"You can go through the products [tablets] from all those guys ... and none of them has a product that you can really use. Not Apple. Not Google. Not Amazon. Nobody has a product that lets you work and play that can be your tablet and your PC. Not at any price point." ~Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft
kill switchcould be used externally for cyberwar, or internally for censorship
"Right now, China can disconnect parts of its Internet in times of war. We need to be able to do that too." ~Sen. Joseph Lieberman
Kill Switch: cybercrime and countermeasures concept of activating a single shut off mechanism for all Internet traffic. The theory behind a kill switch is creation of a single point of control for one authority or another to control in order to "shut down the internet to protect it" from unspecified assailants (other countries, dissident groups, ...). The prospect of cyberwarfare over the 2000s has prompted the drafting of legislation by US officials, but worldwide the implications of actually of "killing" the Internet has prompted criticism of the idea in the United States. During the Arab Spring in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya access to the Internet was denied in an effort to limit peer networking to facilitate organization."
Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset (proposed); summary: Presidential powers to shut down parts of internet indefinitely (only 4 months?) with no congressional oversight
rationales: cyber 9/11 (fear); prevent power/utility grid takeover by hackers; Chinese doing it (but so far only for censorship reasons; good role model?)
problems: no traditional electronic borders; multiple international pathways; spoofing; predicting effects? domestic-only use? would government let MPAA/RIAA abuse for 'pirates'?; if implemented, security more vulnerable? (hackers would find a way to use)
G.E's 'Industrial Internet' Goes Bigindustrial equipment, Internet-linked sensors and software to monitor performance and analyze big streams of data; 10/9/2013
The Internet Gets PhysicalInternet of Things; Industrial Internet; sensors; energy conservation, transportation, health care and food distribution; 12/18/2011
censorship: corporations, governments restricting access to consumers, citizens, non-profits, ...
"It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creeds into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics." ~Robert A. Heinlein, Postscript to Revolt in 2100
"Censorship reflects a society's lack of confidence in itself. It is a hallmark of an authoritarian regime." ~Potter Stewart
"As to the evil which results from a censorship, it is impossible to measure it, for it is impossible to tell where it ends." ~Jeremy Bentham
Internet censorship: "control or suppression of the publishing of or access to information on the Internet. It may be carried out by governments or by private organizations either at the behest of government or on their own initiative. Individuals and organizations may engage in self-censorship on their own or due to intimidation and fear."; How Internet Censorship Works
The Battle for Power on the InternetDistributed citizen groups and nimble hackers once had the edge. Now governments and corporations are catching up. Who will dominate in the decades ahead? 10/24/2013
copyright: corporations, governments restricting access to consumers, citizens, non-profits, ? (same as censorship, some say)
"Your fair use of this book is restricted. You may only read this book once." ~Anonymous
"Only one thing is impossible for God: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet . . . Whenever a copyright law is to be made or altered, then the idiots assemble." ~Mark Twain
Senator Wyden lays out "digital freedom" agendawith the defeat of SOPA/PIPA, Wyden went from being a kind of "digital Don Quixote" to
"Senator from the Internet" -- someone whose views on Internet and tech policy have a major public following; 1/9/2013
Watsonwins on Jeopardy; Artificial Intelligence: technology and a branch of computer science that studies and develops intelligent machines and software; since 1950s
"I, for one, welcome our new computer overlords." ~Ken Jenningsquoting from The Simpsons
IBM to Announce More Powerful Watson via the Internetcompanies, academics and individual software developers will be able to use it at a small fraction of the previous cost, drawing on IBM?s specialists in fields like computational linguistics to build machines that can interpret complex data and better interact with humans; 11/13/2013
"It's what we think we know that keeps us from learning." ~Claude Bernard
"Because the Internet has an aura of 'technology' surrounding it, the uneducated believe information from it even more." ~Thomas Friedman, New York Times
"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn." ~Alvin Toffler
Massive Open Online CoursesMOOCs are aimed at large-scale interactive participation and open access via the web. In addition to traditional course materials such as videos, readings, and problem sets, MOOCs provide interactive user forums that help build a community for the students, professors, and TAs; How MOOCs Work
Potential benefits(+) and challenges(-) of a MOOC from MOOCguide:
+ You can organize a MOOC in any setting that has connectivity (which can include the Web, but also local connections via Wi-Fi e.g.)
