Tech Brief
On Tech Brief today: Cakes for all, illegal data for 3D printers and virtual slaves.
• Thanks to the web, fame is cheap. Except when it almost puts you out of business. San Francisco bakery offered coupons via the web which gave patrons 50% off the price of 24 tiny pastries. Cue :
"Things have gotten so bad that the bakery has been forced to put up a disclaimer on its site asking customers to give it at least 48 hours to fulfill an order. Three employees have threatened to quit, and supply runs are now being made twice daily."
• If you need proof of how fast technology develops, look no further than the pages of Shawn McHenry. In an astonishing feat of high-wire geekery, Mr McHenry has got Windows 3.1 running on an Android phone. :
"...and now you should see your Windows 3.1 splash screen. You are now running Windows 3.1 on your Android enabled device! Do a dance! However, it's completely useless, but really damn cool."• Many governments restrict access to websites they would rather their citizens did not see. Paul Raven at wonders if the same will happen when 3D printers squat alongside laser printers in spare bedrooms the world over.
"The simple answer, I'd suggest, is 'yes': nation-states will almost certainly try to outlaw or control ownership and/or access to design files for objects with potentially criminal uses."
• News about Vincent Ocasla's marathon four-year effort to conquer Sim City was all over the web in April. He created a city of six million people, called , that exploited every last corner of the virtual plot upon which the city grows. Now, finds Mike Sterry, there was a method to this glorious madness. .
"Many people say, 'Oh, it's just a game!' But they are mistaken."
Instead, Mr Ocasla saw the creation of Magnasanti as a political comment.
"I wanted to magnify the unbelievably sick ambitions of egotistical political dictators, ruling elites and downright insane architects, urban planners and social engineers."
He also has little pity for the inhabitants:
"They don't rebel, or cause revolutions and social chaos. No one considers challenging the system by physical means since a hyper-efficient police state keeps them in line. They have all been successfully dumbed down, sickened with poor health, enslaved and mind-controlled just enough to keep this system going for thousands of years. 50,000 years to be exact. They are all imprisoned in space and time."
• In cheerier news, some bankers at Standard Chartered have new toys to play with. The bank is taking away the Blackberries of its staff and giving them iPhones. :
"Bankers at other financial institutions such as HSBC Holdings Plc and Morgan Stanley have so far been restricted to the BlackBerry as the standard device issued by their firms for business communications. Despite some indications of change, it may take time for a broader switch to take place, mainly because of security concerns, according to financial professionals and information technology analysts."
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