BREAKING SURF
| Found Documents of the File-Sharing World |
| Found Photos of the File-Sharing World |
| Found Photos of the IRC World |
| A Century of American Road Trips |
| Segway across the States |
| Traveling the American West |
| PATH thru Ground Zero Movie |
| The Bathroom Diaries |
| Missile-Silo Home for Sale |
| The Best WWI Airplane Art We've Ever Seen |
| Jill Greenberg, Photographer to the Stars - and to Monkeys |
| Artful Garbage |
| Netsurfer Recommendations |
| Boys with Toys |
| Hatch Helps Smooth the Move into Adulthood |
| Harnessing Hamster Power |
| High-Speed Video |
| Process Your Disposable Digital Camera Yourself |
| SIPshare: Using SIP for P2P Applications |
| BOOK REVIEWS |
| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
| Contact and Subscription Information |
| Credits |
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BREAKING SURF
IMVU: Avatar Interface for IM Systems
The concept of having some visual representation of yourself, an avatar, while chatting away online is as old as the cyberhills. Many modern instant-messaging systems let you use small pictures or icons to identify yourself. The new IMVU system takes this one step further. It creates animated 3-D avatars that spout your messages in a graphical window. The system comes from Tim Harvey, known in online circles as the creator of There.com, an ambitious attempt to create a 3-D community out of the intersection of online game and suburban shopping mall. Harvey continues the theme, and commerce is very much the point of IMVU; to personalize your IMVU avatar, you have to buy custom features with Avatar Dollars (AV), 6,000 of which will cost you a real $5. For example, a set of custom eyeballs that look like a pair of eight-balls costs AV 438. Sensibly, but not necessarily as expected, IMVU's Clothing catalogue contains a Mature category, reflecting what chatters mostly use IM for. We don't know what's in the Mature section because we're too cheap to fork over $10 for the required Accesspass. The software currently works in Windows in multiple languages and is compatible with all the major IM clients, but it only supports one-on-one chat at the moment.http://www.imvu.com/catalog/web_index.php
US Unveils Two New Nickel Coin Designs
The nickel is a five-cent coin, and while it's not very useful these days for buying much of anything by itself, the coin has a fine numismatic history. Many consider the early 20th-century Buffalo Nickel to be one of the handsomest American coin designs. The US Mint's coin designers have a tradition to live up to. The mint will release two new nickel designs next year, joining two other new designs released this year. The 2005 coins have a new, majestic profile of Thomas Jefferson on the obverse. The reverse of one coin will depict the first view of the Pacific by the Lewis and Clark expedition while the other revisits the buffalo theme with a muscular bison. Not bad. The US Mint's press release has details. Rather than making high-resolution images easy to view, the ever-clueful government agency makes those images available only in downloadable .zip format, although you can easily view thumbnails. Perhaps they're trying to save some nickels on bandwidth costs, bless their little bureaucratic hearts.Buffalo Nickel: http://www.geocities.com/RodeoDrive/4044/fullhorn.html
US Mint: http://www.usmint.gov/pressroom/index.cfm?action=press_release&ID=539
Images: http://www.usmint.gov/pressroom/index.cfm?action=photo#2004NickelSeries
US Presidential Candidates Answer Science Questions
Wouldn't it be neat if candidates for high office were forced to answer questions like "Mr. President, can you explain the evolutionary Red Queen principle?", or "Senator Kerry, what is Compton scattering?" But no, the science journal Nature had to ask a bunch of policy questions instead of testing the candidates' own scientific chops. We don't expect the candidates to be test-tube jockeys but we do expect them to think about how to allocate research dollars, how and whether to amend environmental laws, and how to deal with the security restrictions that are preventing foreign scientists from visiting the US. Nature posed those types of questions to the candidates, and their answers to even those softball questions leave much to be desired. The answers so excellently avoid any statements of value or information that we doubt any real candidate even saw the questions - these were probably answered by a campaign aide. Nature posted the material in a totally gratuitous Flash applet revealling a breathtaking cluelessness about standard and indexable access to information - not good for a science journal. If anybody, this may interest those beyond American shores, since many of the questions touch on global issues upon which American science policy has much impact.Red Queen: http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/REDQUEEN.html
Compton scattering: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/quantum/comptint.html
Nature: http://www.nature.com/news/specials/uselection/index.html#flash
It is a cruel universe indeed when three of the four Ramones have been taken from us while William Shatner still has a singing career. Johnny Ramone (ne John Cummings) died at the age of 55 this week after a long bout with prostate cancer. In case you missed the '70s, the Ramones were a seminal rock band and one of the creators of the punk rock genre. It is a little appreciated fact that they were also the masters of the two-minute song, as revealed by one of us in rigorous timing experiments performed at one of their concerts - 32 songs, 64 minutes (before the encores). Drummer Tommy Ramone is the last survivor. Try the "Loud, Fast Ramones: Their Toughest Hits" album for their best.
