Ex-employees warned Home Depot for years on security breach

Last week, Home Depot confirmed that its payment security systems had been hacked, impacting all of Home Depots 2,200 stores in the United States, and possibly Canada.  The Home Depot computers were apparently hit by a variation of the same maleware program which breached Target's computers last year. 

Today, there is this interesting story that came from the New York Times:

The risks were clear to computer experts inside Home Depot: The home improvement chain, they warned for years, might be easy prey for hackers.

But despite alarms as far back as 2008, Home Depot was slow to raise its defenses, according to former employees. On Thursday, the company confirmed what many had feared: The biggest data breach in retailing history had compromised 56 million of its customers’ credit cards. The data has popped up on black markets and, by one estimate, could be used to make $3 billion in illegal purchases.

Yet long before the attack came to light this month, Home Depot’s handling of its computer security was a record of missteps, the former employees said. Interviews with former members of the company’s cyber security team — who spoke on the condition they not be named, because they still work in the industry — suggest the company was slow to respond to early threats and only belatedly took action.

In recent years, Home Depot relied on outdated software to protect its network and scanned systems that handled customer information irregularly, those people said. Some members of its security team left as managers dismissed their concerns. Others wondered how Home Depot met industry standards for protecting customer data. One went so far as to warn friends to use cash, rather than credit cards, at the company’s stores.

Then, in 2012, Home Depot hired a computer engineer to help oversee security at its 2,200 stores. But this year, as hacks struck other retailers, that engineer was sentenced to four years in prison for deliberately disabling computers at the company where he previously worked.

What disturbs me about this NY Times story is the cavalier attitude Home Depot has in regards towards providing such computer security.  Home Depot's managers knew since 2008 that their systems were vulnerable to hackers, yet they did nothing.  Home Depot continued to rely on outdated scanning software, conducted irregular scans on their computer systems,   and even hired a computer security engineer who was convicted of disabling computers from his previous employer. Stephen Holmes, a Home Depot spokesman, said that the company is moving towards improving computer security through an encryption register system, and switching over to a new payment system based on smart-chip cards for all Home Depot Stores.  Holmes claims that Home Depot maintains "robust security systems," and that "Our guiding principle is to do what's right by our customers." 

And yet, according to the NY Times:

Several former Home Depot employees said they were not surprised the company had been hacked. They said that over the years, when they sought new software and training, managers came back with the same response: “We sell hammers.”

What we have here are Home Depot upper-level managers who are completely clueless on computer systems and security.  These managers could have been MBAs, with specialization in bean counting.  They know exactly how many hammers Home Depot has sold, and how much they could save money by cutting  back from employee payrolls, computer software and hardware purchases, or even not running background checks on a security engineer's potential hiring.  These are managers that are concerned with short-term profits, rather than long-term investment in technology infrastructure to secure Home Depot's computer data.  Technology and software infrastructure is expensive and difficult to replace, implement, and train computer professionals to run and monitor the system--you are not going to get your return on such an investment by the next quarter.   The cost on Home Depot's failure to maintain their computerized security systems only becomes clear after the hackers have breached the system, and possibly stole the customer data. It is all about short-term profit and corporate greed.

Then again, I wonder how much Home Depot will pay for the cost of this security breach?

NASA discovers first Earth-size planet inhabiting Goldilock's Zone

This story is just totally cool:

Using NASA's Kepler Space Telescope, astronomers have discovered the first Earth-size planet orbiting a star in the "habitable zone" -- the range of distance from a star where liquid water might pool on the surface of an orbiting planet. The discovery of Kepler-186f confirms that planets the size of Earth exist in the habitable zone of stars other than our sun.

The artist's concept depicts Kepler-186f , the first validated Earth-size planet to orbit a distant star in the habitable zone. [Click link below for more.]

Image Credit: 

NASA Ames/SETI Institute/JPL-Caltech

Kepler-186f, the first Earth-size Planet in the Habitable Zone

While planets have previously been found in the habitable zone, they are all at least 40 percent larger in size than Earth and understanding their makeup is challenging. Kepler-186f is more reminiscent of Earth.

"The discovery of Kepler-186f is a significant step toward finding worlds like our planet Earth," said Paul Hertz, NASA's Astrophysics Division director at the agency's headquarters in Washington. "Future NASA missions, like the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and the James Webb Space Telescope, will discover the nearest rocky exoplanets and determine their composition and atmospheric conditions, continuing humankind's quest to find truly Earth-like worlds."

Although the size of Kepler-186f is known, its mass and composition are not. Previous research, however, suggests that a planet the size of Kepler-186f is likely to be rocky.
"We know of just one planet where life exists -- Earth. When we search for life outside our solar system we focus on finding planets with characteristics that mimic that of Earth," said Elisa Quintana, research scientist at the SETI Institute at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., and lead author of the paper published today in the journal Science. "Finding a habitable zone planet comparable to Earth in size is a major step forward."

The diagram compares the planets of our inner solar system to Kepler-186, a five-planet star system about 500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus. The five planets of Kepler-186 orbit an M dwarf, a star that is is half the size and mass of the sun. [Click link below for more.]

Image Credit: 

NASA Ames/SETI Institute/JPL-Caltech

Kepler-186 and the Solar System

Kepler-186f resides in the Kepler-186 system, about 500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus. The system is also home to four companion planets, which orbit a star half the size and mass of our sun. The star is classified as an M dwarf, or red dwarf, a class of stars that makes up 70 percent of the stars in the Milky Way galaxy.

 It was only a matter of time before the scientific instruments, imagination, and new means to discover such small, rocky, planets were to take place.  Now that we've discovered our first, Earth-like planet, I'm excited to hear when more will be discovered, or the discovery of liquid water on such planets, or even an oxygen atmosphere.  Then we can truly say that we are no longer alone in the universe.  Life exists on this neighboring star!

We just need to build one of these to to pay a visit:

Download Star Trek Enterprise into White Noise.  whitenoisemarket.com

How many types of orgasms can a woman really have?

