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The U.S. government is hoping that hackers can help make the nation a better place.

The White House announced today that it will kick off a "National Day of Civic Hacking" on June 1 and 2 and is inviting those with tech know-how to use their coding skills to improve communities across the country.

"Civic Hacking Day is an opportunity for software developers, technologists, and entrepreneurs to unleash their can-do American spirit by collaboratively harnessing publicly-released data and code to create innovative solutions for problems that affect Americans," the White House wrote in a statement.… Read more

Leaked from today's 404 episode:

- Australian police discourage use of Apple Maps app after rescues.

- "50 Shades" success yields $5,000 bonuses at Random House.

- Best Buy sends five iPads in error, says "keep them."… Read more

The eternal debate about whether running or walking through rain gets you wetter has now become a moot point. An art and technology installation in London lets you make your way through rain without getting wet at all.

You don't need an umbrella or a Gore-Tex suit to achieve this feat. You just need to make sure you're visiting Random International's RainRoom.… Read more

Did you ever play Yahtzee? With over 50 million copies of the classic dice game sold every year (according to its maker) chances are pretty good that you've heard the familiar sound of dice rattling in the cup, not to mention the game's simple play: Roll five dice up to three times in certain combinations to achieve the highest possible total score. Let's see...random numbers, calculating combinations, and keeping score: sounds like a natural for software, doesn't it? But not just any gameware: Open Yahtzee is open-source freeware that brings the simple, endless, and mentally … Read more

Teachers these days need all the help they can get. Totally Free Teacher Tools is a suite of five tools that can be useful to teachers and plenty of other people, too. Although none of the tools are must-haves, they're not bad to have around just in case.

Once Totally Free Teacher Tools is installed, users have the option to download each individual tool one at a time. This is useful if you don't want to clutter up your computer with unneeded programs, but a bit of a pain if you want to try everything out. We started … Read more

I was pleasantly surprised today to hear of Jesse Anderson's success in getting randomly typing virtual monkeys to recreate a Shakespeare poem.

Alas and alack, though, I found this tale of computational prowess conquering statistical improbability too good to be true.

Anderson said his virtual monkeys successfully recreated A Lover's Complaint, an astounding accomplishment given that it has, by my count, 13,940 characters in 2,587 words. Anderson, a programmer in Reno, Nev., said on Friday:

Today (2011-09-23) at 2:30 PST the monkeys successfully randomly recreated "A Lover's Complaint." This is the first … Read more

Passwords are the computer user's eternal paradox. If you make a password easy enough to remember, it's likely not very secure. If it's a strong password, you'll be prone to forgetting it--unless you write it on a notepad next to your computer, which again compromises your security. Random Password Generator is an extremely easy-to-use program that can help you create strong passwords and keep them stored securely.

When we first launched Random Password Generator we were prompted to create a master password that would protect the password manager from prying eyes. The program has an intuitive … Read more

Like many free applications, The Hat from Harmony Hollow Software uses software to do something usually done "the hard way." In this case, it's drawing names from a hat, the time-honored method for randomly selecting individual entries from a group. The app can randomize a list of names so no one can complain about who goes first and who goes last. It can also draw individual names or pairs of names for raffles, sweepstakes, and ongoing contests. It does this all without requiring you to actually write down names, cut up the list, and throw it all … Read more

After entering into a landmark deal with Amazon.com last month, a well-known literary agent has backed off its agreement with the online retailer.

The Wylie Agency had inked a deal with Amazon that made digital versions of some of its clients' titles, including Norman Mailer's "The Naked and the Dead" and Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man," available exclusively to Amazon's Kindle e-reader platform for two years.

The agreement was considered a landmark because it skirted the publishers of the books' paper editions and effectively offered more revenue to the authors or their estates.… Read more