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Stories and comments across the archive that link to strangedomainname.com.
Stories · 17
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Searching for Exceptional Multimedia Productions?
ContinuousPark asks: "My local college has asked me to participate in a 120 hour course on multimedia production. I proposed that one of the modules should be called something like 'Multimedia Appreciation'; I will be teaching this one. During this 10 to 20 hour period, I intend to show students several examples of multimedia productions so they can get an idea of what's possible; what's has been done; and what's original or too common, so they can formulate their own projects, later. So I'm looking for interesting websites that could inspire students, that could help them understand what is a good multimedia production, what kind of effort goes into it, etc. In fact, I'm not just looking for websites, I would also like to include videogames, movies, opera productions, and any other work of art that uses multiple channels to convey a message. What are the most effective multimedia productions you've seen through the years? Examples easily available so that I can show it to them are of course preferable, I'm willing to buy any CD, DVD, book or whatever though. Thanks for the advice." -
Clockless Computing?
ContinuousPark writes: "Ivan Sutherland, father of computing graphics, has been for the last ten years designing chips that don't use a clock. He's been proposing a method called asyncronous logic where there's no clock signal being distributed and regulating every part of the chip. The article doesn't give many technical details (greatly needed) but Sutherland, now doing research for Sun, is telling that significant breakthroughs have been made recently to make this technology viable for mass production. It is estimated that 15% of a chip's circuitry is dedicated to distributing the clock signal and as much as 20% percent of the power is consumed by the clock. This is indeed intriguing; what unit will replace the familiar megahertz?" -
Project Pengachu: Handheld Linux for $50?
ContinuousPark writes: "The folks at the MIT Media Lab have been working on a $50 handheld Linux computer. 900MHz, 1mW, 200Kbps peering or hub-and-spoke internet gateways for wireless mode and a RS-485 wired LAN: 1Mbps multidrop. Loads of software on less than 1Mb footprint. They've called it the Pengachu Project: Cheap Wireless Linux for Everyone. Read about it here, an article on the kickoff event for the Digital Nations project." -
The E-mail Tax Hoax Meets The Candidates
senort01 writes: "Who couldn't find this humorous? 602P, (the post office will charge for e-mail being sent to make up for lost revenue), a classic Internet hoax, was asked about in the New York Senate debate. Needless to say, both parties aren't going to support it! Thank god!" And for those who prefer their news both more direct and more fun, ContinuousPark writes: "Declan McCullagh's Politechbot mailing list is reporting that the lame e-mail hoax made it into the Clinton-Lazio debate." the_quark helpfully points out not only the famous Bill 602P itself but the USPS's stock page denying its existence. -
Physics Problems For The New Age
In May, we ran a story on ten "math problems for the new age." ContinuousPark writes: "Last month, at the end of a conference on superstring theory at the University of Michigan, a group of physicists chose ten of the hardest problems in their field. They range from 'simple' ones like 'What is the lifetime of the proton and how do we understand it?' to obscure ones like 'Can we quantitatively understand quark and gluon confinement in quantum chromodynamics and the existence of a mass gap?' Resolve one today, get a Nobel Prize tomorrow. This NY Times article has the details." And unfortunately, says the Times, "'Just because' is not considered an acceptable answer." Darn, there goes my Nobel. -
Tivo/ReplayTV Are To TV What Napster Is To Music?