I'm not sure I have a comment on this story from Salon.com.  But it is rather interesting:

 The elusive female orgasm has been the subject of much scientific debate over the last century.  Some researchers have argued that women can have two types of orgasms through external clitoral stimulation and vaginal penetration, while others believe both orgasms are the same type accessed through different parts of the female anatomy.

In a bid to settle the dispute once and for all, a recent study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine claims to have solved this age-old scientific mystery, revealing that there are indeed two types of female orgasms … well kind of.

Two French gynecologists carried out ultrasound scans on three “healthy volunteers” by measuring variations in their blood flow patterns to decipher just how their sexual organs moved during different types of sex.

These women were asked to arouse themselves through manual self-stimulation of the external clitoris and through vaginal penetration using a wet tampon. Say what? Both examinations measured the changes in blood flow patterns in the area to ascertain just how the clitoris and vaginal complex responded.

The outcome? The study discovered there is a “functional difference” in orgasms depending on the type of sexual contact.  Specifically, researchers found that only the top of the clitoris responds to external stimulation, while during vaginal penetration both the “root” of the clitoris and the whole clitoral and vaginal complex respond. This affected the flow of blood and therefore produced different sensations in the body.

The study concluded: “Despite a common assumption that there is only one type of female orgasm, we may infer, on the basis of our findings, that the different reported perceptions from these two types of stimulation can be explained by the different parts of the clitoris (external and internal) and clitorourethrovaginal complex [the system of clitoral nerves] that are involved.”

In other words, as Jezebel explains, both types of orgasms are clitoral, but the parts of the clitoris that respond are different depending on the type of stimulation.

So, are these doctors going to further continue this important line of research?  Inquiring minds want to know.

Scientists discover new "Chicken from Hell" dinosaur

I found this story through TPM.com:

Scientists discovered a new species of dinosaur that looks like a cross between a bird and a reptile.

"It would look like a really absurd, stretched-out chicken," one of the paleontologists who discovered the species, Emma Schachner of the University of Utah, told the Washington Post on Wednesday.

Chicken from Hell Dinosaur.  From TPM.com.

The newly discovered species, Anzu wyliei, is part of the oviraptorosaur group of dinosaurs, but has been unofficially dubbed the "Chicken from Hell."

Scientists found fossil specimens of the new species in in a sedimentary rock layer called the Hell Creek Formation in North and South Dakota, which helped inspire the nickname.

The four scientists who helped discover the new species published a paper on the "Chicken from Hell" in the PLOS Journal on Wednesday.

The dinosaur was five feet tall and eleven feet long, with a very long tail and feathers on the arms, according to the Smithsonian. It lived at the end of the Cretaceous period -- from about 68 million to 66 million years ago.

"This group of dinosaurs looks really bizarre even by dinosaurian standards," Hans-Dieter Sues, one of the paleontologists who wrote the paper on the new species, told the Washington Post.

I have four pet chickens.  They are free-ranging little omnivores, eating grass, dandelions, bugs, slugs, worms, and even these little blue-bellied lizards I have in the back yard.  There are times I'll watch them for an hour in a chicken-zen bliss.  I'm wondering if, someday, my ladies are dreaming of becoming this aspiring role model? 

My own little Dinosaurs from Hell

Comcast to purchase Time Warner for $45 billion

This is from CNN.com:

Comcast and Time Warner Cable could face a big, uphill battle against regulators in order to win approval for their $45 billion merger.

The combined company would bring cable or Internet service to about 30% of American subscribers and serve 19 of the country's 20 largest metropolitan regions. That would give Comcast, which is already the nation's largest TV, Internet and home phone provider, an even more sizable lead on its rivals.

Comcast (CMCSA, Fortune 500) and Time Warner Cable (TWC, Fortune 500) will have to gain approval from two regulators: both the Federal Communications Commission and either the Department of Justice or the Federal Trade Commission. The agencies have not yet decided which will take up the case. (The FTC typically scrutinizes cable mergers but the DOJ usually handles media deals, including Comcast's 2010 purchase of NBCUniversal from GE (GE, Fortune 500).)

The companies said in a statement the deal will be "pro-competitive" and "strongly in the public interest." For instance, Comcast noted that it has higher broadband Internet speeds than Time Warner Cable, more high-definition offerings, and the deal will help make future broadband and digital TV deployment cheaper for the combined company.

 So Comcast is trying to purchase Time Warner for $45 billion, in a deal that would combine two of the biggest cable companies in the United States.  This would make Comcast the dominant provider for cable television, and internet service, reaching out to around one in three Americans.  According to Tim Hanlon, founder of Vertere Group, a media and technology investment advisory firm, '"This isn't about TV anymore -- it's about controlling a fatter, more intelligent pipe for multiple services that emanate from it," including broadband Internet, phone and home security monitoring.'

The control here for Comcast is about broadband internet.  Internet sites such as Hulu and Netflix online through your TV and computer.  However, downloading these movies and TV episodes requires a fast internet connection--certainly faster than your old modem, or even DSL.  Otherwise, when you play an online movie, it will pause at time, as the movie is being downloaded.  So it takes a lot of bandwidth to download and play such online content.  By gaining more control over cable and broadband internet, Comcast can certainly charge higher fees to their customers, who use download online content, and possibly even block internet sites, such as Hulu and Netflix, from Comcast broadband internet customers.  According to Michael Hiltzik: 

 Comcast CEO Brian Roberts tried to finesse the issue Thursday by arguing that the deal "does not reduce competition in any market or in any way," thereby acknowledging the paramount flaw in the nationwide cable market and trying to depict it as a virtue.

But the ramifications of the cable monopoly go beyond mere access to channels on your set-top box. As we observed back in August, the more damaging consequence of the cable monopoly is in broadband Internet access, where the power of the cable firms' monopolies is magnified by the lack of practical alternatives to their Internet services.

Yes, you can buy DSL Internet connectivity from your local telephone company. In some places, you can buy fiber-optic connectivity, also from a phone company (Verizon or AT&T). But DSL service is typically much slower than cable service and is geographically constrained even within service districts. (The further you are from a DSL connection box, or "central office," the crummier your signal.).

Verizon has ended its rollout of its FiOS fiber service; if your neighborhood doesn't have it now, it's not getting it. AT&T says it's still rolling out its Uverse fiber service, but hardly at a light-speed pace.

