Wide Angle: Technology to Save the World

May 04, 2009

Scientists are harnessing computing systems such as the Internet and embedded sensing networks to keep tabs on the world. What they learn could help us observe ecologies we've never seen before, identify endangered species and even see health trends that could adversely affect large populations. In this wide angle, we'll take a look at the technologies on mission to save the world.

• Podcast: Vodafone Wireless Innovation Project
  Vodafone operates in 25 countries, some of them developing nations, where things like infectious diseases and sudden natural disasters take heavy tolls. In response, it sponsored the Wireless Innovation Project. One hundred applicants submitted ideas that harnessed new and existing wireless technologies in pursuit of social good. Clark Boyd talks with the top three winners.

• Blog: Will the Internet Say "I Told You So"?
  The Internet is being eyed as a way to warn us about ecological catastrophe. Our current ecological monitoring systems just aren't fast enough -- looking for key words and patterns online from scientists, government officials, and casual observers could be more effective.

• IEEE Spectrum Feature: How To Master A Seismic Disaster
  When the next big earthquake strikes Tokyo, an early-warning system could help save lives and property.

• IM Interview: Curing the Mosquito to Stop Malaria
  Malaria is a complex disease that involves the interactions of three organisms: human, parasite, and mosquito. If scientists can interrupt any of these interactions, they could control the disease. Tracy Staedter chats with George Dimopoulos about the methods researchers are developing.

• Blog: Tech for the Developing World, Stat! Malaria
  Dr. Robert Malkin is a professor of bioengineering at Duke University and director for the Engineering World Health program. He recently spoke with me about key problem areas in the developing world and emerging solutions.

• News: Technology Saving the World
  From tagging to Twitter, researchers are developing and using new technologies to track endangered species, population growth and even diseases like the recent swine flu outbreak. Read how they do it and how it's helping people all over the world.

• Blog: Surgery Light, MacGyver-Style
  Periodic power outages are more than just annoying. They're dangerous, especially if one happens in the middle of surgery. Enter the pie-plate-bike-part-LED-battery lamp, designed by a University of Michigan student group.

• Blog: Tracking The Spread of the H1N1 Flu Virus
  People are going out of their way to track the H1N1 influenza virus (that's the swine flu) in real time over the Internet. HowStuffWorks explores how and why.

• Puzzle: Tracking the World
  Secret surveillance cameras and Internet maps are used to track everything from animals to flu outbreaks.

• Video: Text Messages Save Lives
  A text messaging-based program, called Mobiles in Malawi, is saving lives by connecting rural communities to hospitals. Kasey-Dee Gardner explain how it works.

• Top 10: Ways Cell Phones Help People Living in Poverty
  Cell phones are becoming ubiquitous, even in underdeveloped countries. This unprecedented penetration by a communications technology is clearly changing the face of the developing world for the better -- in some cases, in ways that not even the most visionary leaders anticipated.

• Top 10: Innovations for Impoverished People
  Two billion people in the world don't get enough to eat, approximately one billion live on less than a dollar a day and every year 1.4 million children die because they lack sanitary conditions and access to clean water. Some humanitarians think these numbers can be lowered with simple technologies. Here are 10 that are making a difference.

MORE DISCOVERY TECH WIDE ANGLES

Variety is the Spice of Tech

March 16, 2009

This week on Discovery Tech, we have a mix of stories, news, podcasts, blogs, puzzles and other articles. Come back daily to check 'em out.

Monday: Clark Boyd's Technology Podcast. CCTV in the U.K., Corporate Snooping in Germany, U.S. DriveCams, and the EYEborg.
A bit of theme runs through this week's Technology Podcast from PRI's The World. That theme is surveillance. In fact, we take a hard look at all manner of technologies and entities that are, in fact, looking at you.

Tuesday: Puzzle. Biofuels made from sustainable crops are showing promise. And scientists are looking at everything from Algae to Jatropa.

Wednesday: Engineering Works podcast. Gene Charleton looks at how food engineers are using a microwave-like device and irradiation to get rid of unpleasant bacteria like salmonella and E-coli that can make us sick.

