San Francisco passes cell phone radiation law

Now here's good news for people worried about mobile phone radiation and its potential harmful affects - San Francisco has become the first city in the US to require mobile phone retailers to post radiation levels next to the handsets they sell. Yet will it really change the industry, or just appease in the short-term?

The board of supervisors, or council, voted 10-1 to approve the measure."This is about helping people make informed choices," said the law's chief sponsor, Supervisor Sophie Maxwell.The mobile phone industry has pointed to studies that it says show mobile phone radiation was not harmful to people. 

It has fought similar legislation in California and Maine, and defeated the bills in both states.The Federal Communications Commission has adopted limits that set out safe exposure to these kinds of emissions.

The measurement defines the amount of radio waves that people can safely absorb into their bodies when talking on a mobile phone.

Some researchers have claimed such emissions can be linked to cancer and brain tumours but there remains little scientific consensus on the matter."This is not about discouraging people from using their cell phones," said Tony Winnicker, spokesman for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who has said he will sign the legislation into law.

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Surveillance system monitors conversations

An intrusive surveiilance system has been trialled in the UK without, until now, the public knowing of it - nothing new there...except that this system has a way of intruding into your street conversations:

The technology, called Sigard, monitors movements and speech to detect signs of threatening behaviour.

Its designers claim the system can anticipate anti-social behaviour and violence by analysing the information picked up its sensors.

 

They say alerts are then sent to police, nightclub bouncers or shop security staff, which allow them to nip trouble in the bud before arguments spiral into violence.The devices are designed to distinguish between distress calls, threatening behaviour and general shouting. The system, produced by Sound Intelligence, is being used in Dutch prisons, city centres and Amsterdam's Central Rail Station. 

Coventry City Council is funding a pilot project which has for six months and has installed seven devices in the nightlife area on the High Street. Dylan Sharpe, from Big Brother Watch, said: "There can be no justification for giving councils or the police the capability to listen in on private conversations."There is enormous potential for abuse, or a misheard word, causing unnecessary harm with this sort of intrusive and overbearing surveillance."

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Charging motorists per mile 'inevitable'

The issue of pay-as-you-drive motoring has been put back in the spotlight with this report from the RAC which considers the outcome as 'inevitable':

Charging motorists for each mile they travel is "inevitable" if future traffic gridlock is to be avoided, a report from the RAC Foundation said today.A "pay-as-you-go" system could be the answer to congestion, said the report from the foundation's director Professor Stephen Glaister. 

What was needed was a fundamental shift in the way England's roads were managed and paid for, he said.

The launch of the report coincided with an Ipsos Mori report for the RAC Foundation which showed that 58% of drivers agreed that a per-mile, pay-as-you-go system across all roads would make them think about how much they drive. 

Prof Glaister's report identified a series of problems facing road users and governments in the future.

These included a lack of vision for the road network, a 33% increase in traffic by 2025 and reduced spending on road infrastructure because of financial and political constraints.He said a system of charging motorists per mile travelled had to come with:

:: A cut in fuel duty and road tax;

:: A governing body to develop and implement a long-term strategy for maintaining and enhancing the road network;

:: A guaranteed sum of revenue put aside to pay for the work and a regulator to ensure the work was done efficiently;

:: More reliable journey times and compensation for delays.

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Car for blind drivers under development

The UK Telegraph has a post on how researchers think they will have a car on the road next year that can be driven by blind people. Although it uses nonvisual interfaces you have to ask yourself - would this be suitable for fast-reaction driving in such cities as London, New York, Istanbul, etc?? It's one thing to have developed the technology, its quite another to put it into real-time practice in some of the most difficult circumstances. Read on:

The National Federation of the Blind and Virginia Tech say they hope to demonstrate a prototype equipped with technology that helps a sightless person to get behind the wheel in 2011.The technology, called nonvisual interfaces, will guide its driver through traffic by transmitting information about nearby vehicles or objects.

 

Vibrating gloves or streams of compressed air directed behind the wheel are among the options for communicating the information needed to avoid collisions and reach a destination.Advocates for the blind describe the scheme as a "moon shot," drawing parallels with President John F. Kennedy's pledge to land a man on the moon."We're exploring areas that have previously been regarded as unexplorable," said Dr. Mark Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind. "We're moving away from the theory that blindness ends the capacity of human beings to make contributions to society." 