Ramones: http://www.ramones.com/
Shatner: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0002RUPH4/netsurferdigest
Loud, Fast: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00006LEQZ/netsurferdigest
Shatner Wins Emmy, Hell Still Balmy
William Shatner has won an Emmy for his guest role in an episode of the TV drama "The Practice". Contrary to expectations, Hell has not, in fact, frozen over. Shatner is of course widely known for his, shall we say, emotive acting style, which complements his, shall we say, iconically awful singing style. In acknowledging the win on his Web site, Shatner quotes the immortal words of Sally Field: "They like me, they really like me!" Well, yes, give the old workhorse credit for his longevity, satirical entertainment factor, and public acceptance of toupees on aging stars, if nothing else. Congrats, Bill.http://www.williamshatner.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=161
Getting Published is Just the Start
The day your new book hits the book stores, 500 or so other books will land there as well. The next day, another 500 new books will hit the market, and so on, so your opus can quickly drown in a tide of titles. Stacy Sullivan found getting her nonfiction book published relatively easy for a first-time author. But getting her book noticed and sold - well, that's a horse of a different color. Unfortunately for Sullivan, her exploration of the Balkans conflict through the ingenious focus of a Brooklyn roofer was relegated to the back shelves of history. The Columbia Journalism Review looks at the book's evolving fate and how the merchandising policies of major booksellers work heavily against so-called midlist books like hers. Money for book tours, high-visibility displays, and prominent shelf space go to promote blockbusters and fad books, the literary pap that passes like junk food through the book world's maw, greased by payments from the publishers and heavy discounts. The story reveals much about how book publishing has changed, how marketing and publicity have become dominant, and how editors, who once took pride in making a good book truly great, have turned into assembly-line workers.http://www.cjr.org/issues/2004/5/ideas-books-beckerman.asp
Shakespeare left no handwritten manuscripts of his plays. Only after his death were supposedly definitive editions published. While he was alive, however, he (probably) produced printed quartos, cheap pamphlets meant mostly as working scripts. These survive, and many show considerable changes from version to version of any given play. The British Library has put many of its Shakespeare quartos online, 93 copies of 21 plays. The library's initiative is one of those breathtaking applications of the Web that makes life 15 years ago seem so insular. At the site, you can read single plays or compare any two versions of the same play. "To be, or not to be, I there's the point," isn't quite the modern accepted line. There's something spooky about these quartos, something that brings back the smell of horse dung, the flicker of lanterns, and the shouts from louts in rustic audiences. Anyone without benefit of previous exposure to Chaucer or other early English writers should be aware that spelling and lettering have changed considerably in the intervening 400 years, but that's part of the fun. The BBC has the story.
British Library: http://www.bl.uk/treasures/shakespeare/homepage.html
BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3641880.stm
Short on content but revealing nonetheless, a Locus Online article has answers by six respected SF authors to a few questions relating to the social future of the people on the planet. Global warming, increased consolidation of global governmental efforts, and terrorism are all too briefly looked into. Why SF authors? Well, pretty much everything you use today was first a science-fiction fantasy. SF authors seem adept at identifying where the current trends will take us.
http://www.locusmag.com/2004/Features/09_ShirleySocialFuture.html
Software engineering has long focused on making software easy to use, but Joel Spolsky argues that it's sometimes better to concentrate more on increasing social function than on form. Software designers need to do all they can to include a social interface, people to people, and Napster is a case in point, Spolsky claims. Its suboptimal interface design - buttons instead of tabs, for example - was made moot by the app's ability to let people trade music files. Text messaging on cell phones is another example of this same logic: people use the maddeningly annoying method of typing messages with a number pad because they can express themselves more comfortably in text than with voice. First, give users something they want to do, then worry about how easy it is to use, Spolsky teaches. Designing the social interface - the human-human link - is today's key software challenge, requiring the ability to combine programming smarts with sociology and anthropology. Subtle applications of the lesson can weave their way into other areas, such as managing discussion groups, which is why you need to read Spolsky's essay itself rather than just this.
