Category: Politics

factcheck.org is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. Doing “fact checking” seems the be the latest trend and a growing obligation for US voters. Quoting out of context, twisting the words, exaggretating – all these techniques seem to be in the arsenal for Democrats and Republicans as well.

Martin Brampton from Silicon.com doubts that software patents are rarely as innovative as the simplistic argument for patents would suggest. A parallel debate is being fought in science. Governments have sought increased commercial involvement with university research, but the price has often been proprietary control over new ideas. Many academic scientists are opposing this trend,…

Just for the record: Why We Know Iraq Is Lying (by Condolezza Rice, Jan. 23rd 2003)

DB Research has issued a paper that claims software patents block innovation: A growing number of R&D-intensive businesses realises that licencing out their IP (intellectual property) can constitute a substantial share or their revenues, which in turn encourages innovation efforts. Bearing this in mind, one could be tempted to consider ever stricter IP protection regimes…

What if you invent a web site creation and maintenance system that permits distributed control and centralized management of a web site? What if the physical implementation of the web site resides on a database maintained by a database administratorand the web site system permits a site administrator to construct the overall structure, design and…

When I was in New York on 9/11/2001 I was stunned by the news program FoxNews. US people know that program: I didn’t at that time. The only US program we see here is CNN Europe (which is very different from the US as I learned that time). Now it seems (some) Americans start to…

This week there is a conference in Copenhagen where scientists debate environmental challenges of the world. Copenhagen Consensus is based on the aim to improve prioritization of limited means. The world is faced with a countless number of challenges such as diseases, environmental degradation, armed conflicts and financial instability. Copenhagen Consensus takes a new and…

This article by James Lovelock keeps me thinking. 25 years ago he was one of the first to warn about the global warming and he first conceived the Gaia hypothesis while working at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., in the mid-1960s, where he was designing life detection instruments for NASA’s Mars Viking probes.…

A project at Columbia’s Center on Organizational Innovation is looking at how technology has or hasn’t been used to enable participatory democracy in the rebuilding of the WTC: “New digital technologies have figured critically in the process of deciding the future of Lower Manhattan after September 11th, not only supplying the infrastructure for soliciting public…

Somehow I find this article very disturbing: Los Alamos National Laboratory has confirmed that classified computer media can not be located. Could it be that the Los Alamos laboratory is a self-service outlet for spies and terrorist affiliates?

HazardCards is a project spearheaded by the Learning Lab Denmark. What is it? A bunch of visual cards to learn and teach about technological hazards. You can play a game with the existing cards or create your own cards. A new twist to a old method of disseminating facts and stories. [via elearningpost]

This news story reports the EU finally will decide to allow software patents in Europe. But it appears the patents will be limited to software that is attached to specific hardware or can be used to produce new things. Seriously I think software patents will destroy more economic value than they can protect. Their primary…

Lawrence Lessig convinced his editor to release the book under a creative commons licence. Now Aaron Schwartz took it and put the complete book online – as wiki, so anyone can contribute and change the content.

Neil Postman – Media Ecology Association: “As far as I can tell, the new media have made us into a nation of information junkies; that is to say, our 170-year efforts have turned information into a form of garbage. My own answer to the question concerning access to information is that, at least for now,…

But I was wondering about this weblog anyway: Graphic Designers for Dean.

Guardian Unlimited: “You’ve got a President who says global warming is a hoax, and across the Potomac river you’ve got a Pentagon preparing for climate wars.” And: Key findings of the Pentagon. Reading the key findings I feel the Pentagon has hired some freaks that want to draw a scenario that would keep the defence…