In the light of a seemingly endless series of revelations about the NSA's multi-faceted infiltrations of just about every network there is, including the private fiber used by Google and Yahoo, more and more folks are stepping up to offer possible solutions.
But because both the Internet and encryption aren't as singular or straightforward as they could be, it isn't likely to be something that can be delivered as a single product anytime soon.
The most common analogy used about email security is that it's no better than a postcard written in pencil and sent via conventional mail. To do something about it, two big names in security, Lavabit and Silent Circle, are joining forces to create a project they call the Dark Mail Alliance.
Silent Circle, a provider of both encrypted email and phone solutions, and Lavabit, a secure email provider, both made headlines earlier this year when they voluntarily shut down their email services in the wake of Edward Snowden's leaks about NSA actions against ISPs, rather than be a party to such spying. Their plan is to help create a new email system that is as resistant as technologically possible to spying.
The idea isn't to offer a product per se, but rather to create an open standard that could be freely implemented by themselves or by third parties. "1,000 Lavabits all around the world," was how Jon Callas, CTO and founder of Silent Circle, described it in a discussion with Infoworld.
This decentralized plan is both the best and worst thing about the project: Best in the sense that no one person has explicit control over it, but worst in the sense that it's also not possible to guarantee how consistently it can be delivered if it's an open project.
The technical details of Dark Mail involve taking existing email clients -- Outlook and Exchange were cited as possible targets -- and outfitting them with add-ons that would use the XMPP Web messaging protocol in conjunction with another encryption protocol developed by Silent Circle, named, appropriately enough, SCIMP, or Silent Circle Instant Message Protocol. Encryption keys are held on the end user's system and not managed by the email providers themselves, so a court order against the ISP will yield nothing. Both the message's contents and metadata (e.g., to/from headers) are encrypted.
The thing is, the technical details of encrypted email aren't themselves the real obstacle. The difficulties tend to be social -- that is, getting people to use the existing standards and projects in the first place. Many existing packages, such as Enigmail, already allow you to equip email clients with encryption without too much difficulty. But few non-technical users bother with them, in big part because in order to send someone else an encrypted message, they have to be running the same software. The lack of a common implementation, as common as a web browser, is a big stumbling block, but end user indifference is ultimately the biggest reason why most email isn't encrypted.
The other issue is something Silent Circle and Lavabit are at least attempting to tackle: Participation from common email providers. If Gmail supported the Dark Mail standard, for instance, that would provide a great many existing email users with a near-seamless way to make use of it, but so far, no third-party mail providers have piped up. That might well be a defensive measure: If they announced early on they were working on such a thing, it would give attackers all the more time to try and plan a way to subvert it.
The Snowden papers have also showed how even those who do take the pains to encrypt can have their privacy subverted by attackers who simply perform an end-run around the encryption and intercept information either before or after it's ever encrypted. Unfortunately, the only way to prevent such a thing is via such extreme measures as an air-gapped system.
So what can we expect from Dark Mail? If it's ever implemented as its creators intend, it ought to serve two functions: Give end users a way to casually encrypt email without going through a whole hassle, and make them that much more conscious of how, on the current Internet, there may not be any safe places at all.
She’s always a welcome sight to behold, and last night (October 30) Lindsay Ellingson was scorching hot at the 4th Annual UNICEF Masquerade Ball in New York City.
The 28-year-old SoCal cutie donned a flirty mask and worked the arrivals area at The Angel Orensanz Foundation in a shimmery navy gown with a gold underlay and long train prior to the festivities.
Lindsay has been preparing for the forthcoming Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show since September, and unlike other Angels, she’s not worried about being skinny.
She told press, "I like to add curves. I think it's sexier and more feminine to be more full. So, I add like almond butter, peanut butter, protein shakes to my diet, just to feel a little sexier and curvier. I also step up my workouts. But I try not to stress about it because that's never good."
WASHINGTON (AP) — Government safety rules are changing to let airline passengers use most electronic devices from gate-to-gate.
The change will let passengers read, work, play games, watch movies and listen to music — but not make cellphone calls.
The Federal Aviation Administration says airlines can allow passengers to use the devices during takeoffs and landings on planes that meet certain criteria for protecting aircraft systems from electronic interference.
Most new airliners are expected to meet the criteria, but changes won't happen immediately. Timing will depend upon the airline.
Connections to the Internet to surf, exchange emails, text or download data will still be prohibited below 10,000 feet. Heavier devices like laptops will have to be stowed. Passengers will be told to switch their smartphones, tablets and other devices to airplane mode.
Cellphone calls will still be prohibited.
A travel industry group welcomed the changes, calling them common-sense accommodations for a traveling public now bristling with technology. "We're pleased the FAA recognizes that an enjoyable passenger experience is not incompatible with safety and security," said Roger Dow, CEO of the U.S. Travel Association.
Supreme Court's Obamacare decision established new limits on federal authority, IU paper says
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: George Vlahakis vlahakis@iu.edu 812-855-0846 Indiana University
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- A new paper by an Indiana University professor sheds new light on the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection of legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act, which many critics said threatens state sovereignty and individual liberties.
The paper comes at a time when problems with the act's implementation, particularly the creation of state health care exchanges, highlight the limits of federal capabilities and the importance of state cooperation in the success of domestic government programs.
In an article in Business Horizons, a journal published by IU's Kelley School of Business, Tim Lemper argues that the court's decision in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius actually established new limits on the power of the federal government.
"The court was heavily criticized for betraying the principles of federalism and limited government in the U.S. Constitution," Lemper said. "In reality, the court's decision placed groundbreaking limits on Congress' power to regulate commerce and use federal funds to pressure states into doing its bidding.
"These aspects of the court's decision received less attention in the popular media but may actually prove to have a more significant impact on the scope of federal power in the future," said Lemper, a clinical professor of business law at Kelley.
In his research, Lemper often takes a more critical approach to overlooked details in legislation and jurisprudence. Earlier research brought to light a drafting error in the federal trademark dilution statute, which led Congress to amend the law last fall.
In his paper, "The Supreme Struggle: 'Obamacare' and the New Limits on Federal Regulation," Lemper bases his arguments on two points raised in the court's opinion: new limits on Congress' power to regulate interstate commerce and to coerce states with the threat of losing federal funding.
In his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts explained that the limits on Congress' power in the Constitution, and the reservation of powers to the states, were intended to protect individual liberty.