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/NotJustUsability.html
Battle of the Music Compression Formats
Ever wonder why MP3 is the dominant format for online music? This excellent Spectrum article explores the various music compression formats and how they interact with the state of the music industry. The article notes that while the music industry argued over the CD's replacement, users were already ripping CDs and storing MP3s on their hard drives - and the industry doesn't seem to have ever caught up. The article also previews what might happen in the video universe. Do check out the great links at the bottom of the article.http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/WEBONLY/publicfeature/sep04/0904audio.html
Everything's Coming up Hitchhikers
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" returns this week. No, not the movie - that's due next year. This is BBC Radio 4's remake of the radio serial, and the site provides not only a lot of hype, but very cool material. You can listen in, check out photos, catch some video of the recording sessions, and much more. BBC offers previews, Vogon poetry, and a chance to beat the Vogons by submitting your own poetic dung. You can download animations and screensavers and test your hitching knowledge in the quiz section. If you've never cared much for the work of Douglas Adams, there's no need to trouble with a visit. It is, however, a must-see for Hitchhiker's fans.http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/
Mozilla Suite Security Bugs Fixed In Latest Versions
This week brought news of a set of serious security vulnerabilities in older versions of Mozilla, Firefox, and Thunderbird. The security bugs range in severity from critical to annoying. The good news is that the latest versions of all those products have all the fixes built-in. So don't delay, and upgrade your Mozilla applications forthwith.Security Advisory: http://secunia.com/advisories/12526/
Latest Mozilla: http://www.mozilla.org/
Microsoft Fixes Serious Security Problem with JPG Images
It used to be that it was thought impossible to infect your computer with worms or hackware simply by looking at a picture. Sadly, Microsoft has proven that bit of wisdom wrong with a nasty programming bug involving how its operating systems and applications parse the ubiquitous JPEG image files. A buffer overflow problem can allow hackers to run arbitrary code on your computer, and we all know what that means. A Windows Update fix is available, but no known attack of this sort exists except as a proof of concept by Microsoft itself. Still, if we were you, we'd update our systems before looking at any cute kitten pics or porn shots of unknown origin.http://www.microsoft.com/security/bulletins/200409_jpeg.mspx
911 Emergency Services and VoIP Don't Mix
All of you using VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) to substantially lower your phone bills should remember one very important fact the next time your kitchen is on fire - the 911 emergency number probably won't work. 911 depends on the very feature that VoIP doesn't possess, a fixed physical address. This Slate article details the comical attempt by the author to reach 911 in Manhattan while using his VoIP service. Although there are solutions to the problem, some of them require changes in VoIP that will disappoint users. Of course, do you want to have your life on the line and find out that the operator can only identify your location through common landmarks?http://slate.com/Default.aspx?id=2106424
FCC Reports on State of Advanced Telecommunications
The broadband revolution is nearly ubiquitous in the US. Only 6.8% of American ZIP codes don't have broadband access at the end of 2003, down from 22.2% in June 2001, according to the FCC's latest report to Congress on national advanced telecom access. Other new high-speed services such as WiFi are also making inroads. What remains most striking is the continued dominance of cable over DSL services. You can read the full report, but the much shorter press release has nearly all the interesting details.Press release: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-251959A1.pdf
Report: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-04-208A1.pdf
PayPal to Fine Buyers/Sellers of Porn, Gambling, Drugs
Porn hawkers quake in their custom-fitted boots as PayPal announces it will begin fining customers as much as $500 for using their own accounts to sell or buy porn, gambling, and uncertified-seller prescription drugs. Some, including former PayPal executive Eric Jackson, think PayPal has adopted this "draconian" position to ward off regulatory pressure. PayPal had already forbidden transactions in porn and gambling, but did little to enforce the rules. but of course that suggestion is denied. CNET has a tad more.http://news.com.com/2100-1026_3-5362576.html
ONLINE CULTURE
Found Documents of the File-Sharing World