Thursday: Slideshow. Math Model Grows Snowflakes

Friday: Top 10 Uses for the Large Hadron Collider

Image: David Griffeath

Weekly Preview -- Dec 8

December 08, 2008

Monday, Dec. 8
Magnet Meltdown
Why did the Large Hadron Collider break down and how do scientists and engineers plan to fix it? Clark Boyd sheds light on this and other technology with his weekly podcast. Listen in.

Video: The Skinny On Clean Rooms
Some people wear business suits to work, but scientists who build semiconductors wear "bunny suits.” Tracy Staedter and Kasey-Dee Gardner learn the ins and outs of clean room couture.

Tuesday, Dec. 9
Solve the Biomimetic Robot Puzzle

Guest Spot Invitation blog: Student researcher David Ellis talks about his area of research and what it's like to be a freshly designated PhD researchers who's still a little wet behind the ears.

Wednesday, Dec. 10
Engineering Works! podcast, courtesy Texas A&M University's Gene Charleton.

Thursday, Dec. 11
The Top 10 languages on the Internet. Can you guess what they are?

Friday, Dec. 12
Opalescent nano-sized particles are being developed for use in drug delivery, special coatings, sensors and more. See the slide show featuring different views of these beautiful nanojewels.

On Deck for the Week of Nov. 24

November 24, 2008

Monday, Nov. 24: Podcast from Clark Boyd. Among lots of things, he'll be talking about how experts are trying to reduce internet scams.

Tuesday, Nov. 25: It's Thanksgiving week and everyone is getting on the road. And you know that means traffic accidents and traffic jams. Jorge Ribas has a video for us about "roads of the future" where cars talk to each other, to the roadside and even to other people's mobile phones—all to make driving safer and smoother.

Wednesday, Nov. 26: Our weekly podcast from Gene Charleton. Venice is sinking. Or rather, the sea around it is rising. The Italian government is spending $4 billion on an engineering project to save it. Listen to what it's all about.

Thursday, Nov. 27: We need to dramatically reduce CO2 in the atmosphere. So, how? For starters, we can stop pumping it into the air. But Kurt Zenz House and Julie Shoemaker of Harvard University think we should be burying it in the ground. They give us their take.

Friday, Nov. 28: Guest blog from David Alexander Ellis. Does Social Stimuli Expand Time? Recently graduated PhD student, David Ellis, tells us about his area of study and what it's like to be starting down the path of research. Read his guest blog.

Green Roofs, Warp Engines and Cheap Solar Power

August 01, 2008

These are the coolest stories I read this past week.

July 25 / Scientific American
Urban Roofscapes: Using "Wasted" Rooftop Real Estate to an Ecological Advantage
How a green roof can minimize run-off and mitigate the urban “heat island effect.”

July 25 / BBC
HP's Plan to Fix Ailing Planet
Trillions of sensors deployed worldwide will monitor the state of the planet and pick up ailments (wildfires, hurricanes, bacteria, hazardous chemicals) that may need to be warded off or remedied.

July 26 / The New York Times
China Surpasses U.S. in Number of Internet Users
Is anyone surprised? I'm so not surprised that I almost didn't put this on the list. You're right. I'm taking it off. 

July 28 / Discovery News
Warp Drive Engine Would Travel Faster Than Light
Gather 'round Trekkies. Your time has come. Two physicists have figured out warp drive works without breaking the laws (of physics, that is).

July 28 / Scientific American
Engineering Silicon Solar Cells to Make Photovoltaic Power Affordable
One company is on a mission to get the cost of solar cells down to a buck a watt. Those are light bulb prices that would make energy from the sun competitive with that from coal-burning power plants.

July 28 / The New York Times
Former Employees of Google Prepare Rival Search Engine
This company pronounces their name, Cuil, as "cool." That, and the fact that they are trying to upstage Google, makes me narrow my eyes with skepticism.

July 30 / Nature
Energy: Upgrading the Grid
What it takes to make a stupid power grid super smaht.

July 30 / Wired
Project to Rebuild Internet Gets $12M, Bandwidth
There's a project dedicated to rebuilding the Internet's underlying architecture? Whoa. I didn't even know about that.