Details overlooked in media reports about the decision include what Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in dissent, called "a novel constraint" on Congress' power to regulate interstate commerce, a sweeping and seemingly unlimited power that has been used to uphold a broad range of federal regulations on activity far beyond traditional commercial transactions, Lemper said.
"Set in historical context, the court's decision is significant because it establishes a new limit on Congress' expansive power under the Commerce Clause," he wrote. "Five of the nine justices concluded that the Commerce Clause gives Congress the power to regulate existing commercial activity, but does not allow Congress to compel individuals to become active in commerce.
"In other words, Congress can regulate activity under the Commerce Clause, but it cannot regulate inactivity."
Applying this rationale to the Affordable Care Act, the majority on the court concluded that the individual mandate (requiring individuals to buy health insurance or pay a tax penalty) exceeded Congress' power to regulate commerce because it compelled people to engage in commerce by buying health insurance.
"That the court still upheld the individual mandate as a valid exercise of Congress' more limited power to lay and collect taxes does not diminish the significance of the limit that it placed on Congress' more expansive power to regulate interstate commerce," Lemper said. "Congress' power to lay and collect taxes is more limited and less coercive than its power to regulate interstate commerce, which -- before this decision -- increasingly appeared to have no limit."
"The court's decision precludes Congress from venturing into new regulatory territory under the guise of regulating commerce," he said. "At the very least, it forecloses future governmental regulation that uses a person's inaction as a basis to compel them to act."
Lemper said the court's decision also broke new ground in restricting Congress' power under the Spending Clause. Seven of the justices -- "a majority of rare size for this court" -- held that the Affordable Care Act wrongly coerced states into accepting the Medicare expansion by threatening them with the loss of all Medicare funding (a significant portion of states' budgets) if they refused to do so.
"The court's decision is remarkable because it is the first time that the court has ever struck down a federal law under the Spending Clause on the ground that it runs counter to the system of federalism in the Constitution," he added. "For decades, the court has recognized the possibility that the federalism principles could limit Congress' power under the Spending Clause, but it had never actually done so until its decision on the Affordable Care Act.
"Its landmark holding gives real teeth to limits on Congress' power that had previously only existed in theory."
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Supreme Court's Obamacare decision established new limits on federal authority, IU paper says
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: George Vlahakis vlahakis@iu.edu 812-855-0846 Indiana University
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- A new paper by an Indiana University professor sheds new light on the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection of legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act, which many critics said threatens state sovereignty and individual liberties.
The paper comes at a time when problems with the act's implementation, particularly the creation of state health care exchanges, highlight the limits of federal capabilities and the importance of state cooperation in the success of domestic government programs.
In an article in Business Horizons, a journal published by IU's Kelley School of Business, Tim Lemper argues that the court's decision in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius actually established new limits on the power of the federal government.
"The court was heavily criticized for betraying the principles of federalism and limited government in the U.S. Constitution," Lemper said. "In reality, the court's decision placed groundbreaking limits on Congress' power to regulate commerce and use federal funds to pressure states into doing its bidding.
"These aspects of the court's decision received less attention in the popular media but may actually prove to have a more significant impact on the scope of federal power in the future," said Lemper, a clinical professor of business law at Kelley.
In his research, Lemper often takes a more critical approach to overlooked details in legislation and jurisprudence. Earlier research brought to light a drafting error in the federal trademark dilution statute, which led Congress to amend the law last fall.
In his paper, "The Supreme Struggle: 'Obamacare' and the New Limits on Federal Regulation," Lemper bases his arguments on two points raised in the court's opinion: new limits on Congress' power to regulate interstate commerce and to coerce states with the threat of losing federal funding.
In his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts explained that the limits on Congress' power in the Constitution, and the reservation of powers to the states, were intended to protect individual liberty.
Details overlooked in media reports about the decision include what Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, in dissent, called "a novel constraint" on Congress' power to regulate interstate commerce, a sweeping and seemingly unlimited power that has been used to uphold a broad range of federal regulations on activity far beyond traditional commercial transactions, Lemper said.
"Set in historical context, the court's decision is significant because it establishes a new limit on Congress' expansive power under the Commerce Clause," he wrote. "Five of the nine justices concluded that the Commerce Clause gives Congress the power to regulate existing commercial activity, but does not allow Congress to compel individuals to become active in commerce.
"In other words, Congress can regulate activity under the Commerce Clause, but it cannot regulate inactivity."
Applying this rationale to the Affordable Care Act, the majority on the court concluded that the individual mandate (requiring individuals to buy health insurance or pay a tax penalty) exceeded Congress' power to regulate commerce because it compelled people to engage in commerce by buying health insurance.
"That the court still upheld the individual mandate as a valid exercise of Congress' more limited power to lay and collect taxes does not diminish the significance of the limit that it placed on Congress' more expansive power to regulate interstate commerce," Lemper said. "Congress' power to lay and collect taxes is more limited and less coercive than its power to regulate interstate commerce, which -- before this decision -- increasingly appeared to have no limit."
"The court's decision precludes Congress from venturing into new regulatory territory under the guise of regulating commerce," he said. "At the very least, it forecloses future governmental regulation that uses a person's inaction as a basis to compel them to act."
Lemper said the court's decision also broke new ground in restricting Congress' power under the Spending Clause. Seven of the justices -- "a majority of rare size for this court" -- held that the Affordable Care Act wrongly coerced states into accepting the Medicare expansion by threatening them with the loss of all Medicare funding (a significant portion of states' budgets) if they refused to do so.
"The court's decision is remarkable because it is the first time that the court has ever struck down a federal law under the Spending Clause on the ground that it runs counter to the system of federalism in the Constitution," he added. "For decades, the court has recognized the possibility that the federalism principles could limit Congress' power under the Spending Clause, but it had never actually done so until its decision on the Affordable Care Act.
"Its landmark holding gives real teeth to limits on Congress' power that had previously only existed in theory."
###
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Geoengineering the climate could reduce vital rains
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: David Hosansky
hosansky@ucar.edu
303-497-8611
National Center for Atmospheric Research/University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
Simone Tilmes
tilmes@ucar.edu
303-497-1445
NCAR
John Fasullo
fasullo@ucar.edu
303-497-1712
NCAR
BOULDERAlthough a significant build-up in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere would alter worldwide precipitation patterns, a widely discussed technological approach to reduce future global warming would also interfere with rainfall and snowfall, new research shows.
The international study, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), finds that global warming caused by a massive increase in greenhouse gases would spur a nearly 7 percent average increase in precipitation compared to preindustrial conditions.
