A video, created originally for educational publisher Dorling Kindersley, offers a brilliant argument for why books, whether on the iPad or other format, have a future.

Over the past several weeks there have been a number of new Linux graphics features introduced by David Airlie, a Red Hat employee and long-time X.Org contributer. Last month David began on a project rampage by bringing hybrid graphics to Linux via code he called "vga_switcheroo" to switch between ATI/NVIDIA/Intel GPUs without rebooting the system (though restarting the X.Org Server is needed at this time) that that code has now made its way into the mainline Linux kernel. Last week another David Airlie project was multi-GPU rendering support for Linux that was written as a proof of concept to show a second GPU could render 3D applications onto the screen of the first GPU, regardless of the hardware vendor. This week we now have the ability to run two X.Org Servers for a multi-head setup off a single graphics card...

There's not a lot to see here -- in fact, there's nothing at all to see at this point -- but The New York Times has it on good authority that Google, Intel, and Sony have teamed up to develop an Android-powered internet platform using Atom processors for televisions and set-top boxes. Dubbed Google TV, the apparent mantra seems to be making web app navigation (Twitter, Picasa, etc.) as easy as changing the channel. Joining the fun will be the peripheral casanovas at Logitech for, you guessed it, peripherals. It certainly isn't novel territory, from as far back as WebTV to as recent as Yahoo! widgets, but the proof will be in the pudding, and for now, mum's the word on any more concrete details. As they say, stay tuned.

Google TV: Android-based web platform for the living room, with help from Intel, Sony, and Logitech originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There's not a lot to see here -- in fact, there's nothing at all to see at this point -- but The New York Times has it on good authority that Google, Intel, and Sony have teamed up to develop an Android-powered internet platform using Atom processors for televisions and set-top boxes. Dubbed Google TV, the apparent mantra seems to be making web app navigation (Twitter, Picasa, etc.) as easy as changing the channel. Joining the fun will be the peripheral casanovas at Logitech for, you guessed it, peripherals. It certainly isn't novel territory, from as far back as WebTV to as recent as Yahoo! widgets, but the proof will be in the pudding, and for now, mum's the word on any more concrete details. As they say, stay tuned.Google TV: Android-based web platform for the living room, with help from Intel, Sony, and Logitech originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.


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Polish delis and restaurants no longer cater merely for homesick expats – British diners have fallen for this hearty, eastern European cuisine

There's a tiny Polish restaurant by South Kensington tube station in London called Daquise. For 63 years, it has had an almost monastic resistance to change: yellow walls, chipped crockery, plastic flowers and charm. It has been a totem for London Poles since it opened in the 60s: Roman Polanski came daily for dumplings and stews when he was filming Repulsion nearby, and it was always a favourite of cold war spies – Christine Keeler met her Soviet attache there.

Daquise opened in 1947, an emigre's recreation of a country lost to Communism. The food was spartan but homely, the oiled tablecloths a cross between lino and Uhu, and fingerprints smeared the menus. But it was proof that restaurants can be more than the sum of their parts.

And now, a superstar catering family from Warsaw, the Gesslers, has just bought it. Their restaurant in the Polish capital, U Kucharzy, is updated back-to-basics: geese roasted then carved at table, pierogi dumplings handmade to order, proper zurek – the ethereal rich-sour soup made with fermented rye bread. The restaurant has done well – Michelin has awarded it one of Poland's few Bib Gourmands – and they're grafting a similar menu on to Daquise.

It's an ambition that testifies to how much Polish food has grown in popularity here. When Daquise opened, around 150,000 Poles lived in the UK. Today, that figure is close to one million. Until recently, these expats could only assuage their homesickness in shops such as the doddery Prima on London's North End Road, or Morawski at Willesden Junction – both have been around for half a century. Today, supermarkets stock a range of Polish products and luxury delis, Polish bakers and polskie sklepy (polish shops) abound. "It's far easier to buy Polish products today," says Basia Korzeniowska, a British-born woman whose mother arrived in England as a child in 1947. "In the past, we only really had Prima for herrings, cornichons and figs in syrup. Now the Turkish delis all have a good range of Polish food."

Brits are increasingly taking to the new food. Inga Wojciechowska, who co-owns the high-end deli Polsmak in north London, says, "Sausages such as kabanos and podwawelska have always been popular, but more of our British customers are now buying Polish buttermilk and smoked fish. They'll arrive with recipes for bigos [hunter's stew, Poland's national dish] printed from the internet, and make it properly."

For immigrants, home cuisine is always a shrine to collective identity. But the longer they stay, the more their adopted country absorbs their food. Jan Woroniecki, the London restaurateur who owns Baltic, Wódka and Chez Kristoff, understands this better than most. "In the 50s and 60s, central or eastern European restaurants were binge dens like Nikita's: English customers just went there to get drunk. When we opened Wódka in 1989, we had to keep the menu quite simple: things are incomparably better now. Fergus Henderson [the chef at St John] has had a huge effect: ox heart, tongue and even tripe all sell very well today."