July 30 / BBC
Olympic Link to Early 'Computer'
A closer look at an ancient Greek timepiece discovered in 1901 reveals that it has dials that record the dates of the original Olympic games.

July 31 / Technology Trends
OmegaTable, A 24-million Pixel VR Display
This virtual reality display is a multi-sensory touch tabletop that gives people a 3D experience without looking like a giant dork in those special glasses.

July 31 / Technology Review
3-D Printing for the Masses
This printing service takes orders from customers and turns ideas into three-dimensional prototypes at an affordable cost. If you're an artist, architect, designer, or general hobbyist, you might want to read this article.

July 31 / The Guardian
Sweet Peas Make a Second Skin
Didn't know this, but an enzyme in sweet pea pods and seeds can cause floppy skin in grazing animals. That's totally weird. But that same enzyme, when used in a polymer gel wound dressing, could relieve shrinking or lumpy skin grafts on burn victims.

July 31 / Economist
Genetically Modified Olympians?
You can detect performance-enhancing drugs, for the most part, but how do you detect gene therapy?

July 31 / New Scientist
Solar-Cell Material Can Soak Up More Sun
The sun cranks out a ton of energy, but conventional solar cells are only able to absorb the visible light part of the sun's spectrum. A new material that absorbs the infrared could, in theory take energy absorption from 30 percent to 63 percent.

Atom-Fusing Laser, Robotic Jellyfish, Invisibility Carpet, A Pregnancy Gene and More

July 18, 2008

These are the coolest tech stories I discovered this past week.

July 12 / The New York Times
Can’t Find a Parking Spot? Check Smartphone
If you live a big city, then you know what it's like to drive around and around looking for that elusive parking spot. But starting this fall, San Franciscans will be in for a treat. The city is testing the use of wireless sensors that will communicate to street signs or a smartphone the availability of free spaces. Now just don't run anyone over trying to get the spot first.

July 13 / Guardian
Doctors Rage At Being Rated Online
As a big fan of AngiesList and Yelp, I'm all for a Web site that will allow patients to rate their doctors online. Isn't it all about referrals anyway? And health care is a service for which we pay big bucks. So suck it up, GPs, and get with the times.

July 15 / Discovery News
Giant Laser in the Works to Achieve Fusion
Wouldn't Dr. Evil love this "laser?" It can't blow up the planet, but at 10 stories tall and 400 feet long, it will create enough heat and pressure to fuse atoms and create helium. The reaction will release massive amounts of environmentally friendly energy and enough helium to keep us all talking about it with high squeaky voices.

July 15 / New Scientist
Dirt-Repelling Tube Promises Cheap, Pure Water
Man, we've really messed up the world's water supply. Most of it can't be consumed without being purified first, and that's not good for people living in developing worlds. But a a new way of purifying water could offer a simple solution. The technique uses a material that naturally attracts water while at the same time repelling impurities.

July 15 / BBC
The Importance of Being There
You have to really not like your surroundings (or yourself?) to prefer a virtual world over reality. But even still, VR environments have a long way to go before they will supplant this world, says regular columnist Bill Thompson.

July 16 / Wired
Obama Wages Cyberwar
Even though the Bush administration has initiated a $30 billion effort to beef up cyber security, Obama says its too little too late.

July 16 / Popular Science
Robotic Jellyfish Just Like the Real Thing, But Without the Sting
Sure, it's great that the AquaJelly has sensors, a short-range radio system, LEDs for illumination and communication and is coated with conductive metal paint that helps it connect with a nearby charging station, but I think they're dern pretty and I sure wish I had one. Hint hint.

July 16 / Wired
Army Wants 'Psychologically Inspired' Robot Vision
Robots score a big "duh" when it comes to vision. They just can't see the world we do. That's why the Army has put out an APB for a "psychologically inspired object recognition system." But do we really want robots seeing the world through our eyes? What if they notice what a bunch of doofuses we are?

July 17 / Discovery News
Invisible Carpet Idea Close to Actual Invisibility
Invisibility cloaks are great for hiding giant spaceships, but an invisibility carpet is just way more practical. Scientists have created a material that can hide objects in visible light. My question: If we can't see it, how will we know it's working? (See what I mean about being a doofus.)

