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Archive for September, 2009
Patrick Swayze Dies After Long Battle with Cancer
September 14th, 2009 | 
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Patrick Swayze (Getty Images)
LOS ANGELES — Actor Patrick Swayze has died after a long battle with pancreatic cancer.
Swayze’s publicist Annett Wolf says the 57-year-old “Dirty Dancing” actor died Monday with family at his side.
He went public about his illness last spring, but continued working as he underwent treatments.
Swayze was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer in early 2008. Doctors later determined the cancer had spread to his liver.
This January, he was admitted to a hospital for pneumonia, which was reportedly the result of his chemotherapy treatments.
He had to miss an appearance at the Television Critics Association in Los Angeles as a result. He had been scheduled to talk about his new A & E show, “The Beast.”
In March, a picture in a tabloid magazine showed a gaunt and seemingly hairless Swayze with the headline, “Patrick Swayze: THE END.”
The article stated that the actor weighed only 105 pounds.
Swayze remained remarkably upbeat during his brave battle and said he had so much to be thankful for.
He also kept busy and continued to work.
Swayze was perhaps best-known as a romantic leading man in the films Dirty Dancing (1987) and Ghost (1990) for which he received Golden Globe nominations.
Swayze is survived by his wife of nearly 34 years, Lisa Niemi.
He was 56-years-old.
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New hybrids proclaim their German engineering
I’m a big fan of “German engineering”–that combined focus on power and precision that distinguishes the better automobiles designed or manufactured in Germany.
At Frankfurt’s International Motor Show, BMW will be showing off two new hybrid cars intended to deliver the full promise of German engineering. This is no small thing because most hybrid cars to date have been lightly built and somewhat underpowered in order to improve fuel economy.
The two new BMWs are more like previous offerings from that company: big, solid cars with lots of power to maintain performance in spite of the weight. They’re also real cars, not just prototypes.
Fortunately, I don’t need to describe these new cars here; there’s a great article by Antuan Goodwin over on CNET’s Car Tech blog that does a fine job of that (see “BMW unveiling two big hybrid models at Frankfurt“). What I would like to do instead is to drill down into their respective powertrains, which represent two different solutions to high-performance hybrid design, using images provided by BMW.
The ActiveHybrid X6, due to go on sale in the U.S. later this year, represents one end of the spectrum: higher-power electric motors and a larger battery pack. As the first image shows, the new X6 model has a twin-turbo V8 gas engine with 400 horsepower. Though this is a reasonably efficient engine for its size, it certainly wasn’t chosen primarily for its fuel economy.
BMW’s ActiveHybrid X6 uses a large NiMH battery pack and a new transmission with two integrated electric motors to augment its 400-horsepower gasoline engine.
(Credit: BMW)
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Are cell phones safe? Researchers still uncertain
WASHINGTON, D.C.–The question over whether cell phones pose a health risk has been debated for years, and researchers say the final answer could still be years away.
Since the wireless industry’s early days, there have been fears that cell phones could be harmful to your health. Some 600 studies have been conducted on the health effects of cell phone use, but the results have been conflicting.
Several reputable organizations, including the World Health Organization and the National Cancer Institute, say there’s no conclusive evidence that using cell phones can harm your health. Other independent research, meanwhile, indicates a link between health problems and cell phone use.
The Interphone study, which began over a decade ago involving 13 countries and has been funded in part by the wireless industry, was supposed to settle the dispute. But the report’s publication has been delayed as researchers disagree over how to interpret the data. Some countries have ended up publishing some results on their own. Much of it indicates there is a link between brain tumors and cell phone use of 10 years or more.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-10351577-266.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in cell phone, Communication, evironment, Health | 
Tags: cancer, cell phones, Health | 
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Solar start-up squeezes more juice from silicon cells
1366 Technologies, a spinoff from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says it can produce a very efficient solar cell from silicon which will be in the market in two years.
The Lexington, Mass.-based company on Monday plans to disclose the details of its Self-Aligned Cell (SAC) architecture, a set of technologies it has developed to convert 18 percent of sunlight to electricity with polysilicon, the most common solar cell material. Engineers forecast that they will be able to hit 19 percent efficiency in the next nine months without adding significant cost to existing processes, said Ely Sachs, chief technology officer.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10350957-54.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Beware of pricier mobile Internet data plans
Prices for cell phone voice services may be dropping, but consumers are likely to be forced to pay a lot more for mobile Internet data plans in the future.
It’s no secret that the price of voice services for cell phones is falling. Just last week Sprint Nextel announced it was offering a new $69.99 a month, Any Mobile, Anytime plan that allows subscribers to call any cell phone in the U.S., regardless of the carrier, in addition to such things as unlimited text messaging and data services.
Analysts are predicting a price war in the mobile market as national wireless carriers will soon be forced to offer more minutes of voice service or unlimited voice services for equal or lower prices to compete with each other.
To make up for the shortfall in revenue, these analysts also predict that wireless operators will start reconfiguring Internet data service plans to make up the difference.
“Voice revenue is declining for the carriers,” said Charles Golvin, an analyst with Forrester Research. “And the vision for the future is to use data revenue to make up for the shortfall and to kick ARPU (average revenue per user) into growth mode.”
