[BREAKING NEWS] Sen. Frist Breaks with Bush on Stem Cell Research

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) has announced his support for legistation expanding funding for embryonic stem cell research -- putting him at odds with President Bush and religious conservatives who oppose such funding.

Frist, a heart-lung surgeon, said of his decision, "It's not just a matter of faith, it's a matter of science." So far, the Bush administration has had little comment beyond respecting the right of Frist to take his own position on the issue. "I know that the president will listen to what Sen. Frist has had to say," said Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), who is sponsoring stem cell legislation and who is currently battling cancer. "I'm not saying he is going to agree with it but ... I think may bring us all together on this issue."

Predictably, Frist's position has sparked cheers from stem cell research advocates and outrage from pro-life conservatives. A more pertinent question, however, is whether this will help research funding to pass through Congress. If so, it will set Capitol Hill up for a major confrontation with the White House.

Taking a more long-term view, Frist's announcement might signal a sea change among politicians on the topic, emboldening liberal and conservative politicians alike to support stem cell research. Some have predicted that Frist's political future may have been sacrificed by his stand... and he may well have suffered permanent damage among pro-life voters. But it may have been a calculated risk, betting that the majority of voters support embryonic stem cell research.

In the near term, though, there's no sign of a stampede among Frist's conservative colleagues toward supporting embryonic stem cell research. Said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), "Senator Frist is a good man, he's simply advocating a bad policy."

Hopefully, Frist's position will mark a step toward de-politicizing science, which can only help the US in the long term as it seeks to compete globally in science, technology and medicine.

UPDATE: At the risk of sounding cynical, Sen. Frist's change of heart on the matter might have something to do with popular support for stem cell research. According to the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, Americans favor embryonic stem cell research by a 2-to-1 margin, with such support apparently growing within every demographic group except for evangelical Christians.

Source: AP (Excite)

Could IM Replace E-mail?

Judging by the way young people use the Internet, instant messaging may one day replace e-mail as the messaging technology of choice.

A recent study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that, unlike their elders, only 5% of young people aged 12 to 17 preferred e-mail over IM. This matters because, within a few years, these kids will enter the workforce and will help set their employers' technology strategies. Even now, they represent an important and lucrative market that is not going unnoticed by youth-oriented marketers such as Disney, which is dipping its toe into the cell phone business.

Already, enterprises are seeing the value of IM, including its immediately and ability to announce presence and availability to groups. As enterprise IM platforms offer more security and auditing features, they will surely become more popular over time.

E-mail remains popular, however, and won't go away entirely -- at least not for a long time. But with the rise of IM, it may well lose its dominance sooner than we realize.

Source: Forbes

Mormons to Lose Dominance in Utah by 2030

Because just as many Mormons are leaving the church as are joining it, Mormons will cease to be the majority religious faith in the state of Utah within 30 years, according to state demographic figures.

Currently, members of the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter-Day Saints make up over 62% of the state's population, but statistics show the number of Mormons decreasing since 2000. This may in part be due to new converts leaving the faith soon after joining.

New, non-Mormon residents are also shifting Utah's religious mix. "Utah is essentially becoming more like the nation," said Robert Spendlove, the lead demographer for the state.

Source: AFP (Yahoo!)

Hybrids to Join NYC Taxi Fleet

The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission has approved the use of six hybrid vehicles to be used as taxicabs. The pilot project, which complies with a city mandate for hybrid taxis, is scheduled to begin this fall, despite concerns that even the largest hybrids currently on the market have significantly less legroom than traditional cabs.

For now, the Commission is testing the available hybrid models, and developing facilities for inspecting and servicing the hybrids, and drafting new rules that accommodate the vehicles.

Source: The New York Times

First Look at Windows Vista

A select group of testers who downloaded and installed the first beta of Windows Vista (formerly Longhorn) have finally gotten a peek at the new OS.

Microsoft will make Vista available to a wider pool of testers from its MSDN developer program in August, but about 10,000 testers have already begun exploring the system's new features. They also have access to version 7 of Internet Explorer, which offers tabbed browsing and RSS compatibility (features that Firefox has offered for some time), as well as stronger security.

Two of Vista's key features, the Avalon graphics engine (a.k.a. Windows Presentation Foundation) and the Indigo web services architecture, will be offered as add-ons for Windows XP, for those who like those features yet don't want to upgrade to Vista.

Source: ZDNet

Have You Hugged Your Robot Today?