July 17 / Popular Science
A Gene for Baby Makin’
This could put an end to birth control pills, foams and devices and eliminate the need for testicle snipping. Scientists have located the gene that both regulates and blocks ovulation.

July 17 / Wired
Why China's Olympian Efforts to Clean Up Beijing's Air Won't Work.
China is doing a bunch of stuff to clean up the air in time for the Olympics. Smoking bans, traffic bans and turning off power plants to name of few. But it might not make any difference.

Photo: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

The Week (According to Me)

July 13, 2008

Bionic humans, crowdsourcing the flu vaccine, lemony socks and solar concentrators. These are the coolest tech related stories I read this past week.

July 4 / Guardian
2b or Not 2b
Language is like life. It evolves. Get over it and stop fretting so darn much over whether text messaging will destroy linguistics. In fact, according to professor David Crystal, it improves children's writing and spelling.

July 4 / New Scientist
Do We Have the Technology to Build a Bionic Human?
Scientist can engineer organs, bones, retinas and much, much more. (Yet they still haven't found a way to prevent baldness. Huh.)

July 4 / Guardian
It's the Screens, Not the Internet, That are Making Us Stupid
We may be reading less, but we're staring at computer screens way more. It's enough to give you a stupid headache.

July 7 / Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends
Lemon-Filled Odorless Socks
What's better: socks that smell like citrus? Or those that smell like cheese? You make the call.

July 7 / Wired
Researchers Track Disease With Google News, Google.org Money
What year is it now? 2008. Right. To World Health Organization: Welcome to the age of the Interwebosphere. Finally, you've put together a website that can be used to track new disease outbreaks.

July 9 / Webmonkey
Yahoo’s New ‘Build Your Own’ Search Engine Nips at Google’s Lead
Yikes. Yahoo has a new open source initiative that could allow outside web developers to hack into the company's search engine code to produce customized results and mashups. Yahoo is doing it to compete with search engine giant, Google. Will David defeat Goliath? Duh, duh, duh, duh (dramatic music). Stay tuned.

July 9 / Wired
Nanotubes Hold Promise for Next-Generation Computing
It's carbon nanotube this and carbon nanotube that. Blah, blah, blah. It's all lab talk. Show me the money, man.

July 9 / New York Times
Designing Cars for Low-Carbon Chic
Lighter and sleeker automatically improve gas mileage without even tinkering with the engine. Not only that, but these kinds of cars will just look cool.

July 10 / Discovery News
Implant Designed to Shrink Waistline
Wouldn't an implant for the waistline, by definition, make the midsection bigger? Au, contraire, Monfraire. This one quells hunger pangs and the desire to feed one's pie hole.

July 10 / Super Duper Sustainable Tech
Solar-Powered Home, No Panels Needed
Special dyes designed to capture specific spectrums of sunlight could turn regular old windows into  solar-harnessing power panels. That's genius-level thinking, guys.

July 10 / Wired
Crowdsourcing the Flu Vaccine
More words about how the internet (via data sharing and networking) could help health workers develop a better flu vaccine.

July 10 / IEEE Spectrum
Our First Electric Cars May Be Trucks
Personally, I'd like an electric scooter, but more fuel-efficient trucks could sure help bring those food prices down. 

Steel-melting solar mirror, eco-friendly fireworks, freeing oneself from email's grip and more!

July 04, 2008

June 27 / The New York Times
Data Centers Explore Novel Ways to Cut Energy Use
Data centers make the Web possible. Make my job possible. But electricity consumed by microprocessors in those data center is rising by 16 percent per year. That kind of voracious appetite for energy is expensive and not very green. But people at the recent Data Center Energy Summit are brainstorming solutions to curb the beast's energy appetite, including reusing hot water from cooling systems to filling a town's swimming pool.

June 28 / The New York Times
I Freed Myself From E-Mail’s Grip
Gasp! This guy stopped using email. On purpose. His server didn't even go down or anything!

