NexGen thoughts



Monday, April 23, 2007

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Sky Spies Watch Us from Space


Geospatial intelligence is the science of combining imagery, such as satellite pictures, to physically depict features or activities happening anywhere on the planet. A part of the Defense Department, the NGA usually operates unnoticed to provide information on nuclear sites, terror camps, troop movements or natural disasters.

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Wal-Mart is Going Organic


The nation's largest grocery retailer has decided to go organic. The New York Times reported today that starting this summer, Wal-Mart will be stocking its supermarket shelves with a lot more organic food.

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IBM Backs $100M Supercomputer Center

"To do simulations on how molecules react, which is the essence of nanotechnology, researchers need the computing power that BlueGene delivers," said Herb Schultz, marketing manager for BlueGene at IBM. "There are so many applications for this that will be emerging in the next decade."

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Why We Trust Google... Should We?

"The level of advance trust we put in Google is incredibly high. I�m not sure another company could just come and say: I read your emails; I�m watching your surfing behavior; I�m checking where you click and what you search for... and I�ll save all that data till 2038. And just what I�ll do with all that data is none of your business."

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You can make another person dream

Studies show that you can bring about a dream in another person. One way is by holding an open bottle of perfume under the sleeper's nose. Another is by whistling. A third way is by blowing air across the sleeper's face with a fan. Someone else can also affect the content of a sleeper�s dream. For example...

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BBC: Nintendo Steals the Show at E3


If success was judged by the size of the queues at this week's E3 games expo, then Nintendo would win hands down.

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THE BIG ONE: L.A. Quake Could Be Strong, Long (New Analysis)


A powerful earthquake on the southern San Andreas fault, which hasn't ruptured in over three centuries, is capable of producing prolonged periods of strong shaking in the greater Los Angeles region, a new study finds.

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Google Videos helps Military for Mother's Day

Highlight: Mother's Day Greetings from Our Soldiers
Soldiers from afar send heartfelt wishes to their moms, wives, and other special women in their lives.

http://googlevideo.blogspot.com/

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Controller showdown: PlayStation 3 vs Wii


"You knew the comparisons were going to be inevitable. Now that we've gotten our mitts on both next-gen consoles' motion-sensing input devices, Nintendo's Wii controller and Sony's PlayStation 3 controller have to go head to head..."

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Sunday, May 07, 2006

Saturn Moon Has Seas of Sand, Images Reveal


When scientists first started observing Titan, they saw what they thought were oceans. The latest images from NASA's Cassini probe reveal that these dark areas are seas of sand, complete with vast complexes of startlingly Earthlike dunes.

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Postal Service offers New 'lifetime stamps'

The post office is planning a "forever" stamp for letters, good no matter how many times postal rates increase. That means folks could say goodbye to those annoying 2-cent or 3-cent stamps that have to be added to letters every time rates go up. Sheets, rolls, books or loose stamps in the drawer would still be good. Forever.

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Robotic Action Painter (Picture)

"RAP" creates its own paintings based on an artificial intelligence algorithm, decides when the work is ready and signs in the right bottom corner with its distinctive signature. The algorithm combines initial randomness, positive feedback and a positive/negative increment of 'color as pheromone' mechanism based on a grid of nine RGB sensors.

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Lying Is Exposed By Micro-Expressions We Can't Control

Research has identified specific and sometimes involuntary movements for 44 human facial muscles that are linked to fear, distrust, distress and other emotions related to deception. The system has proven successful in identifying suspects involved in conventional criminal and potentially criminal behavior.

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Redesigned PS3 Controller To Be Unveiled Monday



If you were one of the many people who didn�t think Sony�s �boomarang� PS3 controller design was crappythen stay tuned � for the big S is going to take the wraps off the final design at next week�s E3 games extravaganza.

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Dogs trained to sniff out fake DVDs

Two black Labradors have become the world's first dogs to be trained to search for counterfeit DVDs. The dogs, Lucky and Flo, have been trained to detect discs to help combat DVD piracy, the Federation Against Copyright Theft (Fact) said.

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Dolphins �know each other�s names�

DOLPHINS may be closer to humans than previously realised, with new research showing they communicate by whistling out their own �names�.

