Technology

In the latest WikiLeaks data dump, around a quarter-million confidential American diplomatic cables were published online. Among the tech-relevant secrets, the State Department tasked agents to collect DNA and other biometric information on foreigners of interest. Specifically, U.S. officials were t...

Calling it "the next generation of realism" Google has introduced the latest version of Google Earth, promising more seamless interactivity with Mother Earth and some unusual new features. "In Google Earth 6, we're taking realism in the virtual globe to the next level with a truly integrated Street ...

Microsoft has filed a patent application for a display screen that would dynamically give users the feeling of pushing buttons when they touch it. It filed patent application 20100295820 last week. The patent's for a "light-induced shape-memory polymer display screen" that would give users the sensa...

Despite talk of dire consequences for U.S. foreign policy and military intelligence, online publisher Wikileaks Sunday began releasing more than 250,000 leaked cables between 274 worldwide embassies and the U.S. State Department. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange calls the leaked cables "the largest ...

OPINION

2011: The Year of the Tablet Wars

This has been an interesting month when it comes to tablets. Apple has pretty much owned the segment, but Samsung reports it shipped 600,000 of its Galaxy Tablets in the first month, which may mean it's a player. HP almost had a surprise winner in its Windows 7 Tablet, but it under-forecast demand.

Motorola announced Wednesday that it will develop a hands-free wireless computing headset with micro-display specialists at Kopin -- a move reminiscent of previous attempts to create wearable computers and communications devices. The device will offer voice, audio and PC capabilities on a virtual r...

With Black Friday fast approaching, I've been thinking a lot about how various forms of technology have become ingrained into our everyday lives. You may be wondering exactly what the busiest shopping day of the year has to do with the spread of new technology. That's a fair question. The answer -- ...

With a catchy title -- "Broadband NextGen 911" -- U.S. Federal Communications Commission and Department of Transportation officials want to bring emergency services into the age of technology with more than just a three-number telephone call. "Today's 9-1-1 system doesn't support the communication t...

Internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee worries that the Web's most successful inhabitants are gradually chipping away at its "egalitarian" foundations. "The Web as we know it is being threatened," writes Berners-Lee in a Scientific American essay. "Large social-networking sites are walling off information...

OPINION

Black Friday Strategies: Shopping Smart

This Friday is Black Friday. Well, we could probably call November Black Friday month, since many of the retailers started their discounting efforts last week. There will be an incredible number of deals to be had, based on some of the leaked information from megavendors like Best Buy. I think tha...

China this week sentenced online activist Cheng Jiangping to one year in a labor camp for retweeting a message urging an attack on the Japanese pavilion at the recently concluded Shanghai Expo, according to Amnesty International UK. News of the sentence comes as tension within China over the country...

Until now, planets known to humans have never wandered into the Milky Way galaxy. However, Friday's announcement that planet HIP 13044b entered our galaxy hitched to a giant star called HIP 13044 has astronomers rethinking how -- and where -- planets form. "This is an exciting discovery," said Max ...

Here Comes the Holodeck

As if scripted for a "Star Trek" episode, news of a real-life, real-time hologram instantly projected images of holodecks in many a sci-fi fan's head, only to be dashed and challenged and revived again. The action opened with an announcement that a technological breakthrough by researchers at The Un...

OnLive has created an adapter that brings its cloud-based, instant-play video games to the TV -- and it's hoping to attract the whole family, not just the hardcore male gamer, to partake in the action. OnLive is taking orders now for its MicroConsole and an accompanying OnLive Wireless Controller. T...

Physicists at CERN have created the stuff of "Star Trek" for the first time ever: genuine antimatter. A 17-member team announced the production and preservation of 38 antihydrogen atoms. Physicists Emilio Segre and Owen Chamberlain of the University California, Berkeley, earned the 1959 Nobel Prize ...

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