Produced and hosted by Jon Gordon, Future Tense brings you the latest technology topics in daily five-minute capsules. From electronic privacy and digital democracy to spam and computer worms, Future Tense keeps you up to date on the rapidly changing world of technology.
Future Tense is heard in the United States during broadcasts of the CBC's As It Happens.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation says Microsoft has betrayed customers of its defunct MSN Music service, and should give music buyers their money back.
Microsoft last week Microsoft announced it would no longer issue digital rights management keys for songs purchased from MSN Music after August 31st. Because the songs are DRMed, or copy protected, consumers will be prevented from transferring their songs to new devices, and could lose their music when they get new computers or when their old machines fail.
As the technology of brain imaging advances, some philosophers and civil libertarians are beginning to worry about a possible threat to privacy.
What if brain scans could eventually detect specific thoughts? If scans could detect criminal proclivities, how would that affect our judicial system - which is based on actions, not thoughts. Do we have a right to mental privacy?
Lower Manhattan -- with its stock exchanges, Federal Reserve, big banks, and bridges and tunnels -- remains a tempting terror target.
New York City is implementing a technology-focused plan to protect the area. At the center of the plan, according to Wired Magazine contributing editor Noah Shachtman, is an array of 3,000 security cameras designed to detect early terror warning signs.
The new feature-length documentary film Disconnected follows three Carleton College students who pledged to go without computers for several weeks last year. The students voluntarily gave up Facebook, email, Google and Microsoft Word, and, along the way, learned to use typewriters.
Despite the catchy and persuasive ads for FreeCreditReport.com, a consumer advocacy group says it's not the best site for exercising your right to free annual credit data.
Also today: The Schwaggin' Wagon collects tech conference freebies for charity
Researchers at the University of California Berkeley have created an experimental site that uses machine learning techniques to recommend a portfolio of charitable giving opportunities based on ratings users give to various nonprofit groups.
I've spent past few days testing Chumby, a grapefruit-sized, Linux-based widget display device encased in a beanbag. In this interview, I compare notes with Dwight Silverman, who previously wrote about Chumby here and here.
Daniel Wilson, who has a Ph.D. in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University, got to thinking recently about devices he'd like to see invented. He's published a list of 10 genius inventions on PopularMechanics.com. They include an insect forcefield, sonic showers and an acoustic cloaking shell.
What would you pay for a computer chip that could help you recall every piece of information that's passed through your brain? It's a question posed by New York University psychology professor Gary Marcus, who says implanting chips in human brains would help us overcome evolutionary limitations on memory.
Americans have a growing comfort level with young people using social networking sites, chat programs and email, according to a new Zogby International survey. The changing sentiment could have implications for technology policy, according to Tim Lordan with the Congressional Internet Caucus Advisory Committee.
Also on the show today:
A new social media study finds many women put a great deal of trust in blogs as a source of information on politics, products and other information. About half women surveyed by BlogHer, a blog network for women, said blogs are very reliable, while most of the rest of the respondents said they're somewhat reliable.
Some major employers, including AT&T, Intel, Hewlett Packard and the federal government, have begun to scale back on telecommuting, calling thousands of home-based workers back to the office.
Justin Draeger believes corporations have lost sight of the benefits of telecommuting, or "teleworking" as he calls it, and in an article on Web Worker Daily recently, he offered tips for wannabe telecommuters on how to sell the concept to reluctant managers.
When photo sharing site Flickr gave users the ability to upload short videos recently, more than 25,000 customers signed an online protest petition. They believe video will detract from the purity and simplicity of the photo site. The Flickr dust-up is another instance of user revolt, in which members of an Internet community rise up against some unwelcome change.
SmartyPig is a Web site designed to help people save money for specific goals, like buying an iPhone or a new digital TV. It includes a social element that lets friends and family contribute to an account and monitor a saver's progress.
April 10, 2008
Researchers promise to make computer music more expressive
Scientists at the University of Rochester are working on a different kind of encoding that promises to make sound files 1,000 times smaller than MP3s.
The new method is not a recording technology. Instead, it recreates music in a computer based on what it knows about the real-world physics of an instrument and its human player.
Researchers say the real benefit is expressiveness, not file size.
Foreign governments and manufacturers working together could sabotage American computers and networks by selling hardware implanted with maliciously-programmed chips, according to a story in the April issue of Popular Mechanics.
The magazine says hardware vulnerability - where malicious instructions are etched permanently into silicon chips - could become an emerging threat.
April 8, 2008
Competition among Internet thieves heats up; New map tracks CO2
A new report on Internet security says fierce competition among identity thieves is driving down prices for stolen data and forcing criminals to adopt mainstream business tactics.
The latest Internet Security Threat Report by Symantec says in the last six months of 2007, credit card numbers were selling for as little as 40 cents each -- less than half what the went for earlier in the year.
Also on the show today:
Scientists have developed a new system for mapping carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. that provides 100 times more detail than previous maps.
The Sunlight Foundation, which advocates for more openness in government, is in the middle of writing the Transparency in Government Act of 2008. The proposal seeks to force Congress and the executive branch to make more information available to the public over the Internet - information about contracts, congressional travel, fundraising and more. But the proposal isn't taking a normal course. It's taking shape online, where the public is invited to comment.
On LiveNewsCameras.com, you can watch nearly 150 live Web and satellite news feeds from the U.S. and around the world. A project of the Fox News affiliate in Chicago, LiveNewsCameras.com features a live on-camera moderator who scans all the feeds and, appearing in a window next to all the news channels, recommends which ones to watch.
April 3, 2008
Psychiatrist campaigns to make compulsive computer use an official mental disorder
Psychiatrist Jerald Block believes heavy use of computers, video games and the Internet can either cause mental illness or, at the very least, be a destructive manifestation of pre-existing behavioral disorders. Writing in the American Journal of Psychiatry, Block argues there ought to be an entry in the next version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Illness called "pathological computer use."
A new survey commissioned by consumer privacy organization TRUSTe finds a strong majority of Internet users are aware marketers are tracking their online activities in order to serve them targeted advertisements. And most of those people find tracking and targeting to be an invasion of privacy - even when marketers don't have a way to identify them personally.
Wired News is reporting that malicious hackers successfully inserted rapidly flashing images on the Web discussion forum of the Epilepsy Foundation last weekend, triggering seizures in some readers. The Foundation temporarily closed the forum while it boosted security to prevent more attacks.
Certain kinds of flashing images can produce seizures in people who suffer from photosensitive epilepsy.
Guest: Greg Barkley, neurologist at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, Michigan and founding director of the Henry Ford Comprehensive Epilepsy Program
