And we all know how amusing that can be. (Second only to banging your head against the wall...)

See:
United States Patent: 6,293,874: User-operated amusement apparatus for kicking the user's buttocks.

Why bother with all of the usual Double Agent hassles when you can just sit back and hack into the entire military industrial complex from the comfort of your own home?

See the LA Times story by Eric Lichtblau:
CIA Warns of Chinese Plans for Cyber-Attacks on U.S..

If you are still relatively new to the singularity, like me, perhaps you will enjoy reading An Introduction to the Singularity, courtesy of the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence.

Eliezer S. Yudkowsky of the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence has released a new paper that will be included in the upcoming book Real AI: New Approaches to Artificial General Intelligence (Goertzel and Pennachin, eds., forthcoming):
Levels of Organization in General Intelligence.

Here's a printable HTML version, in case you want to print out the whole thing.

Where the human line developed from very complex non-general intelligence into very complex general intelligence, a successful AI project is more likely to develop from a primitive general intelligence into a complex general intelligence.  Note that primitive does not mean architecturally simple.  The right set of subsystems, even in a primitive and simplified state, may be able to function together as a complete but imbecilic mind which then provides a framework for further development.  This does not imply that AI can be reduced to a single algorithm containing the "essence of intelligence".  A cognitive supersystem may be "primitive" relative to a human and still require a tremendous amount of functional complexity.

I am admittedly biased against the search for a single essence of intelligence; I believe that the search for a single essence of intelligence lies at the center of AI's previous failures.  Simplicity is the grail of physics, not AI.  Physicists win Nobel Prizes when they discover a previously unknown underlying layer and explain its behaviors.  We already know what the ultimate bottom layer of an Artificial Intelligence looks like; it looks like ones and zeroes.  Our job is to build something interesting out of those ones and zeroes.  The Turing formalism does not solve this problem any more than quantum electrodynamics tells us how to build a bicycle; knowing the abstract fact that a bicycle is built from atoms doesn't tell you how to build a bicycle out of atoms - which atoms to use and where to put them.  Similarly, the abstract knowledge that biological neurons implement human intelligence does not explain human intelligence.  The classical hype of early neural networks, that they used "the same parallel architecture as the human brain", should, at most, have been a claim of using the same parallel architecture as an earthworm's brain.  (And given the complexity of biological neurons, the claim would still have been wrong.)

I just wrote up an O'Reilly Network Weblog that includes a bunch of quotes from the PDF version of the 321 Studios brief:
Fair Use vs. DMCA: 321 Studios Takes the First Swing.

There was some major protesting going on last weekend, although you wouldn't know it from watching television. (Can you say: "media consipracy" boys and girls?)

Here are some links about the Pro-palestinian demonstration that happened in Washington DC:
Demonstrators Rally to Palestinian Cause

Pro-Palestinian march takes Washington by storm

Thousands protest Israeli, U.S. policies

Weekend Protests Prove Peaceful, Yet Send Powerful Message

Here are some pictures from a Pro-Palestinian demonstration that took place in Oslo, the Netherlands.

Upstart isn't taking any chances with the DMCA. It filed a complaint asking the court to OK its product ahead of time.

See the CNET article by Lisa Bowman:
Upstart seeks court OK for DVD

In a pre-emptive strike to stave off the wrath of the movie industry, a small software company is asking a federal judge for permission to sell and market its product for copying DVDs.

In a complaint filed Monday in federal court in San Francisco, 321 Studios asked the court to declare that its DVD Copy Plus program does not violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Here's a pair of Wired News articles by Daithí Ó hAnluain on TMS (Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation).

TMS: Twilight Zone Science?

Thinking Cap or Dunce's Hat? .

Here are more details about the Method of swinging on a swing that I mentioned earlier this week -- which turns out to belong to a 7 year-old boy (courtesy of his savvy IP dad).

Patent turns playtime into pay time.

Let's hope the little boy who took out this patent isn't the only one that will learn from this experience.

Rose-tinted help with reading

Israel's getting cyber-bullied while its busy bullying Palestine:
Israel under hack attack.

The BBC has a great story on how the visual memory technique of mind mapping is now being used as a treatment for dyslexics.
(wow I had to cut and paste that "dyslexics" word to get it right :-)

Check out:
Mind mapping can help dyslexics.

Several unedited ponderings that were supposed to be "posted" and not "published" today were indeed published prematurely. I grumpily add this incident to the list of reasons that I'll be switching to Moveable Type soon....

Here's CNET's take on it:
Government examining HP vote.

And what else might get ushered into the Amendment in the process??

Here's CNN's piece on the crime victims amendment issue:
Bush backs constitutional amendment for crime victims.

Or should I say "The First Wireless Communication Infrastructure?" Looks like we could learn a thing or two about messaging from our bacterial friends (and presumably our viral friends).

See the BBC News article:
Bacteria 'message' to each other.

It is known that bacteria exchange messages by releasing substances into the fluid in which they are growing, but new research suggests they can send signals through the air.

It is the first time airborne communication has been identified, say the team who carried out the study.

The messages sent by bacteria are a wake-up call to other roaming bugs to head towards the bacterial colonies called biofilms.

It made me proud to write for the IEEE's Internet Computing Magazine when I read this arstechnica piece:
IEEE just says NO to the DMCA.

Here's the New Scientist article that explains more of the details:
Controversial copyright clause abandoned.

The excerpt below is from the New Scientist article:

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), which publishes 30 per cent of all computer science journals worldwide, is to stop requiring authors to comply with a controversial US digital copyright law.

The IEEE produced a new set of conditions for publication at the beginning of 2002. These required that authors' work must not contravene the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA).

