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"NewsScan" <[email protected]> Mon, 05 Apr 2004 13:58:21 -0700
| Newsgroups | gmane.culture.it.newsscan |
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| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
Honorary Subscriber: Robert tells users: "The contents of your Gmail account are also stored and Brandt adds: "While Google brags that no humans will read your <a href=3D"http: //www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/36778.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/36778.html</a><br= ><br> href=3D"http: //www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/privacy/story/= 0,10801,91830,00.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/pri= <a href=3D"http: //www.nytimes.com/2004/04/05/technology/05super.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/05/technology/05super.htm= href=3D"http: //australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9160998%5E15306%5E%= 5Enbv%5E,00.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9160998%= 5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html</a><br><br> href=3D"http: //www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0786868171/newsscanco= <html> <body> <font size=3D3><br> NewsScan Daily, 5 April 2004 ("Above The Fold") <br> *********************************************************** <br> NewsScan Daily is underwritten by RLG, a world-class organization <br> making significant and sustained contributions to the effective <br> management and appropriate use of information technology. NSD is <br> written by John Gehl and Suzanne Douglas, [email protected].<br> ***********************************************************<br><br> "ABOVE THE FOLD" <br> Privacy Advocates Target Google's Gmail Storage Policy<br> TSA Eyes RFID Boarding Passes<br> 'Flash Mob Supercomputer' Fizzles<br> Porn Image Sparks Kids' Football CD Recall<br> Agatha Christie Sleuths Featured on PC Games<br><br> FEATURES <br> Flash Card<br> Honorary Subscriber: Robert Hutchings Goddard<br><br> PRIVACY ADVOCATES TARGET GOOGLE'S GMAIL STORAGE POLICY<br> Privacy advocates are voicing concern over Google's data retention plans, following the search company's splashy launch of its free Gmail service last week. Google's Gmail privacy policy tells users: "The contents of your Gmail account are also stored and maintained on Google servers in order to provide the service. Indeed, residual copies of e-mail may remain on our systems, even after you have deleted them from your mailbox or after the termination of your account." The fact that e-mail records potentially could be combined with Google search cookies, designed to index users' searches through 2038, and an Orkut cookie that contains personal identification information, is what has privacy watchdogs worried. "Once users register for Gmail, Google would be able to make that connection, if it chose to," says Pam Dixon, head of the World Privacy Forum. "And if Google ever compared the two sets of data, there are some people who would be chilled and embarrassed." Archivist Daniel Brandt adds: "While Google brags that no humans will read your e-mails, the entire Gmail program will involve extensive automated profiling of you as an individual. Google will be sharing non-identifiable portions of your profile with anyone they choose. If the ownership of Google changes, or there is a merger, the entire personally-identifiable profile will be available to the new owners or partners." (The Register 3 Apr 2004)<br> <a href=3D"http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/36778.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/36778.html</a><br= ><br> TSA EYES RFID BOARDING PASSES<br> The Transportation Security Administration is looking into the possibility of using RFID-tagged airline boarding passes that would enable passenger tracking in airports -- a proposal that has raised the hackles of some privacy advocates. TSA says it would use the special boarding passes in conjunction with its "registered traveler" program, which would permit frequent fliers to provide detailed personal information, corroborated by a background check. The RFID passes would allow these registered travelers to speed through "special lanes" during the boarding process. The TSA has already started work to deploy RFID boarding passes in some countries in Africa under the Federal Aviation Administration's Safe Skies for Africa Initiative. But Katherine Albrecht, who worked against the use of RFID tags on retail goods, says this new proposal is a "nightmare scenario," which uses technology to invade people's privacy. "Are they going to track how long I spend in the ladies room?" she asks. (Computerworld 1 Apr 2004)<br> <a= href=3D"http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/privacy/story/= 0,10801,91830,00.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/pri= vacy/story/0,10801,91830,00.html</a><br><br> 'FLASH MOB SUPERCOMPUTER' FIZZLES<br> An ambitious plan to assemble an instant supercomputer by asking more than 600 students, faculty and volunteers to converge on a University of San Francisco gymnasium with their laptops in hand fell short of expectations Saturday when a handful of computers refused to cooperate. Organizers planned to load each machine with software that would enable them to take part in a single large set of calculations, known and the Linpack benchmark. The result was intended to be similar to massively parallel supercomputers used by corporate researchers and scientific labs, but the USF effort succeeded in producing only a partial result -- 180 billion mathematical operations per second -- short of the 500 billion operations per second they needed to snag a place in the Top 500 supercomputer list. "If we had twice as many machines and another two days, I think we would have been successful," says USF computer science professor Gregory D. Benson. (New York Times 5 Apr 2004)<br> <a href=3D"http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/05/technology/05super.