Israelis ponder Sharon successor The international media crews who rushed to Jerusalem on the news of Ariel Sharon's massive stroke are going home a week later, having reached the conclusion that the controversial Israeli prime minister will survive his brush with mortality. The story has "died" in the unemotional parlance of news journalists. The circus is packing up and moving on. But we leave behind a large proportion of the Israeli population in a state of nervous uncertainty about what the future holds. Mr Sharon had become a colossus of the country's politics. His supporters, who seem to include most Israelis you meet out in the streets, just want him to get better and get back to running the country.
Of course, hardly anyone expects that actually to happen, given the seriousness of Mr Sharon's condition - but who, they ask, is there to replace him?
http://tinyurl.com/74j6f
Half Terrabyte RAID array for $250 What self-respecting geek doesn't get the warm fuzzies at the mere mention of the RAID. With the rising GB to Dollar ratio, we felt it was a good time to feature a project that takes Pure Geekieness(TM) and mixes in a good helping of do it your self. Where else are you going to store all those MP3s (legally obtained, of course)? On a single 200 GB Drive? Or a RAID 5 Array? Take you pick, I know where I will be storing mine.
http://tinyurl.com/dggv7
Vatican moves to clear Judas’ name Proposed ‘rehabilitation’ of the man who was paid 30 pieces of silver to identify Jesus to Roman soldiers in the Garden of Gethsemane, comes on the ground that he was not deliberately evil, but was just ‘fulfilling his part in God’s plan, the London Times reports Ynetnews Judas Iscariot, the disciple who betrayed Jesus with a kiss, is to be given a makeover by Vatican scholars, according to the London Times. The proposed “rehabilitation” of the man who was paid 30 pieces of silver to identify Jesus to Roman soldiers in the Garden of Gethsemane, comes on the ground that he was not deliberately evil, but was just “fulfilling his part in God’s plan,” the London Times said.
Solar energy company lands U.S. deal Solel Solar Systems Ltd to supply technology able to produce solar electricity to Nevada homes Eli Shimoni Solel Solar Systems Ltd, leaders in solar thermal technology for central power generation, is set to supply NIS 50 million worth of solar technology to an American energy project. The technology developed by the Israeli-owned company with subsidiaries in the United States is based on thousands of units for the reception and conduction of thermo-solar energy. The essentiality of solar power plants developed by Solel is their capability to generate environmental-friendly electricity. The project will benefit some 150, 000 Nevada homes.
Apple's new ad isn't so subtle, and Intel isn't too pleased We must admit we found ourselves chuckling at Apple's new ad for their Intel iMac, which states that they'll be setting Intel's chips free from "dull little boxes, dutifully performing dull little tasks." But Intel isn't chuckling, and maybe it's because the ad is a not so subtle slam on their last few decades of existence, and a straight out dissing of all their current partners in the PC world. Intel didn't even know what was going on with this ad, despite allowing it to be shot in their facilities, and saw it for the first time right before the keynote. Kind of reminds us of another little surprise that Apple dropped on a recent keynote partner: a little thing Stevie likes to call the iPod nano. At least Intel is putting on a good face about it; Intel VP Deborah Conrad says that "it's probably a good thing that we didn't see them earlier," but if Steve Jobs starts wearing a baseball cap to the keynotes and flipping through slides about Q2 punking effectiveness, we'll know something has gone horribly wrong.
No XP on Intel Macs, but Vista is good to go If you've been counting on being able to run Windows on those new Intel-based Macs, Apple's not about to make it easy for you -- at least not if you're attached to Windows XP. According to Apple SVP Phil Schiller, the new Macs announced yesterday (those being the Intel iMac and MacBook Pro) may not be able to run current versions of Windows due to the fact that the computers will boot using the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI), rather than a traditional BIOS (current Power PC Macs use Open Firmware). EFI was developed by Intel and allows a number of advanced features, including the ability to connect to the Internet from a command shell before the OS is loaded. Since EFI was developed after the rollout of Windows XP, it's not supported by the current or earlier version of Windows (it is, however, supported by 64-bit versions, but the new Macs are 32-bit, so it's back to square one). However, all is not lost: Windows Vista will support EFI, and Apple has said it has no plans to directly block Windows from working on the new boxes. So, if you're a Vista beta tester and have ordered a new iMac or MacBookPro, get those install CDs out; the rest of you will have to wait for the official Vista release, or find a way to hack XP to boot using EFI (which we're sure is about to become a major priority of some of you at this very moment).
