PoliBlog

Apple announced immediate availability of new, upgraded iMacs. The stalwart desktop computers offering value to the home office now sport faster Intel processors and improved graphic chips. The top model now pushes 3 GHz, making processor-intensive applications such as Photoshop and Final Cut run more efficiently. Every computing task benefits.

Ray Anderson, CEO of Interface, makes carpets, and makes them destructively, as he elucidates in this video.



The responsibility for global warming and the near-end of nature lies with the private control of resource extraction and the Western economic institution, The Corporation.

Nothing less than the disposal of the corporation as we know it will be needed to end the short-term plunder of Earth for private gain.

Education is a system of imposed ignorance. ~ Noam Chomsky
The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education. ~ Albert Einstein

George Carlin Celebrates Earth Day.

• Comcast lies about disrupting Internet traffic
• Comcast packs public meeting hall with paid supporters
  
• Yahoo gives private user information to China
• Creative Commons and Internet copyright
• Sound bites and the dearth of meaningful public discourse
  

The Internet becomes a battle ground involving open public access versus private corporate control for profit.

In this video interview, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! elicits views from Stanford University professor Lawrence Lessig on Net Neutrality and the potential for abuses of power from centralized control of Internet access currently placed in private media corporations.

More about East Timor.

And a recent summation.

Britain's greatest living playwright speaks in acceptance of the Nobel Prize in Literature. 2005.

Apple Computer never has been a leader among the world's supply of computer input devices. The first Apple mouse had an uncomfortable rectangular "sanding block" shape. The infamous "hockey puck" mouse supplied with the original iMac was Apple hitting bottom on functionality, all for visual chic. It's been down hill from down hill--except the Mighty Mouse.

Apple's first foray into the multi-button genre has a comfortable rounded jelly-bean shape sporting the industry-standard optical cursor feature. So far, so good, but not far off lingers the mini scroll ball.

Hailed as the next best thing since sliced bread, the mini scroll ball fails the durability test. In my experience, the mechanical failure rate for the scroller nub is high, and early. Mighty Mouse scroll balls which fail in less than a year of use is, albeit subjective, high.

Enter the recent patent applied for by Apple Inc. for an optical scroll mechanism for an optical mouse. Apple knows the Mighty Mouse needs a fix. The engineers have discarded the mechanical scrolling mechanism found in the current bunch of Mighty Mice, for a solid-state optical device that responds to the movement of a finger placed over a small optical window where the mechanical scrolling ball now sits.

Will Apple soon offer its first mouse than can truly roar quality, functionality, and durability?

As reported today by Democracy Now:

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Report: Ex-Secret Service Agents’ Firm Spied on Environmentalists

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Nonprofit organizations engaged in promoting social justice and environmental protection would do well to take computer network security seriously. Many nonprofits employ inexpensive WiFi networks in small offices and home offices.

Keep in mind that WiFi signals travel far beyond the confines of buildings, out into the street and into other buildings. Electronically breaking into an office may be much easier than physically breaking into it. Accessing sensitive data on your computers may be as easy as working from a parked car on the street, or hacking into a network from the comfort and anonymity of another room in the same building.

In my experience, some nonprofits do not have adequate WiFi network security.

An external mouse and keyboard offers significant comfort and efficiency at your workstation.. The external speakers do sounds justice.

Mobility when you need it; ease and harmony in the office. An external monitor is recommended for serious graphic and video work.

Comic courtesy of xkcd.com