You wouldn't walk into a bank, open up your safe deposit box, and say to everyone in the bank, "Hey, I have some candy in the vault on top of my gold bullion. Anybody want any? I'll just leave it open." Yet people do that everyday with their computers. They log on to peer-to-peer (P2P) networks without securing their computers first. See What You Share is a site dedicated to helping people who don't know better to protect themselves. The site highlights confidential documents taken via P2P connections, but blots out any private or identifying data. For instance, there's more than one person in the archive who has shared a file that contained all his or her credit card account numbers and expiration dates. As with everything, Slashdot airs a variety of opinions on the site's intent.See What You Share: http://www.seewhatyoushare.com/
Slashdot: http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/04/07/28/1813228.shtml?tid=158&tid=95
Found Photos of the File-Sharing World
Rich Vogel realized that as he used peer-to-peer software to search for music, he would get image files among the music. People would share photos they had placed in a shareable directory or folder. Vogel started to gather these accidental glimpses into strangers' lives and published them online at his Found Photos site - to the chagrin of some, who have requested that he take down their images when they see them broadcast to the world. Some of the photos are a testament to the digital format; others are proof that people still take pictures of their fingers with digital cameras. Two quick tips: alcohol does not make you more photogenic, it just makes you think you are; and whether you're patronizing a strip club or admiring a urinal, these are perhaps not so much Kodak moments. We supply links to four of the best, in our humble opinion, of course.Found Photos: http://www.10eastern.com/foundphotos.html
Best 1: http://www.10eastern.com/images/FoundPhotos/images/9-4/c-bo.jpg
Best 2: http://www.10eastern.com/images/FoundPhotos/images/9-4/pentecote-2004-101.jpg
Best 3: http://www.10eastern.com/images/FoundPhotos/images/go_snow.jpg
Best 4: http://www.10eastern.com/images/FoundPhotos/images/7-16/DSCF0108.jpg
This automated Web site searches Internet relay chat (IRC) channels for images, live. Any time the spider finds an image posted to an IRC channel, it grabs it for the display, which is updated every hour. As the homepage clearly states, the images could be of anything, so this isn't one of those "safe for work" sites. While we found the images inoffensive enough when we slid through, it's a sure bet that among the 1,800 images added every day you'll find something to get offended over if you apply yourself diligently. By the way, the most recent links are said to be at the end of the line, not on page 1 - so for all we know, some of the folks in the initial images may be dead by now. Some come with amusing commentary; others don't. Add your own!
http://ircimages.com/
ONLINE TRAVEL
A Century of American Road Trips
Most adult Americans know road trips from their youth, or college. Many continue the tradition. Rising gas prices and screaming kids in the back seat may painfully remind them of the larger picture: road trips are a mirror of America's economic and social development. MSNBC drives this point home in its entertaining, nostalgic multimedia history, Driving Vacations through the Ages, which explores the development of the Automobile Age. The site starts at the turn of the past century, and traces the expansion of roads into the Lincoln Highway from New York City to San Francisco, and later into an interstate highway system. Along the way, an animated salesman dressed for the times pushes three cars per decade, such as the '51 Ford Country Squire station wagon, '51 Studebaker Coupe, or '57 Chevy Bel-Air. Our reviewer calculated that in 1950 he could have driven from Chicago to Miami in three days for $51, lodging included. Here and there you'll pick up a detail hard to forget. For instance, in 1974, an OPEC oil embargo caused gas prices to jump to 53 cents a gallon (up from 38 cents a gallon a year earlier). Horrors! Unless you're a fanatic proponent of mass transit, you'll get a kick looking back here.http://www.msnbc.com/modules/summer_driving/decades/frame.asp
If you sometimes feel like you're missing out on the scenery and interaction with the locals as you zip past it all on the highway, try seeing the country the way Josh Caldwell and his five pals are - on a Segway. Of course, they're not all on it at once. While Caldwell is tooling down the road at the breakneck speed of about 10 mph, the others follow along on four wheels, filming a documentary about the journey from Seattle to Boston. As of the writing of this article, they were in eastern Colorado. Visitors to the east can check the map to see if/when the gang will pass by.
http://www.10mph.com/
American history with a kick, Legends of America focuses primarily upon the western states, with an emphasis on ghost towns, gold mines, and other ephemera that made the west so wild. Packed with links and rich in detail, the site provides brief looks at the infamous Tombstone, Ariz. (ever wonder how it got that name?) and some of its colorful, if transient, denizens. If you're ready for everything from travel destinations to treasure-hunting tips, to say nothing of the odd ghost sighting, we suggest you pack a lunch for your visit.
