Netizen

Privacy, Security And Consensus

There is more room for mischief in mobile. The average person is not aware how much they are already giving away.

Study Reveals a Confused View of Mobile Phone Privacy and Security

Smartphones store a wealth of valuable personal data—photos, videos, e-mail, texts, app data, GPS locations, and Web browsing habits—that is increasingly falling into the hands of advertisers, app makers, law enforcement, and crooks...... The majority of respondents also said they believed their mobile phone to be as private as their personal computer. .... millions of people already provide mobile data to marketers, business analysts, and law enforcement, often without their knowledge or consent

Power Grids Overloaded Many Places

This is the real solution: The Moon Does Not Have Water.

Outage in India Could Be a Harbinger for the Rest of the World

The growing complexity and reliance on the electric grid in both developed and fast-growing countries is making stability tougher to achieve..... "Saying the reason for India's gridwide collapse was that they had more load than generation is too simplistic." .... Mansoor suspects it is something fairly mundane, such as a failed relay or a grid operator making a mistake ..... the causes of India's blackouts have more to do with politics than technology and engineering

You might argue the same for APIs. They are so intermingled, there might be an outage or two down the line.

VoiceGem (2)

VoiceGem

@paramendra Sure, the more the merrier! :)
— Arda Kara (@ArdaKara) August 3, 2012

@ardakara What would be your email?
— Paramendra Bhagat (@paramendra) August 3, 2012

@paramendra Was this on the web or the iOS app? I would refresh the page, if it was the web
— Arda Kara (@ArdaKara) August 3, 2012

@ardakara It was on the web. In a Chrome browser.
— Paramendra Bhagat (@paramendra) August 3, 2012

@paramendra Thanks for the tweet!
— VoiceGem (@VoiceGem) August 3, 2012

@voicegem My blog posts automatically show up as tweets. :-) But still, welcome. Most welcome.
— Paramendra Bhagat (@paramendra) August 3, 2012

A MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle prepares to land after a mission in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. The Reaper has the ability to carry both precision-guided bombs and air-to-ground missiles. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This is like the Google Maps truck peering through your window, all the time. Allowing domestic use by law enforcement will be tricky enough. Wait until civilians get their hands on the licenses. This thing is a serious invasion of privacy, potentially speaking. Paparazzi would have a field day. Too bad because so many great uses can be thought of.

Lawmakers Want to Know: What Are Those Drones Doing Up There?

issue licenses to commercial drone operators and to make it easier for law enforcement and other government agencies to deploy unmanned aerial vehicles ..... Drones are already used to monitor movement on the borders .... shooting Hollywood movies, monitoring oil spills and conducting criminal investigations ..... the possibility of ubiquitous surveillance, especially because the law currently protects the right to take pictures of anyone and anything in public. ..... a voluntary code of conduct which includes a provision to “respect the privacy of individuals.” .... The prospects of any imminent movement on Capitol Hill, though, seem to be minimal. Stubborn partisan divisions have so far doomed agreement on a bill that seeks to strengthen cybersecurity for the electrical grid, nuclear power plants and other critical infrastructure

Curiosity

Boldly Opening a New Window Onto Mars

one-ton, S.U.V.-sized Curiosity rover .... we’re looking for habitable environments ..... Imagine buying a $2.5 billion car with a 10,000-page owner’s manual; one that you don’t just have to read but you must also write, because it’s the first and only one that will ever be made. .... We may get glimpses of time that go back so far that they are equivalent to the time on Earth when microbial life was first evolving. The earliest history of Mars is better preserved than it is on Earth ..... The essential ingredients for a habitable environment are water, energy and carbon. ..... it is a laboratory complete with funnels, test tubes, magnifiers, mass spectrometers, gas analyzers, ovens, and a sampling system with a drill strong enough to chisel away concrete. Not to mention its 17 cameras, including several with color, video capture and HD resolution. Second, it is a plutonium-powered rover, allowing it to take its laboratory on the road for years on end. ..... the most beautifully resolved, highly detailed pictures ever taken on the surface of another planet. ..... travelling almost nine months and 566 million kilometers

Mars rover Curiosity will see red planet like never before

carrying 10 science instruments -- and a wealth of high-tech camera gear

Will NASA's $2.5 billion Mars rover crash on Sunday?

NASA’s mega-mission to Mars and delivery of the Curiosity rover could be a smashing success … or just smashing .... Mars Society, which is dedicated to the human exploration and settlement of Mars. .... a never-tried-before landing system — a Sky Crane on Mars — capable of delivering 1,980 pounds (900 kilograms) to the Martian surface, which would be enough to accomplish the Mars sample return and other extraordinary missions. ..... "I feel like I’m kind of a minor stockholder in a much larger enterprise," said Kim Stanley Robinson, an American science fiction writer acclaimed for his award-winning trilogy "Red Mars," "Green Mars" and "Blue Mars."