Military grooms new officers for war in cyberspace
Once viewed as an obscure and even nerdy pursuit, cyber is now seen as one of the hottest fields in warfare — “a great career field in the future,” said Ryan Zacher, a junior at the Air Force Academy outside Colorado Springs, Colo., who switched from aeronautical engineering to computer science.
Last year the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., began requiring freshmen to take a semester on cybersecurity, and it is adding a second required cyber course for juniors next year.
The school offered a major in cyber operations for the first time this year to the freshman class, and 33 midshipmen, or about 3 percent of the freshmen, signed up for it. Another 79 are majoring in computer engineering, information technology or computer science, bringing majors with a computer emphasis to about 10 percent of the class.
“There’s a great deal of interest, much more than we could possibly, initially, entertain,” said the academy’s superintendent, Vice Adm. Michael Miller.
» via Yahoo! News
CHI 2013: Microsoft IllumiRoom Full Demo
“Our vision for a fully developed IllumiRoom system includes an ultra-wide field of view device sitting on the user’s coffee table, projecting over a large area surrounding the television,” Microsoft Research said in a CHI 2013 document.
“The device would be connected wirelessly to a next generation gaming console as a secondary display. The ultra-wide field of view could be obtained with an ultra-short throw projector, or by coupling a standard projector with a spherical/parabolic mirror. The room geometry could be acquired with a depth sensor or a structured light scan.”
[read more @microsoft] [paper] [via nerdcore]
This is causing universities to rethink their value to students,” says Professor Koller, who is from Stanford University’s computer science department. The most prestigious universities are always going to have enough demand for places - but the emergence of high-quality online courses could be tougher for middle-ranking institutions. Why would you pay high fees to sit through a mediocre lecture, when you could go online and watch world experts at another university, even if it’s in another country? “The universities in the middle will really have to think about their proposition,” she says.
Are Student Loans the Next Debt Crisis?
This isn’t a new problem – student debt has ballooned more than 500 percent since 1999. And while the loan default rate was much higher in the early 1990s, the number’s been trending back up since 2005 – suggesting what the NACBA is calling a potential “debt bomb.” Their survey says almost half of bankruptcy attorneys have seen “significant increases” in potential clients. In fact, 2 in 10 have seen their caseload jump more than 50 percent, and another 4 in 10 have a 25 to 50 percent larger caseload.
So the NACBA is now calling for the government to allow student loans – both private and federal – to be cancelled in bankruptcy, as they were prior to 1976.
Even if that were to happen, it’s still far from ideal for both the taxpayer and the graduate. Most bad marks on your credit report stay there for up to seven years. Bankruptcy sticks around for as many as 10 and can knock up to 240 points off your credit score, making it difficult to get credit and possibly even employment.
» via Mint
The Future of Money (by theRSAorg) where Dave Birch argues that the mobile phone and community based currencies are the future of money.
(via emergentfutures)
“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever.” - George Orwell
(via deus--ex-machina)
The Debt Crisis at American Colleges
How do colleges manage it? Kenyon has erected a $70 million sports palace featuring a 20-lane olympic pool. Stanford’s professors now get paid sabbaticals every fourth year, handing them $115,000 for not teaching. Vanderbilt pays its president $2.4 million. Alumni gifts and endowment earnings help with the costs. But a major source is tuition payments, which at private schools are breaking the $40,000 barrier, more than many families earn. Sadly, there’s more to the story. Most students have to take out loans to remit what colleges demand. At colleges lacking rich endowments, budgeting is based on turning a generation of young people into debtors.
As this semester begins, college loans are nearing the $1 trillion mark, more than what all households owe on their credit cards. Fully two-thirds of our undergraduates have gone into debt, many from middle class families, who in the past paid for much of college from savings. The College Board likes to say that the average debt is “only” $27,650. What the Board doesn’t say is that when personal circumstances go wrong, as can happen in a recession, interest, late payment penalties, and other charges can bring the tab up to $100,000. Those going on to graduate school, as upwards of half will, can end up facing twice that.
» via The Atlantic
(via sahrawi)
Future of Alternate Currencies and Transactions
Uploaded by heathervescent on Jul 10, 2011
Presentation at the World Future Society on the Future of Alternate Currencies and transactions. Slides: http://slidesha.re/qzig14
