Category: Interesting Reads

New thought on the creation of the great pyramids

I was just discussing at work today with a colleague the topic of the construction of the great pyramids. I posted on the site here last year a bit about new thinking on the process, and today found another article about possible casting work done in the creation of the pyramids.

The widely accepted theory-that the pyramids were crafted of carved-out giant limestone blocks that workers carried up ramps-had not only not been embraced by everyone, but as important had quite a number of holes.

According to the caller, the mysteries had actually been solved by Joseph Davidovits, Director of the Geopolymer Institute in St. Quentin, France, more than two decades ago. Davidovits claimed that the stones of the pyramids were actually made of a very early form of concrete created using a mixture of limestone, clay, lime, and water.

Continue reading “New thought on the creation of the great pyramids”

Console sales at 6 months

Some clever person has put together a chart showing sales figures for the first six months for recent consoles. The numbers are rather interesting, I think, and suggest last year’s claims about the Wii being a certain-to-fail doom and downfall plan for Nintendo were off base. Of course, I also think everyone who pays attention to the gaming market already realize that the Wii is beating up on everything else out there except for the Nintendo DS, and that last year’s predictions of Nintendo’s death were very wrong.

firstsixmonths.jpgTo steal a term coined by Kotaku, I put together the above charticle juxtaposing the first six month console sales of Wii, 360, PS3, PS2, Xbox, and GameCube. First, the Wii has sold better than the mighty PS2 after the first six months. Amazingly, both the PS3 and 360 sold worse than the GameCube for the same period (!). Cumulative first six month totals in units sold are as follows:

  1. Wii (2,470,000)
  2. PS2 (2,200,000)
  3. Xbox (1,900,000)
  4. GameCube (1,540,000)
  5. Xbox 360 (1,384,000)
  6. PS3 (1,271,000)


The article doesn’t specify initially that these are measures of US sales, but later verbiage in the article makes me think that’s the message. I’m guessing Sony isn’t that happy with these numbers, given that the PlayStation 3 sold around 81,000 consoles last month, putting them way behind Nintendo and Microsoft.

[tags]Recent console sales for first six months[/tags]

More signs of PATRIOT act abuse

It seems like I’m the only one who cares about this, but I keep posting it to remind people how much our government has been abusing unnecessary powers granted by a bad law in response the the September 11th attack. As the subject title indicates, I’m talking about PATRIOT act abuse here. In particular, here’s the details on a news program which reviews some specific instances of illegal monitoring, data mining, and spying on American citizens.

“So many people in America think this does not affect them. They’ve been convinced that these programs are only targeted at suspected terrorists. … I think that’s wrong. … Our programs are not perfect, and it is inevitable that totally innocent Americans are going to be affected by these programs,” former CIA senior attorney Suzanne Spaulding tells FRONTLINE correspondent Hedrick Smith in Spying on the Home Front, airing Tuesday, May 15, 2007, at 9 P.M. ET on PBS (check local listings) and available for viewing after broadcast at www.pbs.org/frontline .

. . .

President Bush described his anti-terrorist measures as narrow and targeted, but a FRONTLINE investigation has found that the National Security Agency (NSA) has engaged in wiretapping and sifting Internet communications of millions of Americans: The FBI conducted a data sweep on 250,000 Las Vegas vacationers, and along with more than 50 other agencies, they are mining commercial-sector data banks to an unprecedented degree, and they have even been assigning suspicion ratings to anyone who travels across a U.S. border.

. . .

Although the president told the nation that his NSA eavesdropping program was limited to known Al Qaeda agents or supporters abroad making calls into the U.S., comments of other administration officials and intelligence veterans indicate that the NSA cast its net far more widely. AT&T technician Mark Klein inadvertently discovered that the whole flow of Internet traffic in several AT&T operations centers was being regularly diverted to the NSA, a charge indirectly substantiated by John Yoo, the Justice Department lawyer who wrote the official legal memos legitimizing the president’s warrantless wiretapping program. Yoo told FRONTLINE: “The government needs to have access to international communications so that it can try to find communications that are coming into the country where Al Qaeda’s trying to send messages to cell members in the country. In order to do that, it does have to have access to communication networks.”

Spying on the Home Front also looks at a massive FBI data sweep in December 2003. On a tip that Al Qaeda “might have an interest in Las Vegas” around New Year’s 2004, the FBI demanded records from all hotels, airlines, rental car agencies, casinos and other businesses on every person who visited Las Vegas in the run-up to the holiday. Stephen Sprouse and Kristin Douglas of Kansas City, Missouri, object to being caught in the FBI dragnet in Las Vegas just because they happened to get married there at the wrong moment. Says Douglas, “I’m sure that the government does a lot of things that I don’t know about, and I’ve always been OK with that–until I found out that I was included.”

