Many attribute the technical difficulties involved with communicating under large bodies of water as being one of the major reasons why our knowledge of the depths is so limited. Neptune will change all that using a 497-mile ring of fiber-optic cable sitting off the coast of Canada. The ring has five nodes that will stream data from hundreds of undersea devices directly to the internet. Wally, the robot pictured above, is an example of one of those devices. He just happens to be the world's first internet-operated deep-sea crawler.

"It's revolutionary in that it brings two new components into the ocean environment, which are power and high-bandwidth Internet," says Project Director Chris Barnes, from the project's offices at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. "We're really on the verge of wiring the oceans."

Outside of the scientific community, I'm willing to bet that the military would be interested in this kind of technology as well. Check out Scientific American for a full gallery of images. [Scientific American via PopSci]

But! It's "going to get fixed." He promises. (As AT&T has for over a year.) Besides, part of it's in your head—AT&T says they have a national dropped call rate of 1.32 percent, which is within two-tenths of one percent below the "highest-scoring provider." (Though it's, um, higher in NY on some phones, according to some people.)

Disconcertingly, he made reference to AT&T's favorite stat, that 3 percent of smartphone customers push 40 percent of data, and that they're looking at incentives—as the WSJ put it—that'll get those people to cut back, "in a way that's consistent with net-neutrality and FCC regulations." These FCC regulations. Meaning pay-per-byte data.

But you know what? If I could get data 100 percent of the time, sure, I'll pay more for it, Ralphie. [WSJ]

[Online Education]

Oh wait. It's a balloon, too? A man-shaped balloon with strange thumbs who is owned by 50 Cent? Maybe this video didn't make me understand the Internet after all.

Rafael Rivera discovered that there was only a shortcut to the feature that was disabled; the feature itself is still there. All you have to do is type "adhoc" into the Windows search bar in the Start Menu and it'll show up, as illustrated above. Done and done.

You know what else is taken out of Windows 7 Starter? Their screenshot snipping tool. Yeah. They were too cheap to let netbook users have a SNIPPING TOOL. Thankfully the printscreen button combined with Paint (they didn't take that out!) still works. [Within Windows via Neowin]

While Google's always delivered customized search results to people logged into their Google account—that is, search results tailored to you, based on your web history (yes, even outside of Google, like Gizmodo), past searches and previous results you've clicked on—it's now going to be doing that for everybody. Even if you're not logged in, you're going to get personalized results and yes, more targeted ads, based on past searches, tracked by an anonymous cookie that stays on your computer for 180 days. (BTW, it's not like Google's just started keeping track of your searches, it's just now Google's using that info more directly, that's all.)

You can turn it off here, though I'm guessing that won't turn off the dirty feeling you've got right now.

[Google via Bits]

What do you think the future will hold (i.e.will Google end up creating sentient robots hell bent on destroying mankind)? [Image via BustedTees]

With the debate on net neutrality in full swing in the US, we've been hearing about Bandwidth Hogs again. 'Bandwidth Hog' is a sound bite that conveys a strong emotion: you can virtually see the fat pig chomping on the bandwidth, pushing back all the other animals in the barnyard with his fat pig shoulders all the while scrutinizing with his shiny piggy eyes to see if the farmer isn't around...

The image is so powerful that everyone thinks they understand what the term means , no one questions if the analogy is correct. In discussing this issue, Herman and I realised we had serious doubts about the existence of that potentially mythical beast. In fact, we are not sure even the telcos know what a bandwidth hog is and does.

But it makes great headlines: "Net Neutrality will force the telco's to give The Internet away to Bandwidth Hogs". They claim that bandwidth hogs steal all the bandwidth and cause network congestion, and therefore their behaviour harms all the other regular and peaceful law-abiding users. And to add insult to injury they pay the same price as the others! No, policing and rationing must be applied by the benevolent telco to protect the innocent.

Unfortunately, to the best of our knowledge, the way that telcos identify the Bandwidth Hogs is not by monitoring if they cause unfair traffic congestion for other users. No, they just measure the total data downloaded per user, list the top 5% and call them hogs.

For those service providers with data caps, these are usually set around 50 Gbyte and go up to 150 Gbyte a month. This is therefore a good indication of the level of bandwidth at which you start being considered a "hog". But wait: 50 Gbyte a month is… 150 kbps average (0,15 Mbps), 150 Gbyte a month is 450 kbps on average. If you have a 10 Mbps link, that's only 1,5 % or 4,5 % of its maximum advertised speed!

