~e; Electromagnetic News & Views -- #7

[human being <human@electronetwork.org>]

===================================================
Electromagnetic News & Views -- #7
===================================================

00) Electronetwork.org Commentary (12/9/2002)
01) Links to Top Stories of Electromagnetism
02) Electromagnetic health & medicine
03) Electromagnetic trash & treasure
04) Electromagnetic security & surveillance
05) Electromagnetic power & energy
06) Electromagnetic current & human affairs
07) Electromagnetic transportation & communication
08) Electromagnetic matter & information
09) Electromagnetic trends & inventions
10) Electromagnetic weaponry & warfare
11) Electromagnetic business & economics

===================================================
00) --commentary--
---------------------------------------------------

The main thought that has been going about my brainspace
for a week or so now has been in regard to the SIMs article
in the Top Stories section, directly below. I wondered if,
for all of the academicization of culture, if some of the
hypotheses could be put into this petri-dish of culture,
and sociological and other theories and hypotheses tested,
to the extent that even the biggest theory-memes, such as
Negri & Hardt's Empire might be tested in a SIMs environ.

This is to question the modeling of communities, and their
seemingly consistent 1:1 relation to human behaviors in
some cases, and predictability. That there is cross-
over marketing in video- and simulation-games, like in
the movies, with product placements makes fashion designer
plug-ins and accessories, actual and virtual, all the more
fascinating if what purports to define reality is tested
in a reality-simulation, where such ideas can be tested,
outside of certain constraints otherwise present in getting
humans to divulge their mysteries, and their types of knowing.

This is one of the legacies of thought lost to the post-
1960s thought, which somehow became detached from people
and in one view, could be seen to have lost touch with
the grounding, and groundwork, needed for empirical under-
standing, relations, knowledge, education, and truth. If
it takes a videogame that is not a videogame to get ideas
back into the world of oddly idiosyncratic human populations,
then such absurdities as Total Information Awareness, and
the passive public response to just about anything having
to do with realms outside of direct experience, may be able
to be acknowledged, modeled, understood, and designed for.

Not much has changed in the basic nature of the questions
faced, but there is an ever-new, or perennial theory-industry
ready to churn out the next-best version of EM Industrialism,
version 2003. Basical organizational change is needed, but
first, to understand the changing organization of things,
their changing nature. The literal transition being finally
an approach into the quantum realities of physical laws and
its pyschological aspects, different types of logic, thinking,
new ways of approaching the recurring questions, this time
around, maybe with a model that is fit for commoner's reality.

bc


===================================================
01) --top stories--
---------------------------------------------------

Oversimulated Suburbia (The SIMs, ethnographically)
By DAVID BROOKS
<http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/24/magazine/24SIMS.html>

Total Information Awarenesss flash cartoon by Fiore
<http://salon.com/politics/comics/2002/11/28/tia/>

Motifs distinguish networks
By Kimberly Patch, Technology Research News
<http://www.trnmag.com/Stories/2002/112702/ 
Motifs_distinguish_networks_112702.html>

Hi-tech workplace no better than factories
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/2514771.stm>

"Staff in technology jobs work in the white collar equivalent of a 19th  
century factory. suffering from isolation, job insecurity and long  
hours, research has found."


---------------------------------------------------
02-- electromagnetic health & medicine
---------------------------------------------------

// sidenote: mobile phones have the makings of the
// next big lawsuit, like tobacco, for cancer deaths...

Hello? Cell Phones Cause Crashes 
<http://wired.com/news/wireless/0,1382,56655,00.html>

// laser eye surgery. next- nerve regeneration therapy?

Laser leads nerve growth
Beam could help repair spine damage or wire up implants.
<http://www.nature.com/nsu/021125/021125-4.html>


---------------------------------------------------
03-- electromagnetic trash & treasure
---------------------------------------------------

// like many other industries, flexible LCD screens
// seem critical to new appls, just like battery-tech...

E-Fabrics Still Too Stiff to Wear 
<http://wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,56708,00.html>

Murphy's Computer Law (computer waiting games)
<http://www.januarymagazine.com/artcult/computerwaitinggames.html>

Spaceprobe's final secrets remain inaccessible
<http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993109>

"The secrets of the Galileo spaceprobe's final mission remain locked  
inside its tape recorder, which may have suffered irreparable damaged  
during a pass through Jupiter's intense inner radiation belt."


---------------------------------------------------
04-- electromagnetic security & surveillance
---------------------------------------------------

// security in an EM environment is like swiss-cheese...

