Friday, November 22, 2002

Hoarding is for the weak. Xerox has apparently proven what all knowledge workers intrinsically knew anyway; that knowledge hoarding is detrimental. Via Column Two A recent Xerox research report has found that high-performing employees don't tend to hoard information. According to the news summary: The idea that knowledge is power has been knocked on the head by researchers who claim that high-performing employees are more likely to be ones who proactively share information with their colleagues. My own experience agrees 100%. I am personally more powerful in what I do when I collaborate and openly share with others. They provide essential critique, support and grounding for my thoughts. [thought?horizon] I think there are exceptions to this "hoarding is for the weak" rule. When an organization is in decline you might see good people who for some reason can't or won't leave for greener pastures trying to save their butt by hoarding knowledge, in an attempt to make themselves irreplaceable. [Seb's Open Research] comments? [] 12:22:11 PM     Emergent intelligence in the Net?. Cognitive and Biological psychologists (well, including me) have developed behavioral diagnostics of intelligence meta-cognition (the ability to monitor one's own thoughts; a step toward consciousness perhaps).  These could be adapted for study of emergent intelligence in the net...and indeed doing so is the only way to get beyond the current interesting but necessarily inconclusive debate ("is too!" "is not!"  "is too" " "might be!"). Proudly presented pointers to my own work in this area: William James and the emerging philosophy of the World Wide Web The View from the Adaptive Landscape Are Species Intelligent? and early work on metacognition in dolphins, monkeys, and humans, reviewed and extended by David Smith et al here Emergent intelligence in the Net?. Phil Wainewright: Spontaneous intelligence and the Semantic Web. "the only way intelligence gets into a computer is as a result of humans putting it there." My first reaction was to endorse that statement wholeheartedly. Upon thinking a bit more about it, I think I'd be more comfortable with a more restrictive statement such as "the Semantic Web will not by itself generate intelligence beyond what humans put into it". I think spontaneous intelligence might pop up in other computer-related areas. For instance, as the Internet grows into a more and more biological-like system, we might begin to notice large-scale patterns of behavior emerge that were not planned by the designers. (Actually I'm not sure that this hasn't already happened, e.g. in router networks.) If some of these patterns turn out to have a recognizable function, they might be construed as evidence of intelligence. [Seb's Open Research] comments? [] 12:20:42 PM     Microsoft: Peer-to-Peer beats Digital Rights Management any day. MS Researchers say P2P will always beat DRM. According to The Register (File swap nets will win, DRM and lawyers lose, say MS researchers), a paper from a group of Microsoft researchers says that "darknet" file swapping will always be able to share pirated files, no matter what DRM technology copyright holders use. The paper goes through the various options like watermarking and explains why they all will fail. This true even for DRM built into the hardware. The paper concludes that the only way for corporations to compete is to make their services more convenient and full-featured. We have known this all along, but it is pretty amazing to hear some Microsoft people say it. This paper is just the thing to refer to when the next congressional bill comes up to make DRM manditory, just explain to them that even MS says it won't work. [infoAnarchy] [Seb's Open Research] comments? [] 11:56:11 AM     What is SpamArchive.org? SpamArchive.org is a community resource that provides a database of known spam to be used for testing, developing, and benchmarking anti-spam tools.  The goal of this project is to provide a large repository of spam that can be used by researchers and tool developers. In the past, there were a few small personal spam archives that were used. There was no large set of spam that could be used to test new anti-spam algorithms. Thus, developers could not sufficiently test their techniques across a range of messages. Also, the lack of a "standard" sample of spam made it difficult to effectively benchmark anti-spam tools. How can I help? SpamArchive.org's efficiency is proportional to the amount, quality, and variety of spam that is provided. End users can forward known spam to submit@spamarchive.org.  Soon, we will implement a spam review system and will be looking for reviewers to volunteer. Also, if you already have a personal archive that you would like to submit, please contact us at volunteer@spamarchive.org . We will publish SpamArchive.org mailing list information soon. comments? [] 11:42:09 AM     Daily Wireless summary of Comdex Comdex Opens Comdex, opening today in Las Vegas, showcases the $1.3 trillion tech sector. The show may be declaring chapter 11, but things never looked rosier for Wi-Fi. Conventioneers can use the free internet hot spots, supplied by Symbol, which is showcasing their Mobius Wireless System, an 802.11 approach that centralizes intelligence at the switch. Here's a summary of new products compiled from online sources including; C/Net, Extreme Tech, SmallNetBuilder, 802.11 Planet, PC Magazine, PC World, E-Week and Wired . New Wi-Fi Gear Two developments, Wi-Fi Protected Access, an improved security protocol over WEP, and 802.11g demonstrations will be major attractions. D-Link will demonstrate their AirPlus software upgrade that enables some of their TI-equipped Wi-Fi gear to increase 2.4 GHz speed from 22Mbps to 44Mbps. D-Link's AirPlus Turbo firmware upgrade will be available next month. Linksys is going "G" with the WAP-54G Access Point (139.99) and Wireless-G Card (79.99) available first week of December. The WSB-24 Signal Booster was also unveiled. It can boost power up to +16dB over a standard WAP-11 AP. Proxim, which has merged the Orinoco product line, announced