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/
The Port Authority Trans Hudson (PATH) trains used to end their runs from New Jersey in a loop and station under the World Trade Center. The new rebuilt loop now runs around the edges of the great gaping hole of Ground Zero. The side looking into the hole is open to view. This moving movie is simply a trip trough the rebuilt loop with the new perspective. It's not easy to watch.
http://www.sensual-world.com/aw2k/MVI_0052.AVI
You may want to sit down for this one. Mary Ann Racin has a database of public toilets around the world and her site, the Bathroom Diaries, invites individuals to rank them and add to the list. Each entry contains basic information about the rating, contributing factors, and hours. The biggest attraction, however, is not the ratings but the commentary by the, ummm... - patrons of each particular establishment. For instance, the bathroom at the National Museum of American History includes an exhibit on the history of bathrooms and plumbing, and the Peck Building in Montreal contains "violently funny pro-separatist and pro-federalist graffiti." It's always nice to have reading material in the bathroom.
http://www.thebathroomdiaries.com/
Most househunters worry about having enough bedrooms and bathrooms, finding a nice part of town, and getting a down payment together. Other househunters live in a completely different world. If you're one of that latter group - say, a wannabe Bond villain or just plain stinkin' rich - check out the Silohome. Heck, even if you're just curious about how sumptuous an ex-missile silo has to be to demand upwards of $2 million, stop on by. We learned about the silo on a local PBS show, and trust us when we tell you that the pictures at the Web site don't do the place justice. The Silohome does come furnished, which is a big plus when you're talking about 5,000 square feet of living space, but purchasers may need a team of gardeners to handle the 19 acres you get in New York's Adirondack State Park. The private airstrip may come in handy if you need to fly in a landscaper in an emergency. The renovators selling this unique property are happy to confirm that Russia no longer has this site on its nuclear hit list. That's a good thing, but will the local pizza guy deliver?
http://www.silohome.com/index.htm
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
The Best WWI Airplane Art We've Ever Seen
Mark Miller trained as a technical illustrator 25 years ago. From what we see at his Web site, he was excellent at it - but he's an even better fine artist. His World War I airplane illustration is the best we've ever seen, and that covers a lot of airplane art. Miller gets the details, down to the last fastening, right. That's not unique; where Miller goes beyond everything else is in the atmosphere and feel. His background buildings look so real and the sky is so right that you are drawn into his scenes. The dogfights are amazing for the feel as well as their accuracy. His technical art is excellent; his ground and flight art is special and sets a new standard. Don't miss his traditional media work, either.http://mwmiller.net/
Jill Greenberg, Photographer to the Stars - and to Monkeys
Some photographers have all the luck. Jill Greenberg is one of them, but she also has a considerable degree of skill. Besides celebrities such as Clint Eastwood, David Bowie, and John Elway, she's also good with babies and animals. Greenberg rose to media prominence during the 1990s. Many commercial photographers would love to have a fraction of her credits, which include work for beverage giants, entertainment companies, and mainstream magazines. Her artistic signature is manipulation: controlled lighting and Photoshop refinements. An article in Creativity called her "an accomplished 'control freak' who manipulates the shiny-peopled moment for a 'more perfect' image." Greenberg explains: "I just sort of rearrange people's faces sometimes.... I love to pick the best shot, with the best blowing hair or the best-lit tree and landscape and put them all together to make the most striking and beautiful image. Once you have the option to rearrange and perfect the elements, it's hard to resist." It's hard to resist clicking through her photo galleries, especially if you like bold, often flamboyant, arresting uses of color. Call us starstruck, but we like her commercial work better than her personal work, which seems to focus entirely on monkeys and apes.http://www.manipulator.com/
"Just what I always wanted - a box of garbage!" You, too can make someone say those words if you visit Justin Gignac's site and order his product. Gignac takes typical New Yorkers' garbage - losing lottery tickets, coffee cups, etc. - seals them in a clear plastic cube, and sells it as art for everyone to enjoy. Demand is so high that Justin has had to put a temporary hold on orders, although you can still get trashed, as it were, in a hurry if you're willing to pay double the standard $25 price. It's a bit scary that his About the Artist says, "Yes, I have a girlfriend" upon mouse-over, which implies that women were throwing themselves at the garbage man. It's eve scarier that there's a shortage of New York City garbage as art.
http://www.nycgarbage.com/
BOOKS & E-ZINES
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Items our staff likes and you might too. Click on the image or title to order at a hefty discount from our affiliate Amazon.com, and send a few pennies our way as well.