It's good to know that the Association for the Prevention of Cruelty to Robots is getting out ahead of things. Sure, it sounds funny now, but if artificial intelligence emerges, robot rights could be an issue our children and grandchildren will be dealing with.

Future Franchises Catering to Boomers

Baby Boomers who are getting older, and have ample incomes but little time, represent a lucrative market for businesses over the next several years.

Home amenities and services are expected to be big business opportunities, as empty-nester Boomers refurbish homes or buy new ones. Also, business serving healthcare or eldercare needs will be in demand, as the Boomers age.

Source: CNN/Money

The Structured, Indoor Lives of Kids

Summer is supposed to be the time of year when kids spend as much time as possible outside. But that was then...

A somewhat depressing article in USA Today notes what most parents already know: kids are spending much more time indoors than they used to. One survey quoted found that bike riding among kids is down 31% since 1995, and that only 6% of kids who play baseball do so without any kind of adult-imposed structure. Sales of bikes and memberships at public pools are way down. Correspondingly, childhood obesity is way up.

TV, the Internet and video games occupy much of kids' time these days... and when they do go outside, it's in a structured environment such as a camp or club. Affluence provides for kids a home environment so comfortable that they have no reason to venture outside of it. Parents are understandably afraid to let kids wander in an age of fear of child abduction. Lower birthrates, moreover, mean that many of today's children are spending more time alone than did their Baby Boomer predecessors, who could always count on at least a few friends hanging around the neighborhood at any given time. Through the Internet, their friends may hail from all over the world, yet they are friends who have never met face-to-face.

When I was growing up, the fun of summer was its randomness, its chaos. Simply being able to goof off for hours on end tested the imagination and fostered creativity. Being outdoors provided a different perspective on the world.

Today, though, unstructured play is seen as either dangerous or a waste of time, and even the most overprotective parent of the past would be considered negligent by today's standards. How will all of this affect today's children as they grow older? It may be difficult for today's kids to move beyond the confines of the Net and video games into business and personal relationships, as well as engage in creative problem-solving that doesn't involve technology.

And for those kids who master the real world enough to find a mate and start a family, will their children be even more thoroughly "coccooned"? Or will a backlash movement emerge that provides kids with more outdoor, free-form, non-technological activity?

A Distributed Network to Fight Terrorism

Can distributed mobile technology help groups fight terrorism? Two researchers who study group dynamics believe it can.

"Global Neighborhood Watch," a concept developed by Bill McKelvey of UCLA and Max Boisot of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, operates on the premise that groups carrying mobile sensing devices can detect threats such as explosives more readily than central access points. It also relies on groups' innate ability to process and filter abstract information. A distributed, "socio-computational" approach can "connect the dots" to help authorities better see patterns of an attack.

"Our 'distributed' socio-computational approach gets around silo thinking," McKelvey and Boisot wrote. Silos extract information and meaning from data and then pass it up to the next level. "That is, dots [data] collected at the base get 'joined' or linked . . . by intelligence analysts in the middle of the hierarchy before being 'assessed' " at the top, they wrote.

By contrast, the distributed neighborhood watch, and its attendant computing power, focuses less on collecting many dots and more on establishing meaningful relationships and patterns from them. "Assessment does not thereby disappear, but it now operates across different levels," the professors wrote. The watch members help find the most promising patterns, and the intelligence center and government officials select the ones upon which to act.

One example given is of two individuals standing adjacent to an unattended backpack. Both carry mobile phones that can sense trace amounts of explosives; both devices react to the pack, and send signals to alert a central authority.

The clear downside to the plan is that it creates a Big Brother environment, with neighbors effectively spying on neighbors. To that end, and in light of the recent London bombings, communities will have to make a choice between respect for privacy and greater security.

McKelvey and Boisot have submitted their idea to the CIA.

Sources: GovExec.com, Futurismic

IBM's Blue Gene to Simulate a Mammal Brain

IBM is teaming up with Switzerland's Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL) to simulate the workings of a mammal brain on IBM's Blue Gene, currently the world's most powerful supercomputer. The machine being used has a peak speed of 22.8 teraflops (trillion calculations per second); the fastest Blue Gene version runs at nearly 137 teraflops.

Under the "Blue Brain" project, every function of the brain will be modeled, down to the molecular level. The project will focus on the neo-cortex, the portion of the brain that governs higher levels of reasoning.