But as well as simple osmosis, the British have taken to this food because its peasanty homeliness, its elemental, hearth-side enjoyment of pig and potatoes, seems to chime with our wet, windswept identity. Jay Rayner, the Observer's restaurant critic whose Jewish ancestors came from eastern Europe, told me, "We and the Eastern Bloc population are both northern Europeans. And while there's no god in my universe, proper salt beef sets my compass: when I first tried it, it was literally visceral. The ultimate expression of this food is still the farmhouse, which seems to work with the British palate."

The relaunched Daquise, quaintly formal, respectfully hospitable, its chefs in old-fashioned toques (chef's hats), complements the modern appreciation of Polish food. Current, but with an eye to tradition, upmarket but true to its roots, it is honest, stout and upright, which is not unlike how the British like to see themselves.

Top five Polish dishes in the UK

1. Pierogi Divine dumplings, distantly related to ravioli. In Poland, the most popular filling is minced pork, mushrooms and cabbage.

2. Bigos Poland's national dish, a rich and savoury soup with only two agreed ingredients: cabbage and meat. Making an authentic bigos can take over a week: its flavour develops with the addition of new ingredients such as venison, veal and sauerkraut.

3. Barszcz The Polish variant of Ukrainian borscht. It is traditionally served as a clear broth, sometimes with smoked bacon.

4. Herring Polish pickled herring, fresh dill and hot blinis is one of the most delicious quick bites.

5. Golonka Pickled, boiled ham hock, typically served with sauerkraut.

• Food & drink
• Restaurants
• London

Oliver Thringguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Introduction

Offstumped’s post attempts to chart a course for the future of what he calls the “broad political space opposed to Left Liberalism.” As laudable and difficult the endeavour is, the ideas he espouses in the piece leave many gaps in clarity, ignores crucial areas, and casually dismisses many vital points that need to be accounted for.

A few words about some specific items on the recently-concluded online debate before getting into a detailed response of the post. I don’t really have any view on that debate except for what Offstumped says here:

Untamed Internet Activism remains a sore point [.] There is no clear intellectual leadership visible on the horizon for taming this Activism and for taking it beyond the Internet

I’m not sure I agree with the usage of “untamed Internet activism.” He probably means well, but to “tame” generally means “to control, to rein in.” Used in the context of the Internet, this lends itself to the conclusion that we need to come up with ways to control what he calls “Internet activism.” If this taming is what is called for, it’s self-defeating, and it directly contradicts his general principle of upholding the right to free speech. This is not to argue for having the freedom to abuse/insult somebody without provocation but it does smack of censorship. However, in the absence of more information/complete context, I’m not aware what the said activism implies.

I’m all for having clear leadership but everything has its own place. The idea of creating a common platform is good but “taming” something by trying to bring in some sort of standardization doesn’t bode well. It could eventually degenerate into toeing some line—however good or bad the line maybe.

The Future can’t be Separated from the Past

The section titled Its about the future stupid says:

First time voters in 2019 will be a generation born in 2001 around or after 9/11 who are right now studying in 4th grade

The past maybe an inspiration and a guide, the West maybe a case study, but end of the day this exercise has to be about the future. Standing where we are today, if we are not thinking ahead on the challenges, opportunities and the sense of history with which todays 4th grader and the many who probably are not even in school will be making political choices 9 years from now, then we will be irrelevant even before 2002 makes it to History text books [...] We must draw a line to

• #2 make this about the challenges and opportunities of the future and not about righting history’s wrongs

I broadly agree about the challenges etc that the future presents. However, the “past as an inspiration” and “sense of history” present some problems. If you want to look to the past for inspiration, you need to know it thoroughly. Also, a sense of history means that we know our history really well. What percentage of this broad political space know it, and more importantly, can understand its impact on the future? Apart from a vocal fringe, nobody really is interested to avenge (or “right”) historical wrongs. A sense of history therefore, also means understanding the past accurately so we can discard the wrongs and vow to never repeat it. Yet, what’s the kind of history that these 4th graders are being taught?

Also, framing this in terms of votes/voters is shortsighted. The idea is to create an intellectual climate where everybody is unafraid to openly debate everything without attaching labels and trying to figure out “which side somebody is on.” And this has to shorn of concerns such as getting votes. The Nehruvian Congress party—and later, the Left—created precisely this sort of “intellectual” climate with eyes always on the ballot box. I’m unsure if this is the approach Offstumped recommends.

Essentially, this approach—mindshare, 2014 generation, etc—falls in the realm of strategy, not ideology (a term I’m both queasy and careful to use) for want of a better word. This note about generational/age/franchise aspect makes eminent sense if Offstumped was talking about an electoral strategy. Unfortunately, he seems to mix this up with other things I’ve noted above.

Denouncing Hindutva without understanding it

After this, interestingly, Offstumped characterizes “political” Hindutva thus.

#1 at its core was the product of deep insecurity and victimhood

This is quite easy to say offhand but I’d rather Offstumped had given irrefutable evidence in support. Can he deny that the Indian state actively discriminated (and continues to do so) against Hindus for the better part of post-Independence India? Can he deny the fact that Hindu institutions and value systems were systematically derided by the state? Can he deny the fact that the Indian state spawned an education system that showed Hindu history in unflattering light? The said insecurity and victimhood are real. The words are not “insecurity” and “victimhood” but threat and discrimination. But for this kind of state-sponsored discrimination against Hindus, what was the need for a movement like “political” Hindutva, where Hindus felt they needed a political voice?