Mr Maurer first came up with the idea that the blind could drive about a decade ago when he launched the organisation's research institute. "Some people thought I was crazy, and they thought, 'Why do you want us to raise money for something that can't be done?' Others thought it was a great idea," Mr Maurer said. "Some people were incredulous. Others thought the idea was incredible."

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Yike Bike!

Crikes, yikes - it's cool! It's the new design-gadget Yike Bike...the world's first super light electric folding bike (according to Yike, of course...). It's a must see bike design - go to their webpage below to see the pics... they say that:

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The world's most lightweight electric bike folds down into something the size of a backpack. Its designers wanted to create something that could dramatically change urban transport, enabling city dwellers a fast, safe and easy way to navigate their environment. You might not wish to ride it to work on snowy days, but for elegant design...

See the Yikebike homepage

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Big Changes in Online News Consumption

Gather, the leading demand-driven media company, today released results of a survey conducted to understand how 'people are consuming news and engaging around breaking news stories. More than 1,450 individuals of various ages, backgrounds and political affiliations answered questions about how they get news, how they respond to breaking news stories, and where, and if, they share and discuss news online'. Further,

Nearly half (49%) of all adults consider the internet their primary source for news, there is a shift in what people are doing with that news - nearly 80% of adults ages 18+ are actively sharing news stories online. However, the manner in which people share news online varies greatly based on their age - while 68% of those aged 45 and older share news primarily via email, 54% of those under the age of 45 share news primarily via Facebook, and a full 90% of respondents 24 years and younger use Twitter and Facebook to share news (double the respondents 40+).

Read more at 'Big Changes in Online News Consumption'

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Radiation risks cited in full-body airport scans

More controversy surrounding the use of full-body airport security scanners. This recent post explains how

Full-body airport security scanners manufactured by Rapiscan Inc. expose the skin to high radiation levels that may lead to cancer and other health problems, according to researchers from the University of California, San Francisco. Particularly at risk, the researchers said, are travelers who are pregnant, elderly or have weakened immune systems. The machines emit X-ray energy levels that would be safe if they were distributed throughout the body, but a majority of that energy is delivered to the skin and underlying tissue at levels that "may be dangerously high," the researchers wrote last month to the White House Office of Science and Technology. Officials with the Department of Homeland Security defended the use of Rapiscan's backscatter machines. The amount of energy emitted from the machines is equal to two minutes in flight at cruising altitude, said Dr. Alex Garza, chief medical officer for the Department of Homeland Security.

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'Imaginary' Interface Could Replace Screens and Keyboards

TechNewsDaily has a recent post discussing how researchers are experimenting with a new interface system for mobile devices that could replace the screen and even the keyboard with gestures supported by our visual memory:

Called Imaginary Interfaces, the German project uses a small, chest-mounted computer and camera to detect hand movements. Unlike Tony Stark in Iron Man, who manipulates holographic elements in his lab with his hands, users conjure up their own imaginary set of graphical interfaces. For example, people can manually draw shapes and select points in space that have programmed functions, such as a power switch or a "send" key, for example.

This interface could allow people to use gestures during phone calls, much as they do in face-to-face conversations, while eliminating traditional hardware elements.

"We definitely envision a system like this replacing all input for mobile devices," said Sean Gustafson, a research student at the Hasso Plattner Institute at Potsdam University in Germany and lead author of an upcoming study on the Imaginary Interfaces concept.

Read more at ''Imaginary' Interface Could Replace Screens and Keyboards'

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Post-PC era is nigh

CNet News has a post on a D8 conference where Steve Jobs was talking about the post-PC era:

Jobs said the day is coming when only one out of every few people will need a traditional computer. He noted that advances in chips and software will allow tablet devices like the iPad to do tasks that today are really only suited for a traditional computer, things like video editing and graphic arts work. The move, Jobs said, will make many PC veterans uneasy, "because the PC has taken us a long ways." "We like to talk about the post-PC era, but when it really starts to happen, it's uncomfortable," he said.

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The Coming Data Explosion

The New York Times has an interesting post on the emerging 'Internet of Things' and the ever-increasing number of real-world objects connected/interfaced with the digital world:

One of the key aspects of the emerging Internet of Things - where real-world objects are connected to the Internet - is the massive amount of new data on the Web that will result. As more and more "things" in the world are connected to the Internet, it follows that more data will be uploaded to and downloaded from the cloud. And this is in addition to the burgeoning amount of user-generated content - which has increased 15-fold over the past few years, according to a presentation that Google VP Marissa Mayer made last August at Xerox PARC. Mayer said during her presentation that this "data explosion is bigger than Moore's law."