June 29 / Guardian
Calls for ID Card to Replace Passwords
Passwords be damned! Finally, an industry group known as the Information Card Foundation is advocating that we replace our passwords with an electronic ID card. Advantages: security and signing in just once.

June 30 / Guardian
Welcome to the Particle Menagerie
Up, down, top, bottom, charm, strange, axions, sleptons and quarks. How do physicists dream up such whimsical names for the fundamental particles they discover? Simon Singh explains

June 30 /  Guardian
The Brains Behind the Operation
Cern scientists have invented a new way to network computers, and it could be the next leap forward in computing.

June 30 / Discovery News
Meet the Steel-Melting Solar Mirror
Enterprising kids know you can melt crayons by focusing light on them with a magnifying glass. MIT students are now vaporizing wood, and can theoretically melt steel, by focusing sunlight with mirrors.

July 1 / Popular Science
Powering Cars With Toxic Waste
Scientists invent a uranium-eating molecule that could help turn nuclear junk into fuel.

July 1 / Technology Trends
Toward Eco-Friendly Fireworks
Researchers are developing new pyrotechnic formulas that burn cleaner and produce less smoke.

July 1 / Scientific American
Farming Solar Energy in Space
Japanese scientists are working on the hardware needed to realize orbital generators as a form of clean, renewable energy, with plans to complete a prototype in about 20 years.

July 1 / The New York Times
Google’s Ethos, Applied to Dining
Crowdsourcing sommeliers and open source recipes. Let's eat.

July 1 / Guardian
Hybrid Embryos: U.K. Team Plans Stem Cell First
British scientists got the okay from their gov to create the world's first human stem cells from embryos that are part human and part animal.

July 2 / Nature
How to Weave an Invisible Rug
You've heard of an invisibility cloak. Researchers calculate that a carpet, not a cloak, would be the most realistic kind of cloaking device. It would produce a controlled mirage.

July 2 / The New York Times
Obama Voters Protest His Switch on Telecom Immunity
Senator Barack Obama’s Web site has netted him lots-o cash. Now it's netted him lots-o backlash. When followers heard he supported legislation granting legal immunity to telecommunications companies that cooperated with the Bush administration’s program of wiretapping without warrants, they protested electronically.

July 3 / Wired
Laugh at High Gas Prices With a 282-MPG VW
Fuel efficiency seems like oxymoron. But now Volkswagen is upping the ante with a new bullet-shaped car that gets triple-digit mpg. Muh-ha-ha-ha-ha.

July 3 / Scientific American
Who Will Die?: Computer Predicts Which Death Row Inmates Will Be It
Sounds like a gruesome game that no one would want to play. But the predictions could actually lead to a fairer appeals process.

July 3 / The New York Times
See Spot Run. Now Find Out Where He Went.
Track everyone, everything with GPS, for under $130.

July 3 / Guardian
Environment: Climate Risk From Flat-Screen TV
The rising demand for flat-screen televisions could have a greater impact on global warming than the world's largest coal-fired power stations, a leading environmental scientist warned yesterday.

July 3 / IEEE Spectrum Online
Crimeware Pays
Adware, phishing, and spam are a strange -- and big -- business.

July 3 / IEEE Spectrum Online
Iraq Electricity, By the Numbers
The scorching truth about electricity use and need in Iraq.

The Week (According to Me)

June 27, 2008

I've read and scanned hundreds of articles this week from some of the big technology mags and papers. Here are the stories that stood out for me. Let me know if I missed anything.

June 20 / The Engineer
Matching Tatoos
Researchers have created a system that could allow police to identify individuals by matching marks on their body with those stored in a computer database.

June 21 / Guardian
Boss Hu Avoids Tricky Questions In Online Chat
Chinese president, Hu Jintao, made his mark with a four-minute online debut in front of the world's biggest population of Internet users.

June 23 / Guardian
Contraceptive Pill Goes On Sale Online
Women will be able to order the contraceptive pill online from today without having to visit a doctor or clinic.

June 23 / Discovery News
Flying Saucer Craft Set to Fly
A new wingless, saucer-shaped aircraft is scheduled to take to the skies. Just don't call it a UFO.