#2 has been tainted by Adharma committed in its name.

I’d be more careful before using words like “Adharma” without understanding its complete meaning. Adharma is not merely the English equivalent of “injustice” or “crime.” If you look at the history of violence perpetrated by Hindus, it has always been in retaliation to an attack/provocation. Plus, Hindus have taken to the streets because the Indian state has proved beyond doubt that it is incapable of both preventing original offenders from hurting Hindu sentiments, temples, etc as well as proved ineffective in punishing the original offenders. Characterizing this as Adharma shows an ignorance of the meaning of Adharma. This is not to defend violence committed in the name of Hindutva/Hinduism but there is such a thing as spontaneous, natural retaliation. A group of citizens picketing and stoning an MLA’s house for his misdeeds after it has tried all peaceful and legal methods is not Adharma.

#4 was intellectually hollow in its failure to evolve an Intellectual Political Tradition geared for the challenges of this Century drawing on the rich tradition of Kautilya’s Arthashastra and others who followed him

In a post that approvingly talks about drawing from Kautilya’s rich tradition, it is surprising that there’s not a single mention of what that tradition is. Supporting Kautilya is a double-edged sword for I can show a host of material in the Arthashastra that’d qualify Kautilya for the selfsame label of the “political” Hindutva brand that Offstumped asks us to abandon.

In essence, the “political” Hindutva of the 1990s didn’t arise from a vacuum. Hindutva as I suppose he’s aware, has a long history. Ignoring this history and coining a new term “political Hindutva” is not a good approach. However, because he has called upon us to abandon it, the burden of proof lies on Offstumped to show us—by tracing this history—why it makes sense to abandon Hindutva. Instances of demolishing buildings, disrupting lovers on Valentine’s Day, burning posters, etc don’t count. I shall respond to him where I stand on this once I get his response.  

And then in a most interesting (and startling) paragraph, Offstumped lays down this prescription:

Just as Rajadharma as articulated over the Centuries was the Constitution for the State,  the Indian Constitution is the Rajadharma in this day and age. The only “Warrior Spirit” to protect Dharma is that which the has Constitutional sanction. The only Right to bear Arms is that which is sanctioned by the Constitution. Even the Kshatriya of yesteryears had no blanket immunity to use their arms but for the protection of Dharma which in today’s context is the Indian Constitution.

For the record, Rajadharma was not the Constitution for the State. The Indian kingdoms of the time Offstumped speaks about had no Constitution in the sense we understand it today. The definition of a Raja is Ranjanaat iti Rajah (He is the king who entertains/keeps his subjects happy). The closest equivalent to the word “Constitution” is Smriti. Till date, we have 40 Smritis, the earliest dating some thousands of years ago. We can vaguely liken the Indian Constitution to the 41st Smriti but only after it passes some tests as we shall see.

Rajadharma is an entire subject in its own right and very simply, it involved the king to always uphold Dharma and ensure that his subjects were always happy and that his coffers were always full. In the times of the Ramayana, it was to uphold this Rajadharma that Rama had to forsake Sita. The King had sanction to employ any and every means to achieve these twin objectives and relied on the smritis and his council of ministers to guide him. The smritis in turn dealt with every conceivable aspect of Dharma in minute detail including giving us such things as the kind of bodily ailments caused by excessive gambling. Space doesn’t permit me to elaborate further but equating Rajadharma with the Constitution of the State is wholly incorrect.

Equally, the Indian Constitution is not the Rajadharma of today. It is one thing to say that the Constitution is a noble document and one of the pillars of our democracy and other nice things. However, superimposing Rajadharma upon it is misleading to say the least. One of the first tests of whether the Indian Constitution is indeed the Rajadharma of today is to find out whether the Constitution itself upholds Dharma.

A marked feature of a Smriti (I’m using the term very loosely here) is its fluidity, its adaptability to changing times because Dharma varies from age to age. There have been pitched battles to amend whole portions of the Indian Constitution to accommodate the changing needs, and aspirations but such portions have remained in a time warp. However, amendments that injure both the Constitution and Dharma are passed nonchalantly. The other test is how a Smriti treats other/minority groups/religions. The Indian Constitution places minority institutions almost beyond the scrutiny of law. A fourth test is how it treats the cultural icons, symbols, and literature of the nation. The Indian Constitution makes it illegal to kill the peacock and the tiger and also punishes an insult to the national flag. Yet, it doesn’t accord the same status to our epics, which are now reduced to literary lab pieces for anybody to maul at will. The Ramayana and the Mahabharata are not merely Hindu epics—they are Indian epics. They define the Indian way of life and continue to influence people of all major religions in the country. Neither can you argue that a secular/democratic nation has nothing to do with religion because as we see, there’s nothing secular about Indian democracy. Additionally, the word “secular” itself was an ugly aberration that Indira Gandhi introduced and hasn’t been erased till date. This is the nature of Adharma. I can cite several other instances but the point remains that the Indian Constitution doesn’t entirely adhere to Dharma. If Offstumped argues that this is the Rajadharma, we all need to follow, I have nothing further to say.

