Tech Week That Was: Kids And Screens, NSA And Our Data

A protester appears behind Gen. Keith Alexander, director of the National Security Agency, at a hearing of the House intelligence committee this week in Washington.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

A protester appears behind Gen. Keith Alexander, director of the National Security Agency, at a hearing of the House intelligence committee this week in Washington.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

Each week, we round up the tech and culture stories from NPR and beyond. Let’s do this, folks.

ICYMI

Online and on air, we’ve started our new effort to report several stories on a single theme during the week. Our first themed week explored kids and technology, with my look at babies and screen time, Steve Henn on the science of video games, Laura Sydell on tracking the social media use of your teens, and Eric Westervelt on iPads in the classroom. The stories are aggregated on this page for you to go back and read, and on Monday, we’ll put up a mashcast podcast for you to listen to the kids-and-tech journey as one enjoyable download. Also this week, April Fehling asked you how you deal with the scourge of texting-while-walking, I showed you the new airline safety videos making me smile, I continued reporting on the debacle of HealthCare.gov and we chose the Bulb Flashlight as the weekly innovation.

The Big Conversation

Another major revelation came out this week about the sheer extent of the surveillance state, when The Washington Post reported that the National Security Agency infiltrated a link between Google and Yahoo’s data centers to create a back door to collect data from millions of users, without the companies’ knowledge. Google and Yahoo both expressed their outrage and by Friday, Senate intelligence committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein came out against the NSA’s surveillance of U.S. allies, and Secretary of State John Kerry admitted that perhaps the government had sometimes “reached too far.” In Europe, Spain reacted to news that the NSA collected data on 60 million phone calls, in addition to the news about snooping on France and dozens of world leaders. Security expert Bruce Schneier wrote in The Atlantic that this represents the ongoing struggle over control of the Internet.

In tech industry news, Twitter’s marching toward its stock market debut, and this week, it made a significant change in its display of users’ tweets, showing pictures and Vine’s short videos in user timelines by default, without a click. This will make visual ads on Twitter much more prominent, as The New York Times noted, which will help the company serve more mobile ads.

Other Curiosities

The Wall Street Journal: BlackBerry in talks with Facebook about a bid

Could this be a marriage that would benefit both parties?

Los Angeles Times: Is the mysterious barge in San Francisco Bay a secret Google data center?

Water can keep servers cool. The project could be a floating data center, something Google was granted a patent for in 2009 but never built. But CBS San Francisco reported the barge will be used as an exclusive showroom to market Google Glass and other gadgets.

Gawker: ‘The Zuckerberg Files’ Tracks Everything Mark Zuckerberg Says

A new site logs every public utterance of the Facebook founder and CEO.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2013/11/01/242351644/tech-week-that-was-kids-and-screens-nsa-and-our-data?ft=1&f=1001
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Demi Lovato Hosts Halloween Soiree

Taking a break from her hectic schedule, Demi Lovato kicked back and relaxed at her own Halloween party in West Hollywood last night (October 31).

The “Heart Attack” singer gave her guests quite a scare in her gory and goth-flavored getup, hamming it up for the shutterbugs in a variety of settings.

Last weekend, Demi showed up at the Staples Center for the Kanye West Yeezus Tour, and she was joined by Wilmer Valderrama and ex-boyfriend Joe Jonas as well as Joe’s current squeeze Blanda Eggenschwiler.

It isn’t yet clear whether or not the celebrity pals planned the outing, however they all seemed to get along just fine in the VIP area.

Source: http://celebrity-gossip.net/demi-lovato/demi-lovato-hosts-halloween-soiree-953620
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Digitizer makes 3D scanning accessible, but not yet practical

When Bre Pettis unveiled MakerBot’s Digitizer, you couldn’t wipe the smile off his face. And, upon opening our own unit, it’s easy to understand why. When you lift the plastic unit, swaddled in black foam, out of its cardboard box, you feel like you’re stepping into the future. 3D scanning isn’t exactly new, but the allure hasn’t worn off yet. It’s the missing ingredient in the Brooklyn-born company’s ecosystem. Its printers have improved in leaps and bounds since it first started shipping the Cupcake CNC as a kit back in 2009, it finally has a user-friendly software suite in MakerWare and Thingiverse provides a vast repository of designs for people to download and print. But until now there has been no easy, affordable way for users to turn the objects they already own into printable 3D models. Of course, “affordable” is a relative term. At $1,400 the Digitizer isn’t exactly an impulse purchase, but it’s certainly cheaper than comparable systems.

