Regulation and evolution in bacteria and Linux
If you've read enough of the reporting on the completion of genomes, you'll invariably come across a science writer who has compared the genome to the operating system of the cell. Apparently, a team of researchers from Yale decided to take the metaphor seriously. They built a call graph of the Linux kernel, and compared that to the gene regulation network of the gut bacterium E. coli. Given that the two serve radically different purposes, it should come as no surprise that the layouts look radically different—but the real surprise may be that there are so many intriguing points of comparison.
We'll take a look at each of the two systems in turn. To create a graph of the E. coli gene regulatory network, the authors divided up genes into three categories. Some genes don't do any regulation; they perform a structural or metabolic function and only receive input from the regulators. These were defined as workhorses, and placed at the foundation of the graph. Other genes participate in regulatory networks, receiving input from their peers, and controlling both workhorses and other regulators—these were termed middle managers. Finally, a few master regulators sit on top of the hierarchy and only regulate other genes.
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Steam for Mac: the beta is limited, but the future is bright
Valve's not-so-subtle hints that Steam would be coming to the Mac platform were met with a great deal of enthusiasm from the wholly under-served community of gamers who own Apple hardware. It has been years of slim pickings for Mac owners.
We've been playing with the beta of the Steam service on a variety of Mac systems over the weekend, and while this may not be the Holy Grail for Mac gaming some had hoped it would be, the future is indeed brighter than it once was. Let's take a look.
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Mac blog editor MarsEdit 3 finally gains rich text editor
Fans of Red Sweater Software's blog publishing tool MarsEdit got a surprise Tuesday morning with the release of MarsEdit 3. The most significant update to the software is the addition of a rich text editor, though those who fiddle with the HTML for their blog posts got an updated syntax highlighter. A new media manager rounds out this solid update, one that the company hopes will attract new users and get old ones writing again.
According to Red Sweater founder and developer Daniel Jalkut, some of the features in MarsEdit 3 have been in the works for roughly 2.5 years—basically since MarsEdit 2 was released. Many of the enhancements in the new version respond to long-standing requests from users, Jalkut told Ars, particularly rich text editing. "Most of the [blog] Web interfaces and desktop competitors have a rich mode but, until now, MarsEdit has focused exclusively on HTML/markdown source," Jalkut said.
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Rightsholders tire of takedown Whac-A-Mole, seek gov't help
The worst part of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) was its prohibition on bypassing DRM; the best part was the "safe harbors" that allowed user-generated content sites like YouTube to flourish without massive copyright liability for everything uploaded by users. Take down copyrighted material when asked and do nothing to "induce" infringement and sites were in the clear.
But content owners have always hated the provision, despite the huge gains it brought to the Web. In their view, the law put too much onus on rightsholders to do the hard work of identifying files and sending out takedown notices—only to see some other 14-year old post the exact same Simpsons clip 20 minutes later. Frustrating.
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Unlocked Windows Phone 7 image shows Office, progress
The Windows Phone 7 developer kit was updated last week. The new version brought support for the RTM version of Visual Studio 2010, released mid-April, as well as a new, improved emulator image.
Just as with its predecessor, most of the features in the emulator image are locked down and inaccessible. And just as with its predecessor, enterprising individuals have figured out a way to unlock them. The new emulator image includes the Office Mobile 2010 capabilities shown recently.
Poking around, it's fair to say that Office Mobile 2010 doesn't actually do very much. Then again, it's not really supposed to. It can load Excel, Word, and PowerPoint documents, make basic edits to them (typing into Word, altering numbers in Excel, reordering slides in PowerPoint), and add annotations to them. They can then be saved, either locally or to SharePoint, or e-mailed.
This is probably about the right amount of complexity for Office on a phone; reading documents and annotating them to make proper changes once back in the office is appropriate to the limited capabilities of a phone, whereas full-on document creation wouldn't be (that's not to say that new documents can't be created in Office Mobile—they can, it's just not especially useful). The close integration, especially with SharePoint, makes sharing of annotated documents or reading new ones simple and effective.