Besides, there’s another aspect to this. A king who fails to perform his Rajadharma properly faces the prospect of his own subjects rebelling against him—in other words, of taking the law into their own hands. Pretty much what’s happening today. Successive Indian governments have failed to carry out their Rajadharma properly, and worse, in many cases, actively encouraged Adharma—votebanks, subverting the Constitution, the Emergency, etc. If they had discharged their Rajadharma properly, we wouldn’t have had the “violence unleashed by the political Hindutva” people.

Offstumped leaves me with no choice except to say that equating Dharma and Rajadharma with the Indian Constitution stems from a deep ignorance of the concept of Dharma. As a friendly note, anybody who wishes to talk about Dharma and make sense needs to invest serious time and effort to understand its basics. Merely being well-intentioned and supportive of Dharma isn’t enough.

...Continued in Part 2...

Technorati Tags: Offstumped Rejoinder,We Must Draw a Line,Dharma,India,Indian Politics,Secularism,Democracy,Indian Democracy,Constitution,Indian Constitution,Rajadharma,Bloggers,Blogging,Hindutva,Political Hindutva

Computers are getting smaller and smaller. One need only look at the proliferation of smartphones for proof of this. The trend toward miniaturization is only going to continue. Pretty soon, we’ll have computers inside our bodies, rather than carrying them around with us! Scientists have recently successfully inserted silicon chips into living cells. The initial applications for this research seem focused on intracellular sensing and data acquisition, but that’s only just the beginning.

After inserting the chips into the live cells, the researchers made sure that the cells remained alive and healthy. They found that over 90% of the chip-containing containing HeLa cell population remained viable 7 days after lipofection.

Via Medgadget.

The cells used in this research were HeLa cells. There’s a very interesting history to the HeLa cells, and I never would have known about any of it had I not chanced to hear an NPR piece about a new book: ‘Henrietta Lacks’: A Donor’s Immortal Legacy.

Crackdown pledged by Madrid and Paris after occupants of stolen car open fire at routine check

France and Spain vowed to intensify efforts to clamp down on Eta activities today after suspected members of the Basque separatist group killed a French policeman in a shoot-out in a town south-east of Paris.

Jean-Serge Nérin died of his injuries yesterday evening in Dammarie les Lys shortly after he was shot from a car that had been stolen by a group of at least six people, all but one of whom fled.

Spain's prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, left no doubt as to whom he believed responsible. "France has paid a high price for its help against Eta," he said.

The fatal shooting marks the first time in over four decades of violence that a French policeman has died at the hands of Eta. Members of the national police and gendarmerie have been injured but not killed amid increasing Franco-Spanish efforts to crack down on the group.

French anti-terrorist investigators were today questioning Joseba Fernández Aspurz, a suspected Eta member wanted by Spanish courts to answer charges related to a petrol bomb attack in Pamplona, over the killing.

Aspurz, one of a number of young radicals thought to have joined Eta in the past few months, was part of a group which French police said had stolen several cars from a nearby used car dealership yesterday afternoon.

When their activity on the outskirts of Dammarie les Lys prompted Nérin, a sergeant in his early 50s, to carry out a routine check of the vehicles and their occupants, members of the group began shooting. Although wearing a bullet-proof vest, the father of four, who had served the police for 30 years, was hit in the armpit and died shortly afterwards.

As the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, prepared to visit the victim's family tomorrow, experts said the killing could trigger an increase in already intense French pressure on the group.

In a phone call this morning, Sarkozy and Zapatero vowed to "intensify" their fight against Eta. François Fillon, the French prime minister, said that Nérin had been "coolly assassinated by a terrorist group".

"For us Eta is now no longer a Spanish, Basque or terrorist problem. Eta members have dispersed across France and have become an internal, criminal problem for France," a French police source told Spain's ABC daily.

French police have done much to weaken Eta in recent years. They captured the group's military chief, Ibon Gogeaskoetxea, and two other Eta members at a country cottage in Normandy on 28 February. They were about to embark on a campaign of bomb attacks in Spain, police said at the time.

Eta and its supporters are also furious with French authorities over the death of Eta member Jon Anza, whose body was identified at a morgue in Toulouse last week.

Anza's body had been in the morgue for 10 months. He had died in a Toulouse hospital after collapsing in a local park. The body remained unidentified despite months of pressure from his family and radical Basque organisations to find out what had happened to him.

Eta has claimed Anza, who was said to have been carrying €300,000 (£270,000) of the group's money when he disappeared, was a victim of Spanish police. French doctors who carried out an autopsy this week said there were no signs of violence. He had €500 on him when he was taken to hospital.

"This is a campaign of lies organised by Eta," Spain's interior minister, Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, said this week, adding that he would sue anyone who repeated the claim.

As Eta finds it increasingly difficult to operate in southern France, it has moved north to Paris and elsewhere. French authorities also recently hailed the discovery of an Eta safe house in Obidos, Portugal, as proof the group was finding it difficult to operate from France.

