Sonalog GypsyMIDI Motion Capture MIDI Controller

The GypsyMIDI uses 12 rotational sensors (6 per arm) placed on body joints which plugs into a MIDI interface. Body movements send MIDI signals to sound modules and audio sequencing software such as Logic Audio, Cubase, Live and Reason, ProTools, MotionBuilder, Traktor DJ Studio. The sensors respond to various movements of the wrist, elbow, and shoulder. The mapping software, eXo-software, gives the user the ability to define how movements are translated to MIDI control. Pictures and videos of the device are available on the Sonalog site.

Belkin CableFree USB Hub

Belkin will offer a four-port USB hub offering high-speed wireless USB connectivity using Fresescale Semiconductor's Ultra-Wideband (UWB) technology during Spring 2006. The USB hub and dongle will retail at $129.99.

Seven Dead In CA Postal Shooting

A female ex-postal employee killed 6 people and injured 1 before committing suicide in a mail processing plant Monday night in Goleta, CA. This is the first deadly shooting at a postal installation in 8 years.

"The Impaler" Arrested

Vampyre gubernatorial candidate Jonathon "The Impaler" Sharkeyarrested Monday night on two felony counts from Indiana: one for escape, the other for stalking. The warrants were discovered when a dispatcher recognized Sharkey's pro wrestling name "Rocky Flash" was on one of the warrants.

Earlier: Satanist For MN Governor

Seventy Acres of Science: The NIH Moves to Bethesda

Michele Lyons, Curator of the DeWitt Stetten Jr., Museum of Medical Research, has created an E-book that details the history of the NIH Campus in Bethesda during the 1930s. The book contains information about the Luke Wilsons and their estate, the construction of the first six buildings, and the ceremony at which President Roosevelt dedicated the campus. An audio recording of the speech is available.

"The National Institute of Health speaks the universal language of humanitarianism. It has been devoted throughout its long and distinguished history to furthering the health of all mankind, in which service it has recognized no limitations imposed by international boundaries; has recognized no distinctions of race, of creed, or of color."

A Long Walk

A US appeals court ruled against EFF co-founder, John Gilmore, after suing Southwest and United Airlines for not allowing him to board their flights without showing identification. While the right to travel is protected, Judge Paez wrote, "The Constitution does not guarantee the right to travel by any particular form of transportation." Another similar incident occurred last year. Deborah Davis of Arvada, CO was taken off a Regional Transportation District bus, handcuffed and ticketed for refusing to show identification when federal officers boarded the bus and asking for ID.

Julian Beever's 3D Sidewalk Art

English chalk artist, Julian Beever is famous for his art on the pavements of England, France, Germany, Australia, and Belgium, which have 3D perspectives when viewed from the correct angle.

Im Divorcing U

A Malaysian Muslim senator, Datuk Kamaruddin Ambok, has been fined $195 by a sharia court for attempting to divorce his wife through an SMS text message and a voicemail message. Kamaruddin was in violation of Section 124 of the Islamic Family Law (Federal Territory) Act 1984, which states "any man who divorces his wife by pronouncement of talaq in any form outside the Court and without the permission of the Court commits an offence".

"Lazy Sunday" Re-cut by 5th Graders

From description: Two 11 year old boys use the MLK holiday off school to recreate their favorite "Lazy Sunday" video, they got dad to help edit it in Apple iMovie and add graphics in Apple FCP, Link

Bethesda Carjacking

A group of 4, possibly 5, African-American teenagers with at least 2 being female approached a 79-year-old woman from Bethesda around noon on Monday and stole her vehicle. The incident occurred at 10250 block of Westlake Drive in Bethesda. After asking for directions, they grabbed her car keys. The victim struggled and fell hitting her head and hip on the ground. The suspects stole her wallet and drove away in a 2000 Mitsubishi Mirage.

8-year-old Boy Shoots 7-year-old Girl

An 8-year-old boy shoots a 7-year old girl at the For Kids We Care center in Germantown, MD in Montgomery county. The boy was playing with the gun, which he brought in his backpack when it went off. The girl was shot in in the arm around 7 a.m. She was flown to the Children's Hospital in DC. There six other children in the day care at the time of the accident; no one else was hurt.

John Linwood Hall Sr., a maintenance worker at NIH, was charged with leaving a firearm in a location accessible by an unsupervised minor, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and possession of a firearm by a felon; he has criminal record dating to the 1960s. There were several weapons that were accessible to the boy. The boy knowingly brought the gun to the day care and charges will be filed against him.