The harvest of this domination of broadband connectivity by cable monopolies is easy to see: In general, the U.S. has the lowest connection speeds and the highest prices in the developed world. The New America Foundation serveyed the world in 2012 to determine what customers could get for the equivalent of $35 a month. In Hong Kong, they could download from the Internet at 500 megabits per second (a half a gigabit); in Tokyo 200 Mbps; in Seoul, Paris, Bucharest (Romania) and Berlin 100. In Los Angeles, 10. Los Angeles is a Time Warner Cable monopoly.

The constraint here isn't technological, but commercial. Our fat and secure cable monopolies simply don't feel competitive pressure to provide customers with the fastest speeds at reasonable, affordable rates. When they do get pressured, they respond.

So in the end, consumers will end up with even crappier cable and broadband internet services from Comcast, while also paying higher rates.  

Corporate boss can look over your shoulder with a "wearable gadget."

This is from CNN.com:

(CNN) -- If you're a person who hates it when your supervisor looks over your shoulder at work, you may want to stop reading this column right now.

Because what follows is only going to depress you.

Hitachi, the big electronics company based in Japan, is manufacturing and selling to corporations a device intended to increase efficiency in the workplace. It has a rather bland and generic-sounding name: the Hitachi Business Microscope.

But what it is capable of doing ... well, just imagine being followed around the office or the factory all day by the snoopiest boss in the world. Even into the restroom.

And, the thing is, once you hear about it, you just know that, from a management point of view, it is an innovation of absolute genius.

 Apparently, Hitachi has constructed the perfect employee monitoring system to watch and record everything you do, everything you say, every time you take a crap on the toilet, every time to take a drink at the water cooler--your every moment that you are at work!  The device will look like an ID badge, but will contain "infrared sensors, an accelerometer, a microphone sensor and a wireless communication device."  According to CNN.com:

If you get up to walk around the office a lot, the badge sends information to management about how often you do it, and where you go.

If you stop to talk with people throughout the day, the badge transmits who you're talking to (by reading your co-workers' badges), and for how long.

Do you contribute at meetings, or just sit there? Either way, the badge tells your bosses.

The stated intention of this is to increase productivity and get the most out of employees

Management's argument for such a device is supervisors need to keep an eye on how workers are spending their time on the company hours, with employers paying for their workers time.  If the employees do not like wearing the Business Microscope, then they can find another job.   The Business Microscope is an employer's dream 'of maximum efficiency, and Hitachi says that, since the Business Microscope was first developed in its labs in 2007, "over one million days of human behavior and big data" have been collected."'

Corporate slavery has arrived.

When I read this article, I seriously wonder just how much hypocrisy and degradation that corporations have towards their employees.  It is bad enough to look at career pages on a corporate website, and read about how much corporations value their employees, and want to make employees feel like they are working in an exciting career, with great wages, and everyone will be treated like family.  While in reality, employee wages have remained stagnant, while the corporate CEOs pay has skyrocketed.  Corporations want to pay as little as they can on wages, expect complete loyalty from you, and treat you not as an "asset," but as a "cost" and "liability," from which they can fire you at any time and for no reason. 

What is especially amazing is that Hitachi had the crazy idea to design this employee monitoring device to eventually market and sell to such corporations.  And Hitachi is probably right.  There may be a huge market for more corporate-intrusive monitoring on employees.  The problem will be whether employees will abide towards company instructions of wearing such monitoring devices.  When companies treat their employees like crap, you can be employee morale and employee loyalty towards the company will plummet.  If employees can quit and move on towards another company which doesn't use such devices, they will.  If employees can not move on towards better jobs, they may be forced to wear such devices at the company workplace.  But such employees will certainly be resentful, and simply put in their time towards the company store--but they will not put in the extra effort, or desire to improve the company products or services.

Then again, I seriously doubt that corporations would give a damn.

UPDATE:  I'm curious.  If corporations start forcing their employees to wear these Hitachi Business Microscope, will the CEOs and top corporate leaders also be required to wear these devices?  And who will be listening to the CEO's Business Microscope?

Milky Way Galaxy to collide with Andromeda Galaxy

Sound collision alert!!! From Talking Points Memo:

Earth’s home, the Milky Way Galaxy, will collide with a nearby galaxy called Andromeda in 4 billion years, according to new observations made using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope announced Thursday.

“Our findings are statistically consistent with a head-on collision between the Andromeda galaxy and our Milky Way galaxy,” said Roeland van der Marel of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, in a press release.

Andromeda, which is located 2.5 million light-years away, is moving rapidly towards the Milky Way at a rate of 250,000 milers-per-hour, a clip that will only increase as the galaxies approach.

The great galactic union isn’t expected to result in the destruction of Earth, the Sun, or any other planet in the solar system. In fact, no stars whatsoever are expected to collide becauase they are so far apart within each system.

But because the Milky Way is flatter than Andromeda, when the two spiral-shaped galaxies collide, they’ll form a single new elliptical-shaped galaxy that is more “three dimensional” in shape, with the merging complete 6 billion years from now.

During the course of the collision and merging, Earth’s Sun, and our entire solar system, will be flung from its current position to a new position on the outer edge of the new galaxy.

I guess we'll need to start building the "Noah's Ark" Rocket Ship;

Apple Announces iCloud Storage Service

I saw this news story this morning on the TV news, and wanted to delve into it. From CNet News:

Apple CEO Steve Jobs today announced an online cloud storage service called iCloud that's designed to make it simple to wirelessly share music, e-mail, photos, calendars, and other data between handheld gadgets and desktop computers.

The new Apple service, which has been the subject of intense speculation for more than a year, attempts to harness the power and flexibility of cloud computing for home users. It uses techniques that have already proved popular with businesses to make it easier to move data stored on Apple's servers back and forth between multiple devices and applications.

Jobs introduced iCloud this morning at the Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco as part of a broader announcement that also highlighted the forthcoming version of Mac OS X Lion, available in July for $29.99, and new features for iOS including a newsstand and tabbed browsing on the iPad.

iCloud represents a direct challenge to Google's cloud-based offerings, which already use services like Gmail, Calendar, Picasa, and Google Docs to let users see and edit the same document or photo across multiple devices. In addition, Google recently announced Google Music and, in March, Amazon.com unveiled Amazon Cloud Drive.

