The Newspaper Shop -- Tuesday edition

[walktalker]

News right ahead
Worms find fertile ground in IM
Having long targeted e-mail with sometimes devastating effects, virus and worm creators are setting their sights on IM services. Infected files, for example, have been burrowing their way slowly through Microsoft's MSN Messenger network over the past few months. Discovered by virus hunters in late June, the so-called Choke worm marked the second attack aimed at MSN Messenger in as many months. In May, the service was struck by the W32/Hello worm. Security experts said they are as yet unaware of any virus attacks that might have targeted AOL Time Warner's AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) and ICQ or Yahoo's Yahoo Messenger.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp01

Linux: From geek tech to corporate tool
It was 10 years ago this month that a 21-year-old Linus Torvalds sent an e-mail to the open-source software community saying an experimental version of the Linux kernel, the core technology that would end up embodied in Linux operating systems, was up and running. "I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones," Torvalds wrote in an e-mail to a discussion group that focused on the Unix variant Minix. "This has been brewing since April, and is starting to get ready." Since that note, Linux has become a worldwide phenomenon. By last year, less than a decade after its inception, Linux had 27 percent of the server market, according to researcher IDC. That compares to 41 percent of the market held by Microsoft's Windows.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

New graphics chips raise ATI's game
ATI Technologies boosted its Radeon graphics chip lineup on Tuesday, announcing processors that it claims offer up to three times better performance than its current product, for about the same price. The graphics chipmaker announced its fastest-yet Radeon 8500 and mid-range Radeon 7500, which will hit the market next month. ATI plans to offer both chips on graphics boards. The new 8500 is aimed at the high-end PC market and at game enthusiasts, the company said. The chip performs between two and three times faster than ATI's current Radeon VE, the company said. Canada's ATI will ship the new chip on a graphics board in September with 64MB of double data rate SDRAM, a multiple monitor feature and support for Microsoft's DirectX 8.1 multimedia application-programming interface. The board is set to sell at retail for $399.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

Software magic for e-tailers
Picture this: You splurge on a purse at your local Neiman Marcus. Later, while surfing at NeimanMarcus.com, you receive a promotional coupon good for 30 percent off matching shoes. Too good to be true? Retailers say they are busy implementing software that will do exactly that within the next year. They call it "multichannel Web marketing," and experts say it could revolutionize the way people shop -- both online and in retail stores. Behind the idea of multichannel Web marketing are software companies eager to unite retailers' legacy systems with their modern databases for online operations.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/ne...kpt=zdnnp1tp02

Microsoft argues for trial delay
Microsoft on Tuesday attacked the government's request to push its antitrust case forward while the Supreme Court considers the company's request for appeal. In a sharply worded, nine-page legal brief, Microsoft rebutted the government's argument that proceedings should begin at a lower court. The Redmond, Wash.-based company last week had asked the Supreme Court to consider an appeal, arguing U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson's comments to reporters before rendering his decision warranted throwing it out.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=mn_hd

Web bug swarm grows 500 percent
Research released Monday shows that the use of surveillance technology popularly known as Web bugs is on the rise, putting online companies in a precarious position with the consumers they're snooping on. In the last three years, Web bug use has grown nearly 500 percent, according to Cyveillance, an Internet technology and analysis company. The flood can be traced to the number of secondary pages carrying the tags, including personal Web pages linked to large community sites and Internet service providers, the report found. The research highlights a growing conflict between policies and practices at many Web businesses, a potential cause for consumer backlash. It also validates efforts by privacy advocates to combat the rising use of such surveillance.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=mn_hd

IBM unleashes supercomputing champ
IBM and the federal government will unveil Wednesday a system that ranks as the world's most powerful supercomputer. The pair will declare ASCI White open for business during a dedication ceremony to be held at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif. ASCI White, which packs 8,192 IBM Power3 processors and 160 terabytes of disc storage, will be used for nuclear weapons testing, including warhead safety and simulation of nuclear explosions. The machine is one of a series of supercomputers commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy to test nuclear weapons. It gets its name from a funding program, called Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative (ASCI), that provides money to computer makers for creating supercomputers out of comparatively ordinary computer components.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200...html?tag=mn_hd

How Big Blue fell for Linux
Corporations involved in the software industry are exploring open-source software, some with the enthusiasm of bodysurfers losing themselves in the roaring surf, others with the timidity of diffident waders in a lagoon full of sharks. They are by no means unified in their approach as an industry sector, or even internally within a single company. But there are executives and engineers at all of these companies who believe that an extraordinarily clear business case can be made for open-source software: Figure out how to make it your friend, before it starts dancing on your grave. To see this process in action, you don't need to look further than the computer industry's venerable giant, IBM -- which has become perhaps the best corporate friend open-source software has ever had.
http://salon.com/tech/fsp/2000/09/12...one/index.html

