WINDING DOWN
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net, technology and science news
by Alan Lenton
This week’s Winding Down has material on exploding headphones, Verisign and the dot-web auction, physical cash, a review of the Synergy utility, and two lots of pictures – the Cone Nebula and the night sky from Spain. URLs take you to material on zippers (the clothes sort), black iPhone problems, wine and ultrasound, a history of Tiffany & Co, a talk on why hackers are winning, and a cynical view of artificial intelligence. Finally, Coda updates you on our move...
So, let’s get down to it...
Shorts:
If you thought flaming mobile phones were bad, then pity the poor lady whose headphone battery caught fire on a flight from China to Australia. Which particular brand of noise cancelling headphones it was is not reported, but the woman was wearing them at the time – fortunately she managed to get them off before they caused too much damage.
Lithium-Ion batteries are starting to get a bad reputation. They are used because they are more powerful than most other options, but they are skirting along the edge of safe technology. That wasn’t too bad when people were prepared to pay a premium for new cool mobile technology. Now, though, the items are ‘ordinary’ technology gadgets, and people buy on price rather than ‘coolness’. The pressures on manufacturers to keep the costs down are severe, and that can move the things over the line from safe to erratic.
I confess that I’m starting to regard my rather cool, and very comfortable, Plantronics headphones with just a modicum of trepidation. Hopefully we will know the make and model of the flaming headphones in the not too distant future...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/03/15/headphone_batteries_flame_out_midflight/
Verisign, the company that operates the highly lucrative dot-com and dot-net internet registries, is under investigation by the US Department of Justice Anti-Trust division over its acquisition of the new dot-web registry. The auction for dot-web was very hurried, and Verisign seems to have used a shell company for the purchase, paying a staggering US$135 million.
I’ll be interested to see how this one plays out – especially in the light of the policies of the Trump administration. More info as it happens.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/02/10/doj_investigating_auction_of_dot_web/
Homework:
With one thing and another physical cash seems to be a dwindling commodity these days. Personally, I tend to mainly pay cash from the ATM for anything I don’t buy online, but I suspect I’m unusual in that – at least for an urban dweller. Governments, of course, don’t like cash, because of its anonymity and would love to see all transactions move over to digital where there is a traceable trail. Corporations like it, because it’s cheaper to handle. The general public like it because, well... it’s more convenient.
Digital cash, though, gives an awful lot of power to those who collect and broker it, and I’m not just talking about the obvious target – the banks. I’m talking about a type of company called a payment processor. When you pay by debit or credit card, for instance, the payment doesn’t go straight to the bank or the credit card company. If it did the merchant would have to have accounts with loads of different banks and credit card companies.
No, it goes to one of a relatively small group of companies called payment processors, who process the payments, deduct a fee for their services, and amalgamate your payments with others drawn against the same bank or credit card company, and then send the whole lot off for payment. These companies are pretty powerful, and virtually unknown to the general public.
The really interesting thing about digital cash is that it is all run by private entities – banks, credit card companies, payment processors, all run by private companies. And they would all like to get rid of cash. Especially the banks, because for them cash is money moving out of the banking system. As long as you pay by card they, collectively, get to keep the money in their coffers.
If we are not careful, one day we will wake up and there will be no cash, no ATMs, no bank tellers (already a vanishing breed), no way of buying anything if you don’t have a card! It’s not a pleasant thought. So, perhaps, before it’s too late, you might like to take a look at a fascinating piece entitled “In praise of cash” recently published by aeon. It will certainly make you stop and think, whether you agree or disagree.
https://aeon.co/essays/if-plastic-replaces-cash-much-that-is-good-will-be-lost
Geek Stuff:
[Review] One of the problems I find is that working with two different computers – Linux and Windows – I end up with two sets of keyboards and mice. Inevitably, at some time during the day I end up typing stuff on the wrong keyboard. Until recently, when a colleague suggested I take a look at a nifty little utility called ‘Synergy’.
Synergy allows you to control more than one computer from a single keyboard and mouse – and it really works. It’s available for Linux, Windows and MacOS, and it costs just US$19 for lifetime access. (It doesn’t say whose lifetime – I always find that a bit worrying...) It’s very clever. Technically it’s a network based, software, KVM switch, but without the video – you still need a monitor for each machine.