TIS ONE IS COOL:
The Swivel Socket power strip Posted Jan 12th 2006 4:00AM by Jonathan Hayter Filed under: Household, Peripherals Many have tried to create a power strip that allows you to use more than the inevitable two of the plugs at once, and many have failed. One notable exception is the PowerSquid, but this Swivel Socket concept seems like it might give that thing a run for its money. Each socket rotates 180 degrees, and each has a swiveling label so you can remember what you plugged into what. Sounds like a plan, no?
http://tinyurl.com/cms9c
Company claims method of harnessing electricity from trees Seemingly from the same school of scientific thought as the person who brought us the "car that runs on water, man!" is a gentleman named Gordon Wadle who claims to have found a very simple way to draw electricity from trees. After studying lightning which emanates from the ground, Wadle began trying to harness this so-called terrestrial power by driving nails into trees and attaching them to copper water pipes driven into the ground. Although so far the process only produces a current that fluctuates between .8 and 1.2-volts (making it completely useless), Wadle managed to convince a company called MagCap to support his research and a law firm to file patents on his behalf. MagCap President Chris Lagadinos is hoping to produce stable 12-volt electricity by the end of 2006, although energy experts seem to be of the mind that this whole thing is a bunch of hogwash. Still, if these guys can somehow pull this off (and without damaging the trees), we'll finally be able to free ourselves from the oppressive oil cartel by simply planting a small oak in our passenger seats.
http://tinyurl.com/cj6ug
GE's kitchen of the future showcased in Orlando We may still be getting over CES and Macworld, but the endless cycle of trade shows goes on, and if you're into appliances, the place to be this week is Orlando, where manufacturers are showing off their gear at the Builders' Show (gee, and here we were looking for the fridges and dishwashers at CES). GE has a slick demo of a "kitchen of the future" that's heavy on voice-activated touchscreen OLED displays, sliding glass doors and integrated appliances (including a slide-out, self-cleaning cooktop). Ask "what's for breakfast?" and the system will give you a list of your available ingredients. Unfortunately, the kitchen won't cook the food for you without at least some manual intervention — and won't shop for you either, which means the response when we ask "what's for breakfast?" is going to be along the lines of leftover pizza and flat diet soda.
http://tinyurl.com/bsyhq
AND FROM TREEHUGGER:
GE Kitchen of the Future We want GE's Kitchen of the future. Now. "The entire suite offers a full-width display combined with touch sensors across the entire surface. What does that mean for consumers? Imagine new possibilities for recipe presentation and entertainment. In total, this surface affords multiple levels of interaction and the navigation of complex information.". ..."GE's industrial designers and engineers envision organic light emitting diode (OLED) technology as the primary lighting source in the kitchen of the future and have represented this with a fabric canopy with lights above the kitchen." ... "The GE Kitchen of the Future will put a focus on environmentally friendly products to reduce pollution and increase efficiency while lowering operating costs. The Kitchen of the Future will provide clean water purified via ultraviolet light, assuring that the water is free of bacteria, without chemicals. Consumers will load the dishwasher with detergent in bulk, and it will be dispensed via algorithms to minimize the cleaning agents in wastewater. GE envisions that in the future, gray (waste) water can be diverted for other home and garden applications." It won't cook for you, but will tell you if you have the ingredients for chick peas in ginger sauce.... GE ::Kitchen of the Future via ::Engadget
http://tinyurl.com/8udxx
MyVu Personal Media Player: LCD goggles for the iPod Remember those Orange LCD goggles we checked out last week? The ones being pitched in France as a virtual display for Samsung's SGH-D600 cellphone? Well, manufacturer MicroOptical Corp. is pretty busy, because this week they're hawking the same goggles at Macworld as the MyVu Personal Media Player, which they claim will "accelerate" the adoption of the iPod by providing "hands free, head-up access to a large virtual image." We may be naive here, but we somehow don't think Apple needs MicroOptical to accelerate the iPod's market growth. MicroOptical doesn't list a price for the MyVu, but the French version is €299 ($361), so we expect similar pricing here.
http://tinyurl.com/c7qqc
Rootkit-like Feature Found in Norton Systemworks
Posted by Zonk on Thursday January 12, @09:26AM from the i'm-helping-i'm-helping dept. GenieGenieGenie writes "eWeek reports a rootkit-like 'feature' in Symantec's Norton Systemworks, discovered by the Mark Russinovich, who was also responsible for blowing the whistle on Sony's DRM rootkit. The cloaked directory is intended to prevent users from accidentally deleting important files, but could compromise a system by serving as a hiding place for malware, as was the case with Sony's rootkit. Russinovich says Symantec had good intentions, but they were right to post an update to fix this hole."