But trying to resolve the problem through "geoengineering" could result in monsoonal rains in North America, East Asia, and other regions dropping by 5-7 percent compared to preindustrial conditions. Globally, average precipitation could decrease by about 4.5 percent.
"Geoengineering the planet doesn't cure the problem," says NCAR scientist Simone Tilmes, lead author of the new study. "Even if one of these techniques could keep global temperatures approximately balanced, precipitation would not return to preindustrial conditions."
As concerns have mounted about climate change, scientists have studied geoengineering approaches to reduce future warming. Some of these would capture carbon dioxide before it enters the atmosphere. Others would attempt to essentially shade the atmosphere by injecting sulfate particles into the stratosphere or launching mirrors into orbit with the goal of reducing global surface temperatures.
The new study focuses on the second set of approaches, those that would shade the planet. The authors warn, however, that Earth's climate would not return to its preindustrial state even if the warming itself were successfully mitigated.
"It's very much a pick-your-poison type of problem," says NCAR scientist John Fasullo, a co-author. "If you don't like warming, you can reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the surface and cool the climate. But if you do that, large reductions in rainfall are unavoidable. There's no win-win option here."
The study appears in an online issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, published this week by the American Geophysical Union. An international team of scientists from NCAR and 14 other organizations wrote the study, which was funded in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR's sponsor. The team used, among other tools, the NCAR-based Community Earth System Model, which is funded by NSF and the Department of Energy.
Future carbon dioxide, with or without geoengineering
The research team turned to 12 of the world's leading climate models to simulate global precipitation patterns if the atmospheric level of carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas, reached four times the level of the preindustrial era. They then simulated the effect of reduced incoming solar radiation on the global precipitation patterns.
The scientists chose the artificial scenario of a quadrupling of carbon dioxide levels, which is on the high side of projections for the end of this century, in order to clearly draw out the potential impacts of geoengineering.
In line with other research, they found that an increase in carbon dioxide levels would significantly increase global average precipitation, although there would likely be significant regional variations and even prolonged droughts in some areas.
Much of the reason for the increased rainfall and snowfall has to do with greater evaporation, which would pump more moisture into the atmosphere as a result of more heat being trapped near the surface.
The team then took the research one step further, examining what would happen if a geoengineering approach partially reflected incoming solar radiation high in the atmosphere.
The researchers found that precipitation amounts and frequency, especially for heavy rain events, would decrease significantly. The effects were greater over land than over the ocean, and particularly pronounced during months of heavy, monsoonal rains. Monsoonal rains in the model simulations dropped by an average of 7 percent in North America, 6 percent in East Asia and South America, and 5 percent in South Africa. In India, however, the decrease was just 2 percent. Heavy precipitation further dropped in Western Europe and North America in summer.
A drier atmosphere
The researchers found two primary reasons for the reduced precipitation.
One reason has to do with evaporation. As Earth is shaded and less solar heat reaches the surface, less water vapor is pumped into the atmosphere through evaporation.
The other reason has to do with plants. With more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, plants partially close their stomata, the openings that allow them to take in carbon dioxide while releasing oxygen and water into the atmosphere. Partially shut stomata release less water, so the cooled atmosphere would also become even drier over land.
Tilmes stresses that the authors did not address such questions as how certain crops would respond to a combination of higher carbon dioxide and reduced rainfall.
"More research could show both the positive and negative consequences for society of such changes in the environment," she says. "What we do know is that our climate system is very complex, that human activity is making Earth warmer, and that any technological fix we might try to shade the planet could have unforeseen consequences."
###
The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research under sponsorship by the National Science Foundation. Any opinions, findings and conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
About the article
Title: The hydrological impact of geoengineering in the Geoengineering Model Intercomparison Project
Authors: Simone Tilmes, John Fasullo, Jean-Francois Lamarque, Daniel R. Marsh, Michael Mills, Kari Alterskjr, Helene Muri, Jn E. Kristjnsson, Olivier Boucher, Michael Schulz, Jason N. S. Cole, Charles L. Curry, Andy Jones, Jim Haywood, Peter J. Irvine, Duoying Ji, John C. Moore, Diana B. Karam, Ben Kravitz, Philip J. Rasch, Balwinder Singh, Jin-Ho Yoon, Ulrike Niemeier, Hauke Schmidt, Alan Robock, Shuting Yang, and Shingo Watanabe
Publication:Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
On the Web
For news releases, images, and more:
http://www.ucar.edu/atmosnews
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Geoengineering the climate could reduce vital rains
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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| E-mail
]
Share
Contact: David Hosansky
hosansky@ucar.edu
303-497-8611
National Center for Atmospheric Research/University Corporation for Atmospheric Research
Simone Tilmes
tilmes@ucar.edu
303-497-1445
NCAR
John Fasullo
fasullo@ucar.edu
303-497-1712
NCAR
BOULDERAlthough a significant build-up in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere would alter worldwide precipitation patterns, a widely discussed technological approach to reduce future global warming would also interfere with rainfall and snowfall, new research shows.
The international study, led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), finds that global warming caused by a massive increase in greenhouse gases would spur a nearly 7 percent average increase in precipitation compared to preindustrial conditions.
But trying to resolve the problem through "geoengineering" could result in monsoonal rains in North America, East Asia, and other regions dropping by 5-7 percent compared to preindustrial conditions. Globally, average precipitation could decrease by about 4.5 percent.
"Geoengineering the planet doesn't cure the problem," says NCAR scientist Simone Tilmes, lead author of the new study. "Even if one of these techniques could keep global temperatures approximately balanced, precipitation would not return to preindustrial conditions."
As concerns have mounted about climate change, scientists have studied geoengineering approaches to reduce future warming. Some of these would capture carbon dioxide before it enters the atmosphere. Others would attempt to essentially shade the atmosphere by injecting sulfate particles into the stratosphere or launching mirrors into orbit with the goal of reducing global surface temperatures.
The new study focuses on the second set of approaches, those that would shade the planet. The authors warn, however, that Earth's climate would not return to its preindustrial state even if the warming itself were successfully mitigated.
"It's very much a pick-your-poison type of problem," says NCAR scientist John Fasullo, a co-author. "If you don't like warming, you can reduce the amount of sunlight reaching the surface and cool the climate. But if you do that, large reductions in rainfall are unavoidable. There's no win-win option here."
The study appears in an online issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, published this week by the American Geophysical Union. An international team of scientists from NCAR and 14 other organizations wrote the study, which was funded in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR's sponsor. The team used, among other tools, the NCAR-based Community Earth System Model, which is funded by NSF and the Department of Energy.
