wersh writes "Matsushita Electric Works has developed a room that helps people sleep. They've been letting their employees take 30-minute sessions in the room and so far, not one has failed to fall asleep, they claim. They plan to open the sleep room to the public next week and intend to start selling it in June 2005 for 30,000 USD."

das writes "Apple has introduced AirPort Express (specs), a palm-sized, portable 802.11g base station with 10/100 ethernet, USB printer sharing, and analog and optical audio output, for connection to a stereo system or powered speakers for streaming your music collection via 'AirTunes.' It supports multiple profiles for easy use at multiple locations It can plug directly into the wall as a "power brick", or use a longer power cord, similar to the newer PowerBook AC adapters. AirTunes requires iTunes 4.6, expected to be available soon."

Lucas Wagner writes "Circa 1979, a strange poster was over nearly every programmer at Apple Computer. The "Syntax Poster" adorned offices, cubes, and even dealers. It was created by Jef Raskin and Steve Jobs. It was half art, half code. My uncle was a printer at the time and gave me one of them, thankfully, because they don't exist anymore. In researching the poster's origins, Raskin told me its history. I found it to be so interesting that, with his permission, I thought it would be a good article for fans of Apple trivia."

securitas writes "Total Information Awareness is alive and thriving. eWEEK's Caron Carlson reports on a new General Accounting Office study that says TIA-style data mining programs are rampant in federal agencies with 199 projects at 52 of 128 agencies. The Defense Intelligence Agency/DoD is the single largest user of these data mining projects (eg. Verity K2 Enterprise). The story was first reported by Reuters' Andy Sullivan (ZDNet UK mirror) and the NYT's Robert Pear, who wrote that at least 122 projects used personally identifying information like names, e-mail addresses, Social Security and driver's license numbers. The 'actual numbers are likely to be much higher' because the report excludes classified projects. Wired News' Kim Zetter writes that, in addition to government databases, federal agencies mine private databases of credit rating agencies, bank account numbers, student loan applications, etc. This week the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) released a report with privacy guidelines for data mining technology (PDF) development and use. Guidelines include data anonymization, government data access authorization and audit trails. Cynthia (Cindy) Webb's 'Total Information Dilemma' at the Washington Post is an excellent survey of media coverage of TIA, MATRIX and the GAO report 'Data Mining: Federal Efforts Cover a Wide Range of Uses' (mirror, both in PDF format). More at GCN, GovExec and the Guardian/AP."

neema writes "Yesterday, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope (web site here) detected the youngest planet, at less than 1 million years old, known to exist. The planet, for those of you who want to visit or something, is 420 light years away circling the star CoKu Tau 4. According to astronomer Dan Watson of the University of Rochester, the discovery of this "Baby Planet" "really causes problems for the major theories of planetary formation." Arist conception pictures and more info can be found at the Planetary Photojournal."

eaglemoon writes ""The days of engineering-led technology companies are coming to an end," Mr. Dell declared. The NY Times outlines a modern version of a classic innovation theory. Who gets to win in the marketplace - the innovators who invest in R&D like crazy or those that just take cost out of standard products? The current fight between Dell and HP over the printer business is a great natural experiment in verifying this theory." The article does a good job of stating what the real contest is - it's the different theories of corporate structure that's being tested.

unassimilatible writes "From the Department of Pre-Crime, the AP reports: before helping to launch the criminal information project known as Matrix (Multistate Anti-Terrorism Information Exchange), a database contractor gave U.S. and Florida authorities the names of 120,000 people who showed a statistical likelihood of being terrorists - sparking some investigations and arrests. The 'high terrorism factor' scoring system also became a key selling point for the involvement of the database company, Seisint Inc., in the Matrix project. According to Seisint's presentation, dated January 2003 and marked confidential, the 120,000 names with the highest scores were given to the INS, FBI, Secret Service and Florida state police. Seisint and the law enforcement officials who oversee Matrix insist that the terrorism scoring system ultimately was kept out of the project, largely because of privacy concerns."

Oily Pakora writes "Those of us in the United States are so used to our Letter and Legal paper sizes. We've seen the A4 paper size option in our printer trays and in printer preference menus. Metric sizes used almost everywhere in the world, save for the US and Canada. Here is an interesting article that discusses all of the aspects of metric paper. For those who enjoy a bit of math, did you know that in the Metric paper system, the height-to-width ratio of all pages is the square root of 2? This means that you can place two sheets of A4 side-by-side and they will equal an A3 sheet exactly, and two sheets of A3 will equal an A2."

deglr6328 writes "Physics Today has a report detailing the surprisingly heated controversy surrounding the usually sober science of nuclear isomers (the Washington Post has run a less scientifically rigorous version). Since the 70's it has been known that the specific "m2" isomer of Hafnium-178 has an extraordinarily long half life of 31 years (nuclear isomers usually have half-lives on orders of pico or nanoseconds) and on decaying, emits high energy gamma rays at ~2.5 Mev. The prospect of energy storage and rapid release in Hf-178 for the puropse of creating large energy stores, bombs and even exotic gamma ray lasers did not escape the interest of Reagan era Star Wars researchers and was seriously studied for a time during SDI's heyday, but was eventually abandoned after being considered unfeasible. Then, in 1999, Carl Collins at the Univ. of Texas Center for Quantum Electronics reported inducing energy release from Hf-178 by bombarding a sample with X-rays (from a dental machine no less). Immediately, comments about the article were submitted, pointing out inconsistencies with basic nuclear theory and the controversy has only grown since then, with claims and counter-claims of flawed experimental design, incompetence and irrational theories in feuds reminiscent of the cold fusion debacle of the late 80's. It's seeming more unlikely as the arguments drag on, but if a Hafnium bomb could be built, it is thought that a golf ball sized chunk could produce the energy equivalent of 10 tons of conventional explosives."