Blue Brain, which will take from two to three years to complete, promises multiple benefits. Aside from testing the limits of Blue Gene, it will hopefully increase understanding of how the mammal brain works, provide insights into artificial intelligence, and reduce the need for live animals in neuro-research.

The researchers had better watch their backs, though. The Japanese government plans to develop a supercomputer that they claim will be 73 times more powerful than Blue Gene by 2011, and that will supposedly be able to calculate at 10 petaflops (quadrillion calculations per second) -- believed by some to be the minimum computing speed of the human brain.
Source: Taipei Times (The Guardian), KurzweilAI.net

Tech for Executives, At a Glance

CIOs and other executives who feel overwhelmed by the amount of information on the technology they're expected to deliver and manage might find BusinessWeek's CEO Tech Toolbox handy. Though there's little here that would surprise the average techie, the article provides a handy overview of technologies that are either hot now or are likely to be in the coming years.

Source: KurzweilAI.net

Good News for IT Pros

According to Gartner, job prospects look good for IT professionals all-around this year, with many companies planning to beef up their tech staffs and offer raises to retain current employees.

Two-thirds of the firms Gartner surveyed in the spring planned at least moderate IT hiring. Project managers, Web developers, database administrators, security specialists, and programmers are all reportedly in demand. The firms surveyed have also increased salaries by 3.5%, and many are adding bonuses to their recruiting and retention packages.

Source: CNET

Red Herring Ends Its "Future" Blog

Red Herring has ended what it calls its "experiment" with blogging, and is shutting down its "Future" blog. Its farewell note states:

After a year, the Red Herring leadership has decided to wrap up its experiment with blogging. Mitch Ratliffe's blog "The Now" stopped when he took his new job; now, the editors have decided to rethink some of the Web site, and to move away from blogging and into other territory.

At one level, I'm surprised the experiment has been allowed to run as long as it has: I was brought aboard a couple editors-in-chief ago, and in my experience, new editors often like to bring their own people in. But all editors and publishers are trying to figure out how blogging can fit into a more traditional structure borrowed from the print world. No one has it quite right yet, and Red Herring can't be faulted for wanting to experiment with something else.

Fans of the "Future" blog can continue to read related posts at Future Now.

Bank Goes Beyond Passwords to Tighten Security

Mindful of phishing scams and other high-profile security breaches, Bank of America is instituting SiteKey, a second security layer that will require more than just a customer's password for online access.

When logging in, customers will see a secret image and challenge phrase from SiteKey that they selected earlier. The challenge question would involve something only the customer would know. If the SiteKey information is missing or incorrect, they might not be at a legitimate Bank of America website.

Security strategies such a SiteKey will surely become more common as financial institutions increase their awareness of security -- and as their customers demand it.

Source: CNN.com

eBay as a Career

The online auction site eBay has announced that 724,000 of its users rely on the system for their primary or secondary source of income, up 68% from 2004. Aside from these professional eBayers, a survey by ACNielsen found that another 1.5 million supplement their incomes through trading on eBay. Compare these figures with those of Wal-Mart, America's official largest employer, which as of 2004 had 1.1 million employees.

If eBay's figures continue to rise, it will force us to start thinking differently about the nature of employment. Can a nation of consumers support vast numbers of online auctioneers to the point where they can make a career out of their sales? Will we begin buying and selling professional services in the same way (though sites such as Guru.com have been around for some time)? More fundamentally, eBay seems to be pushing us in the direction of mass individual entrepreneurship, and away from the traditional employee-employer paradigm. This will affect how we think about the very nature of work, including benefits, pay, and long-term career goals (including retirement). Certainly, not everyone will work this way in the future, but many will choose to.

Tor and the Anonymous Internet

Internet users concerned about identity theft may now have a new tool to help them go online more securely. Tor, developed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, uses so-called "onion routers" to obscure source and destination IPs, making it difficult if not impossible to track somebody online.

However, Tor raises some critical ethical questions, especially in these days of concern over terrorism. Should people be allowed to surf anonymously, especially if they're engaged in criminal activity? Where do privacy concerns end and public safety concerns begin? Moreover, does Tor provide true anonymity?

The debate won't begin or end with Tor, and has no easy answers. User tracking, and ways to thwart it, will remain controversial as long as people are worried about both privacy and law enforcement.

Source: TechRepublic

Longhorn = Windows Vista

Microsoft's long-awaited new version of Windows has taken another step toward reality now that it has a real name. The new Windows version, which had until now been known by the code name Longhorn, is now called "Windows Vista." Microsoft has been promising that the new OS will have significantly improved security and file management features (though not the promised WinFS file system), IPv6 support, and more sophisticated graphics.