Feds Label Wi-Fi a Terrorist Tool 
<http://www.wired.com/news/wireless/0,1382,56742,00.html>

Report: Chernobyl virus rises again
<http://news.com.com/2100-1001-975695.html?part=dtx&tag=ntop>

"Antivirus company Panda Software has detected a new strain of the  
W95/CIH10XX virus--commonly known the Chernobyl virus--which can be so  
damaging to some computers that it will render some BIOS chips, and  
even entire motherboards, unusable."

Research aims to stop battery attackers
A team of computer scientists is working to prevent new types of  
denial-of-service attacks aimed at battery-powered mobile devices.
<http://news.com.com/2100-1001-966886.html?part=dtx&tag=ntop>

// this is where nuclear waste will be stored for millennia...

Yucca Mountain Project workers say site problems kept quiet
<http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/nevada/2002/nov/24/ 
112410627.html>

[this story................................]

Firms team to win Homeland Security bid
<http://news.com.com/2100-1001-975523.html?part=dtx&tag=ntop>
In a deal involving the new Department of Homeland Security, two  
companies teamed up to win a multimillion-dollar contract to create a  
system for patching security flaws in software used by U.S. government  
agencies.

[ties in perfectly with this story..........]

Microsoft seeks government partnership
<http://salon.com/tech/wire/2002/11/20/ms_government/>

Delegates tagged and tracked
Radio transmitters follow scientists round conference.
<http://www.nature.com/nsu/021125/021125-1.html>

Nation's infrastructure far from secure
<http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-975677.html>


---------------------------------------------------
05-- electromagnetic power & energy
---------------------------------------------------

// Russia's role is critical in developing the EM future...

Russian Oil Companies to Develop Arctic Pipeline
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
<http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Russia-Oil-Pipeline.html>

UN Hosted Talks Link Energy, Climate Change
<http://ens-news.com/ens/dec2002/2002-12-04-09.asp#anchor1>

"The UN talks stood in contrast to another set of talks being held in  
Washington DC, sponsored by the U.S government. At those talks, several  
Bush administration officials have pointed to ongoing uncertainty about  
the causes and results of climate change as support for their plans to  
spend the next decade studying the issue, rather than taking immediate  
action."


A Carbon-Atom Combo: Diamonds Found in Crude Oil
By KENNETH CHANG  // diamondoids
<http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/science/physical/03NANO.html>

"Nanotechnology researchers have for years imagined what they might be  
able to make with diamondoids, but until now they have been able to  
explore those ideas only with computer simulations."


---------------------------------------------------
06-- electromagnetic current & human affairs
---------------------------------------------------

Immobots Take Control by Wade Roush
<http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/roush1202.asp>

"From photocopiers to space probes, machines injected with robotic  
self-awareness are reliable problem solvers."

Poor cities in China collecting e-waste
<http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/2002/11/24/news/4594193.htm>

" ...This is the dark secret of a famously ''clean industry.''

At the front end, the industry relies on cheap overseas labor working  
long hours to make a profit on computers even as they fall in price. At  
the back end, the industry downplays its responsibility for the toxic  
chemicals and metals used in its short-lived products."

In switch, HP announces support for e-waste bill
<http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/local/4653493.htm>

Digital Domesday book unlocked
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/2534391.stm>

"[The researchers] have developed a way to access the information  
gathered by the BBC's Domesday project which had been stored on  
outdated technology."


Aspen Magazine: The multimedia magazine in a box // now online...
<http://www.ubu.com/aspen/>

---------------------------------------------------
07-- electromagnetic transportation & communication
---------------------------------------------------

Toyota, Honda deliver first hydrogen cars
<http://salon.com/tech/wire/2002/12/02/hydrogen_cars/>

// about a wireless park in NYC, interesting story
// about a park's management using wi-fi for recreation...

Walker in the Wireless City By TOM VANDERBILT
<http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/24/nyregion/24FEAT.html>

Listening to the internet reveals best connections
<http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993112>

"Chafe wondered if variations in jitter could be converted into a  
musical form. A musician can easily hear small changes in the tuning of  
a guitar string, so Chafe decided to model internet connections as  
guitar strings - twanging them to reveal subtle characteristics missed  
by pinging."