ContinuousPark writes: "We've talked about hacking the Tivo and, more recently, about ReplayTV boxes being controlled over the Web. Now, the New York Times is taking it a bit further. The interesting point is that while everyone is raving about the new gadgets or complaining about how useless these devices are, the reality is that they are eventually going to disturb the TV industry just as Napster is doing with the music industry. It's just that ReplayTV and Tivo have been very discreet about this, even playing along with the networks. But it will happen and it's going to be a major disruption. I can't wait. Read why." Tivo changed the way I handle TV, but its relatively steep price prevents it from becoming as common as Napster, which is, well, free. Both will alter their industries (and then the industries will converge, but that's another story ;) -
Pushing Microwaves Faster Than Light
ContinuousPark writes: "According to this NY Times piece, Lijun Wang of the NEC Research Institute in Princeton has reported an experiment where "a pulse of light that enters a transparent chamber filled with specially prepared cesium gas is pushed to speeds of 300 times the normal speed of light". A second experiment by three scientists for the Italian National Research Council is reporting also superluminal speeds. And yet, this seems to be consistent with Einstein's theories. " -
Inside Transmeta
Quite a number of people have written about this story - here, ContinuousPark writes: "IEEE's Spectrum magazine has an interesting article with a step-by-step account on Crusoe's design process. It also talks about how they got the venture capital by creating the term 'code morphing,' how they hired their staff and how is it to work there, among other details." -
Linus Torvalds et al. on Napster
ContinuousPark writes "MSNBC/WSJ has this piece with brief comments on Napster by Linus, Larry Wall, Bruce Perens and Eric Raymond. " -
Telescope Cluster For SETI
ContinuousPark writes: "MSNBC is reporting that radioAstronomers showed today the Rapid Prototype Array, which consists of seven 12-foot off-the-shelf satellite dishes, set up at the Russell Reservation near Lafayette, CA. This experiment, in which computer software will control the drive systems of the dishes and process all gathered information, is going to tell astronomers how to build much bigger radio telescope arrays such as the 1-hectare telescope and the Square Kilometer Array; the SKA would be 10 to 100 more sensitive than the Arecibo radiotelescope. Check out the SETI Institute press release and photos. " -
Democratizing Space
ContinuousPark writes: "According to this Wired News piece, Microsoft Research is working on a huge Internet database (similar to the TerraServer) that will make the data from a massive survey of the cosmos available to anyone with a Web browser. The project, called SkyServer, is the first in a series of initiatives to bring to the public "virtual telescopes". The data (about 40 terabytes) will come from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. This means that, with just an Internet connection, I will be able to use the world's best telescopes and do my own research, maybe discover some celestial objects that have always been there but no one's had the (available telescope) time to look at/for them. " -
Fan Fiction Explained
ContinuousPark writes: "Alternative narratives of Star Wars, Star Trek, X-Files, Buffy, Xena, Starsky and Hutch! Whole seasons never filmed can be read on the Web! The thriving fan-fiction world has been revealed to me in this Slate Magazine article which raises some interesting questions: Who owns the characters? What can be done to them? Who owns the plots if they were posted on some official TV series' Web site? Could I, say, put together a book of these stories, how about a play, a videogame?" The wierdest stuff I've heard is fan fiction writers trying to sue the show when bits of their stories turn up on the show ... I bet someone could write a pretty good generative x-files plot generator to write a few hundred x-files plot synopses, and then just wait until their big chance to score :) -
eBay For Patents?
ContinuousPark writes: "Former UCLA professor Nir Kossovsky has created a website called The Patent & License Exchange. It's basically an eBay for intellectual property. The idea is that there are so many patents granted but yet very few real commercial applications of them. So now it's easier to buy licenses because patent holders will actively promote their patents in this marketplace. Now, I wonder what will happen when they start trading software patents? Would you buy a 1-Click patent or something as trivial as that? How much would you pay?" -
RMS On eBooks
ContinuousPark writes: "There a short but compelling piece on the latest MIT Technology Review by Richard Stallman. Imagine, he says, that you are forbidden to copy the latest eBook: 'no more used book stores; no more lending a book to your friend; no more borrowing one from the public library -- no more 'leaks' that might give someone a chance to read without paying. (And judging from the ads for Microsoft Reader, no more anonymous purchasing of books either.) This is the world publishers have in mind for us.' Creepy but more common every day, which is creepier." -
Portrait Of ICANN Chairwoman Esther Dyson
ContinuousPark writes "The NY Times has an article on Esther Dyson's difficulties heading ICANN, some of them deriving with her inability to do politics, a much needed thing when you have individual and civil interests on one side and huge commercial ones on the other. Although the article praises her enormous intellectual capacity, it also has EFF's Mike Godwin saying: 'I think that there is a dimension of being a political being that involves going out and getting hands on and dealing with individuals. I don't think she is terribly comfortable with that. I think she is democratic in principle but not entirely democratic in practice.' Is Dyson recklessly ignoring politics or is she maybe redefining them?" -
FSF General Counsel Eben Moglen Talks On Upside
ContinuousPark writes, "From an Upside article based on conversations with Eben Moglen, FSF general counsel and author of Anarchism Triumphant: 'In such a context, Moglen says, distribution of a software tool that lets European movie watchers watch American films on DVD before they hit the local theaters or lets Web surfers break through their employer's site censorship policies are about as politically expressive as dumping a boatload of tea into Boston Harbor. Granted, it may not be legal under the current framework. But legal frameworks change. How long before today's encryption crackers become the next generation's heroes? In the face of such potential changes, Moglen says the only mistake for an attorney in his position is standing idly by while new history is in the making.' " -
l0pht Joins with Others to Form @Stake
ContinuousPark writes "MSNBC has an article by Brock Meeks, reporting the formation of a security company called @Stake with members from L0pht and people from Compaq, Forrester and Cambridge Technology Partners. They already have $10 millions to start the whole thing. " Check out the recent interview with l0pht heavy industries, as well.