a lot major traffic lights in the US have infrared receivers built into them. These receive one of two frequencies of infrared pulses: The first is a low frequency, and intended for use by mass-transit like buses. This low frequency makes traffic lights stay green for that bit longer, enabling the bus to pass through and thus speeding up public transport. The second frequency is intended for use by emergency vehicles, and switches traffic lights from red to green within two seconds of activation, allowing them (and anyone possessing a similar device) to pass through traffic lights unhindered.

These sorts of devices had a dodgy legal status in the States up until recently, when they were outlawed entirely and use of them declared a federal crime.

Mac Madness
Traffic Hacking, Mac Madness, Cosmonaut Capers, .xxx interference - Teenage Tech News Review It seems people are getting less civilized by the day: In a scene reminiscent of the riot caused by the opening of an Ikea store in Edmonton near London, there was another riot when a school in Virginia decided to sell its old laptops for $50 a piece. Apparently, “One woman went so far to wet herself rather than surrender her place in line.” The school was selling laptops that were worth around $1,500 dollars 4 years ago for a meager $50. This kind of event does showcase the fact that a lot of people are eager about technology as long as it is at the right price. Maybe if manufacturers decreased their prices by half, although they might initially make a loss, the hugely increased bulk of sales could lead to much lower production costs. Of course, they will never do this, as it will both cut their profit margins as well as saturating the market. Nice thought though!

Cosmonaut Capers
Traffic Hacking, Mac Madness, Cosmonaut Capers, .xxx interference - Teenage Tech News Review Russian Cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev is now the person who has spent the longest time in space, ever. The Russian is currently the commander of the ISS, and now has 750 days in space to his name. Spending this amount of time in space can be detrimental to a person’s health: 6 months in space typically leads to a loss of about 1.5% of bone mass, which can take years to grow back. 2 years of life in space could lead to a variety of problems when the Russian cosmonaut returns back to earth, but the extent of these remains to be seen. In the worst case, his bones could be unable to support his weight here, although NASA suspects it shouldn’t be anywhere near as bad. While in space, people must stick to a strict regime of exercise to simulate the stresses that bones receive during life on earth to ensure they lose a minimum of mass. This along with the increased danger of high radiation (which can lead to cancer), makes space have many more risks than the obvious danger of your vessel disintegrating. Maybe in the future these will be solved, but bar artificial gravity, I fail to see how this might work.

Although I of all people think Space is a pretty cool thing to explore, issues like this must be solved before any lengthy extra-planetary stays are considered.

They Couldn’t Give a .XXX
Traffic Hacking, Mac Madness, Cosmonaut Capers, .xxx interference - Teenage Tech News Review This week, it seems like we have another nice example of people in government being quite the opposite of liberal and interfering with technology: Various suit-wearing, self-important men/women of power have objected to ICANN’s newest top-level domain (things like .com, .net), .xxx: according to them and others, introducing a .xxx top-level domain will mean “Pornographers will be given even more opportunities to flood our homes, libraries and society with pornography through the .xxx domain.”

Apparently, the American Department of Commerce has received a “staggering” 6,000 emails and letters protesting about the creation of a .xxx domain. Ok, so 6,000 sounds a lot, but when you think about it, 6,000 people out of the approximately 600,000,000 who use the Internet worldwide, it isn’t quite so impressive.

Surely, the creation of a .xxx domain might even help people distinguish from a filthy porn site and a normal one: It would mean it would be easier for people to block these kinds of sites from opening, and would mean that classification of Web sites as containing porn or not would be easier, and thus the subsequent blocking of offensive content would be made easier.

Although this doesn’t directly affect me, as I am still under the age of 18, I still believe that political objectives should not be allowed to interfere with the running of the Internet. Besides, the Internet is a virtual, international, entity and as such shouldn’t be allowed to be governed by a single country and it’s respective governing body’s re-election agenda.

Teenagers Wanna iPod, Creative Suffer; Mac OS X On Intel PC’s?; Space Shuttle Still Cool – Teenage Tech News Review

Teenagers wanna iPod, Creative suffer
Creative MP3 Player Apple legal team don’t stamp down on the whole operation and try to deny its entire existence as they have done with similar projects before.

Space shuttle continues to be cool
Shuttle Returns From Space Safely First of all, space is cool from the perspective of a teenager, and there’s no worrying about how much tax payers money is put into these kind of projects. With this in mind, I was delighted to hear that the Shuttle returned safely from space, marking yet another success for man’s conquering of the heavens.