New Way to Stimulate Brain to Release Antioxidants
Posted by samzenpus on Thursday January 12, @12:17AM from the wired-reflexes-2 dept. Neopallium writes "A joint research effort between researchers at the Burnham Institute for Medical Research in La Jolla, CA, and a team from Japan (Iwate University, Osaka City University, Gifu University, Iwate Medical University) has discovered a novel way to treat stroke and neurodegenerative disorders. This approach works by inducing nerve cells in the brain and the spine to release natural antioxidants that protect nerve cells from stress and free radicals that lead to neurodegenerative diseases."http://tinyurl.com/cmwwh
Desktop Cold Fusion Reconsidered
Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday January 11, @11:03PM from the tabletop-sun dept. Armchair Anarchist writes "Nature.com reports on Rusi Taleyarkhan of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, who is once again claiming to have achieved ultrasound-induced fusion in deuterium-enriched acetone. Other experts are sceptical, but Taleyarkhan is keen to have other scientists check his results."
http://tinyurl.com/dectf
The fully-automated convenience store (link to this article) January 12, 2006 The world’s first convenience store opened in 1927 serving customers 16 hours a day (from 7am to 11pm), eventually evolving into the 7-Eleven Corporation and a retailing revolution had begun, though it did not really begin to gather momentum until the automobile became popular and available post WW2. The world’s first 24 hour 7-Eleven opened in 1963 and since then society has become accustomed to demanding and getting instant everything, with the logical imperatives such as 24 hour chemists first, followed by supermarkets and shopping malls. Now robotics and computers can offer an automated shopping experience that lacks little and costs less, we can expect to see many new 24 hour services evolving with the ever-entrepreneurial SingPost recently launching the World’s first 24-Hour Automated Post Office and the recent growth in Europe of 24 hour automated convenience stores. All Seasons Services recently unveiled its first Shop24 automated convenience store unit in the United States, expanding its operations from a successful European base of 160 stores across seven countries. Shop24 offers 24-hour access to as many as 200 items, including anything from milk to a six-pack of soda, batteries, iPod download cards, and health and beauty aids, in a freestanding, self-service, outdoor unit. It’s a new concept and one which can be expected to change convenience retailing on college and business campuses initially, with an inevitable impact on main street as time goes by. http://tinyurl.com/8va2w
I WANT ONE:
New MINI production model announced - inspired by Traveller Concept (link to this article) January 12, 2006 BMW will be enhancing the MINI family with a further model. The new MINI model will offer increased interior space and increased functionality in order to appeal to the distinctively experience-oriented and active MINI customer. The new car will take its inspiration from the MINI Detroit design concept shown at the North American International Auto Show (NAIAS) this week. Although it has yet to be defined which of the unique ideas and design features presented on the concept will be implemented for series production, Dr. Michael Ganal in his speech at the NAIAS stated a time frame of three years for the realization of the new MINI model. http://tinyurl.com/7khpe
laptop keyboard conversion posted jan 11, 2006, 11:00 am et by eliot phillips related entries: peripherals hacks [leechar] liked the compactness of notebook keyboards and wanted one for his desktop. a friend provided a 486 notebook keyboard and leechar found an old at keyboard controller in a junk box. instead of taking the time to decode the key matrix and make sure that every key was generating the proper scancode he just wired it so that each key generated a unique code. then using keytweak he was able to build a registry key for the correct mapping. still having fun abusing input devices he decided to marry his toshiba laptop track ball with the guts of a microsoft mouse by soldering directly to the photosensor connections.
