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April 24, 2006

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On Future Tense today: The current issue of PC Magazine names the top ten most technologically advanced cars. Editors judged cars on criteria such as entertainment and navigation systems, and environmentally-friendly technology. Topping the list is the Infiniti M45, which warns drivers when they are about to unwittingly change lanes.

Elsewhere...

BBC.co.uk has a remarkable tale of a homeless woman who blogs about the experience of living in her car in London.

It's a tale of our time - about being cut off from everything around you but still connected to people thousands of miles away.

A woman becomes homeless, so she gets into her car and drives. Except she has nowhere to go - so she stays in the car, with all her possessions heaped in the back, sleeping in the front seats, parking in secluded streets.

For eight months, no one notices her, because she makes sure she looks respectable, taking showers and even ironing her clothes in public places like hospitals. She has made herself invisible, out of touch from anyone she used to know - and keeping separate from other homeless people.

But this is the information age. And even though she doesn't speak to anyone, she can go into a library where she can access the internet and write an online journal - a homelessness blog - which she uses to describe all her unspoken experiences and feelings.


Looking for advice on how to set up a Webcam? David Einstein has some tips in the San Francisco Chronicle.


Can city workers be fired for Web surfing on the job? A judge in New York City says no. The AP has the story.

Saying surfing the web is equivalent to reading a newspaper or talking on the phone, an administrative law judge has suggested that only a reprimand is appropriate as punishment for a city worker accused of failing to heed warnings to stay off the Internet.

Administrative Law Judge John Spooner reached his decision in the case of Toquir Choudhri, a 14-year veteran of the Department of Education who had been accused of ignoring supervisors who told him to stop browsing the Internet at work.

The ruling came after Mayor Michael Bloomberg fired a worker in the city's legislative office in Albany earlier this year after he saw the man playing a game of solitaire on his computer.

In his decision, Spooner wrote: "It should be observed that the Internet has become the modern equivalent of a telephone or a daily newspaper, providing a combination of communication and information that most employees use as frequently in their personal lives as for their work."