Once it’s set up it’s dead simple to use. When you originally set it up you tell it where the monitors for each machine are in relation to one another. In my case, the Windows monitor is on the left and the Linux monitor is on the right. If I move the cursor off the right hand side of my Windows monitor it appears on the left of the Linux monitor, and they keyboard is now connected to the Linux computer. Conversely, moving the cursor off the left of the Linux monitor, puts me back in Windows.
I only have one real complaint, which is that I have to keep a keyboard plugged into the Linux machine to enter my password, because Synergy isn’t currently firing up until after I log in. I keep meaning to see if I can fix that, but it’s not irritating me enough yet!
I would definitely recommend it for anyone using multiple computers. [Disclaimer: I have no financial or other links with Synergy, other than buying the software from them.]
https://symless.com/synergy
Pictures:
This week we feature another astronomy picture from the Hubble telescope. It’s the Cone Nebula – though I think it looks more like an old English sheepdog. I guess that ‘The Old English Sheepdog Nebula’ wouldn’t exactly be a snappy title!
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap170315.html
If you’d prefer something a little more down to earth, try this picture of the night sky from the Monfrague National Park in Spain. Put your cursor on the picture to get the names of some of the stars featured in the picture.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap170314.html
Scanner:
Inside the global zipper war
http://www.worldcrunch.com/business-finance/inside-the-global-zipper-war
Crack in black: Matte iPhones losing paint at alarming rate, gripe fans
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/02/10/black_matte_iphones_losing_paint/
Ultrasound waves turn wine into something better
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2017/02/03/ultrasound-waves-wine-brandy/#.WMzAkG_yguV
From stationery store to the famous blue box: The 180-year history of Tiffany & Co.
https://www.6sqft.com/from-stationary-store-to-the-famous-blue-box-the-180-year-history-of-tiffany-co/
Ex-FBI man spills on why hackers are winning the security game
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/02/12/b_sides_sfo_security_is_broken_says_taniums_jason_truppi/
Artificially inflated: It’s time to call BS on AI
http://www.infoworld.com/article/3176602/artificial-intelligence/artificially-inflated-its-time-to-call-bs-on-ai.html
Coda: The Adventure of the Devil’s Curtain Rods
“Did you notice the curtain rods, Watson?” asked Holmes.
“Curtain rods? What curtain rods?” asked Watson.
“Exactly, Watson,” said Holmes. “Exactly!”
It began simply enough. We moved to a larger apartment, so we decided to get new curtains, which duly arrived. Having all the curtains, we decided to lash out on a new set of curtain rods for them, rather than recycling the ones from the old apartment. After sifting through firms supplying such goods, we settled on a supplier and it turned out that we would have to wait a few days, because they would be coming straight from the manufacturers.
Finally the day of delivery arrived, and in the morning we received an email from the carrier saying they would be delivered later that day. There was joy unbounded. However... late in the evening an email was received saying that they’d tried to deliver at 8:52 in the evening, but we weren’t in, so they had left the package in ‘a secure storage’ location.
This came as some surprise since not only were we in the house at that time (indeed all of the day), but we had no such thing as ‘secure storage’!
Needless to say, first thing in the morning we were on to our supplier’s customer service. They were as puzzled as we were and got on to the carrier. When they got back to us they told us the driver had now changed his story and claimed when he got to our house he couldn’t find the package in the van. Unfortunately for him, he couldn’t explain why he hadn’t followed standard procedure and called on us to apologise on behalf of the firm. He also sent the ‘secure storage’ message by mistake, he claimed...
Definitely a case that Lestrade of the Yard should be taking up. Indeed, the following day we heard that the driver was ‘being questioned under caution’ – something that is done when the answers are expected to be used in a court case! The suppliers were very apologetic and apart from demanding a full investigation and a report on the issue from the carrier they refunded the payment for the order, and, as a courtesy, ordered up a new set of rods at no cost to us. We are currently awaiting delivery.
“Somewhere in the East End of London,” Holmes told Watson, “A cheerful Cockney barrow boy is telling a customer, ‘It’s a package of curtain rods, guv – fell off the back of a lorry. Yours for just one of the Bank of England’s new plastic five pound notes!’”
Acknowledgements
Thanks to readers Barb and Fi for drawing my attention to material for Winding Down.
Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Thunderbird spam filter...
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
19 March 2017
Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist, the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/index.html.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.