The most developed, capable application is the one that makes most sense on a phone: note-taking software OneNote. In addition to SharePoint integration, OneNote also offers syncing with Windows Live (another reason why Windows Live IDs will be compulsory on Windows Phone). Notes can be text, of course, but can also include embedded audio and pictures.
One thing that is clear from using this build is that this is all still very new software, with some way to go before it's even beta quality. After using the phone emulator for a few minutes I started seeing all sorts of graphical corruption, with portions of the screen no longer being drawn properly. Internet Explorer also appeared to hang and stop responding to input.
There's also still a long way to go on the software development front. The lack of copy-and-paste and multitasking are at this point well-known. Less widely known are some of the other deficiencies. Developers will eventually be able to integrate applications into the hubs—the centralized, unified user interfaces for contacts, games, audio/video, and photos—but indications are that this capability won't be in version one.
Further, and perhaps even more troubling, there's as yet no standard API for implementing the "Pivot" or "Panoramic" style user interfaces—the sideways-scrolling UIs used throughout the Windows Phone platform, and fundamental to its overall aesthetic. Though developers can, and indeed are, inventing their own solutions, given the importance of look-and-feel, third-party implementations that each have slightly different behavior is not ideal.
These gaps should all be filled sooner or later, although slightly worryingly, the company has not confirmed that such capabilities will be introduced in time for launch. The software is certainly taking shape, but Microsoft will need to get its skates on if it wants to deliver a version one release that's both rock solid and a rich development platform.
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Chimpanzee tool use is no monkey business
Chimpanzees are our closest living relatives and are constantly challenging our notion of what makes humans unique; the cognitive divide between Homo sapiens and Pan troglodytes is becoming less and less distinct. Chimpanzees have self-awareness, can beat college students at memory tasks, and react to the deaths of their companions in ways that we would find uncannily familiar.
Complex tool use may be the best example of chimpanzees’ advanced cognitive abilities; a review in last week’s issue of Science summarizes some of the most interesting instances of tool use among chimpanzees.
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Receptors triggered by pot may lessen hit from chronic stress
Dealing with stressful events requires a careful balancing act. Strong physiological responses to a stressful event—heightened awareness, increased energy—can help deal with the matters at hand. But if you keep responding in the same manner, there are serious and long-term health risks. So, the mammalian body has a way of toning down the response to a stressful stimulus, and research is indicating that the mechanism involves endogenous cannabinoids, chemicals that stimulate the same receptors as the active ingredient in marijuana.
One of the key events to mobilizing a body's response to stress is the release of hormones called glucocorticoids, which help coordinate the body's response. Long-term exposure to high levels of glucocorticoids, however, has an adverse impact on everything from the heart to the immune system. So, the brain apparently has a mechanism for toning down this response. Over time, repeated exposures to the same stressful stimulus result in smaller surges of glucocorticoids, although the response to a novel source of stress can still produce a large spike in hormone release.
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Chrome continues surge as IE drops below 60% market share
Remember back when Firefox hit version 1.0 and over 90 percent of the Internet used Internet Explorer? As of April, fewer than 6 out of 10 people now use Internet Explorer. The browser trends that we've noted over the past several months are continuing with no sign of alteration: IE continues to slip, Firefox and Opera are fairly static, Safari is very slowly moving forward, and Chrome is pushing ahead at breakneck speeds.
During April, only Internet Explorer and Opera failed to show positive growth.
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Canada again tops "special" US piracy watchlist
Every year, the US issues its "Special 301" to name and shame those countries that don't do enough to protect intellectual property rights. Once again, Canada is a member of the top bracket, the "Priority Watch List."
How can Canada possibly be in the same league as Russia, China, and Indonesia when it comes to piracy? It's largely because Canada has yet to ratify the 1996 WIPO Internet Treaties, which require DRM anticircumvention laws and other goodies.
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Mark your calendars: StarCraft 2 coming July 27
We were able to play through a large chunk of the single-player game of StarCraft 2 when we visited Blizzard's offices two weeks ago, and the game seemed nearly done; everything looked and played great. So it comes as no great surprise that the release date has been officially announced: you will be able to buy StarCraft 2 on July 27.
