APM: Garrison Keillor's The Writer's Almanac
Each day, The Writer's Almanac features Garrison Keillor recounting the highlights of this day in history and reads a short poem or two. The Writer's Almanac is produced by Prairie Home Productions and presented by American Public Media.
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Why the Internet will NOT tear apart colleges
Yesterday we heard from Fordham University Law associate professor Zephyr Teachout, who predicted that the Internet would cause the next generation to turn away from college campuses in favor of online education. Today we have a rebuttal from John Sener, an online learning consultant and director …
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Do we have the will and talent to fight future cyber threats?
Part 2 of our interview with Massoud Amin of the University of Minnesota
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Will Internet make college campuses obsolete?
Colleges, like newspapers, will be torn apart by the Internet, according to Zephyr Teachout, assistant professor of law at Fordham University.
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Future threats against our information infrastructure
The worry over coordinated cyber attacks against U.S. computer systems from foreign enemies or terrorists has been larger than any damage that's occurred so far, perhaps, but the bad guys are getting better and threats are growing, according to Massoud Amin, who heads a new Master's program in secur …
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The failure of anonymized data
One of our key protections against privacy invasion, the stripping of personally identifiable information from databases, is not working, according to Paul Ohm of the University of Colorado School of Law.
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The cyberchondriac problem
Many Americans mistakenly conclude they have a rare illness after attempting self-diagnosis on the Internet, according to a recent study by researchers are Microsoft. The company conducted the study to improve its own search engine. Microsoft studied health-related Web searches on popular search e …
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Online TV ascendant
A survey by the nonprofit Conference Board shows that nearly a quarter of households in the U.S. now watch television programs on the Internet.
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Making computer music more expressive
Scientists at the University of Rochester are working on a different kind of encoding that promises to make sound files 1,000 times smaller than MP3s. The new method is not a recording technology. Instead, it recreates music in a computer based on what it knows about the real-world physics of an in …
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Oxford dictionary studies Twitter
The average sentence length of a Twitter message is 1.40 sentences. Gerunds are more popular on Twitter than off. The second most popular word on Twitter is "I." These are a few of the things the Oxford English Dictionary has learned by studying millions of Twitter messages. Guest: Jesse Sheidlowe …
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Apple fans gear up for new goodies
New iPods? Tablet computer? Steve Jobs? Apple fans wait to see what they will get at an invitation-only event next week in San Francisco. Guest: Donald Bell, CNET
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Does the Singularity make sense?
Part 2 of our interview with Patrick Tucker, The Futurist magazine
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Is Craigslist an important company, or just an unusual one?
Part 2 of our conversation with Gary Wolf of Wired
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The Singularity explained
Exponential advances in computing power and biological science will result in the merging of humans and machines in this century, according to renowned inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil. This theoretical point in time when computers gain a kind of super intelligence, and we humans incorporate rema …
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Why is Craigslist so weird?
Iconic Internet company Craigslist is a strange beast: The founder of the simple, text-based online classified site spends a great deal of his time as a customer service rep reading ad submissions and responding to complaints; the company refuses to adopt new features that most users expect from oth …
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Attacks on social networks increasing
The semi-annual Web Hacking Incidents Database report finds an increasing number of malicious attacks targeting users of Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and other social networks.
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Sony's Kindle killer?
Sony has unveiled a new electronic reading device designed to compete with the Amazon Kindle. The Reader Daily Edition is the first Sony e-reader to sport a wireless connection for downloading books. It will go for about $400 when it hits the market in December. Guest: John Falcone, CNET
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Snow Leopard to appear this week
The latest version of Apple's operating system - Mac OS X version 10.6 - is arriving at retail stores this Friday, a week earlier than expected. In the tradition of naming operating system updates after big cats, 10.6 is called Snow Leopard. Guest: Dwight Silverman
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USDA: Rural broadband fuels economic growth
A new report from the United States Department of Agriculture says broadband Internet leads to more and higher-paying jobs in rural areas. Guest: Matthew Lasar, Ars Technica
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U.S. teens nearly on par with adults in cell phone use
New data from the Pew Internet and American Life Project finds young people aged 12 to 17 have adopted cell phones at nearly the same rate as adults. The small gap that exists now was much larger five years ago, according to Pew's Amanda Lenhart.
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Should British government apologize to Alan Turing?
A recognized genius in mathematics, cryptography, and computer science, Alan Turing cracked German naval code in World War II, and is thought to be the father of modern computer science. Despite his achievements he was treated poorly in his home country of Great Britain, which prosecuted him for ho …
APM: Garrison Keillor's The Writer's Al..