+ You can organize it in any language you like (taking into account the main language of your target audience)
+ You can use any online tools that are relevant to your target region or that are already being used by the participants
+ You can move beyond time zones and physical boundaries
+ It can be organized as quickly as you can inform the participants (which makes it a powerful format for priority learning in e.g. aid relief)
+ Contextualized content can be shared by all
+ Learning happens in a more informal setting, at a place of your convenience and often around your own schedule.
+ Learning can also happen incidentally thanks to the unknown knowledge that pops up as the course participants start to exchange notes on the course?s study
+ You can connect across disciplines and corporate/institutional walls
+ You don?t need a degree to follow the course, only the willingness to learn (at high speed)
+ You add to your own personal learning environment and/or network by participating in a MOOC
+ You will improve your lifelong learning skills, for participating in a MOOC forces you to think about your own learning and knowledge absorption
- It feels chaotic as participants create their own content
- It demands digital literacy
- It demands time and effort from the participants
- It is organic, which means the course will take on its own trajectory (you have got to let go)
- As a participant you need to be able to self-regulate your learning and possibly give yourself a learning goal to achieve
No Child Left Untabletedcustomizing curriculum to match learning style, pace and interests; students? enthusiasm for the gadgetry; teachers need tools to show that their students are making progress sharing lesson materials; using the tablet?s classroom-management tools: quick polls, discussions, short-answer exercises, randomly calling on a student; 9/12/2013
Resource Guide to Online PrivacyOSPIRG: Oregon State Public Interest Research Group: 1. Social Media Privacy; 2. Secure Passwords; 3. Stop Cookies; 4. How to avoid viruses; 5. Keeping your Social Security Number secure; 6. Secure Websites; 7. Scam Email; 11/7/2013
Ten Steps You Can Take Right Now Against Internet Surveillance1) use end-to-end encryption; 2) encrypt as much communications as you can; 3) encrypt your hard drive; 4) strong passwords, kept safe; 5) use Tor; 6) turn on two-factor (or two-step) authentication; 7) don't click on attachments; 8) keep software updated, and use anti-virus software; 9) keep extra secret information extra secure; 10) be an ally to EFF; 10/25/2013
NSA surveillance: A guide to staying secure5 ways: Hide in the network, e.g., Tor; Encrypt your communications, e.g., TLS; for something really important, use an 'air gap', i.e., USB stick instead of network; Be suspicious of commercial encryption software, especially from large vendors; try to use public-domain encryption that has to be compatible with other implementations; 9/6/2013
Anonymity, Privacy, and Security OnlinePew: 86% of internet users have taken steps online to remove or mask their digital footprints -- ranging from clearing cookies to encrypting their email; 55% of internet users have taken steps to avoid observation by specific people, organizations, or the government; 9/5/2013
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it." ~Alan Kay
"I used to think that cyberspace was fifty years away. What I thought was fifty years away, was only ten years away. And what I thought was ten years away... it was already here. I just wasn't aware of it yet." ~Bruce Sterling
"I don't have to write about the future. For most people, the present is enough like the future to be pretty scary." ~William Gibson
"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." ~Niels Bohr
"The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time." ~Abraham Lincoln
Techno-utopianism: ideology based on the belief that advances in science and technology will eventually bring about a utopia
or dystopia: a community or society, usually fictional, that is in some important way undesirable or frightening
Technological determinism: reductionist theory that presumes that a society's technology drives the development of its social structure and cultural values
Transhumanism: an international cultural and intellectual movement with an eventual goal of fundamentally transforming the human condition by developing and making widely available technologies to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities
Technological singularity: or simply "the singularity", is a theoretical point in time when human technology (and, particularly, technological intelligence) will have so rapidly progressed that, ultimately, a greater-than-human intelligence will emerge, which will "radically change human civilization, and perhaps even human nature itself
Singularitarianism: technocentric ideology and social movement defined by the belief that a technological singularity?the creation of superintelligence?will likely happen in the medium future, and that deliberate action ought to be taken to ensure that the Singularity benefits humans.
The Year Man Becomes ImmortalWe're fast approaching the moment when humans and machines merge. Welcome to the Singularity movement; 2/10/2011
Ray Kurzweil's Slippery Futurism> his stunning prophecies have earned him a reputation as a tech visionary, but many of them don't look so good on close inspection; 11/29/2010
The Decades That Invented the Future: Part 12: The Present and BeyondDiscovery of Earth's Twin planet; Autonomous Cars; Wearable Technology; Growing the Visual Funnel (optics); Wide-Area Surveillance; AR (augmented reality), 3D printing; device convergence; Internet Memes; Kim Dotcom; Prosthetic Athletics; "Pluto Switch" (specialized hardware); Healthcare; 2/8/2013
