Bruce Sterling's Blog, page 740

Augmented Reality: Worksnug

http://www.worksnug.com/

*The tech is nothing so special, but there's marketing genius in using geeky augmented reality to find some geeky augmented reality hotspots where augmented reality geeks can geek out on somebody else's free broadband.

*"Hey! How come all the guys in this coffeeshop are wearing pink hoodies?"

Tenth Annual Renewable Energy Roundup in Texas

*They said it couldn't be done, and I know, because I spoke at the first one.

http://theroundup.org/

Art Squatters of Columbus, Ohio

*Artsy Favela Chic hits Columbus, Ohio. Is your town next? Did you ask around?

http://thisisindependent.com/squatters.html

"Twenty-five art students have been enrolled in individual studies with Professor Malcolm Cochran for the summer quarter 2009. Their work culminates in a first-ever exhibition of projects, installations, and performances in vacant storefronts and buildings in the downtown core. Most of the works are visible through street front windows; selected sites will be open to...

Neri Oxman in Material Connexion

*The mesmerizing La Oxman is on top of her biomimetic generative-archispeak in this interview. Normally her pitch is so out-there that she comes across like a trance-music diva, but in this interview, she stops to explain, and then she actually explains some highly interesting and relevant stuff.

*Man, the day I live in a robot-constructed organic-brick house, and I'm kicking back amid my host of augments on one of those beastly Oxman chaise longues… even if I have to grow my own urban farm...

Jealous Lover in Spyware Debacle

*Jeez, this is the worst. It's like something out of Alfred Hitchcock.

*From SANS, which can be relied upon to supply all your bungling-cybercriminal

news needs.

–Spyware Intended for Girlfriend Ended Up on Hospital Network

(September 17, 2009)

An Ohio man will plead guilty to federal charges after spyware he
sent to a woman ended up on a hospital computer system. Scott Graham
intended the spyware to be installed on the computer of a woman with
whom he had been in a relationship, but instead...

Return of HADOPI

*There are people who think that Sarkozy is easily distracted, but when it comes to IP for the music biz, the guy is the picture of focussed persistence.

From SANS.

–French Legislators Approve Revamped Three-Strikes Anti-Piracy Bill
(September 15 & 16, 2009)
By a 285 to 225 vote, French legislators have approved a law
that would put in place a system that could be employed to cut off
Internet access of persistent illegal downloaders. A similar bill was
passed earlier this year, but its...

Dead Media Beat: pigeon beats broadband

*Nice publicity stunt.

*Another drawback with broadband: you can't stew it and eat it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8248056.stm

A Durban IT company pitted an 11-month-old bird armed with a 4GB memory stick against the ADSL service from the country's biggest web firm, Telkom.

Winston the pigeon took two hours to carry the data 60 miles - in the same time the ADSL had sent 4% of the data.

Telkom said it was not responsible for the firm's slow internet speeds.

The idea for the race came when a...

The future is here, we just haven't printed it out yet

*Looking forward to many future videos when every quotidian object in this guy's environment is methodically replaced by crowdsourced Favela Chic fabbing. Like, could he fab bricks? And then fab a robot arm to stack him a brick house?

*For one anxious moment I thought he'd fabbed himself a toxic plastic coffeecup.

*Via Makezine (of course)

Nowcasting and the digital humanities

*Sure wish I could go to this….

Nowcasting: Design Theory & the Digital Humanities

A Transdisciplinary Seminar hosted by UCLA's Design Media Arts Department

The EDA @ the Broad Arts Center UCLA

October 16 & 17, 2009

design.ucla.edu/nowcasting

Nowcasting is the first conference to apply contemporary design theory to emerging issues in the digital humanities. Showcasing digital humanities projects at every level from Google mapping to supercomputing visualization, the Nowcasting seminar proposes t...

Robots build brick walls

*Makes you wonder what a thousand robots could do.

http://www.dezeen.com/2009/05/11/on-the-brinck-at-graduate-school-of-design-harvard-university/

http://www.dezeen.com/2009/09/16/pike-loop-by-gramazio-kohler/