Category: Technology

Acquired Attention Deficit Disorder

John Ratey, an associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard University and a specialist on the science of attention, explained that when people use digital devices, they get a quick burst of adrenaline, “a dopamine squirt.” Without it, people grow bored with simpler activities like driving. Mr. Ratey said the modern brain is being rewired to crave stimulation, a condition he calls acquired attention deficit disorder.

“We need that constant pizzazz, the reward, the intensity,” he said. He largely dismisses the argument that people need the time in the car to be productive. “The justification for doing work is just that — a justification to be engaged,” he said.

via Driven to Distraction – Dismissing the Risks of a Deadly Habit – Multitasking on the Road – Series – NYTimes.com.

How The News Gets Out Of Iran

“Tor protects you by bouncing your communications around a distributed network of relays run by volunteers all around the world: it prevents somebody watching your Internet connection from learning what sites you visit, and it prevents the sites you visit from learning your physical location. Tor works with many of your existing applications, including web browsers, instant messaging clients, remote login, and other applications based on the TCP protocol.”

This is something of great value to our friends in Iran.

Tor from Iran Traffic Get Tor & Help Iranian Freedom
(all found at https://www.torproject.org/easy-download.html.en)

Twitter Drives Iranian Revolt

twitterAs the regime shut down other forms of communication, Twitter survived. With some remarkable results. Those rooftop chants that were becoming deafening in Tehran? A few hours ago, this concept of resistance was spread by a twitter message.

The key force behind this is the next generation, the Millennials, who elected Obama in America and may oust Ahmadinejad in Iran. They want freedom; they are sick of lies; they enjoy life and know hope.

This generation will determine if the world can avoid the apocalypse that will come if the fear-ridden establishments continue to dominate global politics, motivated by terror, armed with nukes, and playing old but now far too dangerous games. This generation will not bypass existing institutions and methods: look at the record turnout in Iran and the massive mobilization of the young and minority vote in the US. But they will use technology to displace old modes and orders. Maybe this revolt will be crushed. But even if it is, the genie has escaped this Islamist bottle.

Maybe that’s what we’re hearing on the rooftops of Tehran: the sound of the next revolution.           Allah O Akbar!

via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.

How To Steal $9+ Million in 30 Minutes From ATMs

How did the hackers steal $9 million in one 30-minute time period using only 100 ATM cards you ask? That shouldn’t be possible given the daily limits (usually about $500/day) placed on all ATM cards. Well it turns out that the hackers applied military like precision to old ATM Scam techniques and added a touch of devious ingenuity to pull this one off. Here is a look at how the theft was perpetrated.

via Largest Coordinated ATM Rip-off Ever Nets $9+ Million in 30 Minutes | NetworkWorld.com Community. Continue reading “How To Steal $9+ Million in 30 Minutes From ATMs”

$20 Laptop

The ambitous initiative will be under consideration at a National Mission on Education launch in Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, on Tuesday. Pioneered in India by scientists at Indian scientific and technological institutes and a state-owned semi-conductor laboratory, the laptop has 2Gb Ram capacity and wireless connectivity.

R.P. Agrawal, secretary of secondary and higher education, told reporters last week that the cost of the laptop was about $20 a unit, but he expected that to fall. He also said he expected the units to be commercially available in six months.

via FT.com / India / Politics & Society – India to follow $2,000 car with $20 laptop.

Now Truckloads Of Servers

Microsoft’s data centers growing by the truckload | Latest Microsoft News – CNET News – CNET News
Starting with a Chicago-area facility due to open later this year, Microsoft will use an approach in which servers arrive at the data center in a sealed container, already networked together and ready to go. The container itself is then hooked up to power, networking, and air conditioning.
Microsoft graphic

“The trucks back ’em in, rack ’em, and stack ’em,” Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie told CNET News. And the containers remain sealed, Ozzie said. Once a certain number of servers in the container have failed, it will be pulled out and sent back to the manufacturer and a new container loaded in.

At the growth rate of 10,000 servers a month Microsoft should be at 218,000 servers at the end of August 08.

Overloaded Internet

Video boom threatens to gridlock the internet | Technology | The Observer
Information meltdown

· Electricity reached one quarter of Americans 46 years after its introduction. Telephones took 35 years and televisions 26 years. In just six years, broadband reached 25 per cent penetration.

· It took two centuries to fill the shelves of the Library of Congress with more than 57 million manuscripts, 29 million books and periodicals, 12 million photographs, and more. Now, the world generates an equivalent amount of digital information nearly 100 times each day.
Internet Innovation Alliance Continue reading “Overloaded Internet”

Rash Of Internet Undersea Cables Cut

Apparently, Ships Can Drag Anchors from Egypt to Malaysia | I Love Bonnie.net
As I said: 3 was quite a few. 4 is pushing it. 5 starts to make you wonder. In case you aren’t familiar with that part of the world, here’s a map that I made which shows the approximate locations of the “cuts” in the underwater cables:

We’re supposed to believe that these were most likely caused by an anchor from a ship fighting a storm. This author finds it hard to believe that this anchor was drug behind a boat from Egypt to Malaysia.

1500+ Free Videos

Miro – Demo Video

Click on the link for the video on this incredible new free video search/download and viewer.Install miro and you can download from over 1500+ video channels. If you download a YouTube video, you get to watch it Full Screen. You can search for videos on other torrents by name. Could this do to TV what Skype did to the Telephone?