Whuffie Stream

(via kateoplis) Huxley vs. Orwell

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 20:51:58 -0600

"The centennial edition of the book ranked number 4 on the seller’s [Amazon] “movers and shakers..."

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 14:59:39 -0600

“The centennial edition of the book ranked number 4 on the seller’s [Amazon] “movers and shakers list,” as of Tuesday afternoon. Book sales increased by more than 6,000 within the last 24 hours, jumping to the 123rd spot on book sales overall, from it’s spot at 7,636 the previous day.”

- Sales of Orwell’s ‘1984’ up over 6,000 percent after NSA news - TODAY.com (via brooklynmutt)

(via trackingpoint) Snipers out of work thanks to technology?

Wed, 05 Jun 2013 10:30:31 -0600

(via trackingpoint)

Snipers out of work thanks to technology?

(via quicklime) If Companies Had Realistic Slogans The era of...

Wed, 05 Jun 2013 10:18:31 -0600

(via quicklime)

If Companies Had Realistic Slogans

The era of corporate indifference, and economic sadomasochism.

Justices say police can take DNA upon arrest

Tue, 04 Jun 2013 18:52:43 -0600

Justices say police can take DNA upon arrest:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a major victory for law enforcement agencies, a divided Supreme Court on Monday ruled that police can take a DNA sample from someone who has been arrested and charged but not convicted of a serious crime.

*facepalm*

kqedscience: Scientists Create World’s Tiniest Bunny Using New...

Tue, 04 Jun 2013 18:44:43 -0600

kqedscience:

Scientists Create World’s Tiniest Bunny Using New 3D Shaping Material

“Scientists in Japan recently used a promising new 3D printing material to create objects so small that they are the size as a single bacteria. The researchers were able print shapes that are measured in mere micrometers, including the world’s tiniest rabbit. While the demonstration may be playful, the application certainly isn’t – this new technology may someday be used to print cells and micro-electrodes for medical purposes.”

joshbyard: Military Drones to Police Civilians at Brazil World...

Wed, 15 May 2013 18:04:56 -0600

joshbyard:

Military Drones to Police Civilians at Brazil World Cup. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

iRobot announced today $7.2 million in contracts to provide Brazil with military PackBot robots for security at the 2014 World Cup.

…As part of the deal, Brazil will get 30 PackBot 510 units, which usually cost about $100,000 to $200,000 apiece. The contracts include services, spares, and associated equipment.

The camera-equipped, remote-operated robots can give users a close-up look at suspicious objects, or explore dangerous environments, while keeping operators safe from harm.

The PackBots will be working alongside thousands of soldiers deployed to each of the 12 host cities in Brazil. To spot troublemakers, Brazilian police will be equipped with facial-recognition camera glasses that reportedly can capture 400 facial images per second, storing them in a central database of up to 13 million faces.

The country reportedly purchased four Israeli-made drones to help with security for the FIFA Confederations Cup next month. It is spending $900 million to boost its security forces ahead of the World Cup, including surveillance equipment and helicopters, in a bid to make it “one of the most protected sports events in history.”

(via iRobot military bots to patrol 2014 World Cup in Brazil | Crave - CNET)

Police can now innocently standbye while you are abused by a robot.

laughingsquid: Melon, A Brain Wave-Sensing Headband That Tracks...

Wed, 15 May 2013 17:37:35 -0600

laughingsquid:

Melon, A Brain Wave-Sensing Headband That Tracks the Wearer’s Focus Levels

Photo

Thu, 02 May 2013 14:38:33 -0600

Cities Of The Future, Built By Drones, Bacteria, And 3-D Printers

Thu, 02 May 2013 12:07:48 -0600

Cities Of The Future, Built By Drones, Bacteria, And 3-D Printers:

As complex ecosystems, cities are confronting tremendous pressures to seek optimum efficiency with minimal impact in a resource-constrained world. While architecture, urban planning, and sustainability attempt to address the massive resource requirements and outflow of cities, there are signs that a deeper current of biology is working its way into the urban framework.

Innovations emerging across the disciplines of additive manufacturing, synthetic biology, swarm robotics, and architecture suggest a future scenario when buildings may be designed using libraries of biological templates and constructed with biosynthetic materials able to sense and adapt to their conditions. Construction itself may be handled by bacterial printers and swarms of mechanical assemblers.