And there is a lot more to the article. I will not be home to watch or record the program (and my wife has filled the DVR with Star Trek episodes…), but thanks to the great wonder that is the Internet, I’ll be downloading it and watching it later. (via Tingilinde)

[tags]Reviewing more PATRIOT act abuse, Looking inside government agency’s abuses of the PATRIOT act[/tags]

Cell phones might not be killing bees

I realize this might be a difficult claim to accept, especially if you are my wife, but there is some evidence that I was right. At least, there is evidence that I was right when I recently claimed that cell phones weren’t killing all the bees. Instead, a new theory is coming out saying that a deadly fungus may be causing Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). The scientists behind this thought have said this is very early preliminary information, and they don’t think they can say yet that the CCD issue has been solved. However, the idea looks to be gaining traction when you see reports from other scientists.

A fungus that caused widespread loss of bee colonies in Europe and Asia may be playing a crucial role in the mysterious phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder that is wiping out bees across the United States, UC San Francisco researchers said Wednesday.

. . .

But the results are “highly preliminary” and are from only a few hives from Le Grand in Merced County, UCSF biochemist Joe DeRisi said. “We don’t want to give anybody the impression that this thing has been solved.”

Other researchers said Wednesday that they too had found the fungus, a single-celled parasite called Nosema ceranae, in affected hives from around the country – as well as in some hives where bees had survived. Those researchers have also found two other fungi and half a dozen viruses in the dead bees.

N. ceranae is “one of many pathogens” in the bees, said entomologist Diana Cox-Foster of Pennsylvania State University. “By itself, it is probably not the culprit … but it may be one of the key players.”

There is still quite a bit of research to do to verify this, it seems. But as the article notes, other scientists are seeing this same fungus in the hives they are checking. And I would like to add that there is no evidence that I am right on anything else, nor evidence that I have ever been right before, nor evidence that I will ever be right again. Just in case you think maybe my wife should start giving me a little slack and listening when I say something.

[tags]Possible culprit found for disappearance of bees[/tags]

Legislation offered to set net-radio fees based on revenues

You might remember that I recently wrote about new use fees set for music played on Internet based radio stations. These fees were determined using costs and figures from the dot-com boom time when everything was overvalued by an order of magnitude or more. The new use fees were set so high that nearly all Internet radio stations would have to pay more than pre-tax earnings, effectively killing net-radio. A new bill has been put forward that would legislate the rate at 7.5 percent of revenues (the same as satellite radio broadcasters pay) instead.

A bill introduced in Congress today could nullify the new rates set by the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) which advocates say would put webcasters out of business.

Rep. Jay Inslee (D-WA) and Rep. Don Manzullo (R-IL) have headed the “Internet Radio Equality Act,” which aims to stop the controversial March 2 decision which puts royalty of a .08 cent per song per listener, retroactively from 2006 to 2010 on internet radio.

I’m not generally in favor of the government getting in and messing with private business affairs like this. Given the Copyright Royalty Boards unwillingness to consider realistic pricing schedules, however, this is the only way to get reasonable rates set that I can see outside of letting the current fees kill off net-radio. Then the CRB would have to reset fees far lower so the 2nd wave of net-radio stations could be created and actually get valid rates. (via slashdot)

[tags]New bill to legislate net-radio fees based on revenues[/tags]

Have you had your head checked lately?

Have you ever wondered if your spouse is dead or just not interested in putting out for you? Have you ever wanted to check someone for epilepsy? Shoot, have you ever just wanted to see the brain waves of someone you know while they slept?

Well, thanks to the tireless efforts of hardware and software hackers from around the world, you now have a way to build and use your own EEG for home use. Of course, I doubt you’ll be able to use the information for any valid clinical diagnosis. Still, it’s a pretty cool project, and completely open-source.

Many people are interested in what is called neurofeedback or EEG biofeedback training, a generic mental training method which makes the trainee consciously aware of the general activity in the brain. This method shows great potential for improving many mental capabilities and exploring consciousness. Other people want to do experiments with brain-computer interfaces or just want to have a look at their brain at work.

Unfortunately, commercial EEG devices are generally too expensive to become a hobbyist tool or toy.

The OpenEEG project is about making plans and software for do-it-yourself EEG devices available for free (as in GPL). It is aimed toward amateurs who would like to experiment with EEG. However, if you are a pro in any of the fields of electronics, neurofeedback, software development etc., you are of course welcome to join the mailing-list and share your wisdom.

On the other hand, it’s a pricey project to try out:

The designers have done their best to create a safe device, but knowing whether the effort is good enough is a completely different matter (an $8000 matter actually). Therefore: everything is provided as is, without any warranty of any kind, expressed or implied.

