AOCS silver design contest
The Daily Bendiken
Jul 06
Jul 05
» Forbes: IBM's blindfolded calculator
From the advent-of-blind-computation dept: “In a cryptographic epiphany last summer, [Craig Gentry, a] 35-year-old IBM researcher cracked a problem that had remained unanswered despite 30 years of cryptographers’ attention. […] The premise of what computer scientists call ‘fully homomorphic encryption,’ like many long-unsolved mathematical puzzles, sounds both simple and impossible: Can data be encrypted in a way that allows any calculation to be performed on the scrambled information without unscrambling it?”
Jul 04
Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter transmits first high-res images
Jul 03
» PhysOrg: Scientists create first electronic quantum processor
From the opening-schroedingers-box dept: “A team led by Yale University researchers has created the first rudimentary solid-state quantum processor, taking another step toward the ultimate dream of building a quantum computer. The two-qubit processor is the first solid-state quantum processor that resembles a conventional computer chip and is able to run simple algorithms. […] They also used the [chip] to successfully run elementary algorithms, such as a simple search, demonstrating quantum information processing with a solid-state device for the first time. To perform their operations, the qubits communicate with one another using a ‘quantum bus’ — photons that transmit information through wires connecting the qubits.”
» The Daily Galaxy: Stephen Hawking believes asteroid impacts biggest threat to intelligent life in the galaxy
From the fermi-paradox dept: “Stephen Hawking believes that one of the major factors in the possible scarcity of intelligent life in our galaxy is the high probability of an asteroid or comet colliding with inhabited planets. […] How many times in our galaxy alone has life finally evolved to the equivalent of our planets and animals on some far distant planet, only to be utterly destroyed by an impact? Galactic history suggests it might be a common occurrence.”
Two centuries on, a cryptologist cracks the Patterson cipher
An example of way-too-creative advertising
» Numismaster: Chinese gov to purchase another $80B of gold
From the what-do-you-expect dept: “While the Chinese were laughing at Geithner during his speech at Beijing University for claiming that the U.S. dollar was strong [they] had established another reserve to stockpile petroleum and [were] planning to purchase another $80 billion of gold (about 85 million ounces at today’s price level). […] How can the Chinese accumulate this much more gold without the spot price rising significantly? The simple answer is that this is not possible.” (via JOG)
» InformationWeek: Sony begins shipping PCs with Chinese gov spyware and censorware pre-installed
From the all-your-PCs-are-belong-to-us dept: “Sony appears to have begun shipping computers in China with Green Dam installed, in advance of the Chinese government’s July 1 deadline. But the company is disclaiming responsibility for any damage caused by the Web filtering software. […] The documents reference ‘possible mobile phone standards of similar nature.’” (via JOG)
Some old classics you never heard of
Laissez-Faire City’s ad in The Economist
Jul 02
Measuring Tor usage in Iran
Recent growth of the Tor network
