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Facebook announced this week that it's seeking user comment on a proposed redesign of its privacy policy that's meant to make the policy easier to understand while bringing the world of legalese-smothered documents into the widget-filled realm of the 21st century.

In a post to Facebook's site governance section, the company's privacy team offers a look at its "first attempt" to re-organize, rewrite, and add interactivity to the current policy, which is essentially your standard mass of small black text.

Among other potentially interesting re-imaginings, the proposed redesign features an interactive tool intended to … Read more

The idea of convergence, of one device replacing several, has long been a popular theme in forecasting high-tech gadgetry. It's also something that doesn't happen as often as predicted.

Some of the reasons relate to design and technology. It's hard to make a multitool as elegant for each individual function as specialist devices are. A form factor that's optimized around, say, being a phone demands serious technical compromises when it comes to a totally different function, such as taking a picture. And rapidly evolving technology means some functions in a device are inevitably behind the technology … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--Here's another reason besides video chat that you might want a front-facing camera on your next mobile phone: controlling it by waving your arm or moving your hand.

This type of touchless gesture interface is coming to mobile phones from top-tier handset makers this year, promised Ofer Sadka, chief technology officer of a start-up called Extreme Reality based in Herzeliya, Israel, that's commercializing the technology.

In the Texas Instruments booth at the Mobile World Congress show here, he demonstrated two variations of the gesticulation-sensitive interface being used to flip through a photo gallery. One used close-range hand gestures, including rotating a fist to zoom in and out.

The other was from several feet away--it's got an 8-meter range--and used more sweeping arm motions, an experience more akin to Microsoft's Kinect game controller. … Read more

OS X is a multiuser environment in which besides standard user and administrative accounts there are a number of hidden or background accounts that are reserved for system-level tasks. One of these is the commonly referenced "root" user, which is the main and fully unrestricted administrator account on the system.

Because the root user has unrestricted access to all aspects of the system, running it interactively can pose a security risk as well as result in inadvertent system alterations. Therefore enabling it is highly discouraged, and the only time we recommend temporarily setting its stats to "enabled,&… Read more

The user's home folder in OS X contains a number of default directories including the Documents, Downloads, Desktop, Library, Movies, Music, and Pictures folders. While these locations do not have to be used to store your files, even if you rarely use these folders to store your files we recommend you do not rename or remove them.

OS X should have default permissions settings on these folders that prevent them from being inadvertently renamed; however, if you migrate your system, restore it from backup, or purposefully change permissions, then this restriction might change and allow you to rename the … Read more

Sick of your keyboard and mouse? Our touch points with technology are finally expanding beyond them. The Wii gave us motion-controlled games to one extent, and the Kinect took it to the next step: gamers are using their entire bodies for control. Apple, of course, has ushered in an era of multitouch and gesture-based user interfaces, and voice-operated technology is making great strides. What's next? We discuss with Ars Technica's Jon Stokes and Forrester's James McQuivey.

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Some of our discussion points… Read more

If you have a system that you allow other people to use, you may at times want to be able to see when others have logged into your system. This may be particularly true with systems you use as a server, a workstation at a school, or even a family computer that may have multiple accounts on it. Though the system has tools like the Console or Activity Monitor, which can show information about users on the system, using these to track when they logged in can be a bit cumbersome.

To view this information specifically, the terminal has a … Read more

Microsoft is testing a new version of its home page that completely changes its lineup of products and services depending on whether you're there for "work" or "home."

While the idea of a custom-tailored site is nothing revolutionary, Microsoft has managed to go about it in a rather creative way, making use of a Web-based variant of its "Metro" UI that has the page slide from side to side instead of reloading, or having users scroll downward. The same look and feel as can be found in Windows Phone 7 and the recently refreshed Surface computer, … Read more

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

Best Buy scraps its restocking fee policy

Google TV may not be ready for its closeup when the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show kicks off next month

The Privacy Bill of Rights aims to regulate companies' data collection practices

The U.K. government wants to make all pornography opt-in only

Google's PowerMeter can now track your home energy use via your home broadband if you have a PowerCost Monitor

TellMyGeo is the app version of "I've fallen and I can't get up!"

And don't miss tonight's lunar eclipse … Read more