And what qualifies as a “comparable” system? Well, we’re talking about desktop scanners that capture a full 360 degrees, are largely hands-off and self-contained (i.e., not a DIY kit built around a Kinect or smartphone). That means the Digitizer is actually entering a rather sparsely populated field. The big questions though, are how does it fits into the MakerBot universe and, more importantly, the life of the DIY enthusiast? Does the Digitizer do as advertised and turn your pile of doodads into easily replicateable digital files? You know where to look for answers, after the break.

Digitizer hardware hands-on

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15 Photos

Like we said, even before you power up the Digitizer, it already puts a smile on your face. The simple black plastic body definitely isn’t going to win any design awards and it doesn’t exactly ooze luxury, but it is playfully futuristic, in a way reminiscent of early ’90s children’s toys. It’s angular, understated and utilitarian, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Oddly there is some assembly required: the four rubber feet used to keep it from slipping about a desktop come packaged in a small zip-top bag. After you pop those little rubber guys in place, you’re free to plug the Digitizer into an outlet and your computer’s USB port and get going… with the calibration that is.

Just like the replicator before it, the Digitizer needs to be carefully calibrated for effective use. And, while the process is much quicker and less labor intensive (no constant adjusting of knobs here), the scanner actually appears to be much more sensitive and needs more frequent tune ups. MakerBot’s instructions call for recalibrating every 20 scans or once a week, but we needed to run the calibration three times in the course of a week and never topped 10 scans before our results started getting funny. But, more on that later.

The calibration process itself involves making sure the filter is placed over the 1.3-megapixel camera at the center of the raised bar on one side, then placing a special calibration tool on the turntable. Over the course of about 10 minutes you’ll be asked to place the checkered, three-sided calibration tool in a variety of poses while the MakerWare app takes measurements from the camera and dual lasers that flank it. From there scanning is a relatively straight forward process, so long as you follow MakerBot’s words of advice. Those words: avoid anything dark, shiny, transparent, fury or larger than eight inches in any direction. If you do, the results will be decent, if hardly mind blowing. MakerBot’s example scan of a gnome figurine is quite a bit clearer than any results we managed to get. Even when we scanned a plain white Munny figure, the model displayed some weird pitting, misshapen ears and webbing between the arms and the body.

Digitizer scans

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5 Photos

The act of scanning an object is about as simple as it gets. Make sure the filter is over the camera (this is /super/ important), place your target in the middle of the turntable and click start scan. The only setting to mess with is adjusting the shade of the object your scanning, between light, medium and dark. Then you’ve just got to find something to do for about 10-12 minutes and stay out of the way of the scanner. Don’t touch it, bump it or even get too close to it. That’s not only to avoid screwing up your virtual model, but also to protect your eyes from the laser line generators. Sure, they’re listed eye-safe, but they’re still pretty unpleasant when they hit your retinas.

Once that’s done, you simply crop your model to the proper height and upload your scan to Thingiverse, if you’d like. You can back up your scans privately or share them for others to download, manipulate and print on their own. MakerWare will walk you through sliding the filter off the camera to take a snapshot of your real world target, ask you to log in and upload the scan.

It all seems simple enough, until you hit a snag. Once one thing goes wrong, the whole shebang has a sort of meltdown. When MakerBot says that dark, transparent or shiny objects are not ideally suited to scanning, what they really mean is: don’t even bother. (Though, we’ve been told you can dull the luster on shiny items with cornstarch and achieve better results.) We tried to scan a pair of matte black sunglasses with particularly dark gray lenses, and ended up with something you’d find MoMA. We immediately saw a problem when the scan started updating live on our iMac, so we cancelled it. When we clicked retry the scan simply failed and we had to restart the scanning service to get MakerWare back up and running. This happened almost anytime we had to cancel a scan or put the computer to sleep. Even after we recalibrated the Digitizer the results were still a mess. While we were able to make out the general outline of a pair of glasses, it was buried in a sea of seemingly random shapes. Even some good, usable scans turned up weird anomalies, such as the UFO hovering above Om Nom you see above.

The Digitizer is fun and potentially ground breaking, but it’s also occasionally frustrating. The device is as small and unobtrusive as you can reasonably expect and, in the grand scheme of things, not particularly expensive. MakerBot has even succeeded at making the scanner damn-near fool-proof. But, it’s hardly perfect. Results are sort of a mixed bag and, if you stray from the suggested ideal conditions, chances are you’ll get something completely unusable. It shouldn’t come as any surprise that the Digitizer isn’t practical for the average user — it’s clearly targeted at tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. But that doesn’t mean things will always be that way. Call us optimistic, but we choose to see the Digitizer as the first tentative step towards something revolutionary.

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/10/31/makerbot-digitizer-hands-on/?ncid=rss_truncated
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Rosie Huntington Whiteley Goes for a Checkup in Beverly Hills

Paying a visit to the doctor’s office today (October 30), the charming Rosie Huntington Whiteley made her way out of a medical building in Beverly Hills on the way home from her checkup.

