IT Trends May 5, 2005

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In This Issue

OPINION

Information Wants to Be Free . . . Again

By Terry Calhoun

IN A DIGITAL INFORMATION AGE, WHAT D'ES 'FREE' MEAN?
UNRESTRAINED? AT NO COST? BOTH?

I recall once, during my lawyering years, getting out of my car on a windy day. I set my legal briefcase on the trunk of my rental car and opened it, and then the wind gusted and hundreds of sheets of fairly important pieces of paper blew away like a flock of magician’s pigeons.

I wonder if that’s how the management of a company like LexisNexis feel when they hear that personal information about hundreds of thousands of people has "flown the coop," so to speak? The analogy breaks down and d'es strange things to legal notions of copyright, of course, when you realize that, unlike my briefcase, the LexisNexis computers still had everything in them that was there before. Read more


IT NEWS

Turning Tragedy into Triumph; Assistive Technology Lab Helps

Julian Sosa was crippled by a guerilla bomb blast in Colombia. Now he's a student at the University of Arizona and is in awe of the ADA-compliant access and of the university's assistive technology computer lab. (Arizona Daily Wildcat) Read more

Florida International University Computers Hacked

The current fear is that the university system has been so compromised that few systems are still safe. Part of its recovery scheme is to carefully examine more than 3,000 potentially compromised machines. (ISSUPERSTORE.com) Read more

Kutztown University Students Stressed by Viruses at Finals Time

The university's network is slowed at times to a standstill by infected student computers transmitting as part of denial of service attacks. Administrators believe that some of the viruses were released to coincide with the end of the semester at many schools. (The Keystone) Read more

You'd Think a Sober Worm Would Behave Better

The new variant of the Sober worm works like the others, but is particularly good at the "social engineering" piece, in that a well thought-out variety of targeted subject lines are used to trick people into clicking on the “attachment.” (ZDnet) Read more

iPods are Responsible for Crime Increase in New York Subways

In what is a harbinger of more to come, as expensive and powerful devices become more and more portable. Thefts of such devices are responsible for a rate of such crimes on the subway that is 21 percent higher than it would have been without them. (Washington Post) Registration required. Read more


RESOURCES

Using Tech to Augment the (Non-Human) Animal Kingdom?

How about a GPS locator simple enough for a squirrel to use to find its buried treasures? Or a bird cage that is designed with an area of air flow to let a captive bird enjoy the illusion of a long flight (like those one-person indoor flow pools). This guy is serious and has some pretty interesting concepts. (Wired News) Read more


DEALS, CONTRACTS, AWARDS

Rice University Gets $11M Grant from NASA to Build a Polymer

It's called a 'quantum wire' and all Rice has to do is produce one a meter long by 2010. Of course, the challenge is that it's to be made of carbon nanotubes. The implications for its use, once mass-produced are throught-provoking. (Wired News) Read more

New Technology Center to Spur Development on Long Island

SUNY Stony Brook plans to build a $50M building for a proposed Center for Excellence in Wireless and Information Technology. The intent is to create a positive regional economic engine. (Long Island Newsday) Read more


Thursday, May 05, 2005

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Upcoming Events

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Events Calendar


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You're invited to a Webinar featuring: Longwood University
How Longwood University Simplified Their Email Infrastructure May 11, 2005 @ 11am PDT / 2pm EDT REGISTER

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Sponsored by:
802.11 Wireless Notebook Printing
With the growth of mobile computing and wireless networks, the simple act of printing now presents challenges to students and their institutions. Read about the technologies and printing solutions that provide value to mobile and wireless users on campus in the whitepaper, "Student Printing in a Mobile Computing Environment," by PrinterOn. Download this comprehensive look at how to leverage current assets and address needs now and into the future from the Campus Technology Resource Page.

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NEW TECHNOLOGY

The New 'Top Dog' at Oklahoma University Is a Greyhound

It's so fast it can do 6.5 trillion calculations each second. The new Dell machine is part of OSCER, a program that is unique in that it teaches a wide range of non-technical experts how to use a supercomputer. (The Oklahoma Daily)
Read more

Sponsored by:
Syllabus2005: Focus on IT and Computing Across Campus
Join higher education technologists at Syllabus2005, July 24-28 in Los Angeles and on the campus of UCLA, to explore how peers approach planning and implementation of IT systems at their institutions. Sessions on identity management, privacy, security, wireless LANs, and web-based portals are among the more than 50 conference sessions that discuss tools, resources, strategies and best practices. Review the complete schedule, keynotes, panels, and speakers on our conference site. Register before June 10 for Early Bird discounts!

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Current Topics in Our forums include:
Networking

Collaboration in the Education Space

Mobile Computing

Campus IT Security

Tablet PCs

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