More news later on

[walktalker]

It's not all, you happy nappy friends !
Professor to delve into anti-copying flaws
A Princeton professor is scheduled to give a speech Wednesday on cracking digital anti-copying technology -- a presentation that the entertainment industry once warned could violate federal copyright laws. Though industry representatives have said in legal filings that they will stand aside and let Edward Felten speak at the USENIX conference in Washington, D.C., the case nonetheless is forcing many to question the content and intent of new digital copyright laws. "This case is about censorship and self-censorship," Felten's attorneys wrote in their most recent brief in the case. Felten has sued to gain permission to give the speech this time around. "At its heart is the private defendants' assertion of the right to threaten professors, graduate students and other researchers with litigation in order to prevent them from publishing scientific papers," the brief says.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46067,00.html

Judges target of workplace monitoring
Federal judges and their employees should be blocked from downloading music and should still be monitored for Internet misuse, a new report recommends. A committee of judges refused to support an end to ongoing Internet monitoring, as members of one court requested. In a compromise, the panel endorsed the prominent display of Internet policy each time computer users log on. The group also suggested revising court policies to match those in a model used by federal agencies.
The recommendations will be considered Sept. 11 by the Judicial Conference of the United States, the courts' policy-making group of 27 judges. Many employers routinely monitor workers' Internet use. Judges of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco protested the practice in May by disabling monitoring software.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Growth in online use slows
In what may be a sign of the economic times, growth in home Web use in the United States dropped in the last year compared with the prior 12-month period, according to a Nielsen/NetRatings report released Monday. The number of people jumping online from U.S. homes went from 88.2 million in July 2000 to 102.1 million a year later, a rise of 16 percent. That compares with a 41 percent increase during the previous yearlong period, from July 1999 to July 2000. According to Sean Kaldor, vice president of analytical services at NetRatings, the smaller growth this year is a result of the economic downturn, sluggish PC sales and increased layoffs.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200...html?tag=ch_mh

Heart devices deliver data over the Web
Ed Krzyston's third heart attack six years ago left him "dead on the table." Today, thanks to the Internet and a tiny device implanted in his chest, he lives a relatively normal life. The device, being tested at several U.S. hospitals, constantly monitors his heart and measures, among other things, the blood pressure in various parts of his heart. The crucial data is then transmitted over the Internet from Krzyston's home in Hammond, Indiana, to doctors at Rush Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medical Center in Chicago, giving them instant access to his condition. "You know the nice part of this? Some people don't want to sound like whiners, but graphs and numbers are universal," said the slender 53-year-old patient.
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200...html?tag=cd_mh

Kids Computer Camp Crashes, Quits
American Computer Experience, the company that runs computer camps at universities around the country, shut its doors abruptly on Friday afternoon, leaving students, parents and staff scratching their heads. The ACE website has shut down, and company representatives could not be reached by phone. The shuttering came two weeks before camp was scheduled to end. "Obviously the people that have paid for the next two weeks are upset," said Sue Nunan, director of conferences at Stanford University in California, one of the campuses where ACE leases space to run their programs. "We were as surprised as the parents were with the situation."
http://www.wired.com/news/school/0,1383,46042,00.html

Searching for Google's Successor
A new generation of scrappy search engines is emerging to challenge the dominance of mighty Google. Google became a huge Web favorite because it's simple and it works. A lot of people use it, even anti-American propaganda sites such as Cuba's Juventud Rebelde. Google has the largest URL database and it often returns highly relevant search results. The company is even profitable. But all empires eventually fall. And if Google has any real fault, it's that it returns too many results -- the bane of most search engines' existences. Now there's a whole new generation of search engines trying to find new ways to top Google's accuracy or optimize the way that results are organized to make them easier to go through.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,45905,00.html

Ethanol Guzzles Gas, Study Says
During the past several months, as lawmakers and energy experts have warned of a looming energy crisis, one alternative to gasoline that has been considered is ethanol, an alcohol fuel produced from corn. But a new study by David Pimentel, a professor of ecology at Cornell University, threatens to nip some of the ethanol excitement in the kernel. Pimentel's report, to be published in the 2001 edition of the Encyclopedia for Physical Sciences and Technology in September, says that producing ethanol is more trouble than it's worth: 131,000 British thermal units of energy are required to produce one gallon of ethanol, but a gallon will only give you about 77,000 Btu of fuel energy. In other words, producing ethanol results in a net loss of energy.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46045,00.html