June 23 / Guardian
Hydrogen Cars and Hot Air
The new breed of hydrogen fuel cell-powered auto isn't as environmentally friendly as you think

June 23 / New Scientist
PC Population Reaches a Billion as E-Waste Piles Up
The number of personal computers in use around the world has surpassed one billion, research firm Gartner reports.

June 23 / Technology Review
Curating Yourself Online
In the old days, the issue was keeping your data secret. Now, the challenge is making sure your data isn't mixed up with someone else's, and controlling it as it spreads out over the Web. This means managing and curating it.

June 24 / Wired
Greener Jet Engine Could Reduce Aviation's Carbon Footprint
One of the biggest names in aviation has developed a jet engine that is more efficient, less polluting and cheaper to use than almost everything else in the sky, and it could revolutionize an industry facing skyrocketing fuel prices and mounting pressure to clean up its act.

June 24 / The Engineer
100 miles per gallon
A experimental version of a 2006 Toyota Prius sedan modified by U.S. researchers at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has achieved a record 100 miles per gallon.

June 24 / The New York Times
The High-Tech Job Capital Is…The Big Apple?
If you’re looking for a tech job in the United States, the best place to go is not Silicon Valley. It’s New York.

June 24 / Popular Science
Oscillate Wildly
Metronomes generally keep their own beat -- that's why we love them -- but when several get together, a compromise is hammered out.

June 24, 2008 / ScienceDaily
Building Giant 'Nanoassemblies' That Sense Their Environment
Researchers in Texas are reporting the design, construction, and assembly of nano-size building blocks into the first giant structures that can sense and respond to changes in environmental conditions.

June 25 / The New York Times
U.S. High Tech Said to Slip
The United States may be synonymous with the high-tech revolution, but it is in danger of losing its high-tech edge, according to Cybercities 2008, a report released Tuesday by AeA, a technology industry trade association.

June 26 / Guardian
Website Domain Names: Any Suffixes Could Be Possible After Landmark Vote
Icann, the organisation that regulates the internet domain name system, has passed a landmark vote to relax rules limiting web addresses to "top-level" suffixes, such as .com and .uk, a move that could see people and companies register almost anything they want.

June 26, 2008 / ScienceDaily
Cooperative System Could Wipe Out Car Alarm Noise
The persistent, annoying blare of an ignored car alarm may become a sound of the past if a cooperative, mutable and silent network of monitors proposed by Penn State researchers is deployed in automobiles and parking lots.

June 26 / Technology Review
Want to Enhance Your Brain Power?
Research hints that electrically stimulating the brain can speed learning.

The Week (According to Me)

June 20, 2008

Don't spend all that time scanning your RSS feed reader. Just read my list.

13 June 08 / The Atlantic
Is Google Making Us Stupid?
Nick Carr writes about how the Internet is changing the way we think.

June 13 / Tech Crunch
Quillpill: A Twitter For Cell-Phone Novelists
Even if they could, few people have the time to write a book. But what if they could Twitter one? For all those aspiring novelists out there, Quillpill might be the app to get them started.

13 June 08 / Guardian
Where Are All the Older Female Geeks?
Since starting her blog, Natalie d'Arbeloff has found that she is not the only older woman in the cybervillage. But they are still in the minority. Come on, she says, what are you waiting for?

June 13 / Wired
Potential New Weapon Against TB: Free Cell Minutes
Researchers at MIT believe they've discovered a new weapon in the battle against tuberculosis: Free cell phone minutes. For years, doctors have struggled to get some TB patients to take all their medication, which generally involves a six-month regimen of multiple drugs. Now a student-led group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has developed a way to use cell phones to let patients test themselves. And if the tests show patients are following doctor's orders, they get rewarded with free minutes.

June 13 / Wired
IBM's Drumming Car Reads Your Lips. Seriously
The people at IBM are hard at work developing technology we never knew we don't need -- a steering wheel that reads your lips, responds to your facial expressions and turns into a drum machine. Tapping out a beat on the steering wheel while jamming to your favorite tunes will never be the same again.