The boy had been suspended previously for bring a weapon to school. Initially, the incident was reported as an accident, but the Washington Post reports that the boy threatened the girl and then fired the gun. The boy has made threatening statements in the past, including, "What the [expletive] can they do to a kid, anyway? I'll shoot 'em," and "Phase 1: Get weapons. Phase 2: Kill the hillbilly."

Survivor IRS

Richard Hatch, the "naked fat guy" who won a million dollars as the first winner of the CBS show Survivor, is on trial for failing to pay taxes on his million-dollar prize, charged in a 10-count indictment with tax evasion, filing false income tax returns, wire fraud, bank fraud and mail fraud. He faces up to 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine.

The Politics of Easter

The Family Pride Coalition, which supports equality for gay families, has plans for a large turnout during the annual Easter egg roll at the White House to earn goodwill. Conservative groups are preparing their response with suggestions of restricting attendance or outnumbering the gay families. Laura Bush has indicated admission is unlikely to be restricted.

Tony the Tiger Taken to Trial

The Center for Science in the Public Interest plans a lawsuit against Kellogg Co, and Viacom to stop them from marketing junk foods in venues where 15 percent or more of the audience is under 8. It also seeks to stop marketing junk foods through Web sites, toy giveaways, and contests aimed at that age group.

FYI: Thurl Ravenscroft, the voice of Tony the Tiger, died last year at the age of 91.

William Summerlin

William Summerlin worked at the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research in New York.He claimed that he could transplant tissue from unrelated animals by keeping the tissue in culture for four to six weeks. He used white mice with patches of black fur which he had colored with a black permanent marker.

In 1974, Summerlin was discovered when he made a presentation to immunologist Robert Good; lab assistants noticed that the patches had been drawn on the mice and could be removed using alcohol. Eventually, the forgery was attributed to a mental health problem.

DC "Meterpops"

Mark Jenkins is an artist from the DC area who has turned parking meters into lollipops. Mark is known for sculptures of people made out of tape.

When Scientists Go Bad

In 2005, the Office of Research Integrity received 265 allegations of scientific misconduct. Journal editors have stated that there is little that can be done practically to intercept the misconduct by scientists. The scientists that attempt to fabricate or falsify results usually do not make sophisticated attempts to cover up evidence and tend to falsify portions of emails or use photo-manipulation software to change the appearance of images.

Even Gregor Mendel is thought to have altered the results of his pea experiments. One of the most barefaced deceptions happened in the 1970s when William Summerlin used a black permanent marker on white mice to give the appearance that skin transplants from black mice had been successful.

Choose Your Poison (HIV/WNV)

Individuals lacking the cell surface protein CCR5 are resistant to be infected with HIV but may be at a higher risk of developing West Nile virus. This finding was reported by Dr. Philip M. Murphy, M.D. from NIH in The Journal of Experimental Medicine. CCR5 encourages the movement of immune cells in mice to the brain, thereby protecting the mice from brain inflammation caused by West Nile virus. This has implications for HIV-positive individuals taking experimental CCR5-blockers and are exposed to mosquito bites.

Satanist For MN Governor

Johnathon "The Impaler" Sharkey Ph.D., L.D.D.D. has started his campaign for Governor of Minnesota. Jonathon is a Satanic Dark Priest, Sanguinarian Vampyre and a Hecate Witch, who supports education and farmers and currently, resides in New Jersey. He also wants terrorists, rapists and drug dealers to be impaled at the state capitol building. As for political connections, during the 2002 Florida State Republican Convention he was photographed with Jeb Bush at the Disney World Convention Center.

His wife, Julie Carpenter, was fired from her job as a school bus driver and her neighbors are requesting her eviction because of her religious beliefs. Julie has had a flawless record driving busses for the past five years. She recently posted to a Metafilter thread about the situation.

• Johnathon's MySpace profile
• Intervyew with the Vampyre

An End To The Lavish Trips?

House Speaker Dennis Hastert R-IL is seeking an overhaul of lobbying ethics rules after the Abramoff scandal. Rep. David Dreier, R-CA, who is leading the effort, said one of the proposed changes is a total ban on privately funded congressional trips. Dreier also stated he wanted to deal with lawmakers who become lobbyists after leaving office.

Deeply Disturbed But Sane

Armin Meiwes, 44 killed then ate his willing victim whom he met on the internet. At one point Meiwes severed his victim's penis and they both tried to eat it. Meiwes later killed the man and froze the body, eating 20 kg (44 lb) over the several months.