Exquisite in a gray dress and boots, the “Transformers” starlet walked with pomp, holding a matching gray handbag.

In related news, the 26-year-old actress, along with a handful of other familiar names, are hard at work on a brand new movie, called “Mad Max: Fury Road.”

Slated for release in 2014, the action-adventure flick stars Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron and Mel Gibson. As of now, the movie does not have a set synopsis, so stay linked to GossipCenter for more news about Rosies upcoming movie!

Source: http://celebrity-gossip.net/rosie-huntington-whiteley/rosie-huntington-whiteley-goes-checkup-beverly-hills-952660
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Barnes & Noble’s Nook GlowLight is lighter, brighter, whiter, with less Simple Touch for $119

As a ketchup bottle once famously said: Good things take time (we’re paraphrasing here, of course). Roughly a year and a half ago, Barnes and Noble made its top-notch Nook Simple Touch even better, with the addition of GlowLight. Before the end of the year, however, the company had been outdone by both Kobo and Amazon in that department; the two e-reader competitors launched devices with more uniform and brighter front-lighting technologies. Since then, those companies have both offered up refreshes, Amazon with a new Paperwhite and Kobo with the slick Aura, leaving us wondering why Barnes & Noble had been quiet for so long. Surely issues with its hardware division couldn’t be helping matters.

Today, however, things are looking, um, brighter for the company. The latest Nook is available now through Barnes & Noble’s site, bringing with it a slew of upgrades and a shortened name. Say “goodbye” to Simple Touch. This time out, it’s just Nook GlowLight, a new name for a new look. Gone is the matte black color scheme of its predecessor (not to mention most of the rest of the industry); the company has traded that in for a white design that evokes the Nook HD tablet. It’s also easier on the eyes, according to the company, with less of a contrast between the bezel and display. It’s still a sizable bezel, of course. B&N didn’t shave things down like the Kobo. There’s also a rubber bumper running around the perimeter. The company won’t actually call it “rugged,” but we suspect that’ll help it take a tumble a bit more gracefully.

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19 Photos

Gone, sadly, are the physical page-turn buttons Barnes & Noble held onto for so long. And while the touchscreen is plenty responsive, we did always appreciate the option. Also ditched this time out is the concave back we liked on the Simple Touch models. We’re told that the company no longer found it necessary in order to provide the most ergonomic experience, though we suspect it just jumped at the opportunity to make the device a bit thinner overall. That said, the reader’s a pleasure to hold, thanks in no small part to its light weight. The GlowLight is a mere 6.2 ounces — 15 percent lighter than the new Paperwhite, as the company happily points out. And indeed, it’s an impressive reduction, bringing the heft down to around that of a pocket paperback.

The power button has been moved to the side, presumably to eliminate accidental triggers, though we watched as a rep put the cover on the reader and found him accidentally turning it on several times. The “n” button is still intact, thankfully, and used for both returning home and turning on the front light, which is accomplished when you hold it down for a few seconds. As for the GlowLight technology itself, the company’s really upped the ante over the last gen, bringing it on par with the competition. Gone is the blue-tinged and spotty coverage of the first model. You can still see the origin of the lights up top, if you tilt it right, but, well, you have to tilt it to actually see them.

Like with the Aura, E Ink has managed to reduce full-page refreshes here, so there’s no flash on the display every six pages or so while reading. Barnes & Noble says it’s also done away with text ghosting, and indeed, we didn’t see any during our demo. There’s no expandable storage, though the on-board amount has been doubled to 4GB (also double that of the Paperwhite). The UI and store, meanwhile, have been simplified to the essentials — probably the best for an e-reader. All of that is available today through Barnes & Noble’s site for $119. The cover, meanwhile, will run you $22. It doesn’t add to the reader’s bulk, but it also doesn’t close exactly, thanks to an absence of magnets. Life is full of trade-offs.

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/10/30/nook-glowlight/?ncid=rss_truncated
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Amazon’s Matchbook service gives you cheap/free Kindle copies of print books

Amazon on Tuesday launched Matchbook, a new benefit for Amazon customers that provides you with access to inexpensive (or free) Kindle versions of print-edition books you’ve bought through Amazon. The service is launching with 70,000 titles, and works with your back catalog of past Amazon purchases, all the way back to 1995. Matchbook-qualifying titles are available for download for $2.99 or less.

When Matchbook was first announced in September, Amazon included 10,000 titles. Now that number has swelled by a factor of seven. Amazon’s signed up major publishers including HarperCollins, Macmillan, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Amazon Publishing, Wiley, Chronicle Books, and Marvel, along with indie publishers as well. Russ Grandinetti, Amazon’s vice president of Kindle Content said in a statement that his company plans to “keep expanding rapidly” in the months ahead.

