Buzz Out Loud 782: Two-steppin' robot cows

You can lead a cow to the dance-hall, but you can't make him two-step. Unless, that is, you've got a dollop of artificial intelligence and some wraparound earphones. In technology news of the day, universities fight back against the RIAA, a cut-and-paste application appears for iPhone (and it's really, really hard), and robots learn to move themselves.

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EPISODE 782

Episode 782

11 charged in theft of 41 million card numbers
http://news.cnet.com/11-charged-in-theft-of-41-million-card-numbers/2100-7348_3-6244876.html?tag=newsLatestHeadlinesArea.0

Tufts tells judge, we can’t tie IP addresses to MAC addresses
http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/08/06/0224238&from=rss

University wants cease-and-desist order for MediaSentry
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080805-university-wants-cease-and-desist-order-for-mediasentry.html

MacRumors iPhone blog: Are you rich? Buy this $999.99 iPhone app
http://www.macrumors.com/iphone/2008/08/05/are-you-rich-buy-this-999-99-iphone-app/
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/8/apple-s-iphone-app-approval-mouse-falls-off-treadmill-buy-the-1000-app-that-does-nothing-aapl-

Cut-and-paste application
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10007275-2.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=Webware

How to watch the Beijing Olympics LIVE on the Web — Even if NBC doesn’t want you to
http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/8/how-to-watch-the-olympics-live-on-the-web-even-if-nbc-doesn-t-want-you-to

Researcher: Encourage more, not less Internet traffic
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080806-researcher-encourage-more-not-less-internet-traffic.html

Lost SFO laptop found--where it went missing
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10008094-83.html

Robots learn to move themselves
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7544099.stm

You will never, ever game on this 40-foot rig (with 27 HD monitors ) (Thanks Peter!)
http://kotaku.com/5033602/you-will-never-ever-game-on-a-rig-this-expensive

VOICE MAIL

Jean-Guy
About the Linux call yesterday.

Rafa
Hey Twitter! I got a message for you.

Dragon
I know where Apple got their name from.

E-MAIL

Tom,

More ashes were lost than James Doohan. Of the other 207 people, I thought you ought to at least give Gordon Cooper equal time. As an original Project Mercury astronaut, He flew the longest spaceflight of the Mercury project, was the first American to sleep in orbit, and has been noted as the last American to fly alone in earth orbit thus far. (per Wikipedia).

Love the show. Keep ranting Molly!

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Headphone cows steer the herd…

http://www.core77.com/blog/object_culture/cows_herded_with_headsets_10712.asp

excerpt:

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…Ear-A-Round, stereo earphones that transmit sounds directly into the cow’s ears to guide its movement. Researchers are currently working on developing the prototype which has, as a goal, to “give farmers a much finer control of pastures, finer management of where animals are and a better use of the land,” not to mention finding “out what the animals do all day.” (Ahem….rock out to Madonna?).

Here are some choice sound bites from the lab:

The technology won’t eliminate the need for cowboys; instead, the focus is to shift their labor from physical to cognitive. Ranchers and cowhands will no longer have to spend time building and repairing fences.

uh huh…well, there goes my master plan of learning to be a “cow whisperer”…

Best,
Shalin