I'm starting to wonder if Apple is a little late on their introduction to cloud computing. There is a wide range of cloud computing services for consumer to choose from. A perfect example is internet-based photo sharing, such as Google's Picasa, Photobucket, and Flickr. Businesses can develop their own email and marketing campaigns through Constant Contact,and you can back up your computer hard drive's data files through Carbonite. There are a ton of free email services with Yahoo, Google, Hotmail, AOL, and such. This is just what I can remember off the top of my head--I'm sure there are many other cloud-based services out there for computers, netbooks, touch-pad computers, and smart phones.

However, this next paragraph really struck me:

About 10 years ago, Jobs said, Apple experienced one of its most important insights: The PC would become the digital hub for your digital life and store photos, video, and music, which would in turn be synchronized with mobile devices plugged in to it. Now, he said, his company is at a similar turning point, where iCloud can store data and wirelessly push it to every device you own.

I think Steve Jobs saw the light a little late here. Jobs may have believed that the PC would first be the digital hub for your digital life, with storing photos, music, and video. Apple concentrated into selling its operating system to really organize your digital life around the computer. But the combined rise of smart phones and social networking threw a monkey wrench at Jobs--you can't access your iTunes or digital photos on your smart phone when you're away from your computer. So Jobs is shifting Apple's attention towards this bigger market of cloud computing, where you can purchase your iTunes at the Apple Store, and then store them on Apple's cloud servers to access them from your iPhone and your iPad. I'm sure Apple will also provide a digital photo sharing program (if they do not already have one). Will Apple allow developers to write applications to their mobile operating system, as we see with Google's Android? It will be interesting to see how Apple develops its iCloud system here, considering how successful they have been with their iTunes, iPhone, and iPad technology.

Then again, Google is not going to sit around and wait for Apple to catch up, as they are introducing their own Google Music to compete with Apples iTunes. The cloud computing world has just gotten a lot more competitive for consumers' dollars to go up in the clouds....

Could alien life be already here on Earth?

This is from MSNBC News:

LONDON - For the past 50 years, scientists have scoured the skies for radio signals from beyond our planet, hoping for some sign of extraterrestrial life. But one physicist says there's no reason alien life couldn't already be lurking among us — or maybe even in us.

Paul Davies, an award-winning Arizona State University physicist known for his popular science writing said Tuesday that life may have developed on Earth not once but several times.

Davies said the variant life forms — most likely tiny microbes — could still be hanging around "right under our noses — or even in our noses."

"How do we know all life on Earth descended from a single origin?" he told a conference at London's prestigious Royal Society, which serves as Britain's academy of sciences. "We've just scratched the surface of the microbial world."

The idea that alien micro-organisms could be hiding out here on Earth has been discussed for a while, according to Jill Tarter, the director of the U.S. SETI project, which listens for signals from civilizations based around distant stars.

She said several of the scientists involved in the project were interested in pursuing the notion, which Davies earlier laid out in a 2007 article published in Scientific American in which he asked: "Are aliens among us?"

Of course the aliens are among us. You just have to look here;



I'll admit that I was first going with the 1956 movie trailer, but I think I like the 1978 trailer even better. Both are great science fiction movies.

Google introduces PC operating system, takes on Microsoft Windows

All I can say is wow--we've got a battle between two software titans. From MSNBC News:

SUN VALLEY, Idaho — Google Inc. is hoping to gain greater control over how personal computers work with its plans to develop a free operating system that will attack Microsoft Corp.'s golden goose — its long-dominant Windows franchise.

The new operating system will be based on Google's 9-month-old Web browser, Chrome. Google intends to rely on help from the community of open-source programmers to develop the Chrome operating system, which is expected to begin running computers in the second half of 2010.

The early versions of the Chrome operating system will be tailored for "netbooks," a breed of low-cost, less powerful laptop computers that are becoming increasingly popular among budget-conscious consumers primarily interested in surfing the Web.

That is a direct challenge to Microsoft, whose next operating system, Windows 7, is being geared for netbooks as well as larger computers. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC Universal.)

The vast majority of netbooks already run on Windows, and that is unlikely to change unless Google can demonstrate the Chrome operating system is a significant improvement, said Forrester Research analyst Paul Jackson. He pointed out that many customers had returned the original netbooks that used open-source alternatives to Windows.

"It was not what people expected," he said. "People wanted Windows because they knew how to use it and knew how applications worked."

This is going to be an interesting battle to watch. Google is the king of search engine technology. If you want to search for something on the web, you "google" the topic, and get a ton of results to plow through. Microsoft Windows is THE operating system that has been installed on desktop, laptop, and now netbook, computers for both business and consumer use for years. If you purchase a new computer, more than likely the computer will be installed with some flavor of a Microsoft Windows OS [Sorry, I'm not going into Macs, or Linux systems here]. Google attempted to challenge Microsoft in the internet browser market with their Google Chrome, but it hasn't made much of a dent against MS Internet Explorer. Microsoft has tried to challenge Google in the search engine market with their own Bing search engine, which obviously hasn't toppled Google from the top search engine spot. Now Google is raising the stakes with an introduction of a Google operating system to challenge Microsoft Windows? What is even more amazing is that this Google Chrome will be some type of graphical user OS that may be sitting on top of a Linux engine--can you say Windows 3.1 sitting on top of DOS?

I don't know how successful Google Chrome will be against MS Windows. There are too many variables here--how robust, or easy to use will Google Chrome be in running on computers? Will Google Chrome crash as badly as Windows (Can you say Vista?) has at times? Will businesses and consumers be willing to drop Windows for Chrome? How will Microsoft's new Windows 7 fare in the OS market--especially in the aftermath of the disaster OS called Vista? Will consumers buy into Windows 7, or will the continue using XP? I do not believe that Google Chrome will topple Windows, but Chrome may find a niche in the OS market, similar to Linux or Mac.

