An annual report from the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA) presents a mixed bag of findings on computer use and availability among U.K. schools. According to the agency, the number of computers in schools has increased. Moreover, schools are making “notable accelerated progress” in how they use computers, despite ongoing questions about the [...]

Emery now has a new Second cousin. Seth Malcolm was born last Friday. I’m sure his bothers Chase and Grant are all excited. As you can tell dad is hoping they play hockey… FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Seth Malcolm Acquired as Third Round Draft Pick Friday, April 21 2006 Vancouver , B.C. – General Manager Kari [...]

Suffolk County, in New York, is considering installing a free wireless network that would fully cover the county’s 900 square miles, offering Internet access to 1.5 million residents. If built, the network would be one of the largest in the nation, though officials in Chicago are considering an even larger network, 940 square miles, that [...]

Duke University’s iPod program continues to evolve since its introduction in 2004, when all incoming freshmen were given iPods. The Duke Digital Initiative was started to investigate the pedagogical uses for the devices and, despite skepticism from some corners, has proven successful. In the second year of the program, instead of giving every freshman an [...]

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) have sent letters to presidents of 40 universities in 25 states asking that they investigate possible illegal file trading on campus local area networks (LANs). The letters suggest that many students might think that trading copyrighted files across LANs is [...]

Speaking at an Internet2 conference, Douglas Van Houweling, president of the organization, gave some details about the backbone network that will replace Abilene, Internet2′s current high-speed backbone, in about 18 months. The new network, currently being called “Newnet,” will initially offer roughly 10 times the bandwidth now provided by Abilene. Each institution connected would have [...]

According to a study conducted by IBM and “The Economist” magazine, although the digital divide remains considerable for some countries, the gaps are shrinking. The study assessed both availability and use of technology in 68 countries and assigned each an “e-readiness” score on a scale of 1 to 10. The gap from the top of [...]

Speaking at an Internet2 conference, Douglas Van Houweling, president of the organization, gave some details about the backbone network that will replace Abilene, Internet2′s current high-speed backbone, in about 18 months. The new network, currently being called “Newnet,” will initially offer roughly 10 times the bandwidth now provided by Abilene. Each institution connected would have [...]

The House Energy and Commerce Committee has killed an amendment designed to guarantee net neutrality. The amendment would have prevented Internet service providers from delivering different content at different speeds based on content providers’ having paid extra fees. Supporters of the amendment, including Microsoft, Amazon, and Google, argued that the Internet was built on ideas [...]

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded the University of Massachusetts at Amherst $16 million to fund nanotechnology research, beating out a number of higher-profile institutions for the prestigious grant. UMass already has more than 50 faculty working in the field of nanotechnology, and the university has drawn $54 million in funding for nanotechnology research [...]