A not-so-subtle reminder of why the war is fought, from your friendly neighborhood Sunoco Gas Station.
Cool/Tools
- Momondo – Slick Travel Search Engine – By far the slickest travel search engine I've discovered to date.
- PleaseDress.Me Finds Specialty T-Shirts Online – While this is a neat designer t-shirt search engines, the prize is in the blog comments: A cesspool of great t-shirt shopping sites to browse for your perfect tee!
- Election ‘08 for iPhone Offers Up-to-the-minute Political Info – Like a sportstracker for politics the iPhone… what happens after the elections though?
- Thwarting the Copycats: Sorta Free Anti-Plagiarism Tools – There are a number of free anti-plagiarism search tools available, although they don't offer the integration with a larger learning management package, or the many amenities offered by either Turnitin or SafeAssign
- HostTracker: Website Uptime Monitoring Service – A pretty useful service which lets you know if a site is really down, and if so, to help yo figure out where.
- Zamzar – Free online file conversion – Essentially converts a shitload of file formats entirely online, even Microsoft Word .docx to .doc!
- JDownloader: Automatically handles Radpishare & Megaupload – JDownloader is open source, platform independent and written completely in Java. It simplifies downloading files from One-Click-Hosters like Rapidshare.com or Megaupload.com
Journal/Diving
- Media Credibility: Key News Audiences Now Blend Online and Traditional Sources (17th Aug 2008) – News reported on TV appears more credible than print newspaper, while online news edges in between. Interestingly, news media credibility is on a general decline.
- Writing for Friends and Family: The Interpersonal Nature of Blogs – Bloggers who exhibit both extraversion and self-disclosure traits tend to maintain larger strong-tie social networks and are more likely to appropriate blogs to support those relationships. Age, gender, and education have no relationship to network size, blog content, or the use of blogs as a relationship maintenance tool.
- Use buzzwords to be cited, study suggests – Academics who use fashionable "buzzwords" in their research papers could enhance their reputations as their work is cited more often by their peers, a new study suggests.
Copyright/CC
- EFF to ISPs and Content Owners: Do Your Part to Protect Political Speech | Electronic Frontier Foundation – Here are examples of free political speech being block in the U.S. As the country enters the most "wired" election season to date, EFF and the ACLU of Northern California strongly encourage online service providers (OSPs) and content owners to take special care to safeguard free speech. Copyright claims, trademark claims, and alleged terms of use violations can be misused to silence critics and stifle political dialogue online. Even temporary takedowns can harm open debate, as political speech depends on the spirit of the moment and the rapidly evolving arguments of the participants.
- EFF: Veoh Decision Could Save Muxtape and Friends | Listening Post from Wired.com – When a Northern California judge Howard R. Lloyd handed down a decision on Wednesday in favor of the video sharing site Veoh, after it had been accused by IO Group of hosting ten of that company's pornographic movies without permission, he may have provided mix sharing sites like Muxtape with a blueprint for legality.
- The Creative Commons and Copyright Protection in the Digital Era: Uses
of Creative Commons Licenses – This study explores whether Creative Commons (CC) licenses are a viable solution for copyright protection in the digital era. Through a mixed-methods approach involving a web-based survey of CC licensors, a content analysis of CC-licensed works, and interviews, the study characterizes CC licensors, the ways that CC licensors produce creative works, the private interests that CC licenses serve, and the public interests that CC licenses serve.
Surveillance/Security
- Unmanned-On-Unmanned Vehicular Combat In Iraq – Unmanned systems destroying other unmanned systems is now a reality following the destruction by an MQ-9 Reaper of a remotely controlled car carrying an explosive device in southeast Iraq. This is the next stage of war.
- Camerahead Project has its “Eyes” on surveillance – The Camerahead Project is presented through the eyes of 10 Camerahead agents, and the images they record. The project not only raises the questions of who is watching who, and who is watching the watchers, but also asks questions of why we are being watched at all.
- Features of the new SAF combat uniform – Camouflage is an important element in military tactics. With today’s advanced surveillance equipment and weapon optics, soldiers face a greater risk of detection in combat. Recognising this, the Army and the Defence Science & Technology Agency (DSTA) have jointly developed a new SAF combat uniform with an enhanced camouflage pattern to reduce detection – based on the science of human visual performance and visual biophysics. Besides an enhanced camouflage pattern, the new SAF combat uniform also consists of better quality fabric and an ergonomic functional design.