Future carbon dioxide, with or without geoengineering
The research team turned to 12 of the world's leading climate models to simulate global precipitation patterns if the atmospheric level of carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas, reached four times the level of the preindustrial era. They then simulated the effect of reduced incoming solar radiation on the global precipitation patterns.
The scientists chose the artificial scenario of a quadrupling of carbon dioxide levels, which is on the high side of projections for the end of this century, in order to clearly draw out the potential impacts of geoengineering.
In line with other research, they found that an increase in carbon dioxide levels would significantly increase global average precipitation, although there would likely be significant regional variations and even prolonged droughts in some areas.
Much of the reason for the increased rainfall and snowfall has to do with greater evaporation, which would pump more moisture into the atmosphere as a result of more heat being trapped near the surface.
The team then took the research one step further, examining what would happen if a geoengineering approach partially reflected incoming solar radiation high in the atmosphere.
The researchers found that precipitation amounts and frequency, especially for heavy rain events, would decrease significantly. The effects were greater over land than over the ocean, and particularly pronounced during months of heavy, monsoonal rains. Monsoonal rains in the model simulations dropped by an average of 7 percent in North America, 6 percent in East Asia and South America, and 5 percent in South Africa. In India, however, the decrease was just 2 percent. Heavy precipitation further dropped in Western Europe and North America in summer.
A drier atmosphere
The researchers found two primary reasons for the reduced precipitation.
One reason has to do with evaporation. As Earth is shaded and less solar heat reaches the surface, less water vapor is pumped into the atmosphere through evaporation.
The other reason has to do with plants. With more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, plants partially close their stomata, the openings that allow them to take in carbon dioxide while releasing oxygen and water into the atmosphere. Partially shut stomata release less water, so the cooled atmosphere would also become even drier over land.
Tilmes stresses that the authors did not address such questions as how certain crops would respond to a combination of higher carbon dioxide and reduced rainfall.
"More research could show both the positive and negative consequences for society of such changes in the environment," she says. "What we do know is that our climate system is very complex, that human activity is making Earth warmer, and that any technological fix we might try to shade the planet could have unforeseen consequences."
###
The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research under sponsorship by the National Science Foundation. Any opinions, findings and conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
About the article
Title: The hydrological impact of geoengineering in the Geoengineering Model Intercomparison Project
Authors: Simone Tilmes, John Fasullo, Jean-Francois Lamarque, Daniel R. Marsh, Michael Mills, Kari Alterskjr, Helene Muri, Jn E. Kristjnsson, Olivier Boucher, Michael Schulz, Jason N. S. Cole, Charles L. Curry, Andy Jones, Jim Haywood, Peter J. Irvine, Duoying Ji, John C. Moore, Diana B. Karam, Ben Kravitz, Philip J. Rasch, Balwinder Singh, Jin-Ho Yoon, Ulrike Niemeier, Hauke Schmidt, Alan Robock, Shuting Yang, and Shingo Watanabe
Publication:Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
On the Web
For news releases, images, and more:
http://www.ucar.edu/atmosnews
[
| E-mail
Share
]
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, center, walks with Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., right, and Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, before their meeting. Earlier, the prime minister met with Vice President Joe Biden. (AP Photo/Molly Riley)
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, center, walks with Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., right, and Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, before their meeting. Earlier, the prime minister met with Vice President Joe Biden. (AP Photo/Molly Riley)
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki listens during a meeting with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., and the committee's ranking Democrat Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Molly Riley)
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, left, talks with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., right, during a luncheon meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. (AP Photo/Molly Riley)
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, left, is greeted by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., center, and the committee's ranking Democrat Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, during a luncheon meeting. (AP Photo/Molly Riley)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Terrorists "found a second chance" to thrive in Iraq, the nation's prime minister said Thursday in asking for new U.S. aid to beat back a bloody insurgency that has been fueled by the neighboring Syrian civil war and the departure of American troops from Iraq two years ago.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told a packed auditorium at the U.S. Institute of Peace that he needs additional weapons, help with intelligence and other assistance, and claimed the world has a responsibility to help because terrorism is an international concern.
"They carry their bad ideas everywhere," al-Maliki said of terrorists. "They carry bad ideas instead of flowers."
The new request comes nearly two years after al-Maliki's government refused to let U.S. forces remain in Iraq, after nearly nine years of war, with legal immunity that the Obama administration insisted was necessary to protect troops. The administration had campaigned on ending the war in Iraq and took the opportunity offered by the legal dispute to pull all troops out.
Al-Maliki will meet Friday with President Barack Obama in what Baghdad hopes will be a fresh start in a complicated relationship that has been marked both by victories and frustrations for each side.
Within months of the U.S. troops' departure, violence began creeping up in the capital and across the country as Sunni Muslim insurgents, angered by a widespread belief that Sunnis had been sidelined by the Shiite-led government, lashed out. The State Department says at least 6,000 Iraqis have been killed in attacks so far this year, and suicide bombers launched 38 strikes in the last month alone.
"So the terrorists found a second chance," al-Maliki said — a turnabout from an insurgency that was mostly silenced by the time the U.S. troops left.
Al-Maliki largely blamed the Syrian civil war for the rise in Iraq's violence. In Syria, rebels — including some linked to al-Qaida — are fighting to overthrow President Bashar Assad.
Al-Maliki said he will ask Obama for new assistance to bolster Iraq's military and fight al-Qaida. The Iraqi ambassador to the U.S. said that could include speeding up the delivery of U.S. aircraft, missiles, interceptors and other weapons, and improving national intelligence systems among other things.
Iraqi Ambassador Lukman Faily did not rule out the possibility of asking the U.S. to send military special forces or additional CIA advisers to Iraq to help train and assist counterterror troops, but noted that if the U.S. doesn't provide the help, Iraq will go where they can, including China or Russia, which would be more than happy to increase their influence in Baghdad at U.S. expense.
The two leaders also will discuss how Iraq can improve its fractious government, which so often is divided among sectarian or ethnic lines, to give it more confidence with a bitter and traumatized public.
The ambassador said no new security agreement would be needed to give immunity to additional U.S. advisers or trainers in Iraq. And he said Iraq would pay for the additional weapons or other assistance.
A senior Obama administration official said Wednesday that U.S. officials were not planning to send U.S. trainers to Iraq and that Baghdad had not asked for them. The administration official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief reporters by name.
U.S. officials were prepared to help Iraq with an approach that did not focus just on military or security gaps, the administration official said. The aid under consideration might include more weapons for Iraqi troops who do not have necessary equipment to battle al-Qaida insurgents, he said.
