All those topics that i wish i had time to pursue more earnestly.

Articles:
The Best and Worst Internet Laws
Date: Apr 20, 2007 By Eric Goldman.
Over the past dozen years, the lure of regulating the Internet has proven irresistible to legislators. For example, in the 109th Congress, almost 1,100 introduced bills referenced the word Internet, and hundreds of Internet laws have been passed by Congress and the states. This legislative activity is now large enough to identify some winners and losers. In the spirit of good fun, Eric Goldman offers an opinionated list of personal votes for the best and worst Internet statutes in the United States.

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this is a good read… it covers in a U.S.-centric way some of the most important internet issues of our day.

Internet traffic prioritisation:
Internet traffic prioritisation is an increasingly important policy issue as bandwidth demands increase and Internet applications require higher levels of quality of service to function well. Debates about traffic prioritisation, particularly in the context of “network neutrality” discussions, have been divisive. The study provides background for national debates by examining the role of traffic prioritisation in networks and highlighting associated policy and regulatory issues.
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/43/63/38405781.pdf

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It is the net neutrality debate by another name.

Freedom of Expression — Press Freedom:
World Press Freedom Day 2007

May 2, 2007

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a free press is central to peace and democracy.

‘$100 Laptop’ to Cost $175:
That’s partly because at least seven nations have expressed interest in being in the initial wave to buy the little green-and-white “XO” computers – Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Pakistan, Thailand, Nigeria and Libya – but it remains unclear which ones will be first to pony up the cash. The project needs orders for 3 million machines so its manufacturing and distribution effort can get rolling.
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hmmm, it just doesn’t roll off the tongue like $100….

Quantum physics says goodbye to reality (April 2007) – News – PhysicsWeb:
Quantum physics says goodbye to reality

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Berkeley was right? well sort of. ‘reality does not exist when we are not observing it’

this is a hard metaphysical question to address actually, and the ’science’ is not really speaking about reality as much as what can be observed… so the model is probably more of: ‘that which we are trying to measure/observe does not manifest its properties when we are not observing it’

Cool Ads, issue 5 (cont.):
Cool Ads, issue 5 (cont.)
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some funny adverts…..

What not to say at your Dissertation Defense:
Things you shouldn’t say at your dissertation defense

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hehe…

TV Turnoff Week:

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Radical Vixen points us to TV Turnoff Week, which if we were allowed to post things on walls and door outside of certain areas… would be posted on my door at work.

Ted Leung on the Air » Macintosh Tips and Tricks:
Macintosh Tips and Tricks

This is a list of hardware, software and information that has been useful to me as I’ve moved over to Mac OS X. I hope that you find it useful as well. This version is now up to date for Mac OS 10.4 Tiger and Intel Macs.

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ted’s tools and tips…. worth a glance or more.

Map of Science:
The Map of Science is a network map showing the relationships between 1.6 million scientific articles. The algorithm for the map was put together by Richard Klavans and Kevin Boyack. At the site you can click through to other maps showing analysis by geography, industry, institutions, and topics.
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Pretty cool, but does history guide policy in this way. does prior performance of scientific networks determine how we should encourage them in the future? I’m not really certain, but my opinion is that the data that comprises systems like this is at best representative of certain scientific misconceptions and at worst only related to individual subjects in a way that makes real systemic understanding impossible.