On Monday, March 30, 2015, the United States Supreme Court issued a ruling that satellite-based monitoring of sex offenders is considered a search under the Fourth Amendment. The case, Torrey Dale Grady v. North Carolina, was brought by petitioner, Grady, who was convicted of two sexual offenses, one in 1997 and one in 2006. After …
Game development engines are some of the most sophisticated software products available today, so why are so many manufacturers beginning to offer them to users for free? It takes a lot of different people to build a virtual world, including illustrators, programmers, designers, writers, and a myriad of other roles, each of which is vital …
On March 24, 2015, the National Organic Program (NOP) released a policy memo clarifying the status of nanotechnology in organic production and handling under the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) organic regulations at 7 C.F.R. Part 205. Nanotechnology is science, engineering, and technology conducted at the nanoscale, which is about 1 to 100 nanometers. One nanometer equals about 3-10 …
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court heard Michigan v. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”). This case, an extension of previous cases regarding the Clean Air Act, is an additional challenge the Obama Administration’s ability to propagate regulations in an increasingly divisive political environment. This challenge falls less than one month after a challenge to the Obama Administration’s …
The security breaches that occurred last year at retailers like Home Depot, Target, and Michaels shocked consumers and experts alike. An astonishing number of consumers were affected by the breaches. Home Depot reported 56 million debit and credit card holders were affected, while Target reported 40 million credit card numbers and 70 million phone numbers …
In 2014, AT&T offered to purchase DirecTV for approximately $67 billion in total compensation – $48.5 billion in cash and stock, plus an assumption of DirecTV’s $18.6 billion in total debt. Click here. Some believe that this deal was predicated on AT&T’s desire to be able to stream DirecTV’s content to AT&T’s wireless customers. Click …
When Robin Thicke sang the words “I hate these blurred lines” he probably wasn’t talking about copyrights. Two weeks ago a jury awarded the family of Marvin Gaye almost $7.4 million dollars when it found that Thicke and co-writer Pharrell Williams copied elements from Gaye’s song “Got to Give It Up.” The jury found that …
Much has been made of the recent “academic scandal” at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. In which classes in the African studies department did not require weekly attendance and in some cases only a single paper was the basis for the student’s final grade. The notion that these classes never physically met was so …
The MIT Media Lab has just developed a new way to exhibit social media to the outside world. The lab’s Fluid Interfaces Group has created a “Social Textiles” T-shirt that alerts the wearer with a vibration in the collar when another person within a 12 foot range is also wearing this T-shirt. Once the two …
With an optimistic eye towards the coming spring, I thought it relevant to discuss one of springtime’s sweetest fruits: strawberries. Most Americans can enjoy the sweet, red berries year-round thanks to the advent of greenhouses. However, much more technology goes into producing the perfect strawberry than most consumers may realize. Unbeknownst to most strawberry lovers, …
