news
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New York Wants To Kill All Of Its Invasive Swans
Swans: elegant symbols of romantic love or terrorisers of plants, small children, and aeroplanes? The non-native mute swan has been wreaking enough havoc in New York City that the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation wants to declare it a “prohibited invasive species.” By 2025, under the proposed plan, there will be virtually no more wild…
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New York City Is Using Data Mining To Fight Fires
Helmets? Check. Breathing tanks? Check. Hoses? Ditto. Algorithms? Yep: the New York City Fire Department is using data mining to predict which of the city’s buildings are at highest risk of catching fire. Now that’s metadata we can get behind.
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Rating Obama’s NSA Reform Plan: EFF Scorecard Explained
Yesterday, US president Obama announced a series of reforms to address abuses by the National Security Agency. We were heartened to see Obama recognised that the NSA has gone too far in trampling the privacy rights of people worldwide. In his speech, the President ensured that National Security Letters would not come with perpetual gag…
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Gorilla Glass Will Be Coming Soon To A Curved Phone Near You
Gorilla Glass, Corning’s enormously sturdy scratch and crack-resistant touchscreen glass, is pretty impressive, found on billions of devices worldwide. Now, the glass maker has announced a novel manufacturing technique to make 3D shapes out of Gorilla Glass.