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Google grab bag: Chinese lawsuit, 9/11 ASCII art

It's time for our aperiodic wrap-up of Google items. We'll start off with the most unusual, in my opinion: wacky ASCII art.

• September 11 obviously made quite an impression on people, and its effects continue to reverberate. The latest example: Google Trends, which monitors hot search terms at the company, has picked up on what appears to be a symbolic representation rendered in ASCII text characters. It consists of an airplane and two vertical bars.(Via Search Engine Land.)

• Google shed a little light on the popularity of its blog posts from 2008. The top item: … Read more

Innovation and the media

In the past two weeks, there’s been at least a dozen stories in the mainstream and not-so-mainstream media about the importance of innovation in a recession. For businesses, refocusing on R&D and innovation really is a good strategy in down times. There’s plenty of historic evidence to back the claim up (the invention of farming technologies and civil engineering breakthroughs in the Great Depression, alternative energy investments in the early 1970s, and a sharpening of Internet business models after the dot com bust in the late 90s). What’s also true is that writing about innovating … Read more

An all-electric Porche 997? Blasphemy!

RUF, tuner of Porsche cars, is working on a new concept based on the Porsche 997, but it seems they've forgotten to put in the fantastic Porsche engine. In its place, they dropped a 150kW electric motor and about 1,200 pounds of batteries. Yes, the new E-RUF concept is an electric vehicle. It's green, but is it any good?

The electric power train outputs 200 horsepower (meh) and 479 pound-feet of torque (wow!). Gobs of torque available instantly make for a decent 0-60 time of about seven seconds, despite the fact that the E-RUF weights close to … Read more

Latest from Porsche: 2009 911 Carrera and Carrera S

As a car-maker, Porsche is unusual in that it usually seems to be driven more by engineering than by marketing. But, especially in the 911 line, that means a focus on traditional sports car core values--power balanced with handling, and driving characteristics that can be best utilized by skilled drivers.

The recently introduced 2009 911 Carrera and Carrera S models continue in that vein. They are still known by internal code 997, but it's Version 2.0. New engines boast more power, better fuel efficiency, and lower emissions. As with all 911s since the 1963 prototype, they are horizontally … Read more

On track: 2009 Porsche 911

The usual procedure for the driving part of an automotive press introduction is four to six hours in the car, on the road. "Road" meaning a mix of entertaining and hopefully uncrowded back roads, some freeway, and as little city traffic as possible, all with the intention of highlighting the featured vehicle's capabilities and comfort.

That is adequate, and appropriate, for most cars, even relatively high-performance cars. Most cars get used mainly around town and on the freeway, with maybe a lucky clear shot at an empty canyon road early on a weekend morning.

The Porsche 911 … Read more

Oh no, they didn't! Porsche calls foul on GT-R Ring time

Known as the Green Hell or more simply the Ring, the Nurburgring Nordschleife is considered the longest and most challenging racetrack in the world. Automotive manufacturers and speed demons place a high premium on Nurburgring lap times. So when the Nissan GT-R shattered the Porsche 911's record with a blistering 7:29:03 lap time earlier this year, a few feathers were ruffled in Stuttgart, Germany.

So what did Porsche's engineers do about it? Well, they went out, purchased a brand new GT-R, and drove it back to back with a 911 Turbo and a 911 GT2 in … Read more

911ICE: A social network for the sick and wounded

In 2005, British paramedic Bob Brotchie launched an initiative to encourage people to put emergency contact information in their mobile phone address books, under the name "ICE," which stands for "In Case of Emergency." He hoped that when emergency workers reached a person who had become incapacitated, they would learn to look up the ICE number on the phone to connect to a person who could speak for the one in need.

The program has succeeded in the U.K. and Australia, and is gaining some traction in the U.S., Brotchie says. He was at … Read more

NYC's 911 system upgraded to accept photos, video

New York City is touting a new weapon in its war on crime: cell phone cameras.

Tipsters in New York City can now send photos and video from computers and Web-enabled cell phones and PDAs to the city's 911 and non-emergency hot lines to report crimes and quality-of-life issues such as potholes, officials announced Tuesday.

While many cities' emergency systems are equipped to accept text messages, this is believed to be the first system that also is able to process photos and video.

When 911 callers tell police operators that photos or video related to their complaint are available, … Read more

Buzz Out Loud 748: At play in the Web of Misery

Somehow today's show suddenly turned into a poetry slam, replete with economic gloom, the devastating hackery of coffee pots, and the slow creep of a fox on fire. All right, that's about enough of that annoying crap. In other news that may or may not be news, a new study finds that folks who are enthusiastic about technology may also be enthusiastically jerky. Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 748

Flickr co-founders depart Yahoo http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9971209-7.html

Statistics show Firefox 3 spreading fast http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9971672-7.html http://mashable.com/2008/06/18/firefox-record/… Read more