The launch also seems to be worldwide, as Blizzard states you'll be able to buy the game in the United States, Canada, Europe, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, Mexico, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau "starting" on that date. Here's what you have to look forward to.
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Why Camp Fantastic supports the Comcast/NBCU merger
Comcast and NBC Universal must have been really good last year, because Christmas in the Park is on board with their proposed merger. According to the group, NBC affiliate KNTV in San Jose, California "has been an excellent supporter and partner with our group and many others in the nonprofit community." The holiday display group was so moved at KNTV's outpouring of Christmas spirit that it wrote to the Federal Communications Commission, which is evaluating the Comcast/NBC union.
Amen, says Special Love, which receives NBC support for its Special Love Camp Fantastic—"a one week adventure for children in the midst of cancer treatment." You can add to this list the San Jose Holiday Parade, the By the Hand Club for Kids, the Youth Conservation Corps, the Muscular Dystrophy Association, Boys and Girls Club of Greater Dallas, the Beacon Therapeutic and Diagnostic Treatment Center, Hope House, and the PENCIL Foundation of Nashville, Tennessee.
"Comcast has shown its dedication to Nashville’s students by providing a huge range of support for public schools, including courtesy broadband services to many of the schools we serve," PENCIL wrote to the FCC in mid-April. "This is extremely significant since so many students in our community do not have these resources at home, and because today’s employers cannot afford to have employees that are not proficient in computer skills."
We think it's great that NBCU and Comcast do these nice things for worthy groups, though it's clear from examples like this that spreading the wealth around in a community can produce more than mere philanthropy—it's good for some political backing, too, when the need arises.
At this point, the window for public feedback on the merger remains open. Various public interest groups asked for an extension on the comment period, which the Commission's Media Bureau denied.
But since then, FCC staff have asked Comcast/NBCU to submit two additional economic reports—"one addressing the economic support for the claimed benefits from the transaction and one addressing the potential impacts of the transaction on online video distribution." So now the comment deadline has been extended to 45 days after those reports roll in.
On the last day of April, the FCC agreed to give these anticipated documents "highly confidential treatment status," which means much of their content could be redacted. Redactable materials could include Comcast financial data, customer data, business strategies, advertising sales, and both Comcast and NBCU's video programming and carriage agreement terms.
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Nearly half of parents friend their kids on Facebook
A question for those of you who maintain Facebook or other social networking accounts: how many of you friend your parents? How many of you would friend your parents if you were still a teenager? I'm friends with my mom on Facebook, but I can't say for certain whether I would if I were 16. According to a new survey by Retrevo, almost half of parents say that they're friends with their teenagers on social networks.
Retrevo surveyed more than 1,000 adults in the US and found that parents not only want to learn more about their kids through technology, they also have solid opinions on how their kids should use it. Even though parents aren't always as savvy as their kids, they generally know how to wield the social networking carrot and stick within the home in order to elicit desired behaviors.
For example, 12 percent of surveyed parents ban social networking as a form of punishment, and 18 percent ban all Internet usage. This is creeping very close to the 22 percent who nix TV, showing that parents understand how valuable Internet access is to their teens. (Forty-seven percent "talk with their kids" as punishment—it's unclear whether the talking itself is the punishment, or if that's just to communicate the punishment.)
Additionally, 29 percent of all parents ban the use of mobile phones and texting while at the table. That number goes up to 36 percent for parents of teenagers. That figure is actually lower than we expected though—perhaps many teenagers know that if they don't overdo it, they can get away with a text every so often.
Still, many parents see the value in trying to "friend" their kids on social networks, even though it might be a bit awkward at times. According to Retrevo, most parents who are Facebook friends with their kids have teenagers—only 8 percent of parents said kids under 12 should have Facebook accounts in the first place—and they say that they learn a lot about their teens this way.
This, of course, is part of the reason why 52 percent of teens don't friend their parents on Facebook, but let me give those teenagers a tip: you can make your parents happy by friending them, and make liberal use of Facebook's privacy controls. Win-win!