If you build one, let me know – I’ll volunteer to try it out for you.

[tags]Open source EEG, Check your own bravewaves with this make-it-at-home project[/tags]

Traffic explosion for the Blahg

I’ve held steady under 1 Gig of bandwidth since launching a year and a half back (under 100 Meg initially, in fact). Because there is so little traffic here, I’ve been able to get by with some low price hosting ever since launching. In the past 3-4 months, however, traffic has exploded on the site, jumping from less than 50 visitors a day in November and December last year to several hundred visits plus 1500-2000 RSS hits per day in the past few weeks. Just how much a jump counts as an explosion in my view? Well, here’s traffic stats by month from the beginning of the year:

blahgstats-20070427.jpg

And let me point out that the bandwidth counter is missing some traffic, as I received a warning Sunday night for passing 80% of my cap (10 Gig per month). Total traffic on my site is as follows:

Continue reading “Traffic explosion for the Blahg”

Who is to blame for the Virginia Tech slayings?

It’s really easy to answer the question “Who is to blame for the Virginia Tech slayings?” – the shooter is to blame. However, there are going to be many, many, many, many other people, ideas, and entities blamed for the shooting. To see where the tally is, I recommend checking out The Blame Game for an up-to-date count. Here are just a few (my comments in parentheses after each blame):

It’s the fault of violent video games. (I was expecting idiot Jack would make this claim – glad to see someone tracking this info)

It’s the first victim’s fault. (it is shameful that anyone would even suggest this one)

It’s the Second Amendment’s fault. (Hey, didn’t I already cover this? Why yes, yes I did)

It’s the GOP’s fault.

It’s the Democrats’ fault. (glad we have blame for the left and the right here)

It’s the fault that schools teach that the theory of evolution is fact. (sure – let’s just jump from blaming the schools and blame Darwin himself)

As I write this, the list is up to 56, and more additions are being made based on commentors’ responses. Drop by and see who or what is to blame. This will make it easier for you to join in discussions that avoid blaming the pathetic loser who made up persecution so he could die a cowardly death while believing he was doing something grand.

[tags]Who is to blame for the Virginia Tech slayings?, Blaming everyone and everything except the shooter for the Virginia Tech shootings[/tags]

Salon.com in favor of taking away Americans’ rights

There is a lot of good commentary on Salon.com, in my opinion, even though there is a massive liberal bias to what is published there. I recently paid for a subscription because there was enough on the site that I wanted to read but couldn’t that I felt it was worth investing a few dollars to be able to access it. However, the latest article I’ve read on Salon would sound to me like the creation of any of a large number of well known conservatives (also on video so you can hear it yourself) trying to restrict out rights and freedoms were it attacking any American right other than the 2nd amendment guarantee of our right to bear arms. But rather than the more well-known conservative grabs for restricting Americans’ rights that we’ve seen recently, this Salon article is a liberal call to repeal the 2nd amendment, claiming (in reference to the recent Virginia Tech massacre) &147;hitting the delete button on the Second Amendment surely would lower the odds against future mayhem.&148; Maybe I’m a moron, but I don’t see that ridding the US of the 2nd amendment would necessarily and assuredly lead to the reduction in odds of future mayhem. On the other hand, I do believe that allowing students with carry permits to actually carry firearms on campus would lead to fewer victims in future cases, simply because those most in danger are also best set up to defend themselves. But like I said – maybe I’m just a moron for thinking that.

April 18, 2007 | WASHINGTON — Fifteen unambiguous words are all that would be required to quell the American-as-apple-pie cycle of gun violence that has now tearfully enshrined Virginia Tech in the record book of mass murder. Here are the 15 words that would deliver a mortal wound to our bang-bang culture of death: “The second article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.”

Continue reading “Salon.com in favor of taking away Americans’ rights”

Your GPS could be lying to you

“Warning! Undead pirate zombie ninja battle ahead!!!” Someday soon, such an alert could come to you on your GPS system. Well, maybe not quite the end-of-fucking-civilization(TM) alert that undead pirate zombie ninjas would dictate (yes, I just said the end of civilization would hinge on a battle of undead pirate zombie ninjas – leave a comment if you think I am wrong!), but certainly other startling alerts like Terrorist attack or Bull fight in progress could come through. Thanks to the insecure method of alert delivery made possible by FM subcarrier channels (known as RDS), some GPS systems will pick up local news alerts and inform you of problems before you get caught in a bull fight or otherwise dangerous zone.

Two security experts have discovered a way to inject false messages– some amusing and others potentially frightening– into car satellite navigation systems.