Microsoft plans to release a beta version on August 3, and will offer further details about Vista in September. A commercial release is scheduled for the latter half of 2006... creating the longest time lag ever between release of Windows versions. The server version will be available in 2007.

For more on Windows Vista, visit ZDNet's Q&A on the topic.

Source: Reuters (Excite)

Environmentally Friendly, Safer Concrete

Who knew that the manufacture of concrete contributed so much to greenhouse gases, and was such an inefficient process? Scientists at Australia's CSIRO Novel Materials & Processes did... because they invented a process for making concrete that uses less energy and generates fewer pollutants.

The HySSIL (High-Strength, Structural, Insulative, Lightweight) panels are made without curing equipment, which require high levels of energy. The are also lightweight enough to be moved without the use of specialized lifting equipment.

The downside of this technology is that it will likely be more expensive than traditional methods of making concrete, at least in the near term.

And if that's not impressive enough, concrete is also getting more flexible, literally. Bendable concrete resists brittling, making it safer. The type developed by the University of Michigan is, like HySSIL, lightweight, and its manufacture is less harmful to the environment.

Source: WorldChanging

Video Game Backlash?

In the wake of revelations that the popular video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas contained sexually explicit content, several major retailers, including Target, Wal-Mart, Best Buy and Circuit City, have yanked the game from their shelves. Wal-Mart and Best Buy have said that they aren't sure whether they would restock the game, even if the offensive content were removed.

The mod (or modification) content was not something ordinary gamers were meant to see. Rather, it was intended for tinkerers, and accessible only through a downloadable file called "Hot Coffee." The odds that a child could have accessed that content were almost nil.

The controversy raises several key questions about the state of today's video game industry. Clearly, video games now show up high enough on politicians' radar screens for them to make a fuss (and, in Sen. Hillary Clinton's case, to build some conservative street cred). But where was the uproar earlier? Grand Theft Auto is notorious for its violent content, including cop killing. Will we see further crackdowns on violent video games, or will outrage be reserved purely for sex?

Also, what will this incident do to the video game industry? It's never good to have your product kicked out of Wal-Mart, after all. Is this just the latest outrage du jour, or just the beginning of a wide, ongoing government crackdown? Will it serve to drive developers of the most controversial games underground?

UPDATE: The GTA backlash is not limited to the States. Australia has reportedly banned the game outright, claiming that its content exceeds its most restrictive rating for adult material.

Sources: Wired, The New York Times

Digital Photography Disrupting Film, Photo Paper Sales

More than ever, consumers' preference for digital photography is putting the squeeze on sales of traditional photo supplies, namely film. No better evidence was offered for this shift than yesterday's announcement by Eastman Kodak that it will shed up to 10,000 jobs.

It's not just Kodak that's feeling the pain. Specialty photo stores are selling fewer film cameras and related supplied, and are having difficulty competing with electronics and discount stores for sales of digital cameras. Photo-printing kiosks may help photo stores offset some losses, but even those may not be enough, especially as photo printers become less expensive and easier to use. Plus, since many digital camera owners share and store their photos electronically, not all of them want or need to print them.

Googling the Moon

In honor of the anniversary of the first manned moon landing, Google introduces its Moon Map, so you can pinpoint the location of your favorite crater.

HINT: Be sure to zoom in to the maximum (tightest) level...

Mobile Phones on ICE

ICE (In Case of Emergency) is a UK mobile phone service that allows emergency responders to quickly contact the next-of-kin of someone in distress. In the wake of the London bombings earlier this month, ICE generated considerable interest in the UK.



The ICE website takes pains to note that it is not a hoax or a virus, as was mistakenly reported recently.

As mobile phones become the most common electronic device on the planet -- and as concern grows over both man-made and natural catastrophes -- services like ICE will become ever more valuable and common. After all, many people originally bought cell phones did so with the idea of using them for emergency communication.

Source: Smart Mobs

The Tattle-Tale Toilet

UK designer Malcolm Kimberley has created a urinal that can analyze urine and let the user know via Bluetooth cell phone if he has an STD.

And if that's not creepy enough, one can easily imagine similar toilets that could scan urine for traces of drugs and who knows what else. Employers, police and parents could all be notified in real time, and the guilty party could be apprehended before he/she leaves the rest room.