Many academics believe the DMCA discourages scientists from publishing valuable research through fear of legal action. The DMCA prohibits "any technology, product, service, device, component or part" that circumvents digital copy protection systems. This includes the software encryption designed to stop people making copies of music or video files, for example. Scientists say the Act means that just producing research on a copy protection system could land them in legal trouble.

Here's a little update on the webcasting compulsory licensing fee situation going on over at the U.S. Copyright Office.

The latest word is that the U.S. Copyright Office is calling for a "public roundtable discussion" on May 10th (more on this later...):
Check out John Borland's story for ZD Net:
Feds want to thrash out Webcasting.

It seems to me like we should have several more years' worth of successful missions under our belt before we start sending non-superpeople "up there"...(but nobody asked me :-)

See the AP story:
NASA plans to send teacher into space.

A breakthrough in biomarkers was revealed at an oncology conference last week in San Francisco. See:
New biomarkers for ovarian, breast, and head and neck cancers identified.

Researchers have identified new biomarkers for ovarian, breast, and head and neck cancers that could lead to earlier detection of these malignancies and improved treatment outcomes, according to study findings presented this week at a major oncology meeting in San Francisco.

Scientists have stumbled upon a type of matter considered previously undiscovered in the universe.

See: Quark stars point to new matter.

An Arizona-based company has settled with the RIAA over files that were arguably being traded in a perfectly legal manner over a private network.

Corporate scaredy-cats! Phoo-ey!

Here's the arstechnica coverage of it and a Reuters article:
Recording industry collects $1 million fine.

You're not the only one that can see what's going on over that home wireless security cam.

Check out the NY Times article by John Schwartz:
Nanny-Cam May Leave a Home Exposed.

Here's the letter I sent to Gateway:

Dear Mr. Waitt, CEO
Gateway Computers, Inc.,

Thanks for your company's recent digital music website launch.

I am a teacher and computer consultant that will be recommending Gateway products to my students and clientele in the future because you guys were the first company to take a stand on these issues -- and that really means a lot to me.

Thanks,

Lisa Rein
lisarein@finetuning.com

http://www.finetuning.com

If you agree with Gateway's position on Digital Music, perhaps you'll take five minutes to write write at letter to Gateway's CEO to say "thank you":

Ted Waitt, CEO
Gateway, Inc.
14303 Gateway Pl.
Poway, CA
92064


or send an e-mail:
c/o corporate.communications@gateway.com

Finally! A technology company that is willing to stand up for its future!

Gateway has launched a great new campaign to help educate consumers about their rights in the digital marketplace and help educate lawmakers about the dangers of attempting to regulate innovation.

Thanks Gateway -- for standing up for all of us!
(And for putting an advertising budget behind it!)

Here's a quote from the Your Personal Rights & Responsibilities as an MP3 User section of the new Gateway Digital Music Website:

Gateway believes:

• You have the right to make copies for your own use of any CD you've purchased legally -- so you can listen to it in different locations and have a backup if something happens to your original copy.

• You have the right to enjoy legally acquired music in any format you want -- like converting CD tracks to MP3 files to take with you on a portable or car MP3 player.

• You have the right to download music from the Internet that you've paid for or that's been made available for download by the artist or record label.

Some content distributors want the government to regulate your ability to do these things. There's even a bill before the U.S. Senate that would force the technology industry to implement anti-piracy technology that could prevent all digital copying - even copying that's legal today under U.S. copyright laws.

If this concerns you, it's time to protect these rights. Take action. Write your senator and congressman.

Get more information at www.digitalconsumer.org, www.digmedia.org, or www.hrrc.org. Let's protect our right to legally use technology to improve the quality of life.

See the story by Alex Kirby for the BBC:
Blind gorilla sees again.

Cool. I just generated a Bitzi Ticket for my song "Wander" using Bitzi's XML/RDF Ticket service.

Extra! Extra! Even more people than previously suspected think the CBDTPA sucks!
(and for a wide variety of reasons!)

See: Digital-Copyright Bill Inspires Flurry of Criticism.

Did Bush know about 911 before it happened?

Only time will tell. But some people, such as Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-Ga) are starting to ask questions and suggest that such issues be investigated further.

Here's a Washington Post article by Juliet Eilperin on the subject:
Democrat Implies Sept. 11 Administration Plot .

Someone's patented a Method of swinging on a swing (United States Patent: 6,368,227).

The EFF has started a weblog, Consensus At Lawyerpoint, that covers the ongoing "open" activities of the Copy Protection "Technical" Working Group.

What is the BPDG?

The BPDG is a coalition of Hollywood studios and technology companies that are ready to control our technological future, in the name of digital television, if you let them.

How might they control our technological future? By insisting upon airy fairy "standards" that can only be complied with via business deals when the entertainment monopolies decide that the price is right.

Celine Dion must really hate her fans to let her latest CD be released containing such harmful copy prevention technologies on it.

So I've been very busy this last week getting over what was left of my flu bug, working on the Creative Commons Project, correcting finals for the class I teach for UC Berkeley Extension Online, writing up an interview I did last week with Elcomsoft Lawyer Joseph Burton and doing my regular entries in the O'Reilly XML.com and OpenP2P.com Resource Guides.

I've also been working on a new version of my music website and will soon be releasing two more songs!

Now that I am feeling a little better and not so buried under the backlog, I promised myself I would resume blogging today...

Okay. I'm back for real this time.

Wowza. What a week!

I musingly went to Microsoft.com, just to see what was on the front page these days, and assuming, of course (?) that there would be a direct link to IE6 from the Home page.

No such luck.

So I typed in "Internet Explorer" in the Search box, and here's what I got.

Great comic from Rubin Bolling's Tom the Dancing Bug.

I've been knocked out with the flu all week. But I'm starting to feel better and have a lot of little goodies I've been collecting all week.

Thanks for checking back! There seem to be a lot more of you on a regular basis.