You might remember Aimee Copeland as the twentysomething who went through a harrowing experience last year, losing most of her limbs after a zip-line accident exposed her to flesh-eating bacteria. Fortunately, though, technology is giving her a second chance. Copeland recently received bionic hands from a company called Touch Bionics—devices which are so effective that she can actually grab things and do tasks that most people take for granted. Amazing stuff.
The Republican Study Committee, a caucus of Republicans in the House of Representatives, has told staffer Derek Khanna that he will be out of a job when Congress re-convenes in January. The incoming chairman of the RSC, Steve Scalise (R-LA) was approached by several Republican members of Congress who were upset about a memo Khanna wrote advocating reform of copyright law. They asked that Khanna not be retained, and Scalise agreed to their request.
The release and subsequent retraction of Khanna’s memo has made waves in tech policy circles. The document argues that the copyright regime has become too favorable to the interests of copyright holders and does not adequately serve the public interest. It advocates several key reforms, including reducing copyright terms and limiting the draconian “statutory damages” that can reach as high as $150,000 per infringing work.
Mind you, tech scholars and the public thought this idea was great. But content groups? They said no, and now this dude is out of a job. Ouch.
Paper lives: Little Printer and the rebirth of the hard copy
Inside the company that makes your life front page news, and the soulful gadget it designed to do the job
Well, hello there, little fella.
This idea sounded out-of-date when first announced, but watch the interview. You’ll see the creator, Matt Webb, does a really good job selling it.
At its gleaming store, RadanMac offers the latest Apple gear - the new iPad, iPhones, iPods, laptops, all-in-one desktop computers and more.
But this is no ordinary Apple store. It’s in Tehran, where Apple and other U.S. computer products are banned under U.S. sanctions that have been in place for years.
Despite the embargo, RadanMac is one of an estimated 100 stores in the Iranian capital that openly sell Apple products, often at little more than U.S. prices.
“Business has been booming for the last three years,” said Majid Tavassoli, the store’s owner, in a phone interview. He said his company employs more than 20 staffers and has been supplying Apple products to Iranian buyers since 1995.
The company also has a servicing unit and a business sales arm whose clients have included the Central Bank of Iran, state television channels, newspapers and design professionals.
Meanwhile in the U.S., Apple Store managers in Atlanta are going after customers that speak Farsi. (It’s worth noting, by the way, that the machine on the left is not an iPad, but an iMac model that’s about a decade old.)
A question raised by Richard Thanki, a wireless consultant who used to work for Ofcom. GigaOm summarizes:
This isn’t a new concept by any means – operators like AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint are now planning their first small cell deployments with an aim of implementing multitechnology heterogeneous networks in the future. But while their plans include Wi-Fi to varying degrees, those operators are still leaning heavily on small cells built over licensed spectrum they own and control, which to Thanki makes absolutely no sense.
“For example a cellular picocell costs from $7,500 to $15,000 whereas a much higher capacity carrier-grade Wi-Fi access point costs around $2,000,” Thanki wrote. “The cost of a Wi-Fi chipset for a consumer device is around $5, whereas 3G cellular chipsets costs around $30.
Thanki specifically cites the rise of so-called “super Wi-Fi” technology, which could help reach rural areas much more easily than current Wi-Fi can. He suggests that TV “white spaces” — i.e. the parts of the local TV spectrum not being used to show “Seinfeld” reruns — get used for wireless access. Fascinating. (ht Hacker News)
Samsung Electronics defeated Apple in the latest spat in the rivals’ patent wars when a British judge ruled Samsung’s Galaxy tablets did not infringe the U.S. company’s designs for the iPad because they were “not as cool.”
In Monday’s High Court judgment Judge Colin Birss said that Samsung’s Galaxy tablets belonged to the same family as the Apple design when viewed from the front, but the Samsung products were “very thin, almost insubstantial members of that family with unusual details on the back.”
“They do not have the same understated and extreme simplicity which is possessed by the Apple design. They are not as cool,” he said. “The overall impression produced is different.”
