February
23, 2002
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- eBay
in the News
- Stewart
Richardson pulls off largest eBay scam to date
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Losses may reach 250K
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Has Figurines sold on eBay for 5 years
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Has 6,000 rave reviews posted, so he was trusted
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Held a large auction for many items the first week of January
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Disappeared with all proceeds
- Bidding
for Segway Human Transporter (HT) reaches $100,000
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Formerly known as Ginger and IT
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HT
Facts
- Top
Speed 12.5 mph
- Range:
17 miles
- Platform
height: 8 inches
- Width:
19 inches
- Weight:
80 pounds
- Cost:
Initially 8 to 10K
- Virtual
World Grows Real Economy on Ebay
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EverQuest players create and control characters – avatars –
within a fantasy world Norrath
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They can trade using the game’s currency of “platinum pieces”
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Edward Castronova found “platinum pieces” for sale on eBay
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He computed that Norrath has a gross national product per
capita of $2,266.
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If Norrath were a country, it would be the 77th
most wealthy, just behind Russia
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Players earn an average of $3.42 per hour
- Gaming
News
- What
is EverQuest?
- Real
3D, massively parallel multiplayer role-playing game
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2,000 players per server.
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Up to 60,000 online at any time
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Over 400,000 active users
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13 races, 14 classes, 40 skills, 5 continents, powerful deities
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Very addictive (I read about one EverQuest divorce)
- Hand
Disorder linked to Vibrating Console Controllers
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15-year old boy played Sony Playstation for 7 hours a day
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Hands became painful and swollen
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Condition cannot be reversed and reappears when he hold anything
that vibrates, like a drill
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Recommend 15 minute break each hour
- Napster
Finally Get a Break in Court
- Napster
contended that label sought to impose anti-competitive licensing
terms with online rivals, even as they created joint ventures among
themselves
- Napster
calls such actions copyright misuse
- Federal
judge ordered that such practices should be scrutinized further
- IBM
is gaining share of server market
- LCD
Flatpanel monitors may go up in price
- Raw
material shortage
- Motherglass
shortage expected to last until 2003
- Looking
Back at CISCO $2 Billion Blunder
- Supply
chain screw up caused May 2001 $2.2 billion write-down
- Cisco
over produced equipment
- Multitiered
supply chaing did not repond to reduction in demand
- Many
customers ordered multiple times during the shortage.
- After
Global Crossing, Is There Any Hope for Broadband
- Thanks
Dan Benson of the Internet Society for this article
- Low
broadband demand is documented by FCC
- Fewer
than 10% of households have signed up for broadband despite the
fact that it is available to 81 million homes via cable and 51 million
homes via phone lines. Only 6% of businesses have signed up.
- Consumers
not willing to shell out $45 per month
- Not
needed for email….dialup works just fine
- Not
enough broadband content on the net.
- Google
eyes IPO
- Hires
insider Sheryl Sandberg to drum up new business
- Harvard
MBA, former World Bank Economist, chief of staff to Treasury Secretary
Larry Summers
- Safeway
Expanding Net services
- Now
offering home delivery to 50 neighborhoods in Sacramento area
- Already
testing home delivery in San Francisco area
- Competing
with online rival Albertson
- Filling
the void after WebVan and Kosmo folded and
- Peapod
moved out.
- Microsoft
and Apple alliance
- Five
years ago MS invested $150 in Apple, released MS Office for Apple,
and Apple dropped with patent infringement lawsuit
- Agreement
ends this summers
- Apple
opposed the recent settlement to put MS Software in schools and
courts agreed.
- But
MS just released Office X, hailed by some as the best version of
MS Office
- While
they dance again? Wait and see.
- Security
in the News
- Exeskeloton
Program at DARPA
- Remember
the PowerLoader from the movie Aliens where Leutienant Ellen Ripley
battled the monster while encased in the Powerloader?
- It
is about to become real in DARPA execskeloton program
- Contracts
with
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University of California at Berkeley
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Oak Ridge National Labs
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SARCOS Research Corporation
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Milleninum Jet
- Monkey
Moves Cursor by Thoughts Alone
- CalTech
research project by Daniella Meeker
- Placed
sensitive electrodes in the posterior perietal cortex of a rhesus
monkey and trained it to play a simple video game.
- Used
MRI to placed sensors
- Trained
the monkey to think about moving arm and looked for signals
- Inmates
Help with Electronic Recyling
- Rebuild
or Recycle old computers
- Good
training and produces many computers to give away
- US
Penitentiary in Atwater, California
- Selected
Emails
- Duplicate
Palm Entries
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This is a common problem when using online synchronization on
a palm and a computer
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Take a look a UnDupe
to remove duplicate entries
- Improper
Program Deletion
- Just
delete the extra icons on the desktop and remove the entries
from the Start Menu. In most cases this will be just fine.
- However,
if you want to completely get rid of the application, use Norton
CleanSweep 2002 to eliminate orphan files and remove unneeded
registry entries
- Selecting
New Operating System for small office
- Use
Windows XP for the machines with speeds greater than 350Mhz.
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Stay with 98 for the slower machines.
- Make
certain to ask about the licensing programs. You can save real
money if you need five or more licenses.
- Stratford
News
- Next
Start: March 16th for all programs
- Campuses
at both Woodbridge and Falls Church
- Scholarship
Day is Saturday, March 9th Woodbridge 10 AM
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