Nortel goes bankrupt

There is not much to say here about this New York Times story:

OTTAWA — Nortel Networks, the Canadian telecom equipment maker, filed for bankruptcy protection from creditors Wednesday but analysts said its troubles might be too severe for it to recover and survive.

Unlike other companies, notably airlines, that have used bankruptcy protection to renew their businesses, Nortel, which began this decade as one of the world’s largest makers of telecommunications equipment, is probably headed for liquidation, several analysts said.

“I don’t think it’s going to exist,” said Mark Sue, an analyst with RBC Capital Markets, a unit of the Royal Bank of Canada.

If Mr. Sue and others are correct, the end of Nortel would be one of largest failures in the telecommunications equipment business. During the 1990s, Nortel designed and built much of the fiber optic equipment that now carries most of the Internet’s data.

Along with the company now known as Alcatel Lucent, it computerized the operation of telephone networks during the 1980s. Nortel pioneered the development of equipment and software that brought the world wireless phone networks.

Nortel’s demise would also be among the biggest business failures in Canadian history. During the zenith of the technology boom, Nortel’s market value accounted for about a third of all equity traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Nortel’s shares peaked at 124.50 Canadian dollars in July 2000 in trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange. On Wednesday, Nortel closed at a market price of 12 Canadian cents, or 1.2 cents after adjusting for a stock consolidation. While the current economic slump contributed to Nortel’s decision to file for protection in both Delaware and its hometown, Toronto, the company’s problems began in 2001, when it was hit by the technology stock price collapse and became mired in an accounting scandal that led to criminal charges against three of its former executives.

Nortel’s woes went beyond finances. In the market for Internet-related equipment, Cisco Systems and others proved to be more innovative and successful.

In the heyday of the dotcom boom, Nortel was one of the biggest telecommunications companies, providing equipment and software for the wireless networks, and the internet. They were the pioneers in this field. Now companies like Cisco and Verizon have surpassed Nortel in providing such telecommunications equipment, sending Nortel into bankruptcy. I wonder how many other telecommunications companies will join Nortel as the world economy continues to slow.

Scientists unearth Superman's 'kryptonite'

Better make sure that Superman doesn't get near this stuff. From MSNBC News:

LONDON - Kryptonite, which robbed Superman of his powers, is no longer the stuff of comic books and films.

A mineral found by geologists in Serbia shares virtually the same chemical composition as the fictional kryptonite from outer space, used by the superhero's nemesis Lex Luther to weaken him in the film "Superman Returns."

"We will have to be careful with it — we wouldn't want to deprive Earth of its most famous superhero!," said Chris Stanley, a mineralogist at London's Natural History Museum.

Stanley, who revealed the identity of the mysterious new mineral, discovered the match after searching the Internet for its chemical formula — sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide.

"I was amazed to discover that same scientific name written on a case of rock containing kryptonite stolen by Lex Luther from a museum in the film 'Superman Returns,'" he said.

The substance has been confirmed as a new mineral after tests by scientists at the Natural History Museum in London and the National Research Council in Canada.

But instead of the large green crystals in Superman comics, the real thing is a white, powdery substance which contains no fluorine and isn't radioactive.

The mineral, to be named Jadarite, will go on show at the London's Natural History Museum starting tomorrow.

The discovery of kryptonite brings up a new question here--since kryptonite now exists, does that mean we will soon see Superman?



You'll believe a man can fly.

Friday Fun Stuff--The Inner Life of a Cell

I found this incredible video on YouTube, showing what goes on within the inner life of a cell. The animation conception and scientific content is provided by Alain Viel and Robert A. Lue. The animation is by John Liebler. Biovisions at Harvard University produced this film. It is just incredible.

You can view the film here at Harvard's Multimedia Production Site:

Here is The Inner Life of a Cell. From YouTube:



Now if you're a total science geek, you can watch the full eight minute version of the film here, showing what each part of the cell is and what it does:



Both versions are just as fascinating.

An early overview of the 2008 presidential candidates blogs and websites

This past week we've had a nice little fight over John Edwards' hiring, firing, and rehiring of his blog staff. So I thought it would be interesting to cruise around to the rest of the top presidential candidates blogs and websites for both the Democratic and Republican Party. I've posted links to the front-runner blogs and websites for both political parties. As for the content of each candidate’s site, I’m giving the benefit of the doubt to each candidate. The websites were designed to present the presidential candidates in the best and most positive manner possible. I’m not interested in whether the content on a particular candidate’s site is valid, but rather that the content is included in the website to allow the web user to view such content and make their own judgments as to the validity of such content. In other words, I don't care about the candidate's message itself--I'm more interested in the packaging of the candidate's message. Shall we cruise?

Let's start with the man of the hour--John Edwards. Edwards has his full website up--complete with links pointing to his his biography, news, events, multimedia, blog and the obligatory donation button to the Edwards campaign. There is a One Corps button which links to a separate social networking page for the Edwards campaign.

John Edwards site.

There are plenty of links here to play around with on the Edwards website. As for the Edwards blog, the staff has created an online diary site, where anyone can can create an account and post diaries and comments, similar to the Daily Kos. Overall, it is not a bad site, considering how early it is in the presidential campaign.

Our second stop is Hillary Clinton's website. Or perhaps I should say Hillary for President? Hillary's website is also pretty clean, red-white-and-blue-styled theme with the standard links for her biography, "Take Action" button to contribute or volunteer to the campaign, a newsroom for press releases, a blog, and the Contribute button for soliciting campaign contributions. Hillary Clinton's site is a lot cleaner and easier to navigate through over that of John Edwards’s site, which might just overdue it on the links.

Hillary Clinton's site.

Clinton's site has a link for a blog, however the blog is not yet posting. The Clinton blog is running a First Guest Blog Post Contest, where supporters are free to submit their own entry for the guest post of Hillary's blog. I'm sorry, but that is a little too tacky here. Clinton would be better off either creating an open blog, where anyone can post diaries and commentary, or have her own blog staff create postings for her blog. Why should I even bother trying to submit my own post in this Hillary Blog Contest, when I have my own blog to write and publish? A second question that I would have to ask is once Clinton's campaign staff selects the winner of this first guest posting for Hillary's blog, will they also publish the rest of the contestant blog entries, or provide links to their blogs, so that we can compare them to the winning blog entry? Guess we'll find out when Hillary presents the winner to her First Guess Blog Post Contest.