Metamaterial bends microwaves into beam
Foam-packed copper grid broadcasts focused radiation for  
telecommunications.
<http://www.nature.com/nsu/021118/021118-13.html>

"Because the metamaterial has a tiny refractive index, less than that  
of air, it bends radiation passing from it into air. The radiation  
leaves the surface at close to a right angle - no matter which way the  
ray was initially travelling. In other words, the only way that the  
radiation can escape from a slice of the metamaterial is as a beam  
perpendicular to the surface."

Molecule stores picture
<http://www.trnmag.com/Stories/2002/112702/ 
Molecule_stores_picture_112702.html>

"Researchers from the University of Oklahoma have found a way use the  
spins of 19 hydrogen atoms contained in a liquid crystal molecule to  
briefly store and read 1,024 bits representing a 32-by-32-pixel black  
and white pattern, a method they have termed "molecular photography"."

Assembling the Digital Sky by David Essex
U.S. astronomers are gathering terabytes of data into a worldwide  
"virtual observatory" that will be accessible to scientists and laymen  
alike.
<http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/wo_essex112202.asp>


---------------------------------------------------
08-- electromagnetic matter & information
---------------------------------------------------

Sign Language Goes Gobbledygeek  // .cn character translation
<http://wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,55681,00.html>

Mud-Loving Microbes May Aid in Manufacture of Nanoelectronics
<http://www.scientificamerican.com/ 
article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=000D6FBF-D791-1DE3-A838809EC588F2D7>

Quantum computing making 'tremendous progress'
<http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993114>

"Last week, Robert Clark of the University of New South Wales in Sydney  
unveiled a silicon-chip qubit, complete with a readout mechanism,.."


---------------------------------------------------
09-- electromagnetic trends & inventions
---------------------------------------------------

Eyes in the Back of Your Mouth
The brain doesn’t care where visual input comes from. So why not see  
with a camera jacked into your tongue? By Michael Abrams
<http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.12/start.html?pg=9>

Xerox Says New Material Will Allow Plastic Transistors
By JOHN MARKOFF
<http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/technology/03XERO.html>

// note: a product that could possibly replace the floppy...

SimpleTech Mini-Drive (USB-flashdrives)
<http://www.simpletech.com/products/consumer/minidrive/>

Printer Targets Mobile Workforce
<http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/20145.html>

Hot-wired piano tunes itself
<http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993143>

// recommended, for those interested in computing design...

Future of the Notebook by Gary H. Anthes and Bob Brewin
<http://www.computerworld.com/mobiletopics/mobile/story/ 
0,10801,75889,00.html?f=x68>

Tattooing robot unveiled at hi-tech trade fair
<http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_718442.html>

Art restoration: Two cultures united
<http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=1429361>

"Lasers are only one of a panoply of scientific tools that conservators  
are deploying to preserve and study the objects in their charge, and to  
winnow the genuine from the fraudulent. In the name of research and  
conservation, works of art are bombarded with light, both visible and  
invisible; they are probed by electron beams; they are inoculated with  
bacteria; they are even having their DNA read. And for those deemed too  
precious for permanent display, copies that would make the greatest  
forger envious might one day be created."


---------------------------------------------------
10-- electromagnetic weaponry & warfare
---------------------------------------------------

[no news, which hopefully could be good news.]


---------------------------------------------------
11-- electromagnetic business & economics
---------------------------------------------------

Tech Specs: Less Geek, More Chic 
<http://wired.com/news/holidays/0,1882,55763,00.html>

"Head-mounted displays, or HMDs, the term for products like Spitzer's  
image-beaming glasses, have long been a promising area of wearable  
computing, but until now showed little promise as a consumer device...

Spitzer's company, MicroOptical, hopes to change that. Its eyewear  
products, which cast a floating image three feet in front of the  
wearer's eyes, will be "fashion-driven," the CEO said. The company is  
already signing deals with its first industrial customers."


The Smart Money Behind Computer Aesthetics by Masha Zager
<http://www.newsfactor.com/perl/story/20172.html>

"Aesthetics is most important for personal products, such as notebook  
computers and PDAs, but even enterprise desktops and servers are  
designed to fit visually into the corporate world."

// predicted was a drop in LCD prices as computer manufactuers
// transitioned to flat-screen monitors. now with the HDTV market
// waiting to be developed, there are hybrid monitors with both
// tv-computing screen capabilities. so that someday, one of those
// people with jumbotron TVs may be both a web- and couch-potato...

Prices Drop on Giant LCDs
Costs plummet by 79 percent on 19-inch displays, and more deals are  
expected.
Tom Mainelli, PCWorld.com
<http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,106260,00.asp>



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