Palm Beach County sheriff gets $1 million Spy On Your Neighbor Program

Thu, 02 May 2013 11:57:00 -0600

Palm Beach County sheriff gets $1 million Spy On Your Neighbor Program:

Florida House and Senate budget leaders have awarded Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw $1 million for a new violence prevention unit aimed at preventing tragedies like those in Newtown, Conn.

He said he met with Bradshaw about the program and “got assurances from the sheriff that this is going to be done in a way that respects people’s autonomy and privacy, and that he makes sure to protect against people making false claims.”

Yet if anonymous tips are received there is no way to prevent false claims.

"Five things everyone should know about U.S. incarceration"

Thu, 02 May 2013 11:55:41 -0600

"Five things everyone should know about U.S. incarceration":

1. The US incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation in the world: Approximately 1 in 100 adults or more than 2.2 million people are behind bars in the US, according to the Pew Center on the States. In addition, another 4.6 million (or a total of almost 7 million) people live under some form of correctional supervision.

Although the US is widely recognised as a “land of liberty”, it could also be described as a nation of prisons. It incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation. Its imprisonment rate (per capita) is almost 50 percent higher than Russia’s and 320 percent higher than China’s.

Within the western hemisphere, the US incarcerates five times as many people per capita as Canada and almost 2.5 times as many as Mexico.

2. Mass incarceration is not a result of higher crime rates: The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world not because it has higher crime rates, but because it imprisons more types of criminal offenders, including non-violent and drug offenders, and keeps them in prison longer.

With the exception of homicide, US crime rates are comparable to other European countries with much lower incarceration rates.

High incarceration rates are the result of “truth in sentencing”, “mandatory minimum” and “three strikes” laws which have limited judicial discretion in sentencing and parole release. As a result, sentences are now mainly determined by what the prosecutor decides to charge. And prosecutors routinely over-charge defendants in order to encourage plea agreements.

An egregious, but not unusual, recent example illustrates this point. In 2012, a Florida woman, who fired a “warning shot” in the direction of her physically abusive ex-husband (who was not hit by the bullet), was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

The judge, as a result of mandatory sentencing legislation, was given no discretion in her sentencing. He sentenced her to 20 years in prison.

3. Mass incarceration disproportionately impacts US racial minorities: Mass incarceration has had a devastating effect on blacks and Hispanics in the US. African Americans are six times more likely to be incarcerated than a white person and non-white Latinos are almost three times more likely to be incarcerated, according to the Pew Center on the States.

Incarceration hits hardest at young black and Latino men without high school education. An astounding 11 percent of black men, aged between 20 and 34, are behind bars.

Much of the racial disparity is a result of the US’ war on drugs - started by President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. By 1988, blacks were arrested on drug charges at five times the rate of whites.

By 1996, the rate of drug admissions to state prison for black men was 13 times greater than the rate for white men. This is despite the fact that African Americans use drugs at roughly the same rate as white Americans.

4. Mass incarceration is expensive: Imprisoning people is not cheap. The average cost of housing an inmate is approximately $20,000 to $30,000 per year. This price tag comes at the direct expense of public money that could be spent on public education, medical care and public assistance. And it is one reason why so many states face fiscal crises today.

To put this in perspective, the state of California spends 2.5 times more money housing and feeding its inmates than it does educating students. California is not alone: five states “spend more on corrections than higher education”, a 2008 Pew Center study revealed.

5. Mass incarceration disguises the US’ real unemployment rate and exacerbates inequality: The current unemployment rate in the US is high. And if we factored in all the people who are not looking for work because they are behind bars, it would be higher - especially among young black Americans and people without a high school diploma.

A recent research by Becky Petit reveals:

“Employment-population rates adjusted to include inmates suggest that only 26 percent of young black, male dropouts were employed in 2008, while over 37 percent were in prison or jail. Over half of the joblessness of young, black, and male dropouts is linked to incarceration.”

Incarceration also negatively impacts former prisoner’s ability to earn a decent living. Several studies suggest that there are at least six million “ex-prisoners” living within society and when they look for a job, they are 50 percent less likely to be hired than job seekers without a criminal record.