Automatic for the Pedal
The days of grinding through your bicycle gears and bumping over potholes may be coming to an end. Japanese bike parts manufacturer Shimano has developed a computer-controlled system for automatically changing a bicycle's gears and adjusting its suspension. Shimano's Digital Integrated Intelligence (DI2) system automatically shifts down the gears when going uphill and up the gears when going downhill. It also adjusts the stiffness of the front and rear suspension –- making the bike more rigid in the lower, slower gears and bouncier in the higher, faster gears. It all makes for a smooth and effortless ride -- except for the actual pedaling, of course.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,45788,00.html

Solar Plane Sets Altitude Record
A solar-powered flying wing soared past previous altitude records for non-rocket powered aircraft on Monday, and NASA officials hoped it would reach a maximum height of 100,000 feet. The remotely controlled Helios Prototype reached 81,100 feet five hours and 16 minutes after its launch from the Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility at Barking Sands, Kauai. That surpassed the altitude record for propeller-driven aircraft of 80,200 feet, set by a smaller version of the craft, Pathfinder Plus, in 1998.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology...,46054,00.html

Christ's Music Shalt Stream First
In the marathon struggle for a fully functioning online music subscription service, Christian music devotees have become the first to take an important baby step: These fans now have a subscription plan that gives them on-demand access to streaming selections of major label content. Under existing services from competitors, consumers can't select which songs they want to hear or access tunes from the major labels. On Monday, Streamwaves of Dallas, Texas, launched Higherwaves -- a program offering on-demand access for $14 per month to CeCe Winans, dc Talk and other acts from EMI Christian Music Group, the world's largest Christian music company.
http://www.wired.com/news/mp3/0,1285,46036,00.html

US building mega computer
Forget supercomputers. The US Government is building an incredibly powerful computer. Next year it hopes to throw the switch on a massive distributed computing system, dubbed the Teragrid, that can carry out over 13 trillion calculations per second. Four US supercomputer centres are collaborating to create the machine that will employ over 3,000 separate processors. Scientists are keen to use the computational cluster to study the most complex problems in science such as the origins of the Universe, the causes of cancer and global weather patterns.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci...00/1490272.stm

Computer Developers Aiming to Exterminate the Mouse
Controlling a computer has been largely defined over the years by the humble keyboard and mouse. Now, researchers are turning their attention to new kinds of controllers, including eye movements, voice commands and even brain waves. "One of the questions we in the industry struggle with every day is how we can make computers easier to use," said Tim Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies Inc., a consulting firm in Silicon Valley. "Not everybody is keyboard-centric. You have to look at alternative methods of getting computers into the hands of more people." Experts say keyboards and mice force users to adapt to the technology, not the other way around.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-081401haptics.story

Brain Pacemakers
Brain pacemakers were first successfully implanted in humans nearly 15 years ago in France, and in 1997, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first U.S. use of pacemakers to treat essential tremor and Parkinsonian tremor — currently, the only approved indications. But until very recently, the procedure had been performed relatively infrequently, and not surprisingly, it has been viewed with great caution. "Historically, the field has been hindered — appropriately — by the problematic memory of things like the lobotomy, where the science wasn't there and many of the outcomes were horrific," says Joseph J. Fins, chief of the Division of Medical Ethics at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. But now, as the science of brain circuitry has become better understood, and as the long-term outcomes of brain pacemakers have shown the technology to be both effective and safe, that could be about to change.
http://www.techreview.com/magazine/sep01/hall.asp

High-frequency radar detects runway junk
A new high-resolution radar system developed by a UK team could be used to rapidly scan airport runways for potentially deadly debris. The researchers hope it could prevent accidents such as the Concorde crash at Charles de Gaulles airport in France in July 2000, which killed 113 people. A piece of metal on the runway is believed to have ruptured one of the aircraft's tyres during take-off, sending rubber into a fuel tank and causing the plane to burst into flames. The radar has been developed by researchers at QinetiQ, the commercial offshoot of the UK government's Defence Evaluation and Research Agency. A prototype version can detect an object no larger than a Coke can up to 300 metres away. "We hope eventually to get it up to one kilometre," says business development officer Tim Floyd.
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99991149

Beating Parkinson's
William Bland can now hear a song just once before effortlessly strumming it on his guitar. He has the ear, and many years of musical experience. But most of all he has control over his hands again after years of hearing a tune without being able to play it, because his fingers just wouldn't cooperate. About 10 years ago, Bland was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. The increasingly worse hand tremors, the inability to walk without shuffling, the endless medications that wear off anyway — all this he has known well.
http://www.techreview.com/web/basu/basu081401.asp

The newspaper printers never stop

[nanook]

good stuff wt!

thanks again for your hard work dude, it's always worth it

[Catbert13]

Thought this was interesting....

What's McDonalds Secret "Flavor" Anyway?

NEW & IMPROVED SOYLENT GREEN..."Now with even more people!"

"Brain Pacemakers" - wonderfull article.