Administration officials consider the insurgency, which has rebranded itself as the Islamic State of Iraq in the Levant, a major and increasing threat both to Iraq and the U.S., the official said.
U.S. and Iraqi officials see a possible solution in trying to persuade insurgents to join forces with Iraqi troops and move away from al-Qaida, following a pattern set by so-called Awakening Councils in western Iraq that marked a turning point in the war. Faily said much of the additional aid — including weapons and training — would go toward this effort.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who opposed the U.S. troop withdrawal in 2011, said Iraq likely would not get the aid until al-Maliki, a Shiite, makes strides in making the government more inclusive to Sunnis. "The situation is deteriorating and it's unraveling, and he's got to turn it around," McCain said Wednesday after a tense meeting on Capitol Hill with al-Maliki.
Al-Maliki's plea for aid is somewhat ironic, given that he refused to budge in 2011 on letting U.S. troops stay in Iraq with legal immunity Washington said they must have to defend themselves in the volatile country. But it was a fiercely unpopular political position in Iraq, which was unable to prosecute Blackwater Worldwide security contractors who opened fire in a Baghdad square in 2007, killing at least 13 passersby.
James F. Jeffrey, who was the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad when the U.S. troops left, called it a "turnabout" by al-Maliki. He said Iraq desperately needs teams of U.S. advisers, trainers, intelligence and counterterror experts to beat back al-Qaida.
"They could mean all the difference between losing an Iraq that 4,500 Americans gave their lives for," said Jeffrey, who retired from the State Department after leaving Baghdad last year.
Nearly 4,500 U.S. troops were killed in Iraq between the 2003 invasion and the 2011 withdrawal. More than 100,000 Iraqi were killed in that time.
___
Follow Lara Jakes on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/larajakesAP
I knew the NSA drawing was real from the smiley-face. Only an eager and myopic software engineer—seeing the interception of Google and Yahoo’s data as a challenge and game rather than as a security and political matter—would make such a light-hearted and self-satisfied gesture at the prospect of hacking into Google’s internal servers.
Google knows it’s real as well. “Two engineers with close ties to Google exploded in profanity when they saw the drawing,” writes the Washington Post, which broke the story yesterday (with some help from Edward Snowden). Google’s Chief Legal Officer David Drummond issued the fighting words of someone who knows they’re winning: "We are outraged at the lengths to which the government seems to have gone to intercept data from our private fiber networks, and it underscores the need for urgent reform." Google, clearly fed up, has been rushing to encrypt as much of their traffic as possible. (Full disclosure: I used to work for Google, and my wife still does, though she is refusing to tell me anything she may or may not know—even though it seems unfair that the NSA knows and I don’t.)
The NSA’s spying system is called MUSCULAR, which, according to the Post, can copy “entire data flows across fiber-optic cables that carry information among the data centers of the Silicon Valley giants.” Even the name MUSCULAR smacks of the brutish attitude that compels the NSA to sweep up petabytes of data without being able to process most of it. Call it Broveillance, or Brotal Information Awareness. The unnamed author of the NSA slides provided to the Post is basically begging the agency to stop collecting so much useless garbage. The slides complain of the data’s “relatively small intelligence value” given that the MUSCULAR data makes up one-quarter of all information acquisition.
Just to be clear, that means that one-quarter of the NSA’s surveillance data comes from Google and Yahoo alone. The NSA intercepted the largest sewer pipes of information on the entire Internet and diverted them to dump into their data centers, so that they could search for pearls.
Combine that with the knowledge that NSA chief Keith Alexander is a macho nerd who had his command center built to look like the bridge of the Starship Enterprise (complete with doors that go whoosh), and we have a nice picture of a group of spooks that fancy themselves as James Bond’s Q but are actually closer to Inspector Gadget.
We now have a nice picture of a group of spooks that fancy themselves as James Bond’s Q but are actually closer to Inspector Gadget.
Although the diagram refers to Google, the leaked presentation only briefly refers to “defeating” Gmail. They also refer to “FB buddylist sampling since last year”—i.e., spying on your Facebook friends list—but mostly the slides talk about Yahoo.
The key passage is this one: “Yahoo has been transferring entire email accounts using the Narchive data format (a proprietary format) ... Narchive traffic is collected and forwarded to NSA for memorialization.” “Narchive” is evidently Yahoo’s archival format that can contain the entire contents of a Yahoo user’s mailbox. The Narchive format is internal to Yahoo—that is, no computer outside of Yahoo ever sees it or should even be aware of its existence. (I can’t even find any references to it on the Web.) So there’s your evidence that the NSA was monitoring Yahoo’s internal operations.
Yahoo uses the Narchive format when transferring mail accounts across data centers. Your email account is located within a single one of Yahoo’s datacenters. If they decide, for one reason or another, that your mailbox should be located on a data center in Australia instead of the United States (say, because you live in Australia and so it’ll be much faster for you there), they package all of your data up into the Narchive format and send it from their United States data center to the Australia data center, where they unpack it and set it up.
This is where the NSA comes in. At least according to the slides, they are unable to monitor email accounts that reside within a data center. Instead, they catch them in the process of being transferred along the intercontinental fiber pipes via “secret access to a cable or switch” offered by “an unnamed telecommunications provider,” according to the Post. This means that the NSA can’t do ongoing monitoring of a particular email account, but they can just happen to catch whichever accounts are being transferred—at which point they just snag the whole thing. Since only a small subset of accounts are transferred intercontinentally, they are effectively capturing snapshots of a random subset of accounts at arbitrary points in time. (The slides point out that over one-half of the mail is more than three months old, and one-quarter of it is more than a year old.)
This is the very opposite of targeted collection, and of course it gives lie to any statement about how the NSA was only collecting metadata and not collecting on Americans. The NSA has no idea which of these accounts belong to Americans and which to foreigners. How would they? They admit they don’t even know what they’re sweeping up.
The slides note that “FISA restrospective [sic] collection” would be just as effective and far more efficient than the sewer pipe approach of MUSCULAR. The slides don’t mention that FISA collection would also have the happy side effect of being legal, but I suppose that issue wasn’t on the NSA’s radar. MUSCULAR: inconvenient, useless, and illegal. The perfect encapsulation of the Broveillance attitude.
Alexander and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper will say various things in response, in line with the nondenial denial already issued by the NSA, which puts so many conditionals on what it claims not to do that it might as well be a confession. Clapper and Alexander have already both lied to Congress, so there is little reason to listen to them. Alexander is on his way out, and Clapper needs to go too. Nothing short of an agency overhaul will reestablish trust.
