It looks as if I'll soon be able to tell if those are really her breasts. Some clever < a href="http://www.dartmouth.edu/~news/releases/2004/07/01.html">academics have figured out how to detect manipulate digital photos, no doubt using math that will be forever a mystery to me.
I guess it makes sense. The pictures themselves may show no trace of manipulation, but if you look at all the ones and zeros, well, there's no fooling Mr. Computer!
RussNews on 07.24.04 @ 11:33 AM PDT [link]
Lots of stuff having to do with aging today.
First, a belated birthday greeting to a friend whose birthday I missed. I shoulda done something, so feel free to miss mine in a few weeks.
But two guys have had nearly twice as many birthdays as I have and are more newsworthy. First, as mentioned on the Daily Show, this one guy ran 100M in a little over thirty seconds. The article, as befits something about a hundred year old guy, confuses me, but I feel bad if he did that running and the clock stopped, as it sounds.
The other 100 year old guy's story is a lot more tragic than a clock stopping. His wife stopped working, stopped doing much of anything after he slit her throat after sixty-seven years of joyous marriage. The court, I think it is, saw it as "an act of love" and it's one of the sadder news stories to cross my screen.
RussNews on 07.17.04 @ 08:59 PM PDT [link]
According to the ex-cons interviewed on CNBC, people who got caught up in earlier SEC violaions or the Savings and Loan scandal, Martha Stewart won't be tossing anyone's salad in prison.
She probably won't be raped, beaten, or dragged around by her hair, either.
In fact, according to one guy, she'll be out so quickly (five montths) that the whole experience won't even really hit her until she's serving her home prison time.
I guess these white collar, level 2 Federal Prisons aren't like Oz. The only positive news to come out of it is that she'll fare better if she gets humbled, and there's no evidence that's anywhere in her makeup.
RussNews on 07.16.04 @ 07:51 PM PDT [link]
This is most excellent news. The NEA has releases a study detailing the decline of reading in the US of A. As it turns out people are no longer reading fiction short stoies or poetry, but are spending time on the Internet.
This explains why I can't get my books sold.
NPR, in a rare display of irony, has an audio link to the study, or you can buy a transcript. The report itself (Reading at Risk) is available as a PDF from here.
RussNews on 07.09.04 @ 09:39 PM PDT [link]
The most important news today isn't about Johns Kerry and Edwards, it's that I'm two days late with letting you know that you can own something like something I used to own and help feed people!
Probably one of the best auctions , ever!
I wonder if mine is still around somewhere.
RussNews on 07.07.04 @ 09:30 PM PDT [more..]
Surprisingly, I couldn't find the expected "aren't we great?" story, but BBC News is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary today, at least as far as TV reporting goes. On July 5, 1954 the first televised edition of BBC news hit the airwaves. It was basically a slide show since BBC felt online personnel might impart a bias by gesture or inflection.
I'm not aware that the US had any such concerns.
Also, interestingly, the lead story looks as if it covered peace talks in Hanoi. Um, they'd be covering that one later, too.
As interesting as that is, this is more interesting. Sure. we just got over our cicada's, but this is legendary. Also, I think, kinda common.
RussNews on 07.05.04 @ 06:06 PM PDT [link]
This isn't even news any more.
But I still like to watch. It's more a chess game, or a strategic thing, than Nascar, which bores the pants off me. There's very little passing (or "overtaking") in F1, and the whole sport revolves around possilby the most highly-designed machines on the planet.
I like the thought of a V10 engine that runs at 19,000 RPM, kicking out 900 HP and can be lifted by one strong man.
I like the thought of a car so incredibly designed aerodynamically that it could literally drive on the ceiling at something like 70MPH.
I not upset by the thought of $5,000 brake disks that last one race. Or of teams spending four hundred million dollars a year to compete.
These people live a life different from mine.
RussNews on 07.04.04 @ 05:50 PM PDT [link]
It shouldn't really be news, but we've doubled the number of known planets in the galaxy overnight.
I guess it's true that stars have planets, and planets can have people, just like you and me!
RussNews on 07.02.04 @ 09:01 AM PDT [link]
I guess the Next Big War is heating up.
Many people remember the browser wars and how a great little company like Netscape owned the world unitl it caught the eye of Bill Gates. "What?" I'm certain he said, "someone is making money using a computer and it isn't me?"
We all know the story. Internet Explorer was born, was given away free, then made an intrical part of the Windows desktop. Once a lot of people were using IE, it was changed to permit it to perform in ways not supported by the Internet community, but that would "enchance" the users experience if the web site was also, surprisingly, a Microsoft product.
People got pissed, and sued. Microsoft won.
Microsoft has had a long history of attacking companies, or putting software that others have developed into their own stuff to stifle the competition. There used to be third party memory managers, compression programs, finance software, all kinds of things that Microsoft felt it could do better than everyone else. Even when they can't do it better, they can give it away, so they win the competitive war, anyway.
Today they announced their new search engine. I think Google, just as it's going public, is getting the fight it's expected for a long time. Not that it matters, but Bill doesn't lose.
RussNews on 07.01.04 @ 11:33 AM PDT [link]
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