Hasta La Gadget!

Ah, throttling. Can’t ever seem to fully shake it, can we? Just weeks after hearing about a similar issue with the Epic 4G, scores of Clear at-home WiMAX users are now up in arms over apparent throttling on certain accounts. As the story goes, it seems as if the company is pulling back on upload and download speeds (from 10Mbps to around 0.25Mbps) for users who have consumed between 7GB and 10GB in a month, which is comically low even compared to Comcast’s hated 250GB / month usage cap. Forum users are finding customer service lines to be no help whatsoever, and some digging has found that this may all be a part of a network traffic administration program that’s ongoing within Clearwire. Have any of you seen similar issues? How much data are you sucking down per month? Does your usage clock still show up in your account profile? Let us know in comments below.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

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Thought film was dead? Far from it. In an interview with the British Journal of Photography, Kodak’s US marketing manager of pro film Scott DiSabato said that sales of color film are steady, and that black and white is “doing extremely well.” He sees it as a mini-revolution, adding that “it almost feels that there is a very real resurgence for film.”

And this strong market is letting Kodak release brand new emulsions. The updated Portra 400, which will be available in November, is described by DiSabato as “the best film Kodak has ever made.” Given Kodak’s history, that’s quite a claim. And that’s not even the biggest surprise. Portra 400 is not made for printing. It is designed to be scanned.

The new emulsion has very fine grain (using Kodak’s T-grain technology first seen in the 1980s) and has had its color saturation and contrast tweaked to better suit scanners. DiSabato and the Kodak techs realized that most film is scanned at some stage in a photographer’s workflow, so they made it scanner friendly. Contrast was lowered to better allow the scan to capture the full range of tones, and the color gamut “is not pumped up so much that it begins to compete with some of that tonal information.”

The stills team worked with the Kodak motion-picture team and borrowed some of this technology from the Vision3 line of films, also designed to be part of a digital workflow.

Kodak is also making small-batch films, in collaboration with Canham Cameras. Canham specializes in very large-format film – 11×14, 20×24 and “other goofy sizes.” Canham takes orders from all over the world until they have enough to make it economical for Kodak to tool up and manufacture it. Amazingly, Kodak is actually “moving in this direction,” say DiSabato.

Like vinyl before it, the death of film seems to have been greatly exaggerated. Hell, even the kids are getting into it. “Once they do get a hold of film in a university,” DiSabato says, “they just seem to fall in love with it.”

Kodak Portra 400 product page [Kodak]

Kodak:There is a very real resurgence for film [BJP]

See Also:

• Mama, They Took My Kodachrome Away
• Kodak Claims Film Sales Growing
• Polaroid Ends Instant Film Production

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A new joint-commissioned report from DARPA, the CIA, and Homeland Security has concluded that the current state of biometrics–the technology that can identify individuals based on unique characteristics such as fingerprints, retinal and voice patters, or facial features–is “inherently fallible.”

The report argues that the technology may be used for certain small-scale tasks, however it will cause major problems if utilized in a wide-scale framework.

There are two main problems, the report argues, with the current state of biometrics. One, the systems rely on probabilistic results, they inherently rely on a certain degree of uncertainty. And also the technology assumes that the parameters it uses are static. Humans are mushy bags of tissue and organic material–our bodies change over time due to injury, disease, age, or any number of variables. This can lead to false-negatives or the inability to create an ID at all.

Security-minded folks have invested much time and effort into biometrics
over the past decade. This has largely been in reaction to a post 9-11 world, but more accurately, it is a reaction to increased access to affordable international travel. Advances in transportation have transformed
humans into a truly borderless species. There are many advantages to
breaking down barriers, both physical and otherwise. Unfortunately, it hasn’t all been kumbaya. As technology has evolved us physically, we haven’t
completely evolved sociologically to accommodate our new powers of
distance-bridging–we are still prone to tribal instincts and conflict
and we’re still, as a species, inherently prone to corruption. That’s
why those who seek to maintain order would love to harness the power to
identify an individual beyond the shadow of a doubt. Biometrics are
already being utilized by coalition and local security forces in Iraq
and Afghanistan and, more recently, have been implemented by the Indian government
in a nation-wide bid to ID its citizenry.

Privacy advocates will be disheartened to hear that this probably doesn’t mark the end of biometric technology. It does mean that the human power behind the technology will have to be trained to deal with the inconsistencies and the technology will be forced to innovate beyond where it is now.

via POPSCI

When I attended Star Wars Celebration earlier this year, Star Wars series creator George Lucas sat down with TV’s Jon Stewart and promised a full Blu-ray disc set of the entire six-film series next year. Brilliant idea, George. Now, Lucas, who loves new technology and had to use the best available at his own Industrial Light and Magic special effects house to enhance the original three films and make cold, impersonal messes of the last three, is now ready to enter the next digital dimension. 3D.

That’s right director, writer, entrepreneur, one-time Star Wars cameo actor George Lucas wants to rerelease the entire saga in three dimensions, starting in 2012. According to a report in The Hollywood Reporter Lucas was, apparently, only waiting for enough 3D movie screens before he pulled the trigger on adding three dimensions to all six films.

Lucas will start with the newer films and while some Star Wars critics think at least Revenge of the Sith was watchable, 3D could actually help the flat, emotionless Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. On the other hand, films that have been converted to 3D after the fact, like Clash of the Titans, typically do not fare well in visual quality or at the box office. Lucas’ reported plan could turn the classic A New Hope, Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi into muddy messes.

Obviously Lucas is also thinking of revenue (studios usually charge a premium for 3D movie viewing) and of the 3D home viewing market. Early 3D TV shipments sold out and major manufacturers are still bringing new models to market. By the time Star Wars 3D makes it in and out of theaters, we may even see 3D TV’s that do not need special glasses. Perhaps in-home viewing will make the Star Wars 3D experience less painful. As a fan, I somehow doubt it.

Thanks a bunch Avatar.

In conjunction with the Air Force, nanotech researchers at the University of Michigan have created a new super-efficient ultra-thin display technology. The new “plasmonic” technology is far more versatile than any currently available display technology and will allow for the projection of high quality images and video the size of a stamp.

The Air Force is interested in utilizing the tech to project virtual displays onto pilots’ windshields. For us civilians, the tech could also be incorporated into clothing to create wearable computer screens–your shirt could be your smart phone. It will also allow for very tiny displays. If people are still sending letters in 10 years, it may be possible that the post office could create a commemorative stamp for the 10-year anniversary of Avatar that will actually show Avatar.

And the displays will be very high quality. The tech uses pixels 10 times smaller than those of your average
desktop and more than eight times smaller than displays currently
available on most smart phones.

What makes the tech so versatile is its efficient use of light. The new technology quite handy at trapping and transmitting light–they make the current technology seem sloppy. For
example, in current LCD displays, only about five percent of the
backlighting makes it through to the viewer. The rest is lost in the process.

The nerdly whats and hows are a little
complicated, but for those who are interested, the deets are available over at Physorg.