READ MORE: Samsung wins court case against Apple because it’s “not as cool”
Defeat disguised as victory.
To people who think QR codes are a fad: This guy’s headstone. In five years nobody will know what it is; either that, or people will think it’s a Cuecat. (ht Gregory Bufithis)
Motion detection for your computer: This thumb drive-sized piece of technology will allow users to “completely control your computer by waving your hands around like Tom Cruise in Minority Report.” For $70, the Leap will plug into your USB drive and will provide touchless control of your laptop/computer of choice. The Leap website states: “It sounds too good to be true, we know. But, that’s what we specialize in around here.” It also claims that the device is 200 times more accurate than the Kinect bar and tracks “movements to the 1/100th of a millimeter.” We can’t wait to look like idiots! source
Twitter coming downtown is exactly the kind of innovative company Detroit needs to advance our vision of becoming one of the most exciting high-tech and web-centered corridors of growth and activity found anywhere.Dan Gilbert talks up Detroit’s high-tech future in “What Twitter Means for Detroit.” I’m posting this from Detroit, where I’ve been visiting family for a few days … and, while none of them have Twitter accounts, I can tell you that they’re all hoping Gilbert is right. HT: Michael Tofias. (via kohenari)
In her last days, my mother occasionally became confused....
”The reporter...
I can’t add much to what’s already been (and will be) ...
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#FMMDI (at 30 Rockefeller Plaza)
If you haven’t already seen this Evolution of Storage infographic, take a look. It’s beautiful and fun, and it has me thinking about the way we live.
The graphic falls apart on the right side, as the graphs stop following the key, but the infographic is pretty fascinating nonetheless.
Hint: It’s not what you think it is.
![jaredbkeller:
The Curator’s Guide to the Galaxy
That could be changing, though. This weekend, Maria Popova (whom you may know as an Atlantic contributor, or as the author of Brainpickings, and either way as one of the web’s foremost experts on the art of curation) is launching The Curator’s Code, a system (and, she hopes, a movement) to “honor and standardize the attribution of discovery across the web.” The new project offers both a code of ethics and a common standard for borrowing and sharing. It aims to provide a framework for celebrating curation by way of formalizing it — or, as Popova describes it, of “keeping the whimsical rabbit hole of the Internet open by honoring discovery.”
How to steal other people’s ideas (without being a jerk about it).
[by Megan Garber]
Cool idea ᔥ Jared; but the real ↬ goes to Megan (ᔥ Maria of course). There are too many ways to skin this cat, and it’d be nice if everyone (or at least a majority) decided on one. But would people actually do it?](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0qs51isBO1qbdh71o1_500.png)
The Curator’s Guide to the Galaxy
That could be changing, though. This weekend, Maria Popova (whom you may know as an Atlantic contributor, or as the author of Brainpickings, and either way as one of the web’s foremost experts on the art of curation) is launching The Curator’s Code, a system (and, she hopes, a movement) to “honor and standardize the attribution of discovery across the web.” The new project offers both a code of ethics and a common standard for borrowing and sharing. It aims to provide a framework for celebrating curation by way of formalizing it — or, as Popova describes it, of “keeping the whimsical rabbit hole of the Internet open by honoring discovery.”
How to steal other people’s ideas (without being a jerk about it).
[by Megan Garber]
Cool idea ᔥ Jared; but the real ↬ goes to Megan (ᔥ Maria of course). There are too many ways to skin this cat, and it’d be nice if everyone (or at least a majority) decided on one. But would people actually do it?
![producermatthew:
Rumors are swirling of an Apple event to be held in either San Francisco or New York next week. Sources have told various news organizations that the event will be the launch of the iPad 3. [Photo: CNBC]
CNBC’s sources appear not to be that awful if they got a hold of this.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m045hwed1Y1qz5ew6o1_500.jpg)
Rumors are swirling of an Apple event to be held in either San Francisco or New York next week. Sources have told various news organizations that the event will be the launch of the iPad 3. [Photo: CNBC]
CNBC’s sources appear not to be that awful if they got a hold of this.
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