the ORiNOCO AP-2500, which adds gateway functionality to their AP-2000, a dual-slot access point. WPA will be available from Proxim's website in the first quarter of 2003. Netgear launch of a full line of 54Mbps 802.11g products, including a PC Card, Access Point and Router, with projected availability in the first quarter of 2003. Intersil and Ubicom will demonstrate a 802.11g Access Point. The access point combines Ubicom's IP2022 processor and software platform with Intersil's PRISM GT(TM) chipset to deliver true 54 Mbps operation and full backwards compatibility with the 802.11b standard. Hand-Helds Tablet PCs were the center of attention last week, but at Comdex, new Pocket PCs may grab the spotlight. They include: Dell is launching its $199 Axim X5 line of Pocket PCs. Hewlett-Packard is showing its $299 H1910 IPaq and $699 H5450 (with built-in Bluetooth and Wi-Fi) as well as their Tablet PC. OQO may demonstate their pocket-size Windows XP computer, a form factor that is attracting other vendors. Viewsonic's Smart Displays ($999-$1200) feature Wi-Fi connectivity to a mated PC. Corel is showing Corel Grafigo, a program for sketching, annotating, and creating graphics. Boingo will demonstrate Pocket Boingo which works on PocketPCs that use ARM processors and Wi-Fi cards that have NDIS 5.1 compliant drivers. FrogPad (above) features a one-handed keyboard. 802.11 Chip Vendors A Wi-Fi Pavilion features 802.11g demonstrations. Broadcom and Intersil are demonstrating 54 Mbps products based on the IEEE 802.11g spec (due to be ratified in March, 2003). The IEEE should finalize the 802.11g standard by May 2003. EE Times warns that chip set vendors are moving headlong into IEEE 802.11g wireless-LAN silicon before the ink is dry on the standard, hoisting the specter of non-interoperable 802.11g solutions in a market that has depended on interoperability for its very success. Broadcom's all CMOS solution employs a direct conversion and has delivered single-band and dual-band chips to major wireless LAN vendors. Information about the 54g certification process may be found at www.54g.org. Intersil will demonstrate their PRISM GT and PRISM Duette by wirelessly streaming HDTV video at 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. Their two-piece Prism Duette chipset does 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.11g using direct down conversion architecture Atheros was first out of the gate with a dual-band 5001x and has 2nd generation chips including the 5 Gig-only AR5001A and AP-oriented AR5001AP. Intel will demonstrate their HyperThreaded Pentiums. Intel's "Calexico", a hybrid 802.11a/802.11b chip, is designed to be used with the Banias mobile processor, available in early 2003. Texas Instruments will talk up their Auto-Band technology, with a new processor and accompanying system reference designs for seamless interoperability between the three different 802.11 physical layers. TI's new chip, the TNETW1130, claims interoperability between 802.11a, b, and g (the latter with full 54Mbps support). It won't be available until the 2nd quarter, however. SyChip is unveiling an Secure Digital (SD) card for 802.11b, one of the first WLAN cards in this tiny form factor. A bunch of 802.11a/b vendors will be showcasing their wares. The Wi-Fi Alliance will demonstrate improved security using Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) which will replace the existing WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy). The Wi-Fi Alliance expects the first Protected Access software to be available via download around the end of 2003's first quarter. By year end 2003, it will be mandatory for Wi-Fi certification of networking gear. Nearly all the large Wi-Fi vendors have announced support of the new standard. The Moxi PVR runs on Linux with a 733 Mhz C3 Cyrix x86 CPU, a Broadcom graphics chipset and comes with 40 GB of hard drive. Will an Alienware Media Center (right, $1699) with 42" Gateway Plasma Monitors ($3000) deliver wireless streaming HDTV using Vixs chips to provide eight streams to Viewsonic's Smart Displays ($1000) in shopping malls across the planet by Comdex 2003? Bet on it. Posted by samc on Sunday, November 17 @ 13:41:43 PST (14 reads) comments? [] 11:36:49 AM     RFID RF-ID chips RF-ID can be attached to the inside of a vehicle or a license for remote interregation. Contactless smart cards differ from traditional smart cards by not requiring physical connectivity (or power). EZ-Pass allows for remote toll taking in the U.S. (although it's not perfect). London has issued 80,000 contactless smart cards for the London Underground. They use Philip's smartcard. RFID transponder systems commonly have operating frequencies as low as 60 kHz and as high as 5.8Ghz with a range up to 1000 feet. Alien Technology plans to bring the cost down to a penny or two. Gillette is buying 500,000 RF-ID tags for their consumer products. Some states use them for access control. RF-ID identity cards, combined with ITS, may enable tracking of the driver and other individuals inside a car. Real-time traffic information is an emerging need at ports. Traffic data can also be archived. Retracing routes can be accomplished by searching traffic data by date, vehicle type, speed, driver and other parameters. Archived map projections can be pulled up and filtering for drivers conforming to targeted background seems a likely scenario. The RF-ID Journal has details. [Daily Wireless] comments? [] 11:35:10 AM     "inexpensive" cable modem access to low-income communities Innovation Partnership is working with AT&T Broadband and One Economy Corporation to provide "inexpensive" cable modem access to low-income communities in Portland and Gresham. The pilot project includes one neighborhood in each city, and focuses on community policing, city budgets, and economic development. The effort "will set a national standard for Digital Democracy." One-Economy collaborates with a portal called BeeHive which wants users to bank with them and use their portal services.  --Daily Wireless comments? [] 11:19:24 AM

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