January 2011
20 posts
“Predicting people’s behavior is becoming big business—and increasingly feasible in an era defined by accessible information. Data crunching by Canadian Tire, for instance, recently enabled the retailer’s credit card business to create psychological profiles of its cardholders that were built upon alarmingly precise correlations. Their findings: Cardholders who purchased carbon-monoxide detectors, premium birdseed, and felt pads for the bottoms of their chair legs rarely missed a payment. On the other hand, those who bought cheap motor oil and visited a Montreal pool bar called “Sharx” were a higher risk. “If you show us what you buy, we can tell you who you are, maybe even better than you know yourself,” a former Canadian Tire exec said.”
—How Visa Predicts Divorce - The Daily Beast (via slantback)
Your Facebook Activity is Now an Ad (via ReadWriteWeb) →
readwriteweb.com
Facebook is launching a new ad format called “Sponsored Stories,” which allows participating advertisers to promote your Facebook activity by turning it into homepage ads seen only by your friends. This activity can include “liking” a Facebook page, checking in via Facebook Places or sharing content to the News Feed from a Facebook application.
…
With Facebook’s Sponsored Stories, your activity is now up-for-grabs, available to the advertiser associated with the brand, business or app you interacted with.
Just checked in to a restaurant? That’s an ad. Just liked a brand? That’s an ad. Just shared a news story from the Web? That’s an ad.
“Augmented Reality is going to be huge, it might even be as big as the web”
—
Maarten Lenz-FitzGerald Cofound of Layar
More than true. Consider Google Earth; the largest most used, and most successful augmented reality application in the history of mankind.
Visual Aug & spimes will get real with the advent of Cloud Computing and devices like iPad & iPhone.
By the way I hate the term “AR” (augmented reality) we have too many acronyms. “Aug” is much better.
~ Esau Kessler
The Era of the PC is Over →
ciozone.com
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu has just released its tenth annual Predictions for the next 12-to-18 months
NYU Graduate Students Create Concious Fashion
(via citadelnow)
Nien Lam and Sue Ngo have developed “wearable technologies” in the interactive telecommunications program at Tisch School of the Arts, such as shirts displaying a read heart or lungs with veins that turn blue when exposed to air pollution. Read the whole story at The Daily News.
“
The modules, which have never been launched, were built as part of Almaz, a Soviet military programme that sent astronauts into orbit to take reconnaissance photographs of Earth. But Excalibur has also bought four reusable Almaz spacecraft, including one that was flown twice, which might be used much sooner.
Indeed, the firm’s immediate goal is finding ways to get passengers into orbit. Before this is possible the spaceships will need to be refurbished and modernised. However, Excalibur will attempt to preserve many of their “workhorse” components, including the heat shield, parachute system, solid rocket motors, and an escape system that can jettison a crew to safety if a rocket malfunctions.
” —Fledgling space firm will use old Soviet gear - space - 12 January 2011 - New Scientist (via m1k3y)
Could the Wikileaks Scandal Lead to New Virtual Currency? →
pcworld.com
vruz:
By Keir Thomas, PCWorld
It’s not an exaggeration to say that the recent Wikileaks scandal has
shaken the Internet to its core. Regardless of where you stand on the
debate, various services have simply refused to handle Wikileaks’
business—everything from domain-name providers to payment
services—and this has led to many questioning how robust the Internet
actually is.
Hackers have already stated their aim to create their own DNS system,
which will bypass officialdom. This uses peer-to-peer technology to
get around the problem, a favorite of hackers because it’s impossible
to regulate.
But how about an entire currency based on peer-to-peer technology?
That’s what’s on offer from Bitcoin, a decentralized virtual currency
that could either be the best idea since they figured out how to slice
bread, or just another hacker’s daydream. As the Wikileaks debacle
continues, it’s being increasingly discussed in various sections of
the Web as a possible solution to the PayPal online payments monopoly.
WIRED: Transhumanism DIY →
wired.com
Interesting article about a DIY wetware modder. A girl who does her own RFID and magnet implants.
Reminds me of a talk on body modding I watched once where the lady discussed mods she had previously done (like an RFID tag to identify her to her computer, magnet in the finger, etc) and the practical applications of them. One idea she had was placing a glucometer with an RFID tag in her skin to constantly measure and report her blood sugar level.
It’s also interesting to see that she’s reintroducing magnetoception in humans. We still have the ability to sense fields, but it’s fairly weak.
