Thanks for the InfraGard link.
I'll post the following tonight on-blog:
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The latest issue of Baens UNIVERSE MAGAZINE is out,
containing two big items from yours truly -- Part Five
of my comedic serial The Ancient Ones... plus a
fast-paced, action novella The Smartest Mob. The
latter is an excerpt from my novel in progress,
another lavish, near-future exploration, like EARTH.
This one is the best portrayal of rapid,
tech-empowered citizen action that youll see, this
side of Vernor Vinge! Subscribe to the top online
magazine ever! http://baens-universe.com/
Now click to the coolest bit of urban theater. Will
somebody please tell the organizers that it is an
almost perfect rendition of a scene from my short
story Coexistence?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwMj3PJDxuo
Some of the most influential leaders of the space
community are quietly working to offer the next U.S.
president an alternative to President Bush's vision
for space exploration -- one that would delete a
lunar base and move instead toward manned missions to
asteroids, starting in about 2025, along with a
renewed emphasis on Earth environmental spacecraft.
Dang, is sanity popping out all over?
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0801/18avweek/
The latest in a long series of fascinating articles by
sexual-anthropologist David Buss has just come out:
Women Want It All: Good Genes, Economic Investment,
Parenting Proclivities, and Emotional Commitment, in
the journal Evolutionary Psychology.
http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/EP06134146.pdf
Bill Gates and ex-Microsoft executive Charles Simonyi
have donated a combined $30 million to the Large
Synoptic Survey Telescope, which will feature the
largest digital camera ever constructed. Scientists
say it will provide a color movie of the universe.
The donation will go partly to the construction of
LSST's three giant mirrors, which will enable it to
survey more of the sky faster than any other
telescope. With its three-billion pixel camera, the
telescope will produce 30 terabytes of images that
will be immediately available to the public online.
(Comet and asteroid hunt from your home!) The LSST
requires huge amounts of data processing. Project
leaders estimate it will generate 1.2 gigabytes per
second, which is orders of magnitude more data than
the most data-intense astronomical application
available today.
http://www.wired.com/science/space/news/2008/01/internet_telescope
bSome misc interesting things.../b
Aliens spying on us from another star system might be
able to discern continents and oceans on our planet by
plotting the fluctuation in brightness as sunlight
falls on different surface features such as forests,
deserts and seas.
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/080131-seti-galactic-wifi.html
Watching the Watchers: Why Surveillance Is a Two-Way
Street: If governments and businesses can keep an eye
on us in public spaces, we ought to be able to look
back.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military_law/4237005.html
Meanwhile, the FBI is gearing up to create a massive
computer database of people's physical
characteristics, all part of an effort the bureau says
to better identify criminals and terrorists. What on
Earth makes the civil libertarians think they can stop
this trend, by trying to outlaw or regulate it? Are
they really that stupid, to think that you can order
back the tide? In ten years, not one of them has ever
been able to cite a single example, from history, when
top elites allowed themselves to be blinded.
Fortunately, there is another approach... if anybody
will listen...
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/02/04/fbi.biometrics/index.html?eref=ib_topstories
Speaking of surveillance... Aliens spying on us from
another star system might be able to discern
continents and oceans on our planet, using technology
barely more advanced than our own.
http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn13126-alien-astronomers-could-discern-earths-features.html
Currently, the largest conventional wind turbines in
the world produce only five megawatts of power.
However, one large maglev wind turbine could generate
one gigawatt of clean power, enough to supply energy
to 750,000 homes. It would also increase generation
capacity by 20% over conventional wind turbines and
decrease operational costs by 50%. If that isnt
enough, the maglev wind turbines will be operational
for about 500 years!
http://www.inhabitat.com/2007/11/26/super-powered-magnetic-wind-turbine-maglev/
Speaking of which, Britain is to launch a huge
expansion of offshore wind-power with plans for
thousands of turbines in the North Sea, Irish Sea and
around the coast of Scotland. The scheme could see
turbines so large that they would reach 850ft into the
sky.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article3022277.ece
An exceptional article about bizarre and tragic events
at the edges of artificial intelligence research. (I
knew one of these guys.) Two AI Pioneers. Two Bizarre
Suicides.