Read more at 'The Coming Data Explosion'

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Sony Shows Rollable OLED Display

Has the Sony company pulled off another hit? A colour display that can even wrap around a pen...uummm

Sony has developed a flexible color display that's sturdy enough to be wrapped around a pencil while still showing video images. The screen will be detailed on Thursday at the Society for Information Display conference in Seattle and ahead of that Sony released a video of it in operation.

Read more at - 'Sony Shows Rollable OLED Display'

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Wikitude Drive Beta – Test Drivers Wanted

Is this the future for satellite navigation, one wonders? Live video stream of the road you are driving on...road testers required - sign up!

Wikitude Drive, the first mobile Augmented Reality (AR) satellite navigation system with global coverage, launches for test drivers. 


Salzburg, May 20, 2010. Wikitude Drive, the Grand Prize Winner of the Global Navteq LBS Challenge 2010 at Mobile World Congress last February in Barcelona, transforms your Android smartphone into a mobile navigation system looking a bit like something out of a science fiction movie…
Driving directions not only appear on screen, they are overlaid on the live video stream of the very street you are driving on. As a result, you are seeing the real world and real road in front of you, while being directed by a digital route on top of it.

Read more at - 'Wikitude Drive Beta – Test Drivers Wanted'

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YeZ concept car sucks in C02, exhales oxygen

Now this does look cool... conceptual... but way smart..

Here is a vehicle that behaves like a plant, photosynthesizing carbon dioxide from the air and exchanging oxygen back into the atmosphere. Meet the YeZ, a concept two-seater that makes other eco cars blush when it comes to zero and even negative emissions. Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation is behind this clever little creation in partnership with General Motors and Volkswagen. YeZ, pronounced yea-zi, which means "leaf" in Mandarin, works its magic of photoelectric conversion with the help of state-of-the-art solar panels on the roof, wind power conversion via small wind turbines in the wheels, and carbon dioxide absorption and conversion through the bodywork. This last bit is made of a metal-organic framework that can apparently absorb carbon dioxide and water molecules from the air. Through the series of chemical reactions, energy is generated, and it's then stored in the car's lithium ion batteries.

Read move over at 'YeZ concept car sucks in C02, exhales oxygen'

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Tweet for Traitors

Yet again Twitter hits the headlines as it becomes a tool for pro-Chavez supporters to whistleblow:

President Hugo Chavez has urged supporters to use Twitter to blow the whistle on currency speculators and announced that police raids on illegal traders would continue as Venezuela's government tries to defend the embattled bolivar. The socialist leader asked Venezuelans to send messages identifying illegal traders. He described them as "thieves" who must be punished for currency speculation, which he blames for rapidly rising inflation. "My Twitter account is open for you to denounce them," Chavez said during his weekly radio and television program. "We're going to launch several raids. We've already launched some raids, thanks to the complaints from the people."

Read more at - 'Chavez asks Venezuelans to tweet on speculators'

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Theory, Culture & Society - Special Issue on Changing Climates‏

I've recently been shifting through a few articles in the new  Theory, Culture & Society ( March/May 2010, Volume 27, No. 2-3) titled Special Issue on Changing Climates - Edited by Bronislaw Szerszynski and John Urry - see http://tcs.sagepub.com/current.dtl

Some great content here... see the following:
 
CONTENTS
 
Bronislaw Szerszynski and John Urry
    Changing Climates: Introduction
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 1-8. 

Bronislaw Szerszynski
    Reading and Writing the Weather: Climate Technics and the Moment of Responsibility
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 9-30. 

Nigel Clark
    Volatile Worlds, Vulnerable Bodies: Confronting Abrupt Climate Change
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 31-53. 

Myra J. Hird
    Indifferent Globality: Gaia, Symbiosis and ‘Other Worldliness’
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 54-72. 

Kathryn Yusoff
    Biopolitical Economies and the Political Aesthetics of Climate Change
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 73-99. 

Aaron M. McCright and Riley E. Dunlap
    Anti-reflexivity: The American Conservative Movement’s Success in Undermining Climate Science and Policy
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 100-133. 

Bradley C. Parks and J. Timmons Roberts
    Climate Change, Social Theory and Justice
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 134-166. 

Melinda Cooper
    Turbulent Worlds: Financial Markets and Environmental Crisis
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 167-190.
John Urry
    Consuming the Planet to Excess
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 191-212. 