Andrea Barisani, chief security engineer for Inverse Path Ltd. and Daniele Bianco, a hardware hacker at Inverse Path, used off the shelf equipment to transmit messages to their car satellite navigation system warning of conditions ranging from foggy weather to terrorist attacks. They presented their findings on Friday at CanSecWest a security conference taking place this week in Vancouver.

. . .

Barisani and Bianco found that they could build a device that transmits over the RDS channel. Through trial and error, they discovered that transmitting certain code numbers translates into certain warnings that are displayed on the satellite navigation system.

Some were amusing. One code number alerts users that there’s a bull fight in progress. Another one indicates delays due to a parade.

But some weren’t so funny. One tells users that there has been a terrorist incident. Another indicates a bomb alert and another an air crash.

Maybe its just my twisted sense of humor, but I think there needs to be an undead pirate zombie ninja battle ahead alert, too. Of course, it could just be that I like saying undead pirate zombie ninja. But you might have already picked up on that. (via /.)

[tags]Undead pirate zombie ninja battle ahead – prepare for end of civilization, Fake GPS alerts via FM subcarrier signalling[/tags]

WKRP on DVD Tuesday

You may remember last year that I wrote how WKRP in Cincinnati was an unlikely DVD release.  Well, it looks like WKRP in Cincinnati will be available on DVD this week on Tuesday.  However, as I reported last year, it is unlikely that much of the original music will make it to the DVD release intact.  Roughly ten years ago, the replacement music was already well entrenched on the show.  I’m not sure what else will be changed in the newest releases, but you can be pretty sure little will remain from the original show.   Expect cut or changed scenes and dialog to even remove references to popular music that was originally in the show.

I got a copy of the first season of WKRP in Cincinnati and the news is not good. Which is disappointing to say, because I was lobbying for this release and believed – and still believe – that it would have been possible to reduce music costs without damaging the integrity of the show. That’s not what’s happened here.

So someone has already taken the time to put together the changes list.  Check it out and see if you are interested in the  changed version on DVD or will just remember the show as it was 30 years ago.

[tags]WKRP in Cincinnati on DVD Tuesday 2007-04-24, WKRP now on DVD but with much changed music, Recording Industry continuously working to make consumers less and less interested in their product[/tags]

Are cell phones killing all the bees?

I’m predicting no. But there are some folks who say bees are being killed off by excessive cell phone radiation.

It seems like the plot of a particularly far-fetched horror film. But some scientists suggest that our love of the mobile phone could cause massive food shortages, as the world’s harvests fail.

They are putting forward the theory that radiation given off by mobile phones and other hi-tech gadgets is a possible answer to one of the more bizarre mysteries ever to happen in the natural world – the abrupt disappearance of the bees that pollinate crops. Late last week, some bee-keepers claimed that the phenomenon – which started in the US, then spread to continental Europe – was beginning to hit Britain as well.

The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees’ navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up.

Color me skeptical. Cell phones have been around for decades now. Bees have just started dying out. Unless there were a massive spike in the number of cell phones in use in the past year, I’d label this claim improbable. Luckily for me, there are others who doubt this theory as well. This way, I won’t be the only one looking foolish if cell phone radiation does turn out to be the culprit. But I’m not too worried that will happen:

Many beekeepers are skeptical of the reports or at least how they’re adding up. For 100 years, beekeepers have logged periodic reports of sudden and inexplicable bee die-offs.

People refer the latest die-off by its initials “CCD,” but one Georgia beekeeper instead calls it the “SSDD” crisis for “Same Stuff, Different Day.”

“People have lost bees from the beginning of time,” Sowers said. . . ..

Most empty hives have been discovered at large, commercial migrating bee farms – and that has led some beekeepers to theorize that it’s the stress of being trucked cross-country that’s killing the bees.

“The (bee’s) instinct is to go out and collect pollen and nectar, and that’s what they do. When they can’t get out of the hive, it puts them under stress. They need to go to the bathroom on a regular basis, but they won’t go in their hive,” said Ken Ograin, an Elmira beekeeper. . . ..

Finally, beehives simply die. Scattered reports of large-scale mortality date from 1915, 1960 and 1987. Scientists don’t always know why.

“This may be a repeat of that situation where we simply don’t figure it out,” said Morris Ostrofsky, president of the Lane County Beekeepers Association.

In fact, some farmers say they are puzzled about the dire news stories appearing in local, state and national media in the past several weeks.

“It’s not new this year,” Williams said. “If you know what I mean.”

So yes, that skepticism thing I’ve got going on looks pretty reasonable right now. Of course, if I’m wrong and we all die because of this in a few years, I’ll apologize on the other side.

[tags]Are cell phones killing all the bees (hint: probably not), Theory on massive bee die-off: cell phones did it![/tags]