Now let's turn to Barack Obama's website and blog. Obama just formally entered the presidential race today. What is even more surprising is that both his website and blog are completely up.

Barack Obama's site.

Earlier this morning, Obama's blog was not yet up--the blog link on the home page was there, but it was still linked to the home page. Obama is also putting up a community blog. But Obama's blog is rather interesting. Obama has incorporated his community blog into a complete social networking site. On this site, you can create links to your friends, view messages, start your own fundraising drive, create your own groups, and write your own blog posts. John Edwards has a similar social networking site, called One Corps, but it is separate from his blog. Obama also has the same links on the top of his page--Home, Learn (a biography), Issues, Get Involved, Blog, Newsroom, and a prominent, red Donate button for campaign contributions. However on each of the web pages, you can still access the social networking site through clickable buttons, set up as My.Barack.Obama.com. Obama's site is an excellent example of the soliciting of netroots support by incorporating a social networking site directly within a political website. Obama's website is really the future of political websites.

Next is Governor Bill Richardson's website. Richardson's site appears to be a fairly standard website with links to Home, About Bill, Issues, News Room, Blog, and a Support Bill for campaign contributions or volunteer.

Bill Richardson's site.

The Richardson website doesn't have as many links or content on the home page, preferring to redirect such content within the top link buttons. In fact, the Richardson home page is mainly directed towards soliciting political campaign contributions--the real content of the site is found within the top web buttons. The Richardson blog is a standard blog written by the campaign staff, and not a community blog. The Richardson blog does not allow you to post comments. Richardson's website does allow you to connect into a social networking site through My Space. In fact, the Richardson website has links to Partybuilder, a Democratic Party networking site, YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, and Zanby.

Those are the main Democratic Party presidential candidates here. I know that Senator Joe Biden is running, and you can see his website and blog here.

Joe Biden's site.

However, with Biden's latest missteps, I seriously doubt that he has a chance against either Clinton, Obama, or even Edwards--unless all three totally screw up somehow in the next year and withdrawal from the race. Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich's website and video blog can be found here.

Dennis Kucinich's site.

Kucinich is really ahead of his time here. Instead of creating a standard written campaign, or community blog, Kucinich has created a community video blog, where participants can upload their own YouTube videos on Kucinich's video blog. Kucinich's community blog is through the comments section on front page postings, and a forum section where anyone can log in and post content. Both Edwards and Richardson have YouTube links where supporters can post videos, however Hillary Clinton's website does not have a YouTube video link--Hillary Clinton's site has a video link, where campaign staff will post videos of Clinton speeches.

It is time to take a peek over to the Republican side of the websites and blogs. We'll start with Arizona Senator John McCain. McCain's website is still an exploratory site, with very little content, links, or really anything. The only thing you can do on John McCain's site is donate money, or join the McCain team. There is a biography of McCain, and a couple links to some McCain speeches, but that is it. The McCain site does have a future link for creating your own McCain social networking site, but all that is there is a request for contact information. For a supposedly front-running Republican presidential candidate, McCain's exploratory website is a complete wasteland.

John McCain's site.

Then again, McCain may be more interested in pandering to corporate interests, Religious Right-Wingers, and the rich elites rather than ordinary Americans.

What about Rudy Giuliani's exploratory website? Surprise! Rudy Giuliani's exploratory website has more information than McCain's site!

Rudy Giuliani's site.

Giuliani's site is still an exploratory site, mainly used for soliciting campaign contributions and volunteers. But Giuliani's site at least has multiple links highlighting his biography, and his record as mayor of New York. And Giuliani's site does provide some press news--McCain's site doesn't even provide any news links. But while Giuliani's site has more content than McCain's, it is still pretty skimpy here--there is no blog, no stance on issues, no social networking linkage, no press releases, and no linkage to video content. We have the two front-runners for the Republican Party, and they have yet to build their campaign websites--even as all the Democratic candidates have their presidential websites up and running.

I will say this. Mitt Romney's exploratory website is cartainly close to becoming his main presidential campaign website. The layout of Romney's site is pretty much a standard campaign website--with the standard biography button, a news and press release button, an issues button, a Mitt TV video button showing video content selected by the campaign staff, and a contribute button.

Mitt Romney's site.

There is no blog on Romney's site. There is a simplified social networking site called Team Mitt, but there are no links through any of the main social networking sites such as My Space that can be found on the Democratic sites. It is close to becoming a regular campaign website--a campaign website like what you would see back during the 2004 presidential campaigns.

And now for the real irony about the Republican websites. The GOP long shots Senator Sam Brownback and Representative Duncan Hunter are really the only two Republican candidates that have fully functioning presidential websites.

Sam Brownback's site.

Both sites will do the job that they are suppose to do--providing favorable web content on issues, biography, press releases, and soliciting campaign contributions for both presidential candidates. The layouts on both sites seem rather simplified, like they were templates from the 2004 or even the 2000 campaigns. Both sites do provide links to video content that is presented by the campaign staffs.

Duncan Hunter's site.

Neither Brownback nor Hunter's websites have a blog or any social networking links. One thing that is really interesting on Hunter's site is the full page requesting campaign contributions--the Hunter campaign asks for your name, address, phone, donation amount, and credit card payment information. It is as easy to contribute to the Hunter presidential campaign as it is easy to buy a pair of shoes on any online store.

Hunter's campaign contribution page.

I know that the other candidates’ websites have their own contribution pages, with credit card payment information as well, but there is something so early 2000ish about the layout on the Hunter contribution page. Hunter's site also has an email link on the front page, allowing the Hunter campaign to email a newsletter to your web address. However, you cannot read the Hunter newsletter on the website itself. Some of the other sites that have email links to newsletters include Mitt Romney's site, and John Edwards site--which actually has the newsletter published on the Edwards website iself, rather than requesting an email link. Both Brownback and Hunter's websites are solid sites, but they really lack any excitement or pizzazz for making you want to go to their sites and learn about the candidates.