Erik Swyngedouw
    Apocalypse Forever?: Post-political Populism and the Spectre of Climate Change
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 213-232. 

Sheila Jasanoff
    A New Climate for Society
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 233-253. 

Ulrich Beck
    Climate for Change, or How to Create a Green Modernity?
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 254-266. 

Mike Hulme
    Cosmopolitan Climates: Hybridity, Foresight and Meaning
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 267-276. 

Elizabeth Shov
    Social Theory and Climate Change: Questions Often, Sometimes and Not Yet Asked
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 277-288. 

Brian Wynne
    Strange Weather, Again: Climate Science as Political Art
    Theory, Culture & Society 2010 27: 289-305. 

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Google Invests in Firm that Tries to Predict the Future

Google's investment arm, Google Ventures, has sunk an undisclosed sum into Recorded Future, a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based startup that "offers customers new ways to analyze the past, present and the predicted future.":

Recorded Future's own Web site doesn't list any products for sale, but the company appears to have developed a data analytics technology that could be used to try to predict future stock market events or even terrorist activity, according to blog posts and videos on its site. The technology looks at how frequently an entity or event is referred to in the news and around the Web over a period of time, then uses that data to project how it might behave in the future.

Read more here

Bristol psychologist seeking tweets about dreams

This has to be the new level in Tweet-related phenomena! A Bristol academic is to take part in a worldwide experiment to collect and analyse people's dreams using the social networking service Twitter:

Dr Jennifer Parker, of the University of the West of England, is asking people from around the world to tweet their dreams to her on Monday.

The 10 judged the best will be analysed by Dr Parker, who is a member of the Association for the Study of Dreams. The top 10 tweeted dreams will appear on www.twitter.com/dreamshrink.They will be posted on Friday 30 April.

Dr Parker, who is from the university's psychology department, said even the dreams that will not be analysed publicly will help her with her research.

Read more at 'Bristol psychologist seeking tweets about dreams'

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Cell phones to 'smell' biochem attack?

I remember coving this topic about 2 years ago...seems like it's been taking a while to move on this. Anyway, its implications are both 'reassuring' and yet 'worrying' - hopefully, you won't need to ask why!

If you ever get caught up in a chemical or biological weapons attack, your cellphone may save your life. Or at least that's the ambition of the Department of Homeland Security. The Department's science and technology team has begun talks with four cell-phone manufacturers on designing 'nextgen' phones that would be able to sense a wide variety of noxious chemical compounds in the air - and alert the user. The director of the "Cell-All" program at the DHS, Stephen Dennis, tells CNN that within a year, "We expect up to 80 prototype cell phones to be developed that can be then tested against various agents."

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Car Steered With Eyes

Following on from the previous post on the automated car being closer to reality, this is a slightly different take - using the power of 'giving the eye'!

The eyeDriver software is a prototype application for steering the research vehicle Spirit of Berlin using eye movements. The software was designed by computer scientists at Freie Universität Berlin in collaboration with the company, SMI (SensoMotoric Instruments). The eye movements of the driver are collected and converted into control signals for the steering wheel. The application uses a converted bicycle helmet equipped with two cameras and an infrared LED, as well as a laptop computer with special software. One of the cameras is pointed to the front in the same direction as the person wearing the helmet (scene camera), while the other camera films one eye of the wearer (eye camera)...

In the "free ride" mode the viewing positions are linked directly with the steering wheel motor. That means that the x-coordinates of the viewing position are used to calculate the desired position of the steering wheel. The further the driver looks to the left or right, the further the steering wheel is turned in that direction. The speed of the vehicle is set in advance and kept constant, as long as the position of the gaze is recognized. In case it is not possible to detect which direction the driver is looking in, for example, if the driver's eyes are closed, the vehicle brakes automatically.

Read more on 'Car Steered With Eyes'

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Car that drives itself gets closer to reality

It's getting a closer reality: cars that can stay in a motorway lane without the help of a human driver...read the latest developments:

Software developed by the researchers at North Carolina State University helps a computer keep a car within a lane on a highway while staying aware of other lanes and vehicles travelling alongside. It can even read road signs. The technology relies completely on computer vision programming, which allows a computer to understand what a video camera is looking at - whether it is a stop sign or a pedestrian. The program uses algorithms to sort visual data and make decisions related to finding the lanes of a road, detecting how those lanes change as a car is moving, and controlling the car to stay in the correct lane. It does this - while avoiding other vehicles and without becoming confused by multiple lanes.

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