The books will work on Kindle devices or on any device equipped with the Kindle app, including Kindle apps available for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/eUBIBMOjnR0/story01.htm
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Relive the ’80s and Run Windows 1.01 in Your Browser

In these smartphone-studded days, it’s easy to forget how computers worked. Once you had to run programs off of floppy disks and wait ages for everything to load. Luckily for your nostalgia, some bored developers are keeping the past alive with full-featured emulators that run in your browser.

Read more…

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/2JKR4P7b4wE/relive-the-80s-and-run-windows-1-01-in-your-browser-1453363021
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Man With MS Jumps Over Mount Everest: ‘I Feel Very Happy’

French multiple sclerosis sufferer Marc Kopp speaks about his quest to skydive over Mount Everest, in an interview conducted in Kathmandu last week.

Prakash Mathema/AFP/Getty Images

French multiple sclerosis sufferer Marc Kopp speaks about his quest to skydive over Mount Everest, in an interview conducted in Kathmandu last week.

Prakash Mathema/AFP/Getty Images

From the list of things a person with multiple sclerosis can’t do, we must erase “sky-dive over Mount Everest.” That’s because Frenchman Marc Kopp, 55, jumped from a helicopter at an altitude of some 32,000 feet before landing on the mountain this weekend.

“I feel very happy. I am exhausted but very happy,” Kopp tells Agence France-Presse from Kathmandu, where he’s being examined by doctors after his tandem jump with his friend, accomplished skydiver Mario Gervasi. The news agency says he’s the first disabled person to skydive over the world’s tallest mountain.

Kopp, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2001, traveled on horseback to reach the heliport where he took off to make his leap — an exhausting process for the man who often uses a wheelchair.

“There were many times in the last few days when I thought I wouldn’t be able to realize my dream,” he tells the AFP.

For the first few thousand feet of his descent, Kopp and Gervasi were in a free-fall. They landed on a specially prepared platform at about half of Everest’s height of 29,029 feet, according to reports.

“I hope my action will inspire others living with this illness. I hope many more will follow in my footsteps,” Kopp said.

Kopp, who suffers from primary progressive multiple sclerosis, has gradually lost the use of most of his right side, according to French newspaper Le Parisien. He runs a support group for others with the disease.

Source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/10/27/241218946/man-with-ms-jumps-over-mount-everest-i-feel-very-happy?ft=1&f=1001
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McCain considering running again for Senate (cbsnews)

Share With Friends: | | Politics – Top Stories Stories, News Feeds and News via Feedzilla.

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6 charged in boat capsizing that killed 4

MIAMI (AP) — The operator of a boat that capsized off Miami, killing four women, faces federal involuntary manslaughter charges, and five others — from the Bahamas and Jamaica — also were indicted in the case.

The boat carrying Bahamians, Jamaicans and Haitians overturned seven miles east of Miami. The 11 survivors were found clinging to the hull the morning of Oct. 17.

The 24-count indictment Thursday charges 53-year-old Naaman Davis and 38-year-old George Lewis, both of the Bahamas, with encouraging and inducing aliens to enter the United States resulting in death. Boat operator Davis is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. Davis and Lewis face possible death sentences.

Lewis and three Jamaicans on board — Matthew Williams, 30; Everton Jones, 40; and Kenard Hagigal, 35 — were charged with illegal re-entry into the United States by an aggravated felon. A fourth Jamaican passenger, 37-year-old Sean Gaynor, was charged with illegal re-entry into the United States. All face years in prison.

The other five survivors — four Haitians and one Bahamian — are considered witnesses in the criminal investigation, according to the indictment released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office. There were no lawyers listed for the suspects in the document.

The four Haitian survivors have been released from federal custody and could be eligible for work visas in the U.S. It wasn’t clear whether the Bahamian was still being held.

Of the four women who died, three have been identified as Haitian. Their names were reported as Lodilia Escarment, Carmen Valeris and Woodline Alexis. The fourth woman hasn’t been identified.

Since a catastrophic earthquake struck Haiti in 2010, the U.S. has not been deporting Haitians who do not have criminal records. The four survivors are witnesses in a criminal case, and their cooperation with law enforcement likely makes them eligible for visas that would allow them to work, said Cheryl Little, executive director of the Miami-based advocacy center Americans for Immigrant Justice.

Thousands of migrants from Haiti, Cuba and other Caribbean countries attempt to illegally enter the U.S. each year by attempting risky sea voyages in overloaded or unseaworthy vessels, often through established smuggling networks that include islands in the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos.

Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-10-25-US-Capsized-Boat/id-0f234ac8ef9a4513bc8fa111ffb7c548
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