If the definition of going mad with power is pissing off people who can cause you real trouble—like Angela Merkel and Larry Page—Alexander went mad with power the day he took the job. He has lied, broken the law, violated trusts, wasted billions of dollars, and damaged the security of the U.S. far more than anyone he has criticized. He will be seen in retrospect as the perfect illustration of a period when a modicum of technical knowledge was enough to create the illusion of competence in the eyes of the establishment.
Obama may accept the mere appearance of NSA reform in the coming months. But the pressure is mounting: When you’ve lost NSA water-carrier Dianne Feinstein, you are indeed “really screwed.” Despite Obama’s evident unwillingness to buck the system on whistleblower persecution, illegal detention, black sites, and drone strikes, he may be forced to do the right thing here and rein in this rogue agency.
Tomahawk's seamless searching feature is very impressive. Just enter your search term in the slender window at the top of the application window. Including filters makes the searching even more efficient. Tomahawk searches through all of your enabled services. The results list is very expansive and uses columns to show artists, albums, songs, tracks and much more.
The trick to designing an all-purpose music player is to make it work the way you want. The Tomahawk Music Player performs that trick very well.
It could well be a better listening choice than any other cross-platform music player application. It runs on a variety of Linux distros, Microsoft Windows and the Apple OS platforms. This flexibility is important to me as a user because I work on all three.
Tomahawk is intuitive, with a very uncluttered display. That holds true for its interface on all of its supported platforms.
Another performance factor is its ability to separate the song title from the source. This creates a universal translation layer across music repositories, streaming services and geographic territories.
The latest version is 0.7.0 for all supported Linux distros except Fedora and Debian. For those two distros the current version is 0.6.0.
Dual Sources
Tomahawk is a very young Linux music player, but it makes up for its youth with a surprisingly mature level of performance.
It handles local and Internet-based music collections as a single music platform across all three computing platforms. This is a standard that should be met in all modern music players.
Tomahawk seamlessly integrates YouTube, Spotify, Jamendo, Grooveshark, LastFM, OfficialFM and a dozen more. This latest edition makes plugging in Internet music sources easy through a system of third-party resolvers. Just open the Settings panel and click the Services button. Select the corresponding resolver from the list and click the Install>From File button. The same process lets you connect Tomahawk to your social networks.
Look and Feel
Some music players I have liked had a glaring problem with putting too much information into too little display space. That does not happen with Tomahawk.
Its interface has a menu bar you can hide. It is replaced with an icon that opens the tools and settings menus.
A sidebar helps reduce the display clutter. It has to show the local collection, online playlists and radio stations. Playback controls are at the bottom.
What You See
The Queue display expands as you add more titles to play from your collections. You can view the open queue list or keep it closed but see the number of titles waiting to play.
A nice touch is the ability to remove songs or change their order by dragging and dropping them around the list.
Depending on what sidebar labels you select, other expandable windows open in the right side of the player window. For instance, when a title is playing, the display shows the top hits, related artists and a condensed version of the Wikipedia entry for that artist.
Screen Real Estate
Hold the mouse over any item in the sidebar to see a floating option to hide it. The sidebar serves as the functional control panel for what you see in the display window.
For example, the first label is the Dashboard. It shows recent additions to the local catalog, the newest playlists from both local collections and online sources, stations and recently played tracks.
The Super Collection label combines the local libraries of all included online friends also using Tomahawk. This might be the least-used feature, depending on your social status, but if you use it, Top Loved Tracks shows the tracks loved the most by all of your friends. Recently Played Tracks shows the last tracks they've played. I'm not a huge social media fan, so pardon my big yawn here.
More Sidebar Navigation
Charts is somewhat more useful, as it shows the currently best-selling songs on selected services activated by your choice of subscriptions. The New Releases and Search History features are more of those love-it or hate-it options.
Perhaps the most useful part of the sidebar display choices are the My Music and My Collection options. You can hide or show the sublists.
This is where you click to see your local and online music lists. You also can create playlists and radio station lists for regular listening.
Searching Success
Tomahawk's seamless searching feature is very impressive. Just enter your search term in the slender window at the top of the application window. Including filters makes the searching even more efficient.
Tomahawk searches through all of your enabled services. The results list is very expansive and uses columns to show artists, albums, songs, tracks and much more.
Clicking the information icon that appears on hover pops up related details about your listening history for that selection. A Footnote button at the bottom of the information pop-up shows more details about related artists, top hits and more.
You can click on a song or other related album or artist. If that title is not already in your local collection, Tomahawk will connect you to its location on your enabled online music outlets and play it for you.
Getting It
Installing Tomahawk is about the only part of using it that is a bit of a hassle. It is not routinely available in many distro repositories. If you do luck out and find it included in your distro, it will be several versions out of date.
Instead, go to the developer's website and click the download button. Then check the download page for distro-specific installation instructions.
Tomahawk is available for a wide range of distros, but you must install your flavor through the terminal by adding distro-specific repository commands. So far Tomahawk installs on Linux Mint, Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE, Arch Linux, Chakra, Gentoo and Exherbo. Debian is coming soon.
For other Linux distros, you can download the tarball from the developer's website or get it from github.
Bottom Line
If you are looking for the next generation of music players, Tomahawk is a good choice. It is still a young effort with lots of areas its developers need to finesse, but that maturity will continue to come with each new release.
Meanwhile, Tomahawk performs well in its current release state. It has some usability quirks that are more annoying than dysfunctional.
Want to Suggest a Linux Application for Review?
Is there a Linux software application you'd like to suggest for review? Something you love or would like to get to know?
Please send your ideas to me at jack.germain@newsroom.ectnews.com, and I'll consider them for a future Linux Picks and Pans column.
And use the Talkback feature below to add your comments!
Jack M. Germain has been writing about computer technology since the early days of the Apple II and the PC. He still has his original IBM PC-Jr and a few other legacy DOS and Windows boxes. He left shareware programs behind for the open source world of the Linux desktop. He runs several versions of Windows and Linux OSes and often cannot decide whether to grab his tablet, netbook or Android smartphone instead of using his desktop or laptop gear.
Salesforce.com has long had a public AppExchange software marketplace, but now it's going to give customers the ability to create their own private AppExchanges where employees can download applications to use in their jobs.
Private AppExchange is generally available as of Friday to customers running Salesforce.com's Enterprise and higher editions, said Sara Varni, senior director of AppExchange marketing. However, those customers can give employees who don't use Salesforce.com itself access to the private store for $5 per user per month.