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/05/technology/05super.htm= l</a><br><br> PORN IMAGE SPARKS KIDS' FOOTBALL CD RECALL<br> The Australian Football league has been forced to recall 40,000 CD-ROMs given to young children to promote Australian football (soccer) because it secretly included a picture of a topless woman. Officials became aware of the image when a child stumbled across it among myriad football-related files on the disc, distributed to 5 to 12-year-olds in NSW and South Australia. AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou said an investigation had been launched to establish whether the inclusion of the picture was mischievous or accidental. However, he said the AFL had dumped the CD-ROM's producer -- a subsidiary of advertising agency George Patterson Bates. The advertising giant has accepted responsibility for the embarrassing addition and agreed to pay for the recall, estimated at more than $AU250,000, which the AFL hopes will be completed this weekend. (The Australian 2 Apr 2004 -- rec'd from John Lamp, Deakin University)<br> <a= href=3D"http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9160998%5E15306%5E%= 5Enbv%5E,00.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,9160998%= 5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html</a><br><br> AGATHA CHRISTIE SLEUTHS FEATURED ON PC GAMES<br> Fans of Agatha Christie's mystery novels can relive the thrill of solving crimes with detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Jane Marple via a series of five different computer games to be developed by Chorion over the next six years. "My grandmother was always very keen on using new ways to reach people who wanted to enjoy her work," says Christie's grandson, Matthew Prichard. Christie's work has been translated into 45 languages and is outsold by only the Bible and Shakespeare. (AP 5 Apr 2004)<br> <a href=3D"http://apnews.excite.com/article/20040405/D81OL8800.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://apnews.excite.com/article/20040405/D81OL8800.html= </a><br><br> ***** <br><br> FLASH CARD <br> "Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars; let me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars. (Bart Howard, song lyrics)<br><br> HONORARY SUBSCRIBER: ROBERT HUTCHINGS GODDARD (1882-1945)<br> Today's Honorary Subscriber is the pioneer rocket scientist Robert Hutchings Goddard (1882-1945), whose experiments with solid- and liquid-propellant rockets between 1909 and 1945 paved the way for America's successful post World War II entry into space rocketry.<br> Prior to the war the United States government took little interest in Goddard's work, and even during the war years confined its interest to support for the booster rockets he developed for the Navy's seaplanes and carrier aircraft. After the war, however, American interest in rocket science (motivated by the success of the German V-2 rocket bombs) became a military priority. Ironically, the importance of Goddard's work, previously ignored by the U.S. government, was now given its due recognition, partially prompted by the esteem in which it was held by the German rocket experts brought over to work in the American space program.<br> Goddard, the son of a machine shop owner, was born in Worcester, Massachusetts, but raised in Boston. When he was 16, the family returned to Worcester, where he attended the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. After graduating in 1908, he went on to earn a Ph.D. degree from Clark University in 1911. He then taught at Princeton until 1914 when he joined the physics faculty at Clark, remaining at Clark for the next 30 years. There he pursued his dream of space flight, first ignited by the science fiction of H.G. Wells.<br> With small grants from the Smithsonian Institution, he investigated the rocketry it would take to reach the moon, publishing in 1919 his classic report, "A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes." This early work was met with skepticism in the press, but in 1926 he fired the world's first successful liquid-propellant rocket.<br> In the 1930s Goddard successfully launched larger liquid-fueled rockets. He also made fundamental contributions to developments in propellant pumps, gyroscopic controls, and gimbal systems. With moral support from Charles Lindberg and financial help from Harry F. Guggenheim and the Guggenheim Foundation, he was able to conduct his experimentation in the more suitable surroundings of Roswell, New Mexico. During World War II, Goddard offered his work to the military, but lack of interest in rocket development led to his closing down the Roswell establishment, and confining himself to small-scale work on rocket assisted aircraft takeoff boosters. One World War II spin-off from Goddard's work was the anti-tank bazooka.<br> Goddard died of throat cancer in 1945, so he did not live to see the realization of his dreams of jet age travel and rocket-powered space exploration. Recognition of what he had almost single-handedly accomplished came years later, when the United States government paid a $1,000,000 settlement for having infringed the use of more than 200 of his patents covering "basic inventions in the field of rockets, guided missiles and space exploration." Goddard was also awarded the Congressional Gold Medal and the Langley Gold Medal, and NASA's Space Flight Center was renamed in his honor.<br><br> See <a= href=3D"http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0786868171/newsscanco= m/ref=3Dnosim" eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai= l/-/0786868171/newsscancom/ref=3Dnosim</a> for a biography of Goddard by David A. Clary -- or look for it in your= favorite library. (We donate all revenue from our book recommendations to= adult literacy programs.)<br> <br> SUBSCRIPTION INFO FOR NEWSSCAN DAILY:<br> To subscribe or unsubscribe to the text,= html, or handheld versions of NewsScan Daily, send the appropriate= subscribe or unsubscribe messages (i.e., with the word 'subscribe' or= 'unsubscribe' in the subject line) to the addresses shown below:<br> Text version: Send message to= [email protected]<br> HTML version: Send mail to= [email protected]<br> NewsScan-To-Go: <a= href=3D"http://www.newsscan.com/handheld/current.html"= eudora=3D"autourl">http://www.newsscan.com/handheld/current.html</a><br><br= > TELL YOUR FRIENDS ABOUT NEWSSCAN DAILY! 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