Whats New in Technology?

Developing and maintaining information technology skills requires a continuing awareness of technical developments. In this part of the course, Dr. Santoro will highlight news releases from a number of relevent areas, including:
• Business and Industry News
• Basic Research
• Applied Research and Development
• Legal, Social and Ethical Issues

---

16-Nov-2000 Drug Companies use High-Tech to Influence Physician Choices

Drug companies are using data from insurance companies and pharmacies to develop profiles on the drugs that physicians prescribe, with the intent of influencing those decisions.

For more information, see this article in the New York Times

9-Nov-2000 Sony declares this the 'Decade of the Robot'

Sony corporation, ramping up production of its popular Aibo robotic dog, is claiming that the decade 2001-2010 will be the Decade of the Robot. For more information see this CNN News story

7-Nov-2000 Do Andoids Dream?

MIT is working on it. Actually, they are working on developing androids that will interact socially with humans. For more information, see this New York Times news story.

26-Oct-2000 FDA approves device to restore hearing.

The Food and Drug Administration has approved a brain implant device that may restore some hearing for patients who became deaf after tumors were removed from auditory nerves.

For more information see this Discoveryhealth.com web site.

3-Oct-2000 US Government endorses new encryption algorithm.

fter a three-year worldwide search for a new encryption technique powerful enough to earn the official endorsement of the United States government, the Commerce Department yesterday named a winner: Rijndael.

For more information, see this New York Times article.

26-Sep-2000 Top 10 Images from Commercial Eye-In-The-Sky.

The world's only commercial one-meter resolution imaging satellite (Ikonos) is celebrating its first anniversary in space. To mark the event, they have released the top 10 pictures. For more information see this Spaceflightnow.com article.

19-Sep-2000 An elevator to Space?

First proposed by science fiction writer Issac Asimov, the 'space elevator' is now seriously being considered by NASA as a next-generation method of getting stuff to Earth orbit and beyond. For more information see this NASA article.

14-Sep-2000 Making information storage decisions.

This is not really tech-news, but it is relevant to our discussion about data, files, filesystems and storage. Many options for data storage exist today. The smart consumer knows how to gather information before making a decision. One useful site is StorageReview.COM.

12-Sep-2000 Video phones -- is the time right?

Video telephoines have been possible since their intial demonstration in 1964. So why do we not have them? For more information see this CNN story.

7-Sep-2000 Judge says MP3.COM is guilty of copyright violation.

A Federal judge yesterday rules that MP3.com is guilty of willful copyright infringement, ordering the online music distributor to pay up to 250 million dollars in damages. For more information see this CNN story.

7-Sep-2000 Universities unwilling to test Carnivore.

Academic institutions will likely pass on a request to investigate and assess the FBI's Carnivore Internet eavesdropping system -- citing restrictions that would prevent a true independent investigation. These restrictions include the ability of the FBI to edit out, or refuse to make public, parts of the eventual report at its own discretion.

For more information, see this CNN story

5-Sep-2000 Media Convergence Marches On...

Within 10 years, the current TV, radio, newspaper, telephone, answering machine and personal computer will have been replaced by a single device (possibly integrated with the home, eventually wireless) that performs all of these functions. This trend is called media convergence

Here are news items showing the current state of this trend:

• Will you watch Microsoft TV?
• Regulators fear AOL Time-Warner merger

31-Aug-2000 10 GHz by 2011?

Mark 2011 on your calendar - that is the year industry experts predict availability of 10GHz chips. (10,000 MHz) This power, combined with advances in parallellism and genetic algorithims, will permit humanlike interfaces, such as advanced speech recognition to become the norm.

For more information see this ZDNet article.

28-Aug-2000 But are they Stylish?

As a result of studies into human factors and human-machine interfaces, we are embarking on the age of wearable computers. Sound strange? Well, the notion of a telephone in your pocket would have seemed perverse to your grandparents. See the following page for more information:
• The MIT Wearable Computing Web Page

23-Aug-2000 IBM Announces Organic Chip

The ultimate in HCI (human-computer interfaces) will come when one can wire the interface directly into the human neural system. This has immediate application for artificial limbs, restoring (or expanding) human senses and remote control of machinery. An initial step in the development of direct man-machine interfaces is the prototype organic chip developed by IBM.

For more information, see this USA Today article.

23-Aug-2000 The Honda Android

Aside from making really cool motorcycles (like my 1982 Silverwing Interstate - (:-)) -- Honda Corporation also makes many other kinds of machine.

This includes one of the first androids (robots in human form). Following are some links to info about this exciting innovation:

• The Honda Humanoid Robot
• Android World

And a special link:

• Comedy Central's Battlebots.

22-Aug-2000 Majority of Internet Users Want Privacy

Disputing government and business assertions, a Pew Internet & American Life Project survey indicates that a majority of Internet users (86%) prefer 'op-in' approaches to guard their privacy. For more information, see this CNN Article