There was one little niggling thing at the back of my mind about space exploration though: What is its actual use? I mean, if you look at other scientists, you always get a result (well, mostly anyway) from their research, and they always seem to discover things. With Astronauts however, I sometimes fail to grasp how their work has any sort of similar results, and how they could be an advantage to mankind. Maybe it’s time for N.A.S.A. to put a little more of their money into telling people exactly what they are achieving, apart from making slinky space suits and gadgets that look cool. If they explained the good of their work a little more, maybe people would be a little more eager to see what they’ve been working at. (Velcro is the oft-quoted example of tech from space travel, but there must be some more recent examples – Ed)

Talking of space, I made a funny Discovery (Get it? Discovery! Sorry…) Anyway, apparently, N.A.S.A. has had to send pregnancy testing kits up into space to resupply the ISS. I wonder what they’ve been doing up there… ;-)

Oz Gov Give Away Data; DRM Chips On Motherboards; Apple’s Mighty Mouse – Teenage Tech News Review

Australian Government Sells Servers Containing Confidential Information
Let’s start this week’s news with some nice, old-fashioned, technological paranoia: As a teenager, you start to realise that giving everyone your mobile number, letting people know where you live and freely handing out your email address can be a bad thing. Imagine my surprise then when I found out that the Australian government had sold 18 of its servers at a government auction, all carrying confidential information, without erasing any data from them. “Who did they sell these to?” I hear you ask … Well no, it’s not some big company, it’s an individual called Geoffrey Huntley, who has his own blog and who promptly wrote about the issue of these servers having confidential information on them at sale. Using a basic knowledge of AIX, the operating system these servers were running, it was then possible to access all the information on every server, including financial information and emails sent and received.

This sort of occurrence does make me think that it is unsafe to give anyone information, unless I know it is safe with them, as it could all too easily fall into the wrong hands. More must be done to safeguard people’s information in this age of hacking and phishing, where anything not bolted down to the virtual ground is electronically stolen by people who wish to use this information for profit.

The Australian government, it seems, has tried to hush the issue up, as the Web page that originally documented the sale of confidential information carrying servers has now been erased from Geoffrey Huntley’s blog, although it is still available, as above, from a mirroring service.

No DRM DRM on motherboards
As well as compromising people’s privacy, technology can also restrict people’s freedom: Everyone’s known it’s been coming for a long while, but DRM (Digital Right’s Management) chips have started to be incorporated into motherboards. Although at present these are only present in Apple’s new Intel developer machines, Windows looks set to follow suit in its next release and require these chips to be implemented. What these sort of chips do, is to enable applications to make sure that a file or program will only work on the computer which has the right DRM chip. If this sounds similar to the current ways of protecting intellectual property with serial numbers, then think again: These serial numbers will be built-in to computer’s mother boards, meaning that they cannot be changed. For me, this is quite a serious blow, as I like to have the freedom to choose what sort of media I want to play, and from where I get it. This sort of inflexible and likely uncircumventible control could also allow computer manufacturers to enforce people to use a certain OS or certain software. With Microsoft’s clout and their habit of making sure that manufacturers of computers are tied into an agreement of bundling Windows with their computers, they might also enforce them to bundle chips with their motherboards that make them only boot Windows. These upcoming technologies will doubtlessly hurt consumers, but it remains to be seen how restrictive they will be.

Mighty Mouse: Apple’s Multi-Button Mouse
Mighty Mouse: Apple's Multi-Button Mouse In other news: After years of Apple thinking themselves obviously superior by having just the one mouse button, and after years of jokes about how Mac users are inferior because they can’t use more than the one button, Apple has gone back and decided to bring out a mouse with not one, not two, but three buttons, as well as a four way scroll wheel. They have called their mouse, quite simply, Mighty Mouse. What’s so special about this though, and what sets it apart from the hordes of multi-button, Mac-compatible mice out there on the market? The answer is, the mouse has no physical buttons at all! The mouse incorporates iPod-esque touch sensitive technology to make the mouse appear button-less, but still work just fine. Very nice. An earlier argument of many Mac-users was that having just one button on a mouse made computing more accessible to beginners and so called technology-virgins, and I can agree with that statement: Teaching my Mum to use a PC is still a work in progress, and she still asks which button to click. Teaching her to use a Mac, on the other hand, was simply a matter of telling her how to turn the machine on, and what her login password was. Anyway, the new mouse from Apple, having no physical buttons, is programmable to have either one, two or three buttons, meaning that users can specify, on a user-specific basis, which features of the mouse they would like to have, and which ones they would like to leave well alone. What this means, is that You, your Gran, and your Mum can all use the same computer with the same mouse, but still all have as many buttons as suits them and their computing abilities. The mouse should also work just fine with a Windows computer, although from personal experience, trying to use Windows with one mouse button is a bad experience!