And that would be "hogging"?

The fact is that what most telcos call hogs are simply people who overall and on average download more than others. Blaming them for network congestion is actually an admission that telcos are uncomfortable with the 'all you can eat' broadband schemes that they themselves introduced on the market to get people to subscribe. In other words, the marketing push to get people to subscribe to broadband worked, but now the telcos see a missed opportunity at price discrimination...

As Herman explains in his post, TCP/IP is by definition an egalitarian protocol. Implemented well, it should result in an equal distribution of available bandwidth in the operator's network between end-users; so the concept of a bandwidth hog is by definition an impossibility. An end-user can download all his access line will sustain when the network is comparatively empty, but as soon as it fills up from other users' traffic, his own download (or upload) rate will diminish until it's no bigger than what anyone else gets.

Now I'm pretty sure that many telcos will disagree with our assessment of this. So here's a challenge for them: in the next few days, I will specify on this blog a standard dataset that would enable me to do an in-depth data analysis into network usage by individual users. Any telco willing to actually understand what's happening there and to answer the question on the existence of hogs once and for all can extract that data and send it over to me, I will analyse it for free, on my spare time. All I ask is that they let me publish the results of said research (even though their names need not be mentioned if they don't wish it to be). Of course, if I find myself to be wrong and if indeed I manage to identify users that systematically degrade the experience for other users, I will say so publicly. If, as I suspect, there are no such users, I will also say so publicly. The data will back either of these assertions.

Please email me if you're interested. And please publicise this offer if you're not in a position to extract such a dataset but are still interested in the answer. This is a much more important question than knowing how many angels can dance on the head of a pin!

Reprinted with permission from Fiberevolution; written in collaboration with Dadamotive. Megahog source image from the AP via TheAge

Whenever a Google has a hiccup, even if it's not search, our tiplines are flooded. Twitter becomes an unreadable stream of complaining. The world, online, stops. Bing? Despite capturing about 10% of the search market, not so much. We got a couple pings in our tips page, and exactly zero emails. Which is odd! So let's theorize:

1. Bing users don't report outages to tech blogs, because they don't read tech blogs. They're using Bing because that's what Internet Explorer tells them to use
2. Bing users don't bother complaining; they just use Google for a half an hour. They're natural switchers anyway—they switched to Bing, right?—so it's not a big deal to shake things up for a bit. Google users, they're stubborn.
3. People don't feel so bonded with Bing, because it doesn't seem as central to their lives online as Google. Google apps—Mail, Maps Docs, Calendar, whatever—all live under the same umbrella, in the same rough interface, and under the same branding. Bing feels like its own thing to a certain extent
4. Shut up you jerk, I was utterly beside myself between the minutes of 9:24 and 10:07 PM EST last night, because of the lack of Bing.

Now you go! What will it take before Bing starts to feel, as depressingly as Google, like some kind of digital phantom limb? Will it ever?

Though I'll probably keep doing what I usually do, and just plug words into my browser's search bar when I wanna know what it means—why bother going to a separate dictionary site? [Google via LA Times]

Oh, and man, OpenDNS is so, so screwed. Google eats everything it touches. [Google]

Previously, publishers had to make a choice between making their content less discoverable on Google or allowing unlimited access to subscription content via Google News. Naturally, many newspaper publishers who are struggling to survive the transition from print have criticized Google for profiting on their paid content—a point that is hard to argue. I don't agree with the business model, but publishers have a right to to deliver their content how they see fit without having to bow down to a search engine.

Still, it's just another sign that we are in for some negative changes to our online experience. As you may recall, Rupert Murdoch is front and center in this battle, and there has been some serious talk lately that Microsoft will attempt to pay him to delist his holdings from Google—setting an extremely bad precedent for how we might (or might not) access content online in the future. Blend that with the concept of a tiered internet or oppressive data caps and things start looking pretty bleak. [Google via BBC]

Microsoft, Google, Motorola and Intel have all shown interest, with devices needing to be GPS compatible—much like your average smartphone. [eWeek via Engadget]

Due to Google Wave's real time updating capabilities, this is actually a rather fitting use. People are posting everything they know, from information about the suspect (right down to his old pictures and Twitter accounts) to news from police scanners. A Google Map of the manhunt is also being maintained with the major events of the search.