Full Story :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-10351105-266.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Heads up Apple, the Intel Netbook is unstoppable
Friday night at a Best Buy in Southern California. Maybe not the hippest place to be but some interesting dynamics were at work.
HP ‘Mini’ promo: more than a few of the newer Netbooks are not low quality
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)
A typical flow of people passed through the laptop section in the 20 minutes I was there. Towards the end, all of the remaining customers (a few men and women, each) were marveling at all the cute, inexpensive laptops. Cute, inexpensive laptops to them, Netbooks to us in the media who like cut-and-dried categories.
I was mildly shocked to see these people ignore the 50 or so standard laptops behind them and focus solely on Netbooks. So, I began querying the sales guy and one of the customers. It came down to essentially two things: price and selection (surprise, surprise). Best Buy now has a large selection of Netbooks–10 or so on display. A far cry from the Best Buy display of six months ago: a single, tiny, neglected Asus Eee PC pushed into a corner.
And I visited a second Best Buy. The sales guy there gushed about Netbooks. “They’re extremely popular,” he said, adding that “almost all of my customers” just want to do e-mail and surf the Web.
That is circuitous way to get to my point. The Intel Netbook is not going away and is just getting more popular as this marketing research report indicates. Apple’s Tim Cook dissed Netbooks back in April for what seemed like acceptable reasons: cheapness equates to downmarket, shoddy products. But that Apple reasoning needs an update–the fall 2009 version: a lot of the newer Netbooks coming out now are not shoddy nor cheap feeling. (And I am hereby updating my previous pessimistic take on Netbooks too per this post.)
People like cute, light, and cheap–especially in a laptop. This sentiment won’t be overcome, as Intel believes, by the emerging ultrathin laptop category, which ranges from about $500 to $1,000 (formerly called CULV or consumer ultra-low-voltage). Certainly not this year. Ultrathins are not different enough in appearance from a standard laptop and not cheap enough. (And recent reports indicate that the ultrathin category is not taking off as expected.)
Intel will never admit in a thousand years that it has created a Frankenstein monster of sorts. Intel will of course take credit (which it should) for the creation of a new category of computing devices but my sense is that the company is not head over heels about the Netbook business model–and this is also a reason for Apple’s very conscious decision not to make a Netbook. And, as many people are predicting, its reason for pursuing a more upscale tablet-like touch device.
Best Buy has a large Netbook selection
(Credit: Best Buy)
Intel’s sales chief Sean Maloney has intimated in the past that Netbooks are not huge money makers. Speaking about the expected emergence of the ultrathin laptop category back in May he said that this is “an opportunity for upsell. We don’t need to give this stuff away. The industry doesn’t need to give this stuff away. We can reach new price points and we can also get paid for it.”
But there is just too much marketing momentum now behind Netbooks at large PC makers–and in retail. Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Toshiba, Sony, Acer all are pushing Netbooks. And in Japan, easily one the largest PC markets in the world, the Netbook is a hit–despite initial resistance from Japanese PC makers–for all of the same reasons cited above: small, light, inexpensive–and add fashionable. Major Japanese tech Web sites (such as ASCII) and large retailers (like Yodobashi Camera) have a significant Netbook focus now because that’s what readers and consumers are demanding.
And I just don’t think performance is that much of an issue for many consumers. Some will of course return a Netbook because their expectations were too high (I heard this from a sales person at Frys Electronics) but a lot of people across all consumer segments (kids, students, business people) will continue to buy these things by the boatload (unless Intel intentionally sabotages the category–which I hope Intel is savvy enough not to do.)
Apple’s products and marketing are good but not infallible. And the lack of a Netbook may come back to bite Apple at some point. Maybe not tomorrow. Maybe not next month. But maybe next year. One of the Best Buy customers eying a Netbook made a comment that was a powerful counterpoint to all the Apple Mac-PC ads. To paraphrase: “You have to pay an arm and a leg for Apple (pointing to the Apple corner), I’m trying to make a practical business decision here.”
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10351387-64.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
802.11n Wi-Fi standard finally approved
As predicted last month, the IEEE has finally approved the 802.11n high-throughput wireless LAN standard.
Finalization of the new wireless networking standard–which is capable of delivering throughput speeds up to 300 megabits per second (and even higher)–took exactly seven years from the day it was conceived, or six years from the first draft version. The standard has been through a dozen or so draft versions.
News of the ratification broke via a blog post displaying an e-mail sent by Bruce Kraemer, longtime chairman of the 802.11n Task Group, to task group members. There has been no public announcement yet. Update 5:49 p.m. PDT: A press release has been issued.
(The 802.11n Task Group is part of the 802.11 Working Group, which oversees WLAN (wireless local-area network) standards. Task group members include the majority of Wi-Fi chipmakers, software developers, and equipment OEM vendors. Meru Networks, one of the members, posted the blog that broke the news.)
It’s likely, however, that final approval of the standard will be publicly announced by September 15, the date when Meru Networks puts on a public Webcast to provide answers about the ratification.