Finally, there is Mike Huckabee's exploratory website. Another early 2000ish presidential campaign website.

Mike Huckabee's website.

Huckabee's site is still an exploratory website that is in the process of converting into his regular campaign website. The layout is simple and clean, but still lacks any excitement or pizzazz. There is currently no video or blog content on the Huckabee site. There are links to press releases, issues, and a Huckabee Team link, which could provide a foundation for a Huckabee social networking site. But surprisingly, the real strength of the Huckabee exploratory site is Huckabee's biography. There are a whole host of links regarding Huckabee's leadership roles, accomplishments, and a number of Arkansas state issues. Huckabee's biography is probably the most detailed biography in terms of content and links that I've seen on any of the presidential candidates--either Republican or Democrat. Will Mike Huckabee's biography make him electable? I won't say anything yet, except that even Huckabee's website has even more information introducing Mike Huckabee as a candidate for president than either John McCain's or Rudy Giuliani's exploratory websites--perhaps even more than any of the presidential candidates' biographies, on both the Democrat and the Republican side.

That is it. That is the roundup for the presidential websites for both the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates. What I find rather ironic is how the Democratic websites are embracing new modes of communication--especially through video, blog, and social networking. Edwards, Clinton, Obama, Richardson, and even Kucinich have links and pages soliciting the netroots community, providing a social networking site for their supporters. The Republican candidates websites have refused to even embrace this new form of networking, instead requesting a top-down tier of asking for your contact information, then probably bombarding you with countless junk email soliciting campaign donations as the presidential campaign starts in 2008. Even looking at the page layouts on the Republican sites, they appear like they were created back in the 2000 or 2004 campaigns--and these sites are suppose to be designed by professional webmasters! Does that make the Democratic websites better? Perhaps better designed, and more open towards embracing new technologies and new means of providing web content to potential voters and supporters, and allowing supporters and voters to upload their own content to these Democratic sites. That is the big difference between the Democratic and Republican websites. The Republicans are about seven years behind the Democrats in creating new political websites, and embracing new web communications technology.

It is going to be interesting to see how the websites of both political parties fare as we get closer to the election year.

UPDATE: After cross-posting this story on the Daily Kos, I received a comment from Teacherkin, regarding this story. As Teacherken pointed out in the comments section on my Kos post, I totally missed Iowa Democratic governor Tom Vilsack’s presidential website in my original posting. My apologies for the error. So here is Vilsack’s website.

Tom Vilsack's site.

The most striking thing about Vilsack’s website is that it doesn’t look like a political campaign website at all, but rather like a three-column blog. It is a very clean site, very easy to navigate—perhaps even cleaner than Obama’s site. Vilsack’s site has all the social networking links. One thing that Vilsack’s site has that none of the candidate’s websites have is an online campaign store, where you can order campaign buttons, bumper stickers and tee-shirts. Talk about slick. Teacherken does point out that Vilsack's site will be undergoing a major redesign, to be rolled out next week. It will certainly be interesting to compare Vilsack's new site, with that of his old site.

Prehistoric couple embrace for eternity

A pair of human skeletons lie in an eternal embrace at an Neolithic archaeological dig site near Mantova, Italy, in this photo released February 6, 2007. (Enrico Pajello/Handout/Reuters)

This is a fascinating article. From The Los Angeles Times:

ROME -- It could be humanity's oldest story of doomed love.

Archaeologists have unearthed two skeletons from the Neolithic period locked in a tender embrace and buried outside Mantua, just 25 miles south of Verona, the romantic city where Shakespeare set the star-crossed tale of "Romeo and Juliet."

Buried between 5,000 and 6,000 years ago, the prehistoric pair are believed to have been a man and a woman and are thought to have died young, as their teeth were found intact, said Elena Menotti, the archaeologist who led the dig.

"As far as we know, it's unique," Menotti told The Associated Press by telephone from Milan. "Double burials from the Neolithic are unheard of, and these are even hugging."

The burial site was located Monday during construction work for a factory building in the outskirts of Mantua. Alongside the couple, archaeologists found flint tools, including arrowheads and a knife, Menotti said.

A pair of human skeletons lie in an eternal embrace at an Neolithic archaeological dig site near Mantova, Italy, in this photo released February 6, 2007. Archaeologists in northern Italy believe the couple was buried 5,000-6,000 years ago, their arms still wrapped around each other in a hug that has lasted millennia. REUTERS/Enrico Pajello/Handout (ITALY).

Experts will now study the artifacts and the skeletons to determine the burial site's age and how old the two were when they died, she said.

Luca Bondioli, an anthropologist at Rome's National Prehistoric and Ethnographic Museum, said double prehistoric burials are rare -- especially in such a pose -- but some have been found holding hands or having other contact.

The find has "more of an emotional than a scientific value." But it does highlight how the relationship people have with each other and with death has not changed much from the period in which humanity first settled in villages and learning to farm and tame animals, he said.

"The Neolithic is a very formative period for our society," he said. "It was when the roots of our religious sentiment were formed."

The two bodies, which cuddle closely while facing each other on their sides, were probably buried at the same time, possibly an indication of sudden and tragic death, Bondioli said.

"It's rare for two young people to die at the same time, and that makes us want to know why and who they were, but it will be very difficult to find out."

He said DNA testing could determine whether the two were related, "but that still leaves other hypotheses; the 'Romeo and Juliet' possibility is just one of many."

Of course, I can't resist throwing in a little Shakespeare here:

Now old desire doth in his death-bed lie,
And young affection gapes to be his heir;
That fair for which love groan'd for and would die,
With tender Juliet match'd, is now not fair.
Now Romeo is beloved and loves again,
Alike betwitched by the charm of looks,
But to his foe supposed he must complain,
And she steal love's sweet bait from fearful hooks:
Being held a foe, he may not have access
To breathe such vows as lovers use to swear;
And she as much in love, her means much less
To meet her new-beloved any where:
But passion lends them power, time means, to meet
Tempering extremities with extreme sweet.

Friday Fun Stuff--Global Warming and the hypocrisy of Exxon

I just love the smell of hypocrisy on a Friday afternoon. It smells like....Global Warming. This story has been all over the blogosphere, on Shakespeare's Sister, Americablog, The Washington Monthly, and even Crooks and Liars. So what is the story?