Former prisoners are paid less than those who have not been to prison. In addition, incarceration of a parent reduces a child’s prospects for economic mobility.

Earlier I posted a video by way of The National Review...

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 17:39:00 -0600

Earlier I posted a video by way of The National Review about Christopher Grisham, who was wrongfully arrested after police found him carrying a rifle while hiking with his son. The real story is that he posted a fundraiser to cover his 11K legal fees, and currently has 35K with 30 days left to go. (His plan is to share the excess to cover legal fees with another soldier who had his weapons wrongfully confiscated.)

jonprins: The sudden drop in the value of Bitcoins, the hot new Internet currency, has added...

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 16:53:10 -0600

jonprins:

The sudden drop in the value of Bitcoins, the hot new Internet currency, has added urgency to the question of whether Bitcoin is the way of the future, or just another bubble. Not to keep readers in suspense, the answer is a bubble, but a particularly interesting example of one. In particular, Bitcoin represents what ought to be the final refutation of the efficient-markets hypothesis, which still guides most regulation of financial markets.

The Bitcoin Bubble and a Bad Hypothesis,

Police thugs illegally disarm and arrest active duty war veteran...

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 13:30:00 -0600

Police thugs illegally disarm and arrest active duty war veteran infront of his son who is doing his EagleScout 10 mile hike to earn his merit badge.

(To date Temple Police Daprtment has not apologized, continue to hold illegally seized firearms, and by stalling they are putting his military career in jeopardy.)

story | support legal defense fund

eight bitcoin inventions that will change the world

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 20:31:09 -0600

eight bitcoin inventions that will change the world:

After a comically misinformed start, reporters in the established media have actually improved their Bitcoin coverage considerably, at least from a factual perspective. I am noticing much less misu…

emergentfutures: In the face of the sharing economy, new...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 03:56:44 -0600

emergentfutures:

In the face of the sharing economy, new insurance models slowly emerge

Also intriguing, though more mysterious because it is still stealthy, is a UK-based auto insurance company called jFloat. Not only does jFloat aim to insure collaborative consumption, it describes itself as a “collaborative consumption self-insurance platform.”

Essentially, jFloat users come together and pay the majority of their premiums into collective pools of 100 people called “floats,” which consist of extended family members and like-minded people who fill out a survey on the company’s website. The cohort can approve or deny people membership. When a member needs to pay a claim that’s below a certain amount (which founder Kim Miller would not share), the money comes out of that pool. About 80 percent of a member’s premium goes to the pool, and 20 percent goes to a reinsurer – insurance purchased by an insurance company – to handle claims that go over the maximum amount. Miller would not share reinsurance partners.

Full Story: PandoDaily

"The trade-off here is that as virtual value is created, real-world value is used up. About 982..."

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 16:06:01 -0600

“The trade-off here is that as virtual value is created, real-world value is used up. About 982 megawatt hours a day, to be exact. That’s enough to power roughly 31,000 U.S. homes, or about half a Large Hadron Collider.”

- Virtual Bitcoin Mining Is a Real-World Environmental Disaster - Bloomberg (via iamdanw)

"How did you pay for your coffee this morning, by cash? By credit card? If a growing number of..."

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 09:22:22 -0600

“How did you pay for your coffee this morning, by cash? By credit card? If a growing number of bank-fearing techies have their way, you’ll soon be able to pay for that mocha latte through an untraceable virtual currency called Bitcoin. You can’t touch it, it’s prized in the underworld, its creator disappeared in a cloud of mystery, and if you want to keep it safe, you should keep it hidden in a bunch of different places.”

- Bitcoin Explainer, Mother Jones (via motherjones)

No More Typed Passwords, Berkeley Researchers Develop “Passthoughts”

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 02:47:55 -0600

No More Typed Passwords, Berkeley Researchers Develop “Passthoughts”:

infoneer-pulse:

“Instead of typing your password, in the future you may only have to think your password,” explains a UC Berkeley School of Information press release about new research that utilizes brainwaves to authenticate users instead of passwords of numbers and letters. With a $100 consumer-friendly brainwave-reading headset, the Neurosky MindSet, Professor John Chuang found that the mere task of concentrating on one’s breath was enough to uniquely identify them.

» via TechCrunch