Enterprise application stores are rapidly coming into favor as companies seek to appease workers who are used to the generally painless experience of consumer app stores like Apple's iTunes. The managed app store model also gives enterprises a way to place a layer of governance over the software and devices employees are using, even as they provide easier access to software.
"The whole goal of private AppExchange is to empower the CIO to say yes," Varni said. While IT departments curate and oversee which applications get into the store, based on pre-determined permissions, employees can download them when they wish, she added.
In February, Gartner released a report predicting that 25 percent of enterprises will have their own app stores by 2017.
Salesforce.com is clearly hoping to keep its current customers from using rival vendors' technology, such as BMC's recently launched AppZone, to build out these stores.
Customers can use Private AppExchange to deliver any Web, mobile or desktop application to any device, with centralized authentication through Salesforce.com's recently launched Identity service.
Stores can also be customized to reflect a company's brand or various departments' needs, according to Salesforce.com.
Salesforce.com didn't run a formal beta program for Private AppExchange, but sought input from about 50 customers into its design. "Given our conversations, we know customers are hungry for this," Varni said.
The development effort was made easier given that much of the plumbing was already there, given the public AppExchange, said Ryan Ellis, senior director of product management.
Private AppExchange doesn't solve every problem related to enterprise app stores, such as the potential complexity of tracking software licenses and subscriptions as users download and use various applications.
It's possible to integrate Private AppExchange stores with third-party license management systems, Varni said.
Salesforce.com has also integrated Private AppExchange with its Chatter collaboration software. This means that "organizations can enable their employees to discover, discuss, rate and self-support applications collaboratively versus just being pointed to a generic app store and left to fend for themselves," Constellation Research vice president and principal analyst Alan Lepofsky [cq] said.
Chris Kanaracus covers enterprise software and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Chris' email address is Chris_Kanaracus@idg.com
Ever wonder how hot it gets inside of a cow's stomach? Neither have we, but if we ever had cause to find out, we can thankfully now do so wirelessly. Front and center in ARM's Internet of Things display at ArmTechCon this week we found Well Cow, a bovine health monitor that bobs around your cattle's rumen -- the largest of a cow's four stomach compartments. The sensor-laden pill lasts between 80-100 days inside the animal, transmitting pH and temperature data to a Bluetooth collar around the beast's neck. Data can then be retrieved using either an Android device or the company's own PC peripheral. We gave the app a quick whirl and were able to quickly discern the room's temperature and general air acidity with the touch of a button. (There appears to be a no cows rule on the show floor.)
It sounds like an unappetizing ordeal, but the setup actually prevents indigestion. By monitoring a cow's stomach acidity, farmers can catch digestive problems early, and adjust the animal's feed or medical needs before it becomes an issue. Micromanaging the animal's diet could also help maximize milk production. An odd thing to find in ARM's booth? Absolutely, but it certainly highlights the creative potential of the company's MBed development platform and what it could bring to the Internet of Cows Things.
If you're reading this late in the day, pause to consider your eyes. Can you feel that familiar sting that comes from looking at a glaring LCD for too many hours? That's only the most noticeable symptom of what happens to our bodies when we spend hours staring into what's essentially a big, bright, lamp. F.lux is a simple and free app that helps fix this.
f.lux knows what time the sun sets wherever you are.
Turning down your monitor's brightness may help, but brightness isn't really the main issue: Color temperature is, and that can be trickier to adjust. Most computer screens emit bluish light that looks good in daytime, but becomes uncomfortable to look at in a dark room. It can also affect your sleep: Research suggests that reading on a tablet for two hours before bedtime can delay your sleep by about an hour.
F.lux helps by asking you where you're located in the world, then figuring out the approximate sunset time for your location. Come sunset, your screen will mimic nature, gradually warming up the colors and blending in much better with the surrounding light. You basically get your own private mini-sunset, ending up with a screen that's nice to look at.
f.lux now lets you adjust your monitor's brightness with keyboard shortcuts.
This basic functionality—tuning your screen's color temperature according to time of day—has been part of f.lux for years now. A recent version adds some new bells and whistles: You can now change your screen's brightness using Alt+PgUp and Alt+PgDn. This isn't exciting if you use a laptop, but for a desktop user like me, it's a great feature.
Another new feature is the so-called Darkroom Mode. Whereas the normal f.lux effect just warms up your colors, Darkroom Mode completely takes over your display, shading everything in dark, reddish hues. This makes videos unwatchable, but also means you can probably use your computer at 3am without losing your night vision.
You can dial in your own nighttime color temperature to suit your environment.
Since we don't all work with the same ambient lighting, f.lux lets you dial in a color temperature for nighttime. It uses Kelvin notations (commonly used for color temperatures), but also offers human-readable explanations ranging from "Ember" (1200k) to "Sunlight" (5000k).
All of these color changes are great, unless you happen to be trying to watch a movie. That's where Movie Mode comes in: This mode tones down the color effects for 2.5 hours, to let you watch a movie without having everything tinged red. You can also completely disable f.lux for one hour (for doing color-sensitive work such as photo editing), or until the next morning.
F.lux was a very good app to begin with, and this release only makes it better. If you're not using it yet, but do use your computer at night, you really should try it out today.
Note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of the software.
Jessica Andrade dominated Rosi Sexton at UFC Fight Night 30 in Manchester, England, and she was surprised the British veteran was able to survive the first couple rounds on Saturday.
"I feel I showed what I can do in this fight," Andrade told MMAFighting.com. "Every time I go in there, you’ll see a better Jessica. I still have a lot to learn. I was really relaxed and focused coming to this fight. We always get a little anxious before the fight starts, but I was more relaxed now than in my UFC debut. If you watch my UFC debut, you will realize that I looked more relaxed and confident now. I knew what I had to do so it was easier to get in there and win."
Andrade landed 206 significant strikes against Sexton, and UFC president Dana White felt the fight should have been stopped before going to the judges. The Brazilian thought the referee came close to ending it, but props to Sexton for surviving.
"I was surprised she didn’t go down," she said. "I knew she was tough because I saw all of her fights and saw she couldn’t handle the punishment. I thought that the referee would stop the fight or should go down some moments during the fight, but she survived -- and that’s good because the fight was more exciting for the fans."
White compared Andrade vs. Sexton to UFC 166’s main event, and Andrade took that as a compliment.
