Summary of this week:

The Holidays continues in the U.S. with less news on the net
Happy New Year
Washington delays the fiscal cliff a while longer (and raises everyone's taxes)
Apple pays $6Billion in US corporate income tax
NASA is selling its space shuttle facilities for pennies

Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday

Monday December 31, 2012

The Pentagon admits that the UAVs can be hacked. If the Pentagon cannot secure weapons, how do we things the Department of Health and Human Services can secure electronic health records?

I like this: a redesign of the wrist watch interface that shows the time as people would say it. Must see the photos.

Are American Internet service providers gouging us? Should governments run fiber to the home systems?

Both NetBSD and FreeBSD have new releases.

Fascinating photos of 1980s Apple product concepts and designs.

The FAA continues to ban electronic devices during parts of commercial flights. They produce no evidence to back up their bans. It is quite simple, if a plane crashes due to EMI, there will be a riot. Government agencies hate riots (more than they hate plane crashes).

A reminder to look at the refurbished Apple products before buying a new one.

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Tuesday January 1, 2013

Happy New Years.

Our elected representatives in Washington have delayed the fiscal cliff. As predicted, they did something inconsequential, declared victory, and will argue it about this more later. Part of the deal on the table freezes the pay of Federal employees - this after the President promised a 1.7% raise last week (an insult itself). Government employees won't get mad, quit their jobs, and go to work someplace else. Instead, they will get mad and quit in place. That is what demoralized people do. The taxpayers will lose. So much for making government work "cool" again.

Another part of the deal is that everyone's Social Security taxes go up.

It seems that netbooks - those really small portable computers - are dead and gone. They are one of the victims of the tablet computer.

But our elected representative weren't too busy with this trivial money matter...Congress passed and the President signed an extension to the surveillance law.

Intel is rumored to build its own cable TV service of a sort.

And Samsung promises a TV at CES that will be like no other ever.

Reddit.com had a huge year in 2012. This is one of the simplest sites on the web. Maybe that holds a message.

Deep thoughts on the loss of jobs due to automation. There is no guarantee that people replaced by machines will find new jobs building those machines.

More thoughts on the same subject. It is going to be rough. Learn how to work well with "machines."

The future looks bright (?) for tech jobs in 2013.

Great headline: Why Are People More Scared of Facebook Violating Their Privacy than Washington? The answer is simple: the people at Facebook are competent. The people in Washington? Well, there is a word that expresses the opposite of competence, what is it.....

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Wednesday January 2, 2013

Buried away is this significant tech device - You can control your PC with eye movements. This appears to be a real product, not research, and could bring major differences to the lives of those who are physically disabled.

Apple's mini iPad is a huge hit, so look forward to the mini iPad 2 or some such in 2013.

Apple's retail store in Paris was robbed - $1Million in products.

Michael Arrington on how people like him see no tax increases and how he thinks it is wrong. He has a ton of money in the bank, and his income is mostly from high-risk capital gains. Note, taxes are on salary income, not investments and not on wealth.

Avis is buying ZipCar. Will they kill it?

Hmmm, Instagram photos are geo-tagged, so are Google Street View photos. Mash them together and you see where these people live. Fun or scary? Let your mind wander on this one.

Google avoided $1.6Billion in taxes by moving money to Bermuda. Good for Google, good for Bermuda. Who is the greedy party here? Google or the countries that want Google's money through taxes?

The top selling portable computers on Amazon are Chromebooks. Suprised?

MS Windows is gaining market share after six months of slipping. Look at the graph - more people are using Vista than Windows 8. Yikes!

As is the economy isn't in bad enough shape already, 2013 looks like a year where Fed regulators will really harass successful tech companies.

Vanity Fair has a long article about how the "movie" "The Innocence of Muslims" was made. The article explains many things about show business. One is how easy it is to find people desperate for work, record video of bits and pieces, and then edit like crazy. The production quality of the video was terrible. You can, however, make an excellent video using the same sly techniques and convince just about anyone of just about anything. Be a health skeptic.