'Doomsday' seed bank to be builtNorway is planning to build a "doomsday vault" inside a mountain on an Arctic island to hold a seed bank of all known varieties of the world's crops.The Norwegian government will hollow out a cave on the ice-bound island of Spitsbergen to hold the seed bank. It will be designed to withstand global catastrophes like nuclear war or natural disasters that would destroy the planet's sources of food. Seed collection is being organised by the Global Crop Diversity Trust. "What will go into the cave is a copy of all the material that is currently in collections [spread] all around the world," Geoff Hawtin of the Trust told the BBC's Today programme.
http://tinyurl.com/9jkel
The lungs of the planet are belching methane
- 12 January 2006
- NewScientist.com news service
- Zeeya Merali
IT'S not just farting cows and belching sheep that spew out methane. Living plants have been disgorging millions of tonnes of the potent greenhouse gas into the atmosphere every year - without anybody noticing. The concentration of methane in the atmosphere has almost tripled since pre-industrial times. Environmental scientists thought they had identified all natural sources where bacteria convert organic plant matter to methane, such as swamps, wetlands and rice paddies. These bacteria only thrive in wet, oxygen-poor environments; they cannot survive in air. So Frank Keppler, an environmental engineer at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Germany, was surprised when he saw signs of methane being emitted by plants he was examining in normal air. "If we were following the textbook, we would have ignored it as a mistake," he says.
http://tinyurl.com/9okuw
Einstein's 'spooky action' seen on a chip
- 18:00 11 January 2006
- NewScientist.com news service
- Amarendra Swarup
A simple semiconductor chip has been used to generate pairs of entangled photons, a vital step towards making quantum computers a reality. Famously dubbed “spooky action at a distance” by Einstein, entanglement is the mysterious phenomenon of quantum particles whereby two particles such as photons behave as one regardless of how far apart they are. It is widely regarded as essential to the development of quantum computers and quantum cryptography. To generate entangled photons, Andrew Shields at Toshiba Research Europe Limited in Cambridge, UK, and colleagues from TREL and the University of Cambridge manufactured a silicon chip containing a nanometre-sized quantum dot. A quantum dot is a semiconductor crystal that has discrete energy states like an atom and can be optically triggered to generate photons. The team found that the precise shape of the dot dictates whether the emitted photons are entangled or not, and the shape can be controlled by how the quantum dot is grown or by applying an external magnetic field.
http://tinyurl.com/b6tv6
Hycrete Technologies, LLC Hydrophobic Concrete Additive January 12, 2006 07:27 AM - John Laumer, Philadelphia Back in October of 2005 we posted about the first products to receive Cradle to Cradle certification through McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry (MBDC). One of them was "Hycrete", a form of concrete made intrinsically waterproof (hydrophobic really) by use of an additive offered by a New Jersey-based firm Hycrete Technologies, LLC. Hycrete Technologies "...manufactures Hycrete Admixture, a hydrophobic concrete admixture product developed in response to industry demand for a low-concentration, environmentally friendly additive. The admixture blocks penetration of water by forming a nonsoluble precipitate that fills concrete pores and attaches itself to polar particles, thus sealing internal voids". Importance of Hycrete Admixture to the "green building" market is discussed below. From the Hycrete press release we are informed that: "... According to William McDonough, founding partner of McDonough & Partners and a leader in the sustainable development and green office movements, “The need for external membrane and coating systems is eliminated [with Hycrete]. Any time a process in construction can be avoided, more is accomplished with less, and savings through time and material are realized.”"
http://tinyurl.com/7eych
Torino 2006 - the Other Hydrogen Olympics January 12, 2006 02:28 AM - Warren McLaren, Sydney Late last year it seems we might've got a little ahead of ourselves. We brought you a story about the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics embracing hydrogen vehicles. But as our pals at the Italian based Ecoblog kindly pointed out the Torino Winter Olympics, commencing about this time next month, are keen to lay claim to the title ‘The First Hydrogen Olympics’. If we interpret the translated post correctly, the hydrogen for some building usage will be produced from 180m2 of solar panels generating 25kW of power. Apparently this is sufficient to feed the fuel cells for 16 hours a day. And there will also be hydrogen utilised in buses and other vehicles as well. For other green initiatives at the snowy games peruse the Torino official Olympic environmental pages. Original ::EcoBlog post (Italian).
http://tinyurl.com/8u97t
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