Category: Technology

Technology as it applies to me.

YouTube copyright protection system unveiled

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YouTube copyright protection system unveiled:
Yesterday YouTube unveiled YouTube Video Identification, a system designed to prevent copyrighted videos from making their way onto the site without the consent of the owner. Rather cunningly, YouTube requires that content owners send in a master copy of all their copyrighted content — y’know, so they can cross reference it against uploads (nothing to do with Google’s aim of indexing everything, ever … no.) Any data that matches the reference data can be deleted automatically, but only if the content owner says so. According to YouTube chief counsel Zahavah Levine, there will be a way for content owners to set it up so YouTube can scan content on other servers — removing the requirement for a master copy to be uploaded to YouTube — although Levine said that method “would be more difficult.” For who, Google, or the TV and movie studios?

Lights Out San Francisco, Turning Off Lights For One Hour

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Lights Out San Francisco, Turning Off Lights For One Hour:
Lights Out San Francisco is inviting the residents of San Francisco to turn off their lights for one hour (8pm to 9pm) on Saturday, October 20th. The goal is to try and save 15% of the energy that is normally used on an average Saturday night and to encourage energy conservation.

The city of San Francisco has also pledged to turn off non-essential lighting for an hour on The Golden Gate Bridge, The Bay Bridge, City Hall, Alcatraz and other parts of the city and several restaurants will host candlelight dinners that night.

Lights Out San Francisco is a citywide energy conservation event on October 20, 2007. On this night, we invite the entire city of San Francisco to turn off all non-essential lighting for one hour from 8-9pm. To promote long-lasting energy saving, we plan to distribute free compact fluorescent light bulbs throughout the city. Also, watch for community events in your neighborhood. Join us and turn out your lights!

Here’s how you can get involved and for more info, check out their FAQ and blog.

The organizers of Lights Out San Francisco, are planning on making this annual event that takes place throughout the country. The first Lights Out America will take place on Saturday, March 29, 2008

Replug breakaway cable protects your 3.5mm jack

10-2-07-Replug
Replug breakaway cable protects your 3.5mm jack:
Replug’s clever breakaway concoction essentially does for 3.5-millimeter audio jacks what MagSafe does for Apple’s power connection, as it simply snaps away when excess pressure is applied to “protect your audio jack from the rigors of daily use.” The device works in any 3.5-millimeter auxiliary input, be it on your laptop, PMP or desktop, and should be available sometime this fall for a currently undisclosed price.

NOVA | The Elegant Universe

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NOVA | The Elegant Universe | Watch the Program | PBS:
The Elegant Universe homepage

To view any part of this three-hour miniseries, choose an episode from one of the three columns below and select either QuickTime (full-screen option available) or RealVideo to begin. If you experience difficulty viewing, it may be due to high demand. We regret this, and suggest you try back at another time. Note that NOVA programs are not available for downloading due to rights restrictions.

Instead of sending HUMANS to Mars 11 times, the USA sent them on a Mission to Iraq

Visual Equation
Burton MacKenzie: Instead of sending HUMANS to Mars 11 times, the USA sent them on a Mission to Iraq www.burtonmackenzie.com:
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2007

Instead of sending HUMANS to Mars 11 times, the USA sent them on a Mission to Iraq
Way back in the day (2004), President Bush promised to send people to Mars. NewScientist reported that the cost of the mission was “expected to cost $40 billion to $80 billion”. That really seemed like a lot of money.

A year earlier, in 2003, Bush sent his country’s soldiers into Iraq. It is believed that as of September 27, 2007, the war in Iraq has cost the USA a whopping 454 Billion dollars! (and here’s even a more pessimistic estimate reported at The Boston Globe in 2006)

If the original Mars estimate was accurate, that means that instead of going to Iraq, the USA could have funded somewhere between 5 and 11 independent human missions to Mars! By “independent”, I mean Mars mission programs that start from the ground up, and do not leverage each other’s technology, research, or manufacturing. In reality,