• Global terrorism
• France
• Spain

Giles TremlettLizzy Daviesguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

For many years, we've pointed to the fashion industry as a perfect example of how a creative industry can be incredibly innovative and fruitful, even without copyright protections. It's a great story, and studies have shown, in fact, that the lack of copyright protection for fashion designs has been key to the success of the industry. There are a few reasons for this: (1) Brand recognition still matters, so people still want the originator's work -- and thus the copies tend to spread the concept further, and actually increase desire for the "real" version. (2) Copying of designs helps better segment the market, and actually allows top designers to increase their prices. (3) Most importantly, the fact that copiers so quickly copy the works of top designers means that those designers can't rest on their laurels and have to quickly move on to next season's design. In other words, as we've seen in many other industries, as you remove monopoly protections, the incentives to innovate actually increase.

And there should be no question that things work fine in the fashion industry, as it is highly competitive, with many different players, and new designs hitting the market all the time. Considering that copyright's sole purpose is to create incentives to promote such innovation, it's hard to see how anyone would be justified in suggesting we need a new copyright over fashion.

And yet, as with other types of intellectual property, what happens is the incumbents all realize that with such monopoly rights, they would be able to block competitors, slow down their rate of innovation, and capture greater monopoly rents. So they push for them. And, tragically, politicians have been listening. Back in 2007, a bill was introduced to add copyrights to fashion. That bill went nowhere, but similar efforts were made in 2008 and 2009 (when designers tried to enlist Michelle Obama to help their cause).

This year, it looks like the plan is to hide behind an economically questionable law review article put out by a Harvard law professor, Jeannie Suk, and a Columbia law profesor, C. Scott Hemphill (who actually appears to have a degree in economics). A bunch of folks have sent over a Boston Globe article that focuses on how Suk is helping to craft this latest attempt at adding copyright to fashion design, using the law review article as economic proof that such a law is needed. This is troubling, as the economics in the paper are severely lacking.

Given the success of the industry today, combined with the studies showing how it benefits from a lack of copyright, I wanted to read the analysis to see why Suk felt so strongly about this, and I have to say that it makes highly questionable economic arguments with no basis in fact at all. Instead, almost every economic argument is a random assumption about things -- with provably false statements like "Obviously, people always want to purchase inexpensive copies of creative works or have them for free."

No, that's not obvious and it's not right. Studies have shown that people are more than willing to pay for scarce quality -- and recent studies proving that a huge number of buyers of counterfeit goods later buy the real goods suggest that people have no problem paying for the authentic versions when they can. The myth that "people just want stuff for free" has been debunked so many times, it destroys the credibility of this paper.

But, even worse, Suk seems to base her entire argument on one simple economically-illiterate pretense: that competition is bad, and without monopolies, people innovate less: The reduced profits can be expected to have a negative effect on the amount of innovation; this is a standard result of economic theory. No. No, it is not a standard result of economic theory. It is only the result in a market that is static, in which no additional innovation can occur. But in the real world, in a dynamic market, this is called competition and has been a part of every "standard" economic theory since Adam Smith, who he noted that if someone is making a profit, it will bring in competition. But this doesn't have a negative effect on the amount of innovation. Quite the opposite. Competition drives innovation by encouraging people to come up with something new. Monopolies decrease innovation by taking away competition and slowing down market innovation. That is what economic theory (and reality) says.

Basically, Suk's whole position is based on the fact that the monopoly rents of designers is decreased by a lack of copyright, but she fails to consider that this leads to greater and more frequent innovation (which we see all the time in the market). What's even stranger is that she flip-flops her argument in the middle of the paper. She talks repeatedly about how designers need big profits to have the incentive to innovate, but then says that big designers aren't the ones really threatened. Instead, she claims, it's the smaller designers. But, those designers didn't have those big profits to protect in the first place. They're out there trying to make a name for themselves by designing something new and cool -- so they have plenty of incentive to innovate. And if their design this year is copied, that's great for them because it gives them greater recognition and means the demand for their original products will be even greater the following season.

Now, we see bad economic reasoning all the time -- but it's troubling when it comes from a Harvard professor (law, not economics), whose mixed up work is being used as the basis of changing the law that could seriously harm an innovative creative industry that is currently thriving.