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Sony to offer PS3, PSP protection plan, annoy retailers
Video game hardware isn't a big money maker for retailers dealing with razor-thin margins, which is why gamers are often subjected to lengthy pitches for profit-padding protection plans when they buy their systems. Sony is taking the wind out of the sails of big-box retailers by offering its own optional hardware warranty. The deal is available to new customers, or those within the first year of ownership.
Sony calls the pricing competitive with the market, but you can judge for yourself.
| System | Sony extension duration | GameStop | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1-year | 2-year | ||
| PS3 | $49.99 | $59.99 | $40/year |
| PSP | $29.99 | $39.99 | $20/year |
| PSP†| $39.99 | $49.99 | — |
| †with accidental damage | |||
The Sony warranties begin after the one-year included manufacturers warranty expires, while the GameStop warranties cover that first year. Also, Sony's plan requires you to mail your system to Sony and wait for the repair or replacement system; GameStop's warranty allows you to turn in your system and leave with a replacement. A store clerk also told us that controllers and cables were included with the GameStop protection plan, while it was his understanding that Sony only covered the system itself.
Be sure to take a careful look at what you're paying for—Sony's plan doesn't guarantee you'll get your own system back when you send it in, and you may even receive a refurbished unit. The data on the system is also not covered, meaning you may lose everything that's on your hard drive. The PSP Accidental Damage plan protects against drops, but not liquid damage.
We don't think brick-and-mortar stores will be overjoyed at this offer, and it's likely that store-specific protection plans will still be pushed. This does give consumers another option, however, at that's never a bad thing.
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iPad WiFi + 3G: jailbroken, dismantled, 3G video criticized
Apple launched the 3G-equipped version of the iPad last Friday. Over the weekend, it got poked, prodded, and in one case, completely disassembled. Mobile data access aside, there have been a few differences observed compared to the WiFi-only models, including concerns about video quality and differences in battery life. iFixit tore one apart and discovered a few details about its improved wireless reception and GPS capabilities as well. And, for those looking to install apps outside of those approved by Apple, an untethered jailbreak is already available.
Right off the bat, many users complained that using the iPad WiFi + 3G to stream video over cell networks "sucked" in comparison to WiFi streaming. Notably, Netflix and YouTube show videos of much lower quality while streaming over 3G, while ABC's iPad app won't stream videos over 3G at all (though an update with 3G support is on the way). Having watched YouTube videos over 3G on an iPhone, though, we have to wonder why anyone was caught off guard by this—enlarging a blocky, compressed video to four times the size only makes it look worse.
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Fossils show how dinosaur plumage changed as they aged
With the existence of feathered dinosaurs now being well established, a couple of researchers have moved on to learning more about how the feathers grew during the dinosaurs' lifetimes. By looking at samples of older and younger oviraptosaurs, they've noticed that that, unlike modern birds that grow normal feathers once their downy feathers molt away, the oviraptosaurs seem to have gone through multiple stages of feather development.
The work is based on two specimens—one oviraptosaur that had died and been fossilized in its youth, and another that had matured and lived longer. Both of the fossils had evidence of feathers on different areas of their body, but were nowhere near as fully feathered as creatures like the archaeopteryx.
Both specimens had wing-like feathers on their front legs, with downier feathers along their back and hips. The older specimen had larger, wing-type feathers on both the outermost and middle sections of its arms, while the younger one had the ribbon-like feathers on its middle arm section. The older dinosaur also had downy feathers along most of its spine and on its head.
The biggest difference, though, was an unusual type of feather found on the younger oviraptosaur that were thin and ribbon-like with tips that were tufted with normal feather growth. There were no feathers like this on the older oviraptosaur, suggesting that the tufted-tip feather was a developmentally intermediate stage of feather growth—individual dinosaurs first grew downy feathers, then thin, tufted-tip feathers, then full ones. By contrast, modern birds start growing full feathers as their down falls off.
Of course, these feather observations are drawn from only two oviraptosaurs, so it's possible that the tufted feathers are an anomaly, or a possibly the result of a poorly preserved specimen. Still, any related specimen should help our understanding of the role played by the earliest feathers.
Science, 2010. DOI: 10.1038/nature08965 (About DOIs).
