It’s hard to believe, watching the impeccably turned-out young trendies building this thing, that it’s a serious enviro-engineering project, but I have seen the prototype with my own eyes at the DEAF exhibition and it’s an amazingly neat set of ideas about how to capture oil spills, presented in the coolest way imaginable.

I’m tempted to try and get them to come and dorkbot and see if any of the research groups at QM would like to join in – I’m sure there’s be lots of interest from our resident geeks. I love it when something jumps out of an exhibition and makes a genuine play at messing with the world.

Protei _ Open Source Sailing Drone.

A California judge has dismissed 15 lawsuits against John Does accused of sharing pirated adult movies on BitTorrent, saying the court lacks jurisdiction because the geolocation tools relied on don’t always accurately identify the state in which the IP address is located.

In order to serve Internet service providers subpoenas to find out which individuals are behind IP addresses linked to alleged pirated content on BitTorrent, the lawyers for plaintiff Celestial needed to convince the judge that the IP addresses are located in California. But the judge said he was not persuaded that the geolocation tools had a high enough accuracy rate.

Judge dismisses piracy suits, says IP address doesn’t confirm state | Politics and Law – CNET News.

Here is a 12 step program I can get behind. What about a Hamster for MAT mascot and make a interactive housing as ongoing MAT project.

Turning an old unwanted dollhouse into a hamster home can be fun for you, thrilling for the hamster and entertaining for everyone who checks it out. Here are some suggestions for changing an old dollhouse into a new hamster mansion.

How to Make a Doll House Into a Hamster Cage: 12 steps.

Inspired by astronauts who spoke of the life changing power of seeing the Earth from space, award winning filmmaker and composer Kenji Williams created BELLA GAIA to simulate this transformative effect called the “Overview Effect”.

Visit the Site.

About Spreadable Media: Creating Meaning and Value in a Networked Culture:

Of all of the changes in the new media environment over the past two decades, perhaps the biggest has been a shift in how media content circulates – away from top-down corporate controlled distribution and into a still emerging hybrid system where everyday people play an increasingly central role in how media spreads. Cultural Studies has historically been centered around issues of production and reception and has had much less to say about circulation. What issues emerge when we put the process of grassroots (often unauthorized) circulation at the center of our focus? How does it change our accounts of the relationships between mass media and participatory culture? How might it shake up existing models of viral media and web 2.0?

This far-reaching talk, based on a forthcoming book which Henry Jenkins has authored with Sam Ford and Joshua Green, offers snapshots of a culture-in-process, a media ecology which is still taking shape, suggesting what it means not only for the futures of entertainment but also of civic life.

Henry Jenkins – talk and discussion, 15 May 2012.

Usman Haque, who will be giving a keynote at our upcoming workshop Ends of Audience has been putting together this event on the “Open Internet of Things”.

Discussions about what that means have been alternately fascinating and bewildering kinds of things, and are likely to get drawn into relation to other kinds of things like people, coffee, technology etc. on the weekend of the 16th/17th.

Come be one of those things!

Open Internet of Things Assembly | June 16 & 17th 2012, London.

Exactly what a “like” means — if anything — played a part in a case in Virginia involving six people who say Sheriff B. J. Roberts of Hampton fired them for supporting an opponent in his 2009 re-election bid, which he won. The workers sued, saying their First Amendment rights were violated.

Sheriff Roberts said some of the workers were let go because he wanted to replace them with sworn deputies while others were dismissed because of poor performance or his belief that their actions “hindered the harmony and efficiency of the office.”

One of those workers, Daniel Ray Carter, had “liked” the Facebook page of Sheriff Roberts’s opponent, Jim Adams.

While public employees are allowed to speak as citizens on matters of public concern, Judge Raymond A. Jackson of Federal District Court ruled that clicking the “like” button did not amount to expressive speech. In other words, it was not the same as actually writing out a message and posting it on the site.

Clicking ‘Like’ on Facebook Is Not Protected Speech, Judge Rules – NYTimes.com.

Awesome online app for generating drawings so you can laser cut boxes – can’t wait for it to arrive!

http://boxmaker.rahulbotics.com/

How To Survive A Robot Uprising (aka Robopocalypse) – YouTube.