Tech Today w/ Ken May

Built-in webcams are becoming more and more common in computers these days, and in turn, they are becoming more and more of a liability. A Wyoming couple is now accusing national rent-to-own chain Aaron’s Inc. of spying on them at home using their rented computer’s webcam without their knowledge. Aaron’s also allegedly used a keylogger and took regular screenshots of the couple’s activities on the machine, leading the couple to file a class-action lawsuit in the US District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania.

According to the complaint filed on Tuesday, Aaron’s has been using a product called “PC Rental Agent” on its rent-to-own machines since at least 2007 in order to “surreptitiously access, monitor, intercept, and/or transmit electronic communications” made by Aaron’s customers. Created by a company called DesignerWare, PC Rental Agent is advertised as a way to keep track of rent-to-own computers and lock out customers who fail to pay. According to the lawsuit, the product was sold to Aaron’s under the guise that it was undetectable by users, and Aaron’s apparently conceals the fact that it has the ability to monitor customers’ activity when marketing its services.

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PC rental store accused of using webcams, keyloggers on customers

Scientists at CERN have announced that they’ve been able to trap 309 atoms of antihydrogen for over 15 minutes. This is long enough that soon, they’ll be able to figure out whether antimatter obeys the law of gravity, or whether it’s repelled by normal matter and falls “up” instead. It would be antigravity, for real.

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Scientists could be months away from discovering antigravity

Flying generally sucks, but it doesn’t have to be awful. If you’re willing to break a few rules and compromise your status as an upstanding moral citizen, the dark side has a few secrets to help you have a more enjoyable flight. More

After the news of Osama bin Laden’s death, reactions were split: there was the USA, USA, Greek Row kegstand contingent, and then those who saw the historical event as something more solemn and less bacchanalian. More

The Nielsen Company has announced that its estimated number of TV households for 2012 is dropping to 114.7 million (96.7 percent), down from 115.9 million (98.9 percent) the year before which is the first time it’s gone down in two decades. While some will say this marks the end of the TV era as we’ve known it, there are a couple of factors to take into account, starting with how the numbers are gathered — Nielsen only counts TVs that are capable of tuning into at least one channel. If you’ve cut the cord and gone all internet / Blu-ray / DVD without putting up an antenna or never upgraded for digital broadcasts (as some rural or low-income homes have not) then your TV doesn’t count. After reviewing the numbers and watching Apocalypto twice we still can’t tell if this means it’s already over for linear TV or if it’s more of a temporary bump due to an uncertain economy like it was in 1992. Of course, the fact that we rented the movie on iTunes may be telling.

Nielsen estimates show first drop in TV ownership in 20 years, Mayans nod approvingly originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 May 2011 14:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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At first, the exoplanet 55 Cancri e didn’t look all that impressive: just another large rocky planet circling its star every couple of days. But a recalculation of its orbit has revealed that it’s the galaxy’s densest known planet. More

Instead of storing 3TB of five hard drive platters, Seagate has done the unthinkable and squeezed the same amount of memory on just three 3.5-inch platters, achieving the holy grail 625GB/in2 areal density. Keep an eye out for those hard drives later this year. [The Reg] More

Core77’s David I. Seliger has a nice retrospective on the design of American firefighter helmets from the 1731 helmets designed by Jacobus Turk for the Fire Department of New York to the contemporary thermoplastic models. These modern helmets, Seliger says, have plenty of room for improvement, and “Redesigning the fire helmet – both a marketable product and a symbol deeply ingrained in American culture – to satisfy firefighters’ physical, mental, and emotional needs could be the industrial design challenge of a lifetime.”

Three main types of helmets are currently used in the United States. The “leatherhead” is just that–constructed almost entirely of leather. The leather’s resistance to heat actually rivals that of modern composites. The large brim that dips down in back is designed to keep hose water dripping off of the ceiling out of the face. The leatherheads are used in fighting regular fires.

The second type is the structural helmet, a more streamlined version of the leatherhead, constructed of thermoplastics or composites. These helmets are used for structural collapses and extrications. Goggles, instead of a face shield, often sit on the front of the helmet.

The last type is the European-style helmet, which looks like a cross between a motorcycle helmet and something from Star Wars. The design is purportedly much more comfortable and practical. But, as one firefighter put it, “I’ve been involved with fire departments in four states…and in seven years have seen a grand total of two [European-style] helmets… these guys were… universally afraid of being mocked for wearing something new, different or ‘unfashionable.'”

Tradition vs Progress: The Art of the American Fire Helmet

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American firefighters’ helmets through history

Next Monday, I’m taking a Minneapolis Community Education cooking class called “Foods of Lewis and Clark Expedition”. Will there be elk and hardtack? Am I gonna learn how to cook pemmican with suet? Will we all just sit around and feel hungry for a while, for maximum realism? I have absolutely no idea. But it’s going to be fabulous. And I’ll be sharing what I learn here. In the meantime, though, I wanted to direct your attention to a couple of fascinating posts at cooking blog The Shiksa in the Kitchen.

There, Tori Avey delves into the foods available to Colonial Virginians, and how those people turned those foods into a generalized menu. And then, there's a recipe for apple tansey—a sort-of moderately sweet, crispy apple omelet thing (pictured above). Avey's also given Tudor England the same treatment. As someone who loves both history and food, I’m super excited to find a blog series like this one!

BREAKFAST

In frontier outposts and on farms, families drank cider or beer and gulped down a bowl of porridge that had been cooking slowly all night over the embers… The southern poor ate cold turkey washed down with ever-present cider. The size of breakfasts grew in direct proportion to growth of wealth… It was among the Southern planters that breakfast became a leisurely and delightful meal, though it was not served until early chores were attended to and orders for the day given… Breads were eaten at all times of the day, but particularly at breakfast.

DINNER

Early afternoon was the appointed hour for dinner in Colonial America. Throughout the seventeenth century and well into the eighteenth century it was served in the “hall” or “common room.” While dinner among the affluent merchants in the North took place shortly after noon, the Southern planters enjoyed their dinner late as bubbling stews were carried into the fields to feed the slaves and laborers… In the early settlements, poor families ate from trenchers filled from a common stew pot, with a bowl of coarse salt the only table adornment… The stews often included pork, sweet corn and cabbage, or other vegetables and roots which were available…

SUPPER

Supper was a brief meal and, especially in the South, light and late. It generally consisted of leftovers from dinner… In the richer merchant society and in Southern plantation life, eggs and egg dishes were special delicacies and were prepared as side dishes at either dinner or supper.

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What they ate in Colonial Virginia

Artist Daniel Bejar had a key copied and then a new key copied from it, and so on, until the information embodied in the original key had been lost. He calls the resulting piece “The Visual Topography of a Generation Gap”: “A copy was made from my original apartment key, then a copy was made from
that copy. This process was repeated until the original keys information was
destroyed, resulting in the topography of a generation.”

“The Visual Topography of a Generation Gap”(#2, Brooklyn, NY)
(Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

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Sculpture embodies lossy copying using much-copied house-key