We'll keep updating as new details appear for those wanting to keep up (and those without a Google Wave account). [Google Wave via Techcrunch]

Update 1:

Officers on alert at "every exit route out of Washington" looking for officer shooting suspect (source: @seattlepi)

Update 2: Miscellaneous information currently known about the suspect:

Suspect Description:
Maurice Clemmons
(Suspect may be using alias w/fake WA ID for Carsile Dawson)

2004 photo
Twitter photo

Suspect Vehicle Description:
green 1997 Mazda Millenia, WA license [License plate number removed, see update 5]
(vehicle is registered to suspect's wife)

Twitter account

Update 3: Note that a tip line is open for anyone with information regarding the shooting or the suspect's whereabouts: 866-977-236

Update 4:

Suspect reported near 13th and Lander.

Update 5:

Police no longer looking for '97 Mazda Millenia - WSP Trooper Brandy Kessler says it was sold 2 months ago (source: @KIRO7Seattle)

Update 6: The 13th and Lander report was deemed unrelated to this search.

McLaughlin, a major supporter of net neutrality rules, made the comment in a telecom law conference last Thursday by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln law school. Reaction was swift from AT&T's chief lobbyist, Jim Cicconi:

"It is deeply disturbing when someone in a position of authority, like Mr. McLaughlin, is so intent on advancing his argument for regulation that he equates the outright censorship decisions of a communist government to the network congestion decisions of an American ISP. There is no valid comparison, and it's frankly an affront to suggest otherwise," Cicconi said.

Maybe so, but it's a slippery slope. At any rate, the bottom line is that ISPs are going to end up screwing us one way or another—either with some sort of tiered internet, or pricey data caps. [Washington Post]

This fortress, which looks like a heavily armed gas station preparing for a zombie invasion (without the gas pumps) is a stopping point for emails sent to many three-letter government agencies. It's far enough away from DC to survive a nuclear blast, but close enough to service all the relevant entities that depend on them. More beautiful, informative postcards from locations you may never have expected were so important over at: [Wired]

570,937,778 computers are online, with the average weight of 88 pounds, with monitors, printers, and any other peripherals. Ehhh...I'm still a bit skeptical of that number, given the popularity of laptops, but let's keep coming because this is fun!

There are an additional 175,480,931 servers, and about 100 million Blackberries/iPhone/iPod touches to worry about. Plus, there's a 9,320-mile transatlantic cable connecting one half of the digital world to the other (it in itself weighs 191,802,168 pounds) to account for.

Anyway, the final number they come up with is 1,098,868,920,000 pounds (or just over a trillion pounds, for those too lazy to count commas).

To put that number in better perspective, it's about the same weight as 25,000 cloned Sears/Willis Towers. [Crave UK and image]

Vanish, a combination of a manhunt and an experiment, began at 5:38 pm on August 14, 2009 as a bold headline on Wired proclaimed "Author Evan Ratliff Is on the Lam. Locate Him and Win $5,000." We would discover if someone could disappear in today's world, or whether the electronic trails from ATM, email, and cell phone usage would give him away.

Of course, in Evan's case it wasn't just a few concerned family members or police officers looking. It was any person on the Internet whose curiosity was aroused, either by the sheer challenge or by the bounty. Any and all traceable information would be shared over the next few weeks. Soon Evan's phone records, credit card statements, IP dumps, interviews with friends, and anything that his hunters could dig up would be posted on Twitter, Facebook, and Wired's own site.

The end goal for the hunters was to locate Evan, photograph him after giving the codeword "fluke," and then submitting that photo along with a codeword Evan would provide to Wired. And after 27 long days, someone did just that. Evan was caught.

You can read the entire tale here. As you do, consider whether Evan made any genuine mistakes or whether his capture was simply inevitable. Is there a way to disappear, without giving up travel and technology? How would you do it? [Wired]

1. First and foremost, do you "get" what Google is trying do do here? Does it make sense? Is it a good idea?

2. Google OS will be available first on netbooks, and only netbooks starting in a year. Do you think netbooks will even be relevant a year from now?

3. Google also mentions that the first generation of the Chrome OS will focus on secondary machines. Do you even have a need for a secondary machine, or is one computer with a traditional OS enough?

4. Google notes that web browsing is the most important function of a computer . Without it, many of us probably wouldn't use a computer for much in the first place. So my question is, how much of your time spend on a computer is completely offline?