Source: Gizmodo

Ten-Second Gamma Ray Burst Could Cause Mass Extinctions

One more thing to add to your list of Things to Worry About: a burst of gamma rays, ten seconds of which could wipe out most all life on earth.

Scientists at NASA and the University of Kansas have concluded that such a blast, caused by the explosion of a nearby star (within 6,000 light years), could destroy half of the earth's ozone layer, letting in ultraviolet rays that would kill most life on land and near the surfaces of oceans and lakes.

A gamma-ray burst may have been the cause of the Ordovician extinction 450 million years ago. Long before the dinosaurs, life during that period was largely confined to the seas... and 60% of that life was wiped out in that event. Additionally, the burst likely caused the earth's temperature to drop, ushering in an ice age.

Source: NASA

Who Is John Roberts?

It's not yet been 24 hours since President Bush nominated John Roberts to the Supreme Court. But who is he?

Rex Hammock has posted several useful links on RexBlog.com to help us figure that out, including JudgeRoberts.com (created by the conservative group Progress for America, and containing a resume and some positive quotes by politicians and business leaders), and the somewhat more meaty "Campaign for the Court" blog hosted by the Washington Post.

UPDATE: Beltway Blogroll has lists of (mostly liberal) blogs and commentary on the nomination in this post, as well as this one.

A Pill Bottle That Calls Your Cell

The SIMpill medicine bottle uses SMS technology to communicate with both patient and physician, sending a text message to a patient's cell phone if they miss a dose. When a prescription is filled, the pharmacist programs the bottle.

The SIMpill, developed and marketed by a South African company, could be a potential lifesaver for a forgetful patient on a critical medication.

Source: Iconoculture

Employee Turnover May Accelerate This Summer

With the US unemployment rate at the lowest level in four years, workers are in a strong position to seek new job opportunities if they are not happy in their current position.

“With more jobs out there, employees are analyzing their current situation and sometimes think they can find a better opportunity elsewhere,” said Denise Gians, Motivation Product Manager for Sunrise, Florida-based G.Neil, a human resource support company. “Employees who choose to leave impact a company’s morale as well as the budget.” G.Neil estimates that hiring and training a new employee can cost a company anywhere from a few thousand dollars to $100,000.

Moreover, a recent survey by London-based Video Arts has found that 34% of workers aged 18 to 24 planned to change jobs in 2005. The survey also found that 14% of those interested in leaving will do so after a summer vacation, when they feel refreshed and have a renewed perspective on their lives, and that 11% plan to leave in the fall so they can be settled in a new job before the holiday season.

Source: Hermann Trend Alert

Pranking Local TV News

If you think you'll poke your eyes out if you see one more house fire or minor traffic accident on your local TV news broadcast, you're not alone. A pranskter group called Newsbreakers.org has been "hacking" live news reports with bizarre disruptions. Their slogan: "When news breaks, we bust it!"

One of the group's favorite tactics is to dress up as wacky characters and disrupt live TV reports. Aside from being funny and irreverent (they often disrupt news stories involving murders and other serious topics), the group believes it is making an important statement about the irrelevance of modern TV news.

"Television news today is a voyeur's fantasy," says Newsbreakers founder Chris Landon. "It has shifted from the role of challenging those in power to exploiting the weak, or those involved in personal tragedy... TV defines reality for a lot of people ... We just want to startle them enough to disrupt that view of reality."

Until the Newsbreakers come to your town, you can watch video clips of their exploits on their website.

Sources: The Observer, post.thing.net

Divorce, Marriage Decline; Living Together More Common

Fewer US couples are getting divorced... but that may be because more couples are living together instead of getting married.

A report based on US census figures by the National Marriage Project has found that divorces have fallen from 22 in 1,000 married women in 1980 to 10 per 1,000 in 2004 -- a drop of more than half in 25 years. However, marriage rates have also fallen, from 77 out of 1,000 single women in 1976 to 40 per 1,000 in 2004. Meanwhile, 5 million opposite-sex couples are now estimated to be living together out of wedlock.

Family experts worry about the fate of children of unmarried couples who separate, as they are less likely to have legal protections than children of married couples who divorce. One upside of the lower marriage rates may be that those who choose to marry are happier in their relationships; the number of married couples who say they are "very happy" is up for the first time in 25 years.

Source: AP (Newsday)

Computer Science Majors at Lowest Level in 30 Years

Overseas outsourcing -- or at least the fear of it -- has discouraged today's college students from majoring in computer science. As a result, enrollment in computer science programs in the US has