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An anonymous reader writes "Researchers from the University of Liege in Belgium have been able to perform real-time video analysis on regular Canon digicam (video link) without any hardware modification. The results are shown directly on the digicam's screen. They use a hacked version of a popular open-source alternative firmware for Canon cameras: CHDK. This is a proof-of-concept that computer vision algorithms can now be embedded on regular Canon digicams with little effort (CHDK is coded in C). What other popular vision algorithms could be implemented? For what purpose?" You can get some idea about ViBe from this abstract at IEEE; basically, it allows background extraction in moving images.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers from the University of Liege in Belgium have been able to perform real-time video analysis on regular Canon digicam (video link) without any hardware modification. The results are shown directly on the digicam's screen. They use a hacked version of a popular open-source alternative firmware for Canon cameras: CHDK. This is a proof-of-concept that computer vision algorithms can now be embedded on regular Canon digicams with little effort (CHDK is coded in C). What other popular vision algorithms could be implemented? For what purpose?" You can get some idea about ViBe from this abstract at IEEE; basically, it allows background extraction in moving images.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers from the University of Liege in Belgium have been able to perform real-time video analysis on regular Canon digicam (video link) without any hardware modification. The results are shown directly on the digicam's screen. They use a hacked version of a popular open-source alternative firmware for Canon cameras: CHDK. This is a proof-of-concept that computer vision algorithms can now be embedded on regular Canon digicams with little effort (CHDK is coded in C). What other popular vision algorithms could be implemented? For what purpose?" You can get some idea about ViBe from this abstract at IEEE; basically, it allows background extraction in moving images.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MrSmith0011000100110 writes "The lovely people over at AndroidCentral have broken the announcement that Android 2.1 is finally coming to the Motorola Droid, with actual proof on Verizon's droid support page (PDF). I don't know about my Droid brethren, but I'm pretty excited to see the new series of Android ROMs for the Droid phone that are based on a stock Android 2.1. As most of us know, the existing 2.1 ROMs can be buggy as hell and either running vanilla 2.1 or a custom ROM, this phone is still a tinkerer's best friend."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MrSmith0011000100110 writes "The lovely people over at AndroidCentral have broken the announcement that Android 2.1 is finally coming to the Motorola Droid, with actual proof on Verizon's droid support page (PDF). I don't know about my Droid brethren, but I'm pretty excited to see the new series of Android ROMs for the Droid phone that are based on a stock Android 2.1. As most of us know, the existing 2.1 ROMs can be buggy as hell and either running vanilla 2.1 or a custom ROM, this phone is still a tinkerer's best friend."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

MrSmith0011000100110 writes "The lovely people over at AndroidCentral have broken the announcement that Android 2.1 is finally coming to the Motorola Droid, with actual proof on Verizon's droid support page (PDF). I don't know about my Droid brethren, but I'm pretty excited to see the new series of Android ROMs for the Droid phone that are based on a stock Android 2.1. As most of us know, the existing 2.1 ROMs can be buggy as hell and either running vanilla 2.1 or a custom ROM, this phone is still a tinkerer's best friend."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

By Scott M. Fulton, III, Betanews

Usually the purpose of a virtual private network is to establish a secure, tunneled route between two points in an IP network. Is the idea that such a network could be secured using two encryption layers rather than one, and without the need for a user to log in first, worthy of a patent? These were questions central to the latest Tyler, Texas patent infringement case for Microsoft to lose: VPN technology provider VirnetX was awarded $105.75 million yesterday, in a case closely followed by the Seattle P.I.'s Nick Eaton.

It's clear from a reading of VirnetX's key patent on VPN technology, issued in 2002, that it is an attempt to go one step further with the VPN concept. The firm calls its system Tunneled Agile Routing Protocol (TARP). Here, the communications between VPN hosts are encrypted at one level, but then the routing information is hidden behind a second level. The intent is to hide not only what's being talked about or shared over a VPN, but who is sharing it, and what route it's taking to get there.

"Each TARP packet's true destination is concealed behind a layer of encryption generated using a link key," reads a portion of the summary from US Patent #6,502,135. "The link key is the encryption key used for encrypted communication between the hops intervening between an originating TARP terminal and a destination TARP terminal. Each TARP router can remove the outer layer of encryption to reveal the destination router for each TARP packet. To identify the link key needed to decrypt the outer layer of encryption of a TARP packet, a receiving TARP or routing terminal may identify the transmitting terminal by the sender/receiver IP numbers in the cleartext IP header. Once the outer layer of encryption is removed, the TARP router determines the final destination."

Microsoft implemented its own interpretation of VPN technology for Office Communicator, the endpoint for the company's bold Unified Communications project -- its effort to render the phone networks, and PBXes that support them, obsolete. To make the Internet work more like a phone, people using a telephone console need to be able to pick up the receiver and dial. They shouldn't have to go to some dialog box and log in. Avoiding that option is what UC tries to do, and is one of the acts for which VirnetX cried foul.

In hearings last July (which Eaton also covered closely), Microsoft defended itself by asserting that the whole point of a VPN is to establish both secure and anonymous communications between points, so the idea that VirnetX was somehow inventing the addition of anonymity was absurd. If you doubt that a VPN is supposed to be anonymous, counsel argued, just look it up in a glossary. Which the judge did, and that got into a wholly separate argument over the quality of glossaries, resulting in the judge in the case issuing his own glossary for the jury to interpret as fact.

