“While current brain-scanning technologies can reveal the average activity of large populations of brain cells, the new project is aimed at tracking activity down to the individual cell and the tiny details of cell connections. It’s ‘an entirely different scale,’ and one that can pay off someday in treatments for a long list of neurological and psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, Parkinson’s, depression, epilepsy and autism.”

(via chottodoctor)

This is the situation I might be facing on Tuesday so I thought I would pass on the word.  If you are in an area that still hasn’t been cleaned up or your polling station is still out of power be aware of this.  We live in an age where workarounds in the face of disaster can be created, use them, don’t let a fallen tree prevent you from voting.

Exactly what I was thinking when this question was asked. Personally I thought Obama’s answer was a little more on track than this guy gives him credit for, but due to the nature of the election both sides weren’t willing to admit the hard truth.  Some in this country may think it’s nuts to not want every job available here, but some jobs are just not worth what an American wage would be. We should be focusing on training our workforce and creating a supply of skilled, qualified workers that are involved in the part of the process that can’t be duplicated anywhere else.

“The president is a hugely enthusiastic proponent of the power of data, technology and innovation to advance national priorities. Probably the highest compliment I can pay him is that his geek quotient is very high.”

infoneer-pulse:

President Obama on Wednesday issued an executive order requiring government agencies to make services available via mobile phones.

Under the new order, each federal agency will be required to make two “key government services” available on mobile devices within the next 12 months.

The order comes as the administration ramps up efforts to make large amounts of government data more accessible to the public to increase transparency.

» via The Hill’s Hillicon Valley

This is why we have to find a way to get everyone’s attention this time. Unlike what I’m seeing a lot of people say, the truth is these bills are very different, particularly in that this one actually benefits companies. The fact that it negatively impacts your privacy doesn’t concern them. There isn’t going to be a Google or Twitter joining in on a blackout date to reach the apathetic masses. I want to believe that this will get crushed by the senate/president as they claim, but let’s not leave it up to them and create another fight. SOPA proved that people do care about online rights and honestly this bill attacks ones that probably affect them more.

Some behind-the-scenes stuff on the Obama reelection team. I’m happy to see technology being considered so important, however I feel from a regulatory perspective policy should be created to make all IP developed for purposes such as these open-sourced after the campaign, barring they deal directly with a security matter. It’s really the only fair way in my opinion, given the public nature of it’s creation and to further serve the nation’s well being. However, one of the commenters brings up an excellent point that is missed in the article, that being the 2014 elections. Like the article says, current regulations allow certain methods of transfer for IP between campaigns and given the benefit the president would receive from having a house/senate majority of their party they certainly have incentive to hold out for these campaigns.

“The Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights will give Internet users the right to: control what data is collected, how their personal data is used and shared; avoid having information collected in one context and then used for another purpose; have data held securely; and to know who is accountable for the misuse of the data. It applies to personal data, which means any data—including aggregations of data—that is linkable to a specific individual.” Personally, I want to know what the “safe harbor” rules will entail as I feel the ones placed on ISP’s give them way too much flexibility. Also, how will these rules be applied categorically, as in data collected from a laptop vs. a cell phone? Hopefully the final document includes the punishments. Ultimately though the biggest issue seems to be the “voluntary” status. The major players like Google, Facebook and Yahoo are all on board but we’re definitely going to have to make this a requirement eventually for true privacy.

I’m a fan of the equipment deduction part. It is necessary for everyone to have a basic MS Office suite now and when licensing it for a company it can get expensive. Considering the technology aspect of msot start-ups today I don’t know if this addresses the skillset problems a lot of out of work American’s have so hopefully legislation that answers that comes up as well.