The Internet has responded collaboratively to the lack of trust in official pronouncements about radiation levels in Japan. First, Shigeru Kobayashi aggregated geiger counter readings from around Japan. Then Haiyan Zhang, self-described interaction designer, technologist and maker of things, produced a Google maps mashup of Kobayashi's data. Click this image to view the actual interactive map. Alexis Madrigal comments: One of the key problems has been that people aren't sure whether to trust the official measurements, no matter how many of them there are. Today, sociologist Zeynep Tufekci addressed the issue of lack of trust in institutions in her essay, "If We Built...

25 March, 2011

TheAtlantic.com's tech columnist Alexis Madrigal marked the 135th anniversary of Alexander Graham Bell's US patent for the telephone by reproducing a doodle-like drawing of the device Bell submitted with his patent application: That's a fragment; see the whole diagram here. Madrigal found the image among Alexander Graham Bell Family Papers, which are stored at the Library of Congress and available online in a searchable database. Naturally, that set Contrarian searching for terms like "Telegraph House" (9 hits), "Beinn Bhreagh" (100), "Ross Ferry" and "Kempt Head" (zip and zip). A search for "Sydney" produced 47 hits, including this remarkable letter to...

09 March, 2011

Contrarian friend Cliff White muses on tractor percussion (previously here and here): Not only is this just a wonderful piece, it's a nostalgic reminder of just how much rhythm and music there was in early machinery. Aside from the occasional pile driver, I can't think of anything today that carries on that tradition. Even the once ubiquitous make-and-break engine seems to have unfortunately gone completely from our shores....

21 February, 2011

It's been tried, according to Rick Falkvinge, who begins a seven-part history of copyright today. Moneyquote: The copyright industry has tried the same tricks and rhetoric for well over 500 years, and they are also keen on trying to rewrite history. But the tale of the history books differs sharply from what the copyright industry is trying to paint. When the printing press arrived in 1453, scribe-craft was a profession in high demand. The Black Death had taken a large toll from the monasteries, who were not yet repopulated, so copying books was expensive. Obsoleting scribes was not a popular development with...

20 February, 2011

If your supercomputer is going on jeopardy, how do you give it an interesting voice and an appealing face? That's the problem that confronted the Automata Studio and technology artist Joshua Davis, hired by IMB to give Watson personality. If you can't see this video, try here. H/T: Nathan Yau....

15 February, 2011

Engineers from Google, Twitter, and SayNow, a voice messaging startup Google bought last week, put their technical chops to work over the weekend devising a way around the Egyptian government's Internet shutdown. From Google's Official Blog: Like many people, we’ve been glued to the news unfolding in Egypt, and thinking of what we could do to help people on the ground. Over the weekend we came up with the idea of a speak-to-tweet service—the ability for anyone to tweet using just a voice connection...

01 February, 2011

Google's ability to produce its Street View images still leaves me gobsmacked. Now see what the land survey industry has been up to in the digital technology department: Using a portable, eye-safe, laser scanner, and traveling at posted speeds, this vehicle collects data and imagery with survey grade accuracy: Yes, they need a better video, but still...

19 January, 2011

And why single queues, like those at Sydney Credit Union branches and Empire Theatre concession stands, work better. The Engineer Guy explains: H/T: Silas....

26 December, 2010

An early Contrarian post told the amazing story of how Kevin Miller got his iPhone back after he misplaced it in a Chicago bar. Miller got crucial help from an Apple app called "Find My iPhone," which can remotely track an Apple phone's geo-location information and send it to the registered owner in real time. There's no such app for an ordinary desktop—unless you happen to steal the beloved computer of clever hacker called Zoz. He recounted the story, replete with poorly disguised NSFW nudity, at Def Con 18, the underground hackers' conference. (The actual story begins at the 3:15 mark,...

26 December, 2010
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