An excerpt from Judge Leonard Davis' opinion last July shows the extent of the argument over how deeply a glossary may define a concept, especially if that concept may be proof of "prior art" that could invalidate a patent (PDF available here, from SeattlePI.com): "Microsoft cites the portion of the 'FreeS/WAN' glossary definition for 'virtual private networks' that states, 'IPSEC [Internet Protocol Security] is not the only technique available for building VPNs, but it is the only method defined by RFCs [Request for Comments, Internet documents??"some of which are informative while others are standards] and supported by many vendors. VPNs [virtual private networks] are by no means the only thing you can do with IPSEC, but they may be the most important application for many users.'...Microsoft points out that IPSEC is the only method defined by RFCs and supported by many vendors. Microsoft argues that this narrow language shows that the 'FreeS/WAN' glossary does not identify Secure Sockets Layer ('SSL') or Transport Layer Security ('TLS') as methods for building 'virtual private networks.' Microsoft then argues that VirnetX's proposed construction is overly broad because it allows for a network using SSL and TLS. However, Microsoft's cited excerpt is an ancillary portion of the 'virtual private network' definition and is set apart in a different paragraph from the primary portion of the definition...Also, Microsoft selectively asserts that IPSEC is the only method defined by RFCs and supported by many vendors and ignores that its cited excerpt states that, 'IPSEC is not the only technique available for building VPNs.' Thus, Microsoft's cited excerpt does not support that the 'FreeS/WAN' glossary restricts 'virtual private network' to IPSEC."

If Microsoft could have proved that VirnetX's contribution to VPN architecture was so obvious that it would still be covered by a published glossary definition of the term, then it might have persuaded the jury that no patent should have been issued in the first place. But that assertive defense became problematic (at best) last summer when it was revealed that Microsoft itself attempted to patent the same technology, in an application that was denied by the US Patent Office. The basis of the denial was prior art -- specifically, the pre-existence of patents issued to VirnetX.

As the jury no doubt heard from plaintiff's counsel, if Microsoft didn't know about the existence of VirnetX's patents before, it did when it received its rejection notice. No haggling over glossary definitions could save the case at that point. In a statement, Microsoft continued to assert the invalidity of VirnetX's patents, and will begin the long and arduous process of appealing to overturn the verdict.

Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2010

Just in case you’ve blown out a shoulder or three lugging around your insanely large laptop with the 10-key, Thule has come up with a solution: the Crossover Backpack.  Amongst the goodies that this bit of nerd-ware boasts, its padded, integrated notebook compartment is able to hold up to a 17-inch MacBook Pro and it has a heat-molded, crush-proof SafeZone compartment that protects your smartphone, sunglasses, and other fragile gear; now all that you have to do is carry it on your pigeon-shoulders without crushing your 92-pound Weezer-fueled skeleton beneath it.  Off to the comic-con with you, Thomas Dolby.

Tags: backpacks, bags, carrying case, crossover, crossover backpack, laptop bags, safezone, thule, thule crossover,

Thule Crossover Backpack: Protect Your Nerdy-ness originally appeared on Gear Live on Wed, March 17, 2010 - 12:41:08

The release of an Associated Press poll last week that showed President Obama enjoying a healthy job approval rating of 53 percent didn't generate much news beyond the wire service and produced even less commentary among the media's chattering class. Then again, neither did another piece of polling news from January, which showed Obama basking in the glow of a 56 percent job approval rating.

The cold shoulder was expected, though. Why? It's simple: the results didn't fit the script.

Adopting the polar opposite narrative from the Bush era when pundits and reporters seemed obsessed with trying to boost the president's standing, Beltway scribes today have made it plain that when it comes to Obama and polling, good news is no news.

Feeding off right-wing talking points, political journalists love to push the idea that Obama's polling numbers are in the tank and that he's fading fast. It's all part of the preferred, CW narrative that his entire presidency is slipping away. (It must now be "save[d]," according to Newsweek.)

Does the White House wish Obama's job approval rating was higher? I'm sure advisers do. Is there anything unusual in Obama's approval number, other than the fact that it nearly doubles the rating his predecessor left office with? No, not really.

Indeed, the news media's ongoing hand-wringing about Obama's polling numbers and how he's only around 50 percent (it's "tepid" and cause for "worry") is rather odd considering former President Bush served nearly his entire second term with an approval rating below 50 percent and left the presidency with an almost incomprehensibly low 22 percent approval rating.

Also note that for the majority of Bush's first year in office (i.e. up until September 11, 2001), his approval rating remained pretty much exactly where Obama's has been since late last summer: hovering around 50 percent. But do you recall a media obsession about Bush's super-soft poll numbers back during the spring and summer of 2001?

Neither do I.

More queries: Has there been any dramatic shift in President Obama's approval number since late last summer? No. (See below.) Has the press in recent months, busy echoing right-wing falsehoods, often pretended that there has been a sizable shift? Without question. (Rush Limbaugh, last month: "If Mr. Obama hasn't noticed, his approval numbers are in a free fall.")

Just take a look. From The New York Times, December 19, 2009:

After weeks of frustrating delays and falling poll numbers, Mr. Obama decided to take what he could get, declare victory and claim momentum on some of the administration's biggest priorities, even if the details did not always match the lofty vision that underlined them.

Washington Post, January 19:

On Wednesday one year will have passed since President Obama's inauguration. Much of the tidal wave of assessments has been negative: Falling poll numbers. Unfulfilled promises.

Miami Herald, January 29:

Amid declining poll numbers and political fortunes, President Barack Obama on Thursday tried to reconnect with the fickle state that helped put him in the White House and urged voters to keep the faith despite Florida's withering recession.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer, February 23:

The president's falling poll numbers, ongoing backlash from Republicans, even some grumblings from Democrats. Might someone inside the White House bear most of the blame?