June 13 / Technology Review
Doubling Laptop Battery Life
Intel's new integrated power management could dramatically reduce power consumption in your laptop by shutting down operations not being used.

June 13 / Technology Review
You've Had a Genetic Test. Now What?
A new project aims to incorporate the results of genetic screening into medicine.

June 16 / Discovery
Robots to Become Lovers, Predict Researchers
Romantic human-robot relationships are no longer the stuff of science fiction -- researchers expect them to become reality within four decades.

June 16 / Science Daily
Using Brainwaves To Chat And Stroll Through Second Life: World's First
On 7th June 2008, Keio University succeeded in the world’s first demonstration experiment with the help of a disabled person to use brainwave to chat and stroll through the virtual world.

June 16 / Nanowerk
NASA nanotechnology research into shape-shifting airplanes
Aircraft of the future will not be built of traditional, multiple, mechanically connected parts and systems. Instead, aircraft wing construction will employ fully integrated, nanotechnology enabled embedded 'smart' materials and actuators that will enable aircraft wings with unprecedented levels of aerodynamic efficiencies and aircraft control.

June 17 / BBC News
Victim of Its Own Success
Life without the internet is unimaginable for the millions who use it every day. But one of the world's leading academics on the impact of the net warns we could be facing its destruction.

June 17 / New York Times
Philadelphia Revives Citywide Wi-Fi Project
Philadelphia revived an effort on Tuesday to provide free citywide wireless Internet access in a project to be run by a new group of investors. The city aims to provide free-of-charge outdoor Web access throughout its 135 square miles, which would be the largest area covered by public Wi-fi of any U.S. city.

June 17 / Webmonkey
Clock Browser Speeds with Webmonkey’s Stopwatch
With Firefox 3, Opera 9.5 and Safari all claiming “faster than ever” speeds with its latest versions, we started wondering which one is really the fastest. After loading some pages and scratching our heads, we hacked together a small JavaScript stopwatch to find out.

June 17 / Discovery
Talking Robofish to Swim in Puget Sound
Marine creatures have communicated with each other for millions of years. Now swimming robots can too.

June 18 / Scientific American
Hands On Computing: How Multi-touch Screens Could Change The Way We Interact With Computers and Each Other
Multi-touch computing could one day free us from the mouse as our primary computer interface, the way the mouse freed us from keyboards.

June 18 / Scientific American
Wi-Maxing That Wireless Internet Connection
A wireless technology called Wi-Max has a much bigger range than Wi-Fi, making it possible to supply wireless internet accessibility to large areas with a few base stations. Christopher Intagliata reports.

June 19 / Etherized
Snail (And We Do Mean Snail) Mail
A group of artists, whose URL reads "boredomresearch," have created Real Snail Mail, the world's first web mail service using live snails. Yep. Three snails (Cecil, Austin and Muriel) have been fitted with RFID chips and antennae that can pick up data from hardware located in their enclosure. You fill out an email form, hit send and they take things from there.

June 19 / Technovelgy
Never-Stop Rail Transit System Proposed
Taiwanese inventor Peng Yu-lun imagines a main track with a large commuter train that does not stop. The train is serviced by smaller train cars that drop off new passengers while picking up those who wish to leave the train.

June 19 / The Engineer
Solar System
A team from MIT has tested a prototype of a new solar power system that consists of a 12ft-wide dish made from a frame of thin, aluminium tubing and strips of mirror.

June 19 / Discovery
New 'Terminator' Robots Go in Harm's Way
IRobot, best known for their cute Roomba robotic vacuum cleaner, has teamed up with Metal Storm, purveyors of the million-rounds-per-minute electric gun, to create a slick, Terminator-like war robot for the U.S. military.

June 19 / New Scientist
Scrapping MPG Could Boost Sales of Greener Cars
What sounds like an arithmetic brain teaser could in fact hold the key to reducing the amount of gas consumed by Americans – and by extension their CO2 emissions. Richard Larrick and Jack Soll of Duke University in the US say that a simple switch from expressing a car's fuel efficiency in miles per gallon (mpg) to gallons per 100 miles makes it much easier for people to assess how much money they could save on fuel.