edibobb writes "I just fired up my scanner and uploaded the 35-page 1981 (+/- 1 year) personal computer catalog from American Small Business Computers. 16K RAM for $22; 10 megabyte hard drive, 5 meg fixed and 5 removeable, with 14-inch platters; 25-character per second printer. Things have changed a bit since then!"

canfirman asks: "Not exactly a serious question, but maybe good for a laugh: Our company is bringing in new printers into the office, and I noticed that the on-screen instructions state, 'Do not pull pages until after the printer has finished its job'. I thought this would be a redundant instruction (kinda like, 'Don't run with scissors'), but it got me thinking - what are some of the dumbest instructions you have ever seen on a piece of software, hardware, or appliance?"

John Miles writes "It's been almost thirty years since young Laura and Sandy Crowther sat down at a Teletype and took their first steps into the mysterious subterranean world their father, Will, created for them. Now, if Nick Montfort's Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction is any indication, Crowther and Woods's pioneering computer game Adventure and its descendants are finally beginning to garner the critical recognition they deserve. At only 286 pages, Twisty Little Passages is a small, accessible book that addresses a deep and complex subject. The author's stated intention is to bring us the first book-length consideration of interactive fiction (IF) as a legitimate literary field, and he has certainly succeeded." Read on for the rest of Miles' review.

ryantate writes "I was reading TV Tattle and came across an interesting story in the Washington Post about people who spend less than $30 per month on cable buying a la carte. To do this you need a huge C-band dish, but Sen. John McCain wants to require a la carte pricing on digital cable. Content companies like Viacom are fighting it -- they don't want people to be able opt out of their less established channels. And at least one economist type, this guy in the Financial Times, seems to think we'll end up paying just as much under a la carte pricing. EchoStar is game but says Viacom and others are refusing to go along. "

Rade T. writes "Reuters UK reports that HP, the No. 1 personal computer and computer printer maker, said on Wednesday that its putting its weight behind personal computers that run the Linux operating system. I guess this is the first serious step towards solving the problems that Linux faces on the Desktop/Laptop."

unassimilatible writes "Opera's latest browser talks and listens, according to AP. The new browser incorporates IBM's ViaVoice technology, enabling the computer to ask what the user wants and "listen" to the request. "Hi. I am your browser. What can I do for you?" asked a laptop with the demonstration versions of the browser. The message can be personalized, such as greeting users by name. The computer learns to recognize users' voices, accents and inflections by having them read a list of words into a microphone. Opera plans to first launch an English version of the voice browser for computers running the Windows operating system. Versions for other systems, including handhelds, will follow. Opera's press release has more details, including Opera's hopes that people will adopt this technology for presentations - and to replace PowerPoint."

unassimilatible writes "The Transportation Security Administration said Wednesday it will order airlines to turn over passengers' personal records in the next couple of months to test a computerized passenger screening program that could keep dangerous people off airlines, reports Yahoo/AP. The Computer-Assisted Passenger Prescreening System, or CAPPS II, would rank all air passengers according to the likelihood of their being terrorists. Suspected terrorists and violent criminals would be designated as red and forbidden to fly. Passengers who raise questions would be classified as yellow and would receive extra security screening. The vast majority would be designated green and allowed through routine screening. But some say the project would violate privacy rights, while others are concerned it would cost the private sector too much money. The Air Transport Association, the trade group for major airlines, has come up with seven 'privacy principles' that it says the government should follow in implementing CAPPS II."

zmcnulty writes "I finished translating the K-Tai Watch (Japanese) article about a new printer in the Colorio line from Epson. It's not only being marketed at women, it was completely designed by 'Team8' - an all-female project team created within Epson specifically for making a printer 'easy for women to use.' Here is the original Japanese press release." Apparently they've been reading these studies.

Nofsck Ingcloo writes "Orange County, California has discovered the joys of electronic voting. The story originated in the LA Times, which requires registration to view it. Yahoo News has a copy here. Problems occurred in races throughout the county. Among the symptoms of the problem were turnouts exceeding 100%." Read on for more.

An anonymous reader writes "Here's a guy that demonstrates how printer companies abuse their clients. He found that Lexmark cartridges are a perfect replacement for Xerox ones, with only minor modifications to the printer. It's well illustrated with may photographs."

An anonymous reader writes "According to FireflyFans.net and Ain't It Cool News, Universal has greenlit production of 'Serenity,' the motion picture based on Joss Whedon's cancelled TV series 'Firefly.' Both sites point to an article from Variety that says the film will start production in June, and be ready for release in 2005." The informative Whedonesque weblog is also monitoring developments regarding this much-deserved resurrection.