News: Misinformation
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Tycho: SquawkBox is a free plug-in for Microsoft Flight Simulator.  It lets virtual pilots connect to a network where they can communicate with real people performing virtual air traffic control.  I first came across it in 2001 while searching for add-ons to the latest version of Flight Simulator.  The description I read online made it sound like a big MMO for pilots and air traffic controllers, a concept I could scarcely believe until I logged on and tried it for myself.  My inexperience meant that on my first try I flew my small Cessna right into the approach path of a major international airport.  The controller who called on the radio and suggested I do a quick 180 before I get smashed by an incoming 747 was ever so nice.
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Also: U.S. cyberwar games turn into hacker melee. See what people are saying on News.com Extra.
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K5, I'm disappointed in you.  On October 19 I was watching CNN and was hearing that someone was threatening dirty bomb attacks on football stadiums. Obviously fearmongering media idiocy, complete with ex-FBI call-in talking heads throughout the morning/ early afternoon. Obviously a slow newsday for CNN to report the workings of Internet trolls... but that's what bothered me the most: what Internet troll had created this glorious shitstorm?  Ever since our crowning achievement last year in the science of Internet trolling, I've been looking forward to K5 topping that supremely asocial event. So when it was finally announced who the culprit was on October 20th, I was severely depressed. Because this guy was beyond pathetic. Which led me to the inevitable realization: it should have been one of us.
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Plus: Are you having an identity crisis? [News.com Extra]
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Gabe: I've gotten some mail about the Sony Defense Force site we mentioned in the strip today. Most people seem to want to know if it's a joke or not. I am of the opinion that it is. I'm not sure about Tycho but I think it's 100% fake. Stuff like the Lair review and their spin on the video of Halo 3 running on a PS3 demo station just can't be real. I think the guy running the site and making the articles is a genius. He's pulling in all kinds of traffic with an incredible parody and best of all, he even has people in his forums who think the whole thing is real. My guess is, in a couple weeks or maybe a month he'll drop the charade and reveal the whole thing was a gag. Maybe he can keep it going longer than that but I doubt it. I hope he can though because honestly it's fucking hilarious.   128016001920  Also Kiko made you this cool wallpaper based on one of his PAX photos. He has also posted two more sets including the final round of the Omegathon and general PAX culture.  -Gabe out
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Rumorville, conspiracy theory, and over speculation results in crazed forum discussion and a possible slashdot mentioning. Jason Dowdell, someone I have spoken with often for about a year now, published a
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Actual Expert Too Boring for TV! Lazy Scientists Discover New Cable Channel! TV-News Graphics Guy Gives Weatherman On-Air Surprise! Soon, you can have all the fake broadcast news you want from theonion.com. By Sonja Zjawinski.
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Sir, The Nelson Mail's glib and inapt title on a June 23 article "Nappies and compost cause a stink'' is inappropriate and obviously was penned by a philistine.   Compost should never "stink'' if made properly.
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An IBM study expects viruses to crawl into cars and cell phones. Also:  Research finds more people banking online and the trend growing.... The Medicare budget swells past expectations.... and more.
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Beware the Internet's meat puppets. And sock puppets. And trolls and shills and astroturfing and other forms of dubious online marketing.
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The music industry's tactic of mass file-sharing lawsuits is improper, a California judge rules. Also: Japanese scientists work on holographic phones....  Microsoft's antitrust case delayed but not over & hellip;. and more.
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It's not very often that you see something new in News.  News is not exactly new technology, but when personal computers came along, and then widespread networking, it created a whole new playing field for news, that has shaken things up for most of my life. Change comes in fits at starts. First there was the web, then RSS, and now I think we're on the cusp of another bit of change. If you want to see what I think it looks like, check out the home page of nytimesriver.com. But that's not the end of the story. A flat completely chronologic view of news probably isn't enough. And earlier this month at a meeting in NY, two engineers at the NY Times set me off in a new direction, with a very simple bit of advice. They told me to look in the HTML source code of their stories. When I did I saw they had applied a taxonomy to their news flow, and this opened the door to what I would like to show you today -- an outline view of the news.  http://nytimesriver.com/outline/  I believe it's fairly self-explanatory.  The topics are arranged in order of frequency in today's news.  In a previous rendering, the stories were shown in a histogram, but this view I think is much better. You can still see how many pieces relate to the indicated topic, but by clicking on the plus next to each topic, you can actually see the headlines and descriptions, and if you want more you can click through to the full stories. (Initially, the outline was sorted by frequency, with the most frequently occurring keyword appearing first. I changed it, based on feedback, to be alphabetic.) Now, there's still more to do, I showed this to a number of people during the weekend and got some excellent clues on ideas to pursue next, and I will do that. Further, in the process of exploring this, I've been shown the work of other developers who discovered the keywords on their own, and one in particular is very interesting. I'm hoping that these projects will come public so I can show them to you and tell you what I think they mean. This is what I live for, professionally -- the sense of being somewhere with great unexplored potential, a virgin landscape of the intellect. I'm never happier than when I get to play in such a place.  Om Malik: A new way to view news. Please comment on the screen shot page.
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Also: Stephen Hawking looking for assistant. Read these stories and more from around the Web on News.com Extra.
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Plus: My GPS proves your radar gun is wrong. Read these stories and more from around the Web on News.com Extra.
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Two provocative books criticizing homework came out recently. Both are by reputable, well-informed authors, so I was surprised to find these good people trying to get away with hyperbole and incomplete data unworthy of them.
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Also: Sneaky DNA analysis to be outlawed. Read these stories and more from around the Web on News.com Extra.
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Yesterday's piece, lightly edited, on the Huffington Post. http://x98.us/jz  I think it looks pretty good over there!