December 2006
Effective Today - U.S. Companies Must Track E-mails, IM and etc. |
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U.S. companies are now responsible for keeping track of all e-mails, instant messages and other electronic documents sent out by their employees beginning today in case they are ever taken to court. This past April the Supreme Court approved a rule that mandates companies and other entities involved in federal litigation to hand over "electronically stored information" in the discovery process, a time when evidence is shared by both sides before trial. Companies will now be responsible for keeping and maintaining all electronic information that has gone through their systems.
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Cost may be a factor for
many companies, as they must
now consider how they are
going to organize their data
to comply with the new
ruling. Removable memory
cards and photos of work
sites taken on cell phones
will all need to be tracked
and for many companies this
will take some organizing to
know where everything is
being kept. |
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Windows Vista |
Windows Vista is now available
to customers with volume
license agreements, such as
computer manufacturers and
other big business clients.
It is the first release of a
Windows operating in more
than 5 years, the longest
gap of time Microsoft has
ever seen between releases
of operating systems.
It offers improved security,
an improved 3D interface, as
well as new sound and
networking technologies.
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Initially an ambitious
project that promised to
virtually reinvent PC
computing as we know it,
Windows Vista is now being
criticized by many as being
no more than a rehash of
Windows XP. This is
because many of the
innovative features
promised, such as PC-to-PC
synchronization and a new
filing system, were scrapped
along the way due to quality
concerns. This also
helps to explain the delays
in Vista’s release; it was
originally slated for
release in late 2003, and in
2004, the developers
actually found that what
they had would be unworkable
and had to begin again from
scratch.
Despite the perceived
shortcomings of the final
release, it is certain to be
adopted by individuals in
the market for new PCs and
likely to be gradually
picked up by businesses as
well for built-in features
like speech recognition,
improved wireless
networking, and the ability
to use a USB flash memory
device as a form of virtual
memory that can speed up
performance.
Windows Vista, along with MS
Office 2007, will be
available for purchase by
the general public at the
end of January. |
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Wireless Power |
Many people take devices like
laptops, iPods, cell phones,
and blackberries everywhere
they go. They check
E-mails; browse the Web, and
even download songs without
ever plugging their devices
in. However, the
devices are still not
entirely wireless.
They must be plugged into a
wall outlet to charge.
And with more and more
machines and gadgets
becoming commonplace,
remembering to charge them
and finding a spot on a
power strip is becoming more
and more of an
inconvenience.
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So what if your batteries
could charge automatically,
wirelessly?
Researchers at MIT have
devised a mechanism that
will allow them to do just
that. It would work
through a base station that
would emit low frequency
electromagnetic waves that a
charging mechanism within
each device would resonate
with sympathetically and
generate electricity.
Any device within a certain
range that was set to that
frequency would gradually
replenish its battery power.
It has been predicted that a
prototype will be built
within the next year.
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Resilient Machines |
The distinction between natural and artificial life continues to blur thanks to researchers from Cornell University and the University of Vermont. They have purportedly created a robot that adapts to damage done to its limbs and is capable of healing itself when injured.
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While machines are normally programmed with a rigid set of instructions written specifically for certain types of hardware, this machine is taught to think more like a cat or a human being, first surveying its own physical abilities and then figuring out a way to use those abilities to accomplish a given task. As a consequence it can take inventory of its abilities, diagnose and figure out ways to either repair itself or compensate for unexpected situations. For example, if a leg is not functioning properly, it can adapt by limping.
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