Although geared for K-12 students, this material looks pretty good for anybody interested in thinking about technology in general. We think about particular technologies (like computers, automobiles, nanotechnology) all the time, but it's important to be able to think about technology in general.

From their website (http://www.knowledgecontext.org/):

Technology, broadly speaking, pervades every part of our lives. While technologies emerge and change over history — from the simple wheel to the printing press to the personal computer — technology itself remains a constant. So whether or not a child chooses to become a technologist, he or she won't be able to thrive in society without an understanding of technology.

That's where KnowledgeContext comes in. We're dedicated to giving young people the tools to place technology in its overarching context — helping them grasp what technology is, how it ties into other disciplines, how it changes, and how to evaluate it. As a result, they're prepared to make the best choices in a world where technologies change with greater and greater speed.

Radio Frequency Identifier (RFID) chips will probably replace
bar-codes. People may also attempt to use them as a tracking technology
or as a security technology. Like all many new technologies, this one
has some troubling privacy considerations.

This link is an excellent summary of the technology and the issues.

http://securityfocus.com/columnists/169

My test result.

Which OS are You?

Jakob Nielsen's 9 Dec 2002 issue of Alertbox compares software to the world of magic as described in the Harry Potter series. Although Nielsen is not the first to make the comparison to magic (see Vernor Vinge's excellent novella True Names), I liked this insight:

In the Harry Potter books, the population consists of two distinct groups — a small group of wizards, and a much larger group of Muggles (standard-issue humans) who know nothing about magic or the dealings of wizards.

Similarly, in our world, the vast majority of people don't understand computers or technology. Science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke once said that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." Unfortunately, computers and the Internet are this "advanced technology" as far as most people are concerned. Things appear on their screens, computers deliver the desired results, and how it happens is all just so much magic.

In the Harry Potter books, the ethical wizards have agreed to leave the Muggles alone and not do magic tricks on them. It seems that computer wizards have something to learn from Harry Potter, because they often use their power in ways that are harmful to regular people.

It's designed to compete with handwriting, not a keyboard. It's designed more for PDAs or for those with disabilities that limit the use of keyboards.

It's kind of hard to explain, so take a look at it here:

http://www.inference.phy.cam.ac.uk/dasher/DasherSummary2.html

It's open source, and it's a research project, so it's a little bit "interesting" to say the least. But still pretty cool. Although after I used it for a few minutes, I started to get a bit dizzy. Definitely not for everybody, but it's very creative.

An interesting way of creating displays by taking advantage of interference effects similar to the way butterfly wings generate color:

http://www.iridigm.com/tech_overview.htm

It's also nice because if pixels in the display are not changing, the display requires almost now power; power is used mostly to change pixels. This is much better than LCD and CRT displays which draw the same (large) amount of power regardless.

Slashdot discussed this technology: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/01/1427205

From a slashdot article, this guy built a two-wheeled self balancing
device using a Lego robotics kit. He has some videos of it following a
black line on white paper. Very cool.

http://www.geocities.com/stevehassenplug/LegWay.html

His site is being slashdot'ed right now. If it still is when you read this, here are some mirrors you can try.

http://perso.freelug.org/legway/LegWay.html
http://legway.armorica.biz
http://home1.gte.net/res1g289/StevesLegWay.htm

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/biznews/0922story4_business.shtml

So they are getting closer to film, but still have a ways to go. For example, what about contrast, film speed, etc? Take a look at http://pic.templetons.com/brad/photo/pixels.html and http://www.templetons.com/brad/nondig/ for good discussion on the relationship between digital and film.

Also, every "pixel" in film has at least 8 bits of red, green, and blue. But in most digital sensors, each pixel only record 8 bits of red, green, or blue; the pixels are laid out in a mosaic. So the effective resolution compared to film is only 1/2 to 1/3. The exception is the (still in prototype) Foveon X3 sensor. The Foveon does 8 bits of RGB for every pixel. They have a good discussion at http://www.foveon.com/X3_better.html with image comparisons at http://www.foveon.com/X3_comparison.html

http://www.mrichter.com/cdr/primer/primer.htm

Not exactly a tutorial, more like a reference.

The entertainment industry is desperate.

First they convince congress to pass the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which, among other things, could make it illegal to loan a copy of your e-book to a friend.

Now they've convinced Rep. Howard Berman to submit the "Peer-to-Peer Piracy Prevention Act, a bill (PDF) that gives the entertainment industry the special right to hack your personal computer if they suspect you are violating copyright (they don't need to prove anything, just suspect). Think of it like this: If a mugger steals your wallet, are you allowed to burn down his house? No, that's called vigilantism and it's illegal. But that's what the entertainment industry is asking for the right to do.

Bruce Schneier this to say in the 15 Aug 2002 issue of Crypto-Gram (emphasis mine):

To me, it's another example of the insane lengths the entertainment companies are willing to go to preserve their business models. They're willing to destroy your privacy, have general-purpose computers declared illegal, and exercise special vigilante police powers that no one else has…just to make sure that no one watches "The Little Mermaid" without paying for it. They're trying to invent a new crime: interference with a business model.