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10 must have Firefox extensions for Web Development

Firefox is required software for XHTML/CSS development. Here is a list of the best extensions for XHTML development with Firefox

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How To: Improve Your MPG By Up to 37 Percent

Edmunds.com tested a lot of lore on how to change your driving habits in order to save money on gas. Some of the results:

- 65 mph instead of 75 mph saves 12 percent
- smooth driving instead of aggressive driving saves 37 percent
- turning your car off instead of idling when you stop at a light or the drive-thru saves 19 percent

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Saturday, May 06, 2006

A car that could save the planet -- fast


Silicon Valley's big brains think they can beat Detroit and Tokyo and save the planet -- all while doing 0 to 60 faster than almost anything on the road.

Also in this story, a photo gallery of the car with closeups, and a video of the X1 racing a Ferrari in a print. Creams it!

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The Night Sky on Your Desktop


Stellarium is a free open source planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope.

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$149 Book-sized Linux computer



Recent price drop from the makers of this amazing little box. They are also running a contest for cool community projects.

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Friday, May 05, 2006

Everyone Wants to 'Own' Your PC

When technology serves its owners, it is liberating. When it is designed to serve others, over the owner's objection, it is oppressive.

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AMD Quad-Core Opteron, Athlon 64 Processors Details Leak


The first quad-core chip from AMD is reported to be Deerhound, which will be intended for Socket F infrastructure and will have shared level-two cache along with dual-channel registered DDR2 memory controller.

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Finally... Fembots!



It was just a matter of time, Korean scientists have developed a female android called eveR-1. Look out Austin Powers.

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3D models of Leonardo Da Vinci�s Machines


Here are a bunch of 3D models of Leonardo Da Vinci�s Machines, pretty cool.

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Intel's Answer to MIT's "$100 Laptop" for the 3rd world runs Windows/Linux

The head of the world's largest chipmaker unveiled a mobile personal computer Wednesday designed to provide affordable collaborative learning environments for teachers and students around the world.

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Watch Over 700 TV Show Episodes Online

This site has over 700 episodes from a range of TV shows including 24, Family Guy, Lost, Prison Break, Scrubs, South Park and over 50 others.

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Energy From Random Movement of Atoms

Using an entirely new technology, a research team from Umeå University in Sweden has succeeded in controlling and converting energy from the random movement of atoms.The findings are being published in the journal Physical Review Letters.

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Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Viruses: The New Battery Of The Future


Viral batteries: such a battery should last as long as conventional batteries. And it could power anything from microelectronics, including chemical and biological sensors, 'lab on chip' devices, and security tags to larger items such as mobile phones, computer displays and even electric cars.

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Gone in 20 Minutes: using laptops to steal cars


A look at how thieves are using laptops to steal the most expensive luxury cars. Many of these cars have completely keyless ignitions and door locks, meaning it can all be done wirelessly. Thieves often follow a car until it gets left in a quiet area, and they can steal it in about 20 minutes. Scary stuff.

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TiVo Desktop released as a Universal binary

Baby steps, but encouraging.... Perhaps we�ll still see OS X TiVoToGo support this year.

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AMD challenges Intel on power consumption

"Advanced Micro Devices is turning up the heat on rival Intel by turning down the power. AMD's low-power initiative has attracted Dell, which announced it will use Opteron processors in its servers."

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Opera Mini 2.0 released

Opera Software today announced a new version of its awesome micro HTML-browser for non-smartphones, Opera Mini 2.0.

Lots of new features like: change browser's visual skin, search engine improvements, speed dial for bookmarks, and quick horizontal and vertical panning when browsing backwards or forwards.

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Stable Linux Kernel 2.6.16.13 Released

Linux Kernel 2.6.16.13 has been released. This release contains a single fix which might be important to some of you for an infinite loop in "NETFILTER: SCTP conntrack".

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Tuesday, May 02, 2006

DirectX 10 and the Future of Gaming



The crew at [H]ardOCP sits down with ATi, and talks about what DirectX 10 will mean for games.
Bottom line: save your money for a DirectX 10 GPU and Windows Vista!

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