According to the Wi-Fi Alliance, the group that tests and certifies wireless products to ensure their interoperability, all existing Wi-Fi Certified Draft N wireless products will still work with the final standard.
802.11n offers much higher speeds than the previous, already-ratified 802.11g, which caps at only 54Mbps. Due to the compelling higher speed, most wireless vendors haven been offering 802.11n-based (also known as Wireless-N) products during the past six years and calling them Draft N products. Now the Draft is no more.
According to the Wi-Fi Alliance, most, if not all, of the existing equipment can be upgraded to the final specification via a firmware update. Finally, all future wireless networking products will be compatible with today’s products that have been Wi-Fi-certified.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-10351215-94.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Communication, Entertainment, Internet, Tech, wireless |
Tags: 802.11n, IEEE, wireless Lan |
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Microsoft sets up open-source foundation
Microsoft has created the nonprofit CodePlex Foundation to target increased communication between open-source communities and software companies.
Citing an under-representation of commercial software companies and their employees in open source, the CodePlex Foundation aims to work with particular projects to bridge the gap between the open-source and commercial worlds.
The Redmond giant has contributed $1 million to the foundation and has filled out its board and advisory panel with many Microsoft staffers, including Sam Ramji, who is leaving Microsoft as its open source point man but is also becoming CodePlex Foundation’s interim president.
Unlike other open-source foundations, such as the Mozilla Foundation and GNOME Foundation, the Foundation said on its Web site that it intends to address the full spectrum of software projects.
This is an unexpected and interesting move from Redmond. Don’t think that this is completely like other open-source foundations that you may be used to, though.
Take this line from the Codeplex Foundation FAQ: “We wanted a foundation that addresses a full spectrum of software projects, and does so with the licensing and intellectual property needs of commercial software companies in mind.”
Add to this that the About page states that companies will contribute code, not patents, and that is what I think will stop the existing open-source community from going anywhere near the CodePlex Foundation.
I can’t see any patent-encumbered CodePlex project being accepted into, or contributing code into, any large existing open-source project while still having the patent specter looming overhead–it’s something that the open-source community has tried to avoid whenever possible.
But this is probably not that audience that the Foundation is aiming for–it’s more likely to target purely Microsoft companies/developers and attempt to get them to open up a little. Allowing these companies to keep their patents will make it easier for them to engage in the Microsoft ecosystem but not in the wider open source world.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10805_3-10350671-75.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Microsoft, Open source, open source software, software, Tech |
Tags: CodePlex, Microsoft, Open source |
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Symantec tool calculates your data’s value to thieves
It’s no secret that criminals are stealing credit card and bank account data and selling it underground. But most people would find it shocking to learn just how little their sensitive personal information costs.
Symantec on Thursday is launching its Norton Online Risk Calculator, a tool that people can use to see how much their online information is worth on the black market. The tool also offers a risk rating based on demographics, online activity, and estimated value of online information.
I tried the tool when I was initially briefed on it a few months ago and was surveyed about my gender and age range; online assets (including credit card and bank account data, brokerage accounts, e-mail accounts, and social network accounts) and an estimated value of all that information; whether I use security software; how cautious I am when online; and how much I think my information is worth.
I use security software (and do my financial transactions mostly on a Mac at home), am fairly cautious while Web surfing, and didn’t put a high dollar figure on the value of my digital information. My security risk turned out to be 37 percent, or medium, and the black market worth of my online assets was calculated to be $11.29. Those figures didn’t change when I modified the gender, age, and estimated value of the data.
A recent Microsoft Research report concludes that stolen data offered for sale in underground IRC channels is difficult to monetize because of all the–get this–con artists there.
Regardless of whether the underground revenue figures are overblown, the data is being harvested, sometimes in huge batches, during data breaches at large payment processors, and there is a market for it.
It’s discomfiting to think a criminal could pay as little as $11 to get access to my sensitive personal data for identity fraud purposes, while I could end up spending lots of energy and time–years even–reporting the crime, trying to fix my credit rating, and getting my life back to normal.
Symantec isn’t trying to scare consumers with the Norton Online Risk Calculator, but to raise awareness of the risks, said Marian Merritt, Internet safety advocate at Symantec.
“We still find consumers who think using just antivirus is sufficient,” she said.
Merritt recommends that people use security suites that offer antivirus, firewall, and intrusion detection and prevention software, as well as keep their operating system and browsers updated.
Source :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10258549-245.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Symantec |
Tags: bank card, credit card, Norton Online Risk Calculator, Symantec |
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iPhone users aren’t the only ones to get cool apps
The long awaited flood of Google Android devices is about to hit the market, which should help bring more cool applications to new Android phones.
Motorola will be the next big manufacturer to announce its Android phone. The company plans to formally unveil it at an event on Thursday in San Francisco. Motorola has already been reaching out to developers to get them on board to create new applications that it hopes will drive demand for the new phones.
Mobile applications for smartphones are hot. The fact that Apple’s App Store has had more than one billion downloads after only being around for a year means that smartphone users are hungry for applications that make their phones more useful and fun. But developers, whether they are large or small, have limited resources and time, and they must choose which platforms to develop applications for first.
Full story :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-10348863-266.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