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File-sharers are content industry's "largest customers"
Drawing on a major study of Dutch file-sharers, Prof. Nico van Eijk of the University of Amsterdam concludes, "These figures show that there is no sharp divide between file sharers and others in their buying behaviour. On the contrary, when it comes to attending concerts, and expenses on DVDs and games, file sharers are the industry's largest customers... There does not appear to be a clear relationship between the decline in sales and file sharing."
In fact, the study found that file-sharers often buy more content, especially when it comes to films and games.
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Apple iPhone OS compiler policy may lead to antitrust probe
The US Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission may be considering an investigation into Apple's decision to block iPhone OS apps created by many third-party compilers. According to insiders speaking to the New York Post, the two organizations are "locked in negotiations" over which one will launch the antitrust inquiry, and the decision is mere "days away."
Apple started blocking third-party compilers less than a month ago when it updated the license agreement that came with the latest iPhone OS SDK. Previously, the agreement specified that applications must only use documented APIs; Apple modified it to say that apps must also be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++, or JavaScript and that only this code could link against the documented APIs. This essentially blocked the use of numerous non-Apple compilers, such as Novell's MonoTouch, Unity3D, or Ansca's Corona, not to mention Adobe's cross-platform Flash compiler that was to come with CS5.
Regulators are now reportedly looking into the matter, though (as the Post points out) an inquiry doesn't always translate into a full-blown investigation. When the FTC typically begins an inquiry (as it did recently over Google's attempt to acquire mobile advertising firm AdMob), it usually sends letters to both parties with a list of questions and asks competitors for comment on the impact of the decision. The answers are then reviewed and the FTC decides whether the issue warrants further investigation.
Neither the FTC nor DoJ have confirmed the existence of an inquiry and Apple did not respond to our request for comment by publication time.
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Songwriters: piracy "dwarfs bank robbery," FBI must act
The Songwriters Guild of America has a message for the government: start prosecuting file-sharers, both criminally and civilly, because file-sharing is much worse than bank robbery.
"There are numerous economic crimes of much lesser magnitude (such as bank robbery) that are routinely and fully investigated, for which law enforcement agencies such as the FBI have significant resources," complains the Guild (PDF). "By contrast, online copyright piracy dwarfs bank robbery in causing economic losses, yet the FBI has limited criminal investigative interest and no civil mandate whatsoever to pursue this devastating economic harm. This inequity must change."
The Guild demands that the Department of Justice make criminal prosecutions of "willful copyright infringement" a higher priority; right now, the issue is not classed as a "serious" crime.
"Unfortunately, this misguided attitude allows domestic and foreign pirates to decimate an industry—intellectual property—where the United States enjoys a true global competitive advantage," says the group.
In addition, the federal government should do whatever it takes to start bringing civil copyright lawsuits against online offenders, something that is currently up to the private sector. This would require a change to the law; something along these lines was considered in the PRO-IP Act, but was ultimately scrapped before passage.
The Guild contends that its members simply aren't able to "sue thousands of infringers in the Federal Courts"—but the government could. (And should.)
The suggestions were all directed at the new Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator in the White House, Victoria Espinel, whose position was created by the PRO-IP Act. Espinel is currently working on her legally mandated Joint Strategic Plan to bring all the forces of government to bear on counterfeiters, pirates, and trade secret thieves. She asked for public comment—and wow, is she getting it.
Still, the Songwriters Guild had nothing on the MPAA, RIAA, and other "creative community organizations," all of whom suggested to Espinel (PDF) that good ways to deal with online piracy include using:
- Technologies to detect, monitor (and filter) traffic or specific files based on analysis of information such as protocols, file types, text description, metadata, file size and other “external” information;
- Content recognition technologies such as digital hashes, watermark detection, and fingerprinting technologies;
- Site blocking, redirection with automated warning systems/quarantine of repeat offending sites;
- Bandwidth shaping and throttling;
- Scanning infrastructure (the ability to subscribe to RSS-style data feeds as sites get new postings of content and links (for linking, streaming, and locker sites)
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1 comment:
Great news.
Nice blog.
I like it.
allasca
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