Let's start off with this little CBS News story on global warming:

(AP) Global warming is so severe that it will "continue for centuries," leading to a far different planet in 100 years, warned a grim landmark report from the world's leading climate scientists and government officials. Yet, many of the experts are hopeful that nations will now take action to avoid the worst scenarios.

They tried to warn of dire risks without scaring people so much they'd do nothing _ inaction that would lead to the worst possible scenarios.

"It's not too late," said Australian scientist Nathaniel Bindoff, a co-author of the authoritative Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report issued Friday. The worst can be prevented by acting quickly to curb greenhouse gas emissions, he said.

The worst could mean more than 1 million dead and hundreds of billions of dollars in costs by 2100, said Kevin Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, one of many study co-authors. He said that adapting will mean living with more extreme weather such as severe droughts, more hurricanes and wildfires.

"It's later than we think," said panel co-chair Susan Solomon, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist who helped push through the document's strong language.

Solomon, who remains optimistic about the future, said it's close to too late to alter the future for her children _ but maybe it's not too late for her grandchildren.

The report was the first of four to be released this year by the panel, which was created by the United Nations in 1988. It found:

_Global warming is "very likely" caused by man, meaning more than 90 percent certain. That's the strongest expression of certainty to date from the panel.

_If nothing is done to change current emissions patterns of greenhouse gases, global temperature could increase as much as 11 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.

_But if the world does get greenhouse gas emissions under control _ something scientists say they hope can be done _ the best estimate is about 3 degrees Fahrenheit.

_Sea levels are projected to rise 7 to 23 inches by the end of the century. Add another 4 to 8 inches if recent, surprising melting of polar ice sheets continues.

Sea level rise could get worse after that. By 2100, if nothing is done to curb emissions, the melting of Greenland's ice sheet would be inevitable and the world's seas would eventually rise by more than 20 feet, Bindoff said.

Yes, global warming is back in the news again--and it is even direr than we thought. The scientists are 90 percent certain that global warming is being caused by man--not by some natural cause. And even worst, it is through mankinds burning of fossil fuels that is causing the greenhouse gas emissions to trap sunlight within the earth's atmosphere, resulting in this warming trend. Can something be done to save us from this terrifying fate?

Yes! Something can be done! According to this Guardian Unlimited story, titled Scientists offered cash to dispute climate study:

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report due to be published today.

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

The UN report was written by international experts and is widely regarded as the most comprehensive review yet of climate change science. It will underpin international negotiations on new emissions targets to succeed the Kyoto agreement, the first phase of which expires in 2012. World governments were given a draft last year and invited to comment.

The AEI has received more than $1.6m from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI's board of trustees.

The letters, sent to scientists in Britain, the US and elsewhere, attack the UN's panel as "resistant to reasonable criticism and dissent and prone to summary conclusions that are poorly supported by the analytical work" and ask for essays that "thoughtfully explore the limitations of climate model outputs".

Climate scientists described the move yesterday as an attempt to cast doubt over the "overwhelming scientific evidence" on global warming. "It's a desperate attempt by an organisation who wants to distort science for their own political aims," said David Viner of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.

[....]

The letters were sent by Kenneth Green, a visiting scholar at AEI, who confirmed that the organisation had approached scientists, economists and policy analysts to write articles for an independent review that would highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the IPCC report.

That's right--Exxon is going to save us from the dangers of global warming by bribing scientists to write articles contesting the validity of the overwhelming scientific evidence showing the relationship between the burning of fossil fuels to global warming. Even better yet, Exxon is funneling this bribery money through its proxy think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute--can't allow Exxon to be directly linked to these bribes, even though Exxon's former CEO Lee Raymond is the vice chair of AEI's board of trustees. Of course, Exxon's not hurting by this global warming trend:

HOUSTON, Feb. 1 — Exxon Mobil reported a record annual profit today but a modest decline in fourth-quarter earnings because of falling oil and gas prices. Meanwhile, its competitor Royal Dutch Shell reported an unexpected rise in quarterly earnings, a sign that the industry is still going strong.

[....]

Exxon, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, reported profit of $10.3 billion in the fourth quarter. That represented a decline of 4.3 percent from its record profit in the fourth quarter of 2005 and was Exxon’s first quarterly decline in almost three years.

But for the year, Exxon’s profit rose 9 percent from 2005 results to a record of $39.5 billion, the largest annual profit ever for an American company.

Oil prices for the quarter ranged between $55 and $63 a barrel, averaging just shy of $60. That represented a 15 percent decline from the third quarter and was less than 1 percent lower than the fourth quarter of 2005.

Graph of Exxon's yearly profits for the past six years. From the New York Times.

Or perhaps we should understand that Exxon is not going to save us from the dangers of global warming, but rather save their own overly bloated corporate ass, and Exxon's former CEO Lee Raymonds own bloated retirement package from the evils of scientific facts that have a liberal bias.

Then again, maybe I should get involved in this debate on global warming--I mean, if Exxon's willing to pay me $10,000 to criticize this global warming report, I'll do it. I'll admit that I don't have a scientific background, but who really needs a scientific background to write such fiction that can be passed off as fact through the AEI? Global warming is not caused by the buildup of greenhouse gas emissions from the burning of fossil fuels. That is what these scientific think-tanks want you to think--remember, science has a liberal bias. The real truth of the matter is that global warming has been caused by the emission of certain gases from former Exxon CEO Lee Raymond, just after he consumed his $400 million pork retirement dinner. There has been a steady buildup of volatile, intestinal gas within Raymond, which is then expelled through the anus. It is the release of these gases that have trapped the sunlight within the earth's atmosphere, causing the planet to heat up. Instead of reducing the demand for burning fossil fuels, I have determined through rigorous, scientific study, that this global warming trend can be reversed if Raymond would use his $400 million retirement package to buy up the world's supply of Pepto-Bismol. The results are conclusive:



Thus, Exxon-Mobil can continue to drill for oil and gouge American customers at the gas pumps.



So can I have my $10,000 bribe?