Create an ISO in Windows XP

ISO Recorder by Alex Feinman is a Windows power toy for Windows XP, 2003 and Vista that allows the creation of a images from CDs from an existing CD, as well as any from the contents of any folder. Instructions for the program are located here. He has also created a command-line CD buring tool called CreateCD.

That Whistle Isn't For You

Jonathan Fishbein, a medical safety officer with the Division of AIDS at NIH, was reininstated after raising allegations of safety problems with federal AIDS research in the US and Africa, sexual harassment of female NIH workers, and the use of foster children to test AIDS drugs. He returned to his position on Dec. 12, 2005 six months after being fired and a two-year battle which prompted congressional and federal investigations. Fishbein was fired for "poor performance" even though he had been recommend for a cash performance bonus weeks before he was terminated.

On June 30, 2005, Sens. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) and Max Baucus (D-Montana) wrote to NIH Director Elias Zerhouni:

Retaliation against an employee for reporting misconduct or voicing concerns is unacceptable, illegal, and violates the Whistleblower Protection Act. Moreover, it would have a chilling effect on other NIH employees who might make truthful but critical comments about NIH.

Originally, an administrative law judge ruled that Fishbein had no whistleblower protections because he was hired outside the civil service system as special employees; the government subsequently argued that such workers should have some protection if they blow the whistle.

Change in State College Status for MGC

On October 5, 2005, Middle Georgia College submitted an application to the Board of Regents to be able to offer selected baccalaureate degrees. MGC has requested permission to offer a bachelor of science degree in aviation management with tracks in professional flight management, airport management, air traffic management and logistics. It has also requested the approval to offer a bachelor of applied science degree in flight management for graduates of aviation technical colleges. In addition to the aviation programs, MGC also requested the approval to offer a bachelor of science degree in education with a major in early childhood and bachelor of science degree in nursing.

Fla. Vouchers Unconstitutional

The Florida Supreme Court has ruled the statewide education voucher system unconstitutional due to violations of the Establishment Clause. We make no distinction between a small violation of the Constitution and a large one. Both are equally invalid. (PDF)

Hamachi Quick HOWTO

Hamachi is a zero-configuration virtual networking application with the ability create a secure network between computers regardless of firewalls or address translation devices (i.e. routers used for broadband connections). It has a simple and effective interface and can be used to create file sharing networks and/or gaming networks. A self-created network has a limit of 16 connections.

Downloading

Both the Windows and Linux clients are available on the Hamachi site. The latest Linux client can be found here. The Mac OS X client is available on site's forums.

Installation

The Windows installation is basic without any complications. Hamachi can also be run as a service in Windows. The Linux installation takes a more work, but still simple. A more detailed description is provided in the forums.

You'll need to have root privileges for installation:

tar xvfz hamachi-VERSION.tar.gz

sudo su

make install
tuncfg
hamachi-init
hamachi start
hamachi login

tuncfg is an additional program that is distributed with Hamachi, which depends on the tun kernel module being installed. To determine if the module is already installed

modprobe tun

If modprobe finds the module, it will not display a message, otherwise it will display modprobe: Can't locate module tun. For instructions on installing the module follow the instructions provided in the forums.

Hamachi comes with a "Magic Option" to force a connection through a specific port. In Windows, the option is located in Preferences -> System -> Troubleshooting. In Linux, for that option the following line in ~/.hamachi/config needs to be included (it may be necessary to create the file).

UdpPort <port>

If you are using iptables, add the following rule in /etc/sysconfig/iptables (Fedora):

-A RH-Firewall-1-INPUT -p udp --dport <port> -j ACCEPT

Now you'll either need to create a network or join a pre-existing one (these are included in the README):

hamachi create 

or

hamachi join 

Seeing Other Users

To go online

hamachi go-online

To get the nicknames of the other users use

hamachi get-nicks

In Windows this is done by right-clicking and Set Label -> Default.

Sharing Files

In Windows, you can browse stuff by right-clicking a name and share stuff by right-clicking a folder in Windows, clicking the Sharing tab, then click on Share this folder and OK.

In Linux, you can share files using Samba and it will run the following commands:

iptables -t nat -o ham0 -j MASQUERADE
service iptables save

To browse files in Linux you can mount a computer's shares using smbclient:

smbmount //servername/sharename /mountdirectory -o username=username,password=password

Mooning: Disgusting, But Legal

A circuit court in Maryland ruled that mooning is an appropriate form of expression after a Raymond McNealy mooned Nanette Vonfeldt and her daughter. "If exposure of half of the buttock constituted indecent exposure, any woman wearing a thong at the beach at Ocean City would be guilty," said Judge John W. Debelius III.