For more selections, check out: Netsurfer Books: http://www.netsurf.com/nsb/ Netsurfer Library: http://www.netsurf.com/nsl/ |
The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System
The Rape of the Masters: How Political Correctness Sabotages Art
Light
Hacking iPod and iTunes
http://www.millionaireplayboy.com/default.php
Hatch Helps Smooth the Move into Adulthood
During our 20s and 30s, when we hit our "quarterlife", we all hatch out of our family units, find educations and careers, new friends and homes, and even start our own families. The aim of Hatch e-zine is to support those changes with features that cover stuff like waiting for interview results, the social nuances of meeting friends via the Web, and the feminist issues involved in looking good in a bikini. Hatch neatly groups topics into the key areas of interest for people in this age-bracket and the light-hearted touch to even the serious articles prevent the reader from facing information overload. This site could make you a little richer, literally as well as intellectually, as it offers sound advice on how to negotiate a higher salary and when to talk about the cash during the interview process. Bosses beware, the quarterlifers are on the prowl.http://www.hatchmagazine.com/index.phtml
SURFING SCIENCE
The creators of this project freely admit that the idea was conceived "at a rather, uh, soused company Christmas party." But it took an eighth-grader asking "Can a rodent generate enough electricity to power a light by running on it's (sic) wheel?" at a kid's science Web site (AllExperts.com) to put the project into motion. The complete plans, replete with illustrations, for a night light powered by a low RPM alternator are here, complete with pictures of its slave-hamster engine, Skippy. Find somebody who still brews their coffee from that stuff that comes in a can, get a few magnets together, a bit of wire and some super-glue, et voila! The project is more complicated than it seems, involving as it does some complex trade-offs between voltage, resistance, hamster psychology, and a bunch of other variables. This is only the tip of the iceberg, in terms of potential applications for the technology. Be sure to check the stuff at the end of the article for great links to alternative lighting, small-scale power systems, and much more.Night Light: http://www.otherpower.com/hamster.html
AllExperts.com: http://www.allexperts.com/
There's more to slow motion than the study of athletes in action or actors in danger. Want to know what a grape looks like when it's dropped into a blender? What Jell-O looks like when it explodes? What a tomato looks like as it gets smashed? If so, Interesting High-Speed Video Clips may satisfy you. Thanks to the imagination and resourcefulness of David Alciatore, of the College of Engineering at Colorado State University, this large collection of Windows Media files will enhance your appreciation, if not balloon your understanding, of moth flight, face punching, and other natural or destructive activities recorded close up at high speed. Brief though these videos are, curiosity may drive you through all 15 categories of intellectual stimulation with special attention to Fire, Smoke, and Explosions and Stupid Human Tricks. Ah, the fruits of higher education! There's a page of instructions in case you want to capture your own revelatory moments with a Kodak high-speed camera. We prefer the silence and aridity of water balloons exploding on film.
http://www.engr.colostate.edu/~dga/high_speed_video
Process Your Disposable Digital Camera Yourself
While some associate "hacking" with malevolent activities, historically, the term described a range of geekly device exploration - as in this case, which involves hacking inexpensive disposable digital cameras. Aside from the psychological thrill of the chase that drives all hacking endeavors, often another common element is pure pragmatism. In this case, a disposable camera is designed to be processed where you purchased it - and the processing isn't cheap. It's much more economical to download the camera's contents to a standard personal computer so that you can process your own shots. The hackers behind Disposable Digital Camera Interfacing cite other possible benefits as well, but the main use of the site is the hardware documentation for the ubergeek and, more to the point, how to build a USB cable to interface the cam to your system for around $7. Got your cable and all hooked up? Good. Time to learn a couple of methods for reading the flash data in the cam via the USB interface. You can accomplish this feat on a number of platforms.http://www.maushammer.com/systems/dakotadigital/DakotaDigital.html
SOFTWARE
SIPshare: Using SIP for P2P Applications
SIPshare is a demonstration project produced by EarthLink, the giant ISP. SIPshare is a typical peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing application, but built upon the well known Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) standard, already widely used in VoIP telephony. EarthLink created SIPshare in the belief that "an open Internet is a good Internet. An open Internet means users have full end-to-end connectivity... without the help of mediating servers in the middle whenever possible. We believe that if peer-to-peer flourishes, the Internet flourishes." EarthLink thinks the adoption of SIP as a P2P standard would produce superior connectivity and eliminate any need for all the oddball standards fighting it out on other P2P networks. This is a demo project, written in Java, and EarthLink disclaims any support for it. Nevertheless, it is an important proof of concept that may make people take a serious look at using the widely used SIP standard for developing P2P applications in the future.http://www.research.earthlink.net/p2p/