Los Angeles Times, March 7:

For months, Obama had been on the defensive, facing electoral setbacks, declining poll numbers, dissident Democrats and stories that highlighted the deal-making often needed to grind out legislation.

Everybody agrees that Obama's poll numbers are falling, so it must be true, right?

Wrong.

If you look at Gallup's weekly ratings for Obama, in late August 2009, he had a 50 percent approval rating. And for the most recently completed weekly tabulation from Gallup, Obama's rating stands at 48 percent. That's right, over a nearly seven-month period, the president's approval rating, as measured by Gallup, dropped exactly 2 percentage points, which obviously falls within Gallup's margin of error. That means you could accurately say that Obama's job approval rating has remained unchanged over the last six-plus months.

And it's not just Gallup that has chronicled Obama's rock-steady polling numbers. Take a look at the cumulative ratings posted daily at Real Clear Politics, which averages eight different polls (including Rasmussen's outlier tabulations) to come up with Obama's composite job approval rating.

Here are some of the data points from RCP:

• August 20, 2009: 51 percent
• September 23, 2009: 52 percent
• October 4, 2009: 52 percent
• November 4, 2009: 51 percent
• December 7, 2009: 49 percent
• January 11, 2010: 48 percent
• February 18: 48 percent
• March 3: 49 percent

And for the most recent, month-long snapshot, between February 17 and March 14, RCP pegged Obama's approval rating at 49 percent. So, much like Gallup, RCP has found that, since last August, Obama's job approval rating has basically shifted downward just a few points, or again, within the typical survey margin of error.

Given those figures, I'll ask again: Why is the press so eager to push this storyline about Obama's "falling poll numbers"? Where is the proof to back it up? And since when does a 1-3 point movement in any direction qualify as news? It's absurd.

By the way, if for some reason Obama's approval rating does significantly sag this month, or next, that won't somehow vindicate the previously erroneous coverage. Because the press has been claiming for the last several months that Obama's poll numbers have already fallen noticeable (which they have not), not that they're going to.

The media fixation on a barely there approval decline is especially bizarre when you consider how blasé the same press corps was during the Bush administration when the president often suffered gargantuan job approval declines. For instance, between December 2003 and May 2004, Bush's job approval plunged 17 points, according to Gallup. But it's hard to find much proof that the Beltway press corps was obsessed with Bush's "falling poll numbers" at the time.

But back to Obama. From September 1, 2009, to March 1, 2010, there was literally no change in Obama's approval rating. So why is the press so anxious to push the "falling poll numbers" meme? And is that why, when the White House did receive rays of good polling news during those months, the press seemed so anxious to look away?

Was it because when it comes to covering this Democratic White House, good news is no news?

At times it sure seems that way.

Back in January when The Washington Post reported on its latest political survey, the newspaper forgot to mention that Obama's job approval had gone up that month. Not a single reference to that fact was made in the article, which did set aside plenty of space to pile on the doom-and-gloom rhetoric:

A year into his presidency, President Obama faces a polarized nation and souring public assessments of his efforts to change Washington, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Nearly half of all Americans say Obama is not delivering on his major campaign promises, and a narrow majority have just some or no confidence that he will make the right decisions for the country's future.

By the way, this was the Post's headline:

Poll shows growing disappointment, polarization over Obama's performance

According to the Post, there was "growing disappointment" over Obama. Yet the Post itself forgot to report that his approval rating had gone up that month.

The same was true over at CNN.com in December 2009. Writing up the results of its latest poll, CNN not only didn't think the news hook was that Obama's approval rating had gone up 6 points in just two weeks, but the CNN article didn't even reference that finding until two-thirds of the way into the piece.

And then there was the AP in November 2009. Same drill. Its polling at the time showed Obama enjoying a robust 54 percent approval rating. So where was that information buried? In the article's ninth paragraph, after the AP painted an almost comically bleak picture of the political landscape Obama faced at the time.

And again, it's not just that the press has often misstated the facts about Obama's polling numbers. It's that this is the same Beltway press corps that often treated Obama's Republican predecessor in the exact opposite way, often itching to suggest that Bush's horrendous polling numbers were on the mend and spending years denying Bush's glaring job approval ratings collapse.

For instance, in January 2006, Time magazine's Mike Allen announced that Bush had "found his voice" and that relieved White House aides "were smiling again" after a rocky 2005. Of course, within months, Bush's approval rating fell to new all-time lows.

In April of that year, Katie Couric, then with NBC News, was asking Tim Russert if the White House could "breath[e] a sigh of relief" because Bush's latest approval rating had only fallen to 36 percent. In the end, Bush's phantom rebound never materialized and he left office as the least popular president in modern American history.

And yet for most of his eight years in office, the press seemed to have a gut feeling that Americans just liked Bush. And today, their instinct tells them that Americans don't really approve of Obama.

Here's an idea: Maybe journalists should simply report what Americans tell pollsters and stop trying to concoct a storyline.

In case you were wondering, Alessandra Ambrosio is still sexy, and the proof is right here in the new issue of Elle France magazine. Of course, if you don't think that seeing Alessandra Ambrosio topless, or showing some nipple...