archive
index
gp originals
google i
google ii
celebrating porn
idiot voters
| Notice: GeekPress is back up and running, thanks to Paul! It's still a not-so-serious tech news blog, but the format is significantly looser. Diana, having given up programming for philosophy, has her own philosophical blog NoodleFood. More of her work can be found at DianaHsieh.com. |
| Wristwatch telephone |
| 2:05:29 am mst / 14 January 2001 found by paul / filed in inventions / source Forbes 98 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| Samsung has announced that they will start selling a mobile telephone built into a wrist watch. It should hit the marketplace by June. |
| Although it looks cool, I wonder how practical it would be to use. |
 |
| Racial divide in two-way pager camps? |
| 5:20:43 am mst / 14 January 2001 found by paul / filed in culture / source NY Times 106 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| The competing Motorola and Blackberry two-way messaging sytems appear to have carved out different consumer niches. For a variety of reasons, the geek and financial elites favor the Blackberry, whereas many African-American sports and entertainment stars prefer the Motorola. Some hip hop artists disdain the Blackberries, calling them "the white man's pager". |
| I had better find out what the Asian-Americans are carrying before I get into trouble... |
|
| Killer tampons |
| 10:34:12 am mst / 14 January 2001 found by paul / filed in inventions / source IOL 191 hits / 0 comments / 1 e-mail |
| This is an older story, but it was too bizarre not to post. In response to the high incidence of rape in South Africa, a retired physician has invented a "killer tampon". The woman inserts the device in her vagina like a normal tampon. If an assailant attempts to rape her, contact between the penis and the device triggers a hidden spring-loaded blade within the device which then slices off the tip of the man's penis (supposedly without harming the woman). South African men and women are both critical of the device, but for very different reasons of course. (Link from Neoflux.) |
| I think this is a terrible idea medically, but the inventor is right on one point - if this device were widely used, it would probably have a significant deterrent effect amongst potential rapists. |
|
| 'IT' is Overblown |
| 4:03:31 pm mst / 14 January 2001 found by diana / filed in inventions / source Reuters News 172 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| There has been quite a media feeding frenzy over "IT" or "Ginger" in the past week. On Friday, inventor Dean Kamen spoke up to calm the hype, saying "We have a promising project, but nothing of the Earth-shattering nature that people are conjuring up." |
| Sanity at last! |
|
| Princeton group defeats SDMI, but can't say how |
| 10:55:56 pm mst / 14 January 2001 found by paul / filed in legal / source NY Times 41 hits / 0 comments / 0 e-mails |
| Princeton computer scientists say that they had found a way to crack the Secure Digital Music Initiative as part of the competition sponsored by the music industry. Although their entry was not considered by the SDMI, their own lawyers have warned them that they can't publish the results of their research because the 1998 Digital Millenium Copyright Act makes it illegal to "to manufacture or 'offer to the public' a way to gain unauthorized access to any copyright-protected work that has been secured by a technology like encryption." |
| Couldn't they either publish it anonymously on Usenet, or else publish it openly in a electronic journal hosted on an overseas server? |
|