"Some people compared this fight to Cain Velasquez vs. Junior dos Santos, some people said that I’m a prettier version of Cris Cyborg," she said with a laugh. "Cris is fighter that I look up to, my style if very similar to hers. I like to go there, walk straight forward and beat someone, so it was great to hear people comparing me to Cyborg."
After her first win inside the Octagon, Andrade wants to get back there as soon as possible. Jessica Eye, who defeated Sarah Kaufmann a week before at UFC 166, could be the perfect opponent.
"I’ll fight anyone they put in front of me," she said. "If they want me against Jessica Eye, that’s great. I will watch her fights and train hard to do another exciting fight for the fans. I’m just waiting for my next fight."
Contact: Jennifer Horsley collections@plos.org 44-012-234-42836 Public Library of Science
PLOS ONE introduces a new Collection on Sauropod Gigantism
A new PLOS Collection featuring research on the complex evolutionary cascade theory that made the unique gigantism of sauropod dinosaurs possible launched on October 30th. This Collection features new research articles that have published in the open access journal PLOS ONE.
Sauropod dinosaurs were the largest terrestrial animals to roam the Earth, exceeding all other land-dwelling vertebrates in both mean and maximal body size. While convergently evolving many features seen in large terrestrial mammals, such as upright, columnar limbs and barrel-shaped trunks, sauropods evolved some unique features, such as the extremely long necks and diminutive heads they are famous for.
The unique gigantism of sauropod dinosaurs has long been recognized as an important problem in the evolution of vertebrates, raising questions as to why no other land-based lineage has ever reached this size, how these dinosaurs functioned as living animals, and how they were able to maintain stable populations over distinct geological periods.
This new PLOS Collection discusses major efforts by evolutionary biologists and paleontologists to understand sauropods as living animals, and to explain their evolutionary success and uniquely gigantic body size.
The articles address these questions from a number of varied disciplinary viewpoints, including those of ecology, engineering, functional morphology, animal nutrition, and palaeontology. For instance, one section features articles from researchers that investigated sauropod mobility and posture, to better understand the reasons for their extremely long necks.
"You could explain gigantism just by looking at the trait of having many small offspring. But our model shows us there were probably several factors," says Dr. P. Martin Sander, a professor at the Steinmann Institute for Geology, Mineralogy and Palaeontology at the University of Bonn, Germany.
###
PLEASE LINK TO THE SCIENTIFIC ARTICLE IN ONLINE VERSIONS OF YOUR REPORT (URL goes live after the embargo ends): http://www.ploscollections.org/sauropodgigantism
Disclaimer: This press release refers to upcoming articles in PLOS ONE. The releases have been provided by the article authors and/or journal staff. Any opinions expressed in these are the personal views of the contributors, and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of PLOS. PLOS expressly disclaims any and all warranties and liability in connection with the information found in the release and article and your use of such information.
About PLOS ONE: PLOS ONE is the first journal of primary research from all areas of science to employ a combination of peer review and post-publication rating and commenting, to maximize the impact of every report it publishes. PLOS ONE is published by the Public Library of Science (PLOS), the open-access publisher whose goal is to make the world's scientific and medical literature a public resource.
All works published in PLOS ONE are Open Access. Everything is immediately availableto read, download, redistribute, include in databases and otherwise usewithout cost to anyone, anywhere, subject only to the condition that the original authors and source are properly attributed. For more information about PLOS ONE relevant to journalists, bloggers and press officers, including details of our press release process and our embargo policy, see the EveryONE blog at http://everyone.plos.org/media.
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A sauropod walks into a bar. 'Why the long neck?'
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
30-Oct-2013
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Contact: Jennifer Horsley collections@plos.org 44-012-234-42836 Public Library of Science
PLOS ONE introduces a new Collection on Sauropod Gigantism
A new PLOS Collection featuring research on the complex evolutionary cascade theory that made the unique gigantism of sauropod dinosaurs possible launched on October 30th. This Collection features new research articles that have published in the open access journal PLOS ONE.
Sauropod dinosaurs were the largest terrestrial animals to roam the Earth, exceeding all other land-dwelling vertebrates in both mean and maximal body size. While convergently evolving many features seen in large terrestrial mammals, such as upright, columnar limbs and barrel-shaped trunks, sauropods evolved some unique features, such as the extremely long necks and diminutive heads they are famous for.
The unique gigantism of sauropod dinosaurs has long been recognized as an important problem in the evolution of vertebrates, raising questions as to why no other land-based lineage has ever reached this size, how these dinosaurs functioned as living animals, and how they were able to maintain stable populations over distinct geological periods.
This new PLOS Collection discusses major efforts by evolutionary biologists and paleontologists to understand sauropods as living animals, and to explain their evolutionary success and uniquely gigantic body size.
The articles address these questions from a number of varied disciplinary viewpoints, including those of ecology, engineering, functional morphology, animal nutrition, and palaeontology. For instance, one section features articles from researchers that investigated sauropod mobility and posture, to better understand the reasons for their extremely long necks.
"You could explain gigantism just by looking at the trait of having many small offspring. But our model shows us there were probably several factors," says Dr. P. Martin Sander, a professor at the Steinmann Institute for Geology, Mineralogy and Palaeontology at the University of Bonn, Germany.
###
PLEASE LINK TO THE SCIENTIFIC ARTICLE IN ONLINE VERSIONS OF YOUR REPORT (URL goes live after the embargo ends): http://www.ploscollections.org/sauropodgigantism
Disclaimer: This press release refers to upcoming articles in PLOS ONE. The releases have been provided by the article authors and/or journal staff. Any opinions expressed in these are the personal views of the contributors, and do not necessarily represent the views or policies of PLOS. PLOS expressly disclaims any and all warranties and liability in connection with the information found in the release and article and your use of such information.
About PLOS ONE: PLOS ONE is the first journal of primary research from all areas of science to employ a combination of peer review and post-publication rating and commenting, to maximize the impact of every report it publishes. PLOS ONE is published by the Public Library of Science (PLOS), the open-access publisher whose goal is to make the world's scientific and medical literature a public resource.
All works published in PLOS ONE are Open Access. Everything is immediately availableto read, download, redistribute, include in databases and otherwise usewithout cost to anyone, anywhere, subject only to the condition that the original authors and source are properly attributed. For more information about PLOS ONE relevant to journalists, bloggers and press officers, including details of our press release process and our embargo policy, see the EveryONE blog at http://everyone.plos.org/media.
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f.lux knows what time the sun sets wherever you are.
f.lux now lets you adjust your monitor's brightness with keyboard shortcuts.
You can dial in your own nighttime color temperature to suit your environment.