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Thursday January 3, 2013

Polaroid, trying to stay in the photo business, is opening stores where you walk in and print photos from your smartphone.

Canonical (Ubuntu) is showing new smartphone Ubuntu that impresses, but it won't be on a phone for maybe a year.

US government R&D dollars are going to the National Institutes of Health.

It apears that the FBI and DHS misbehaved badly regarding the occupy wall street guys. And I thought all this big brother stuff left twon with the Bush fellow.

Samsung is showing a desktop model of the Chromebook. You supply the keyboard, display, and such.

A great example of patent trolls and how they try to make money. This one wanted $1,000 from every person who uses a scanner to scan a document into their computer.

Samsung shows a new portable computer with a 15" touchscreen.

Apple is teaming with Broadcomm to put 802.11ac chips in this year's computers.

Meanwhile, back in the 1990s, Qualcomm tried to put its radio chips in the Apple Newton. Apple declined, Palm accepted, and ten years of PDA history was written.

Microsoft outbids Apple and Google to buy R2 Studios - a home automation company.

A close look at the iPad mini. Excellent photographs.

Science has now found the cause of our obesity: high fructose corn syrup. We shall see what happens next.

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Friday January 4, 2013

How big can a smartphone be and not be called a tablet? Or what do you call a 6-inch tablet that allows you to make phone calls?

One person’s list of 20 tech innovations that have improved his life.

Starbucks will start using re-usable coffee cups instead of throw-away cups.

I have yet to understand this one. Pick still photos out of video. That, however, doesn’t work well, yet.

Wierd study: baies born during recessions are more likely to behave badly as teens.

Notes on storing your digital photos and scanning and storing your old prints.

Google and the FTC settle with little harm to Google.

HP continues to cut jobs.

This is an excellent xkcd cartoon. Teach local wildlife pests to take care of local human pests.
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Saturday January 5, 2013

NASA is selling its space shuttle facilities for pennies. Your tax dollars at waste.

Apple's OS X 10.8 now has the majority of OS X mahcines.

A major earthquake off the coast of Alaska.

Microsoft signs a $600Million contract with the DoD. The systems need to be updated (remember Windows NT?), but there is going to be a lot of waste here.

Apple is smart about moving money and avoiding taxes, yet Apple paid $6Billion in US corporate income tax in 2012; that is 1/40 of all such tax collected. It seems that Apple is paying more than its share.

Aircraft carrier row in Norfolk, Virginia.

The Library of Congress is attempting to archive all Twitter tweets. Good luck with that one. More tax dollars at waste.

The sale of portable computers from Apple dropped for the 2012 holiday season.

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Sunday January 6, 2013

This post claims that the slow sales of Windows 8 is due to the death of the netbook (really small portable computer). Maybe, but they are looking very hard to find some explanation for the failure.

This looks like a good book for writers to practice their fiction. "The Writer's Lab" by Sexton Burke. Warning: practice is great, but be wary of the temptation to practice all the time.

Why a low-tech eReader may be the best choice for a child. No distractions - just books.

I like this site. I love the display of information and this site shows ingenious clock faces.

Much has been made about Google's Eric Schmidt going to North Korea. I don't understand how the world allows North Korea to exist as it is with the Kim dynasty inflicting suffering on its subjects. Perhaps some good can come of this, i.e., some relief in the lives of a few people.

Things you can do before breakfast as a writer.

Ways to change your workplace so that you produce more. It is about your health and well being.

The more often you write, the less the risk is with each piece you write.

A look at online dictionaries. This is a good list to keep.

How one writer used Kickstarter to publish a series of books. Good, practical tips in this post.

Thoughts on setting writing goals for 2013.

Here are ten solid tips about writing basics.

Tips to help you write when you can’t seem to write.

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