06 Feb 2011
Cracking the Scratch Lottery Code

ROTFLMAO ... you'd have thunk the software guys could've done a better job designing the tickets, but if you make things truly random, then you lose the predictability of winning and losing - a big downside if you're the lottery operator! So it's really not that easy at all. This just proves how difficult it is to rig the game without making it vulnerable to being cracked. In fact, while I'm no mathematician, I'd wager it can't be done. I'd further wager this same logic could be applied to any number of similar contests and games.

On the other hand, winning numbers in lottery games like Powerball are in fact truly random. That's because they're not generated by software, but by analog processes, such as an air blower and a tub of balls. Unlike scratch tickets, there's a pari-mutual payout on these games, and the jackpots are carefully crafted to insure a healthy margin for the operator. These analog processes are non-deterministic, unlike digital processes, which are more properly called pseudo-random number generators. As John von Neumann noted:

Anyone who attempts to generate random numbers by deterministic means is, of course, living in a state of sin.

Interestingly, the "quick pick" process used by games such as Powerball use PRNG's to pick the numbers for the ticket - they're not random, even though they are advertised as such. I wonder how long it'll be before some enterprising lawyer discovers this bit of bait and switch?

The apparent randomness of the scratch ticket was just a facade, a mathematical lie. And this meant that the lottery system might actually be solvable, just like those mining samples. “At the time, I had no intention of cracking the tickets,” he says. He was just curious about the algorithm that produced the numbers. Walking back from the gas station with the chips and coffee he’d bought with his winnings, he turned the problem over in his mind. By the time he reached the office, he was confident that he knew how the software might work, how it could precisely control the number of winners while still appearing random. “It wasn’t that hard,” Srivastava says. “I do the same kind of math all day long.”

(link) [Wired]

23:23 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

30 Jan 2011
More Kids Can Work a Smart Phone Than Tie Their Shoes

When (not if) technology fails, these kids will be up the proverbial creek without paddle. And if the massive failure of technology (war, natural disaster, peak oil, civil disturbance, etc.) takes a while to get here (which is an even bet) then today's kids will be the leaders of our society, and we'll be in trouble. Real trouble.

Is there an app for that?

A study conducted by AVG found that 19 percent of 2-5 year-olds could play with a smart phone app, but only 9 percent of those same children could tie their shoes.

(link) [Time]

09:52 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

27 Jan 2011
X-box Live Labels Autistic Boy a Cheater

Well, MS claims it found evidence of "tampering", but in this case I've gotta wonder. I've watched my autistic grandson play video games, and he's nothing short of amazing, no cheating required. Is this Rainman for real?

Jennifer Zdenek, the mother of an 11-year-old boy who lives with autism, is outraged at Microsoft Xbox Live for labeling her son a "cheater" and taking away everything he's earned online.

(link) [KCPQ]

21:46 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

16 Jan 2011
Russia warns of ‘Iranian Chernobyl'

Wouldn't that just be lovely? Letting politicians make technical decisions is almost always a bad idea - this one could prove catastrophic.

Russian scientists warned the Kremlin that they could be facing "another Chernobyl" if they were forced to comply with Iran's tight deadline to activate the [Bushehr reactor] complex this summer.

(link) [The telegraph]

19:58 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

12 Jan 2011
Detroit in Ruins

The ruined Spanish-Gothic interior of the United Artists Theater in Detroit. The cinema was built in 1928 by C Howard Crane, and finally closed in 1974.

Watching America fall into ruins, one city at a time... click the image for more.

via within the crainium

08:04 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

11 Jan 2011
Your BlackBerry or Your Wife

We've taken the occasional news break, but we've never gone this far. Yet. Might be a good idea, though.

When you're out to dinner, does your BlackBerry occupy a seat at the table? Does your spouse ever check email before saying "good morning" to the kids? Does your son sleep with his laptop? It may be time for a technology cleanse.

(link) [Wall Street Journal]

22:22 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

08 Jan 2011
Newer Antipsychotic Drugs Are Overused

I'm shocked, shocked I tell you, to find that these drugs are over-prescribed in our therapeutic state...

Many people taking powerful psychiatric medications that increase their risk of weight gain and diabetes are prescribed those drugs when there’s little evidence that they will get any benefit from them, a new study shows.

(link) [WebMD]

22:30 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

06 Jan 2011
Placebos work, even when patients are in the know

I have no idea what to think about this. Fascinating.

In what researchers call a novel 'mind-body' therapy, most patients in a study suffering from irritable bowel syndrome reported relief after receiving pills they were told contained no real medicine.

(link) [LA Times]

21:03 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

01 Nov 2010
Funeral for a Friend

Once upon a telephone ...

I started to distrust telephones the instant they stopped working. I can’t pinpoint when that was — the first time I “dropped” a call, or someone said, “I’m losing you” — and I don’t know why the telephone, the analog landline telephone, was never formally mourned. I do remember clearly what life was like when telephones worked.

(link) [New York Times]

06:41 /Technology | 1 comment | permanent link

29 Oct 2010
Why We Hack

I can relate ...

Sometimes disobedience is necessary and good when rules fail us, and it's at the core of why we hack. Hacking is a means of expressing dissatisfaction, confounding the mechanism, and ultimately doing better. Here's why it's so important.

(link) [Lifehacker]

06:15 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

18 Sep 2010
New US Embassy Adopts Defenses From Middle Ages

What goes around comes around ... I wonder if there's a portcullis?

A US embassy is expected to extend the welcoming hand of democracy—while maintaining a 30-meter zone of blast protection. Such was the challenge facing KieranTimberlake when the architectural firm entered a State Department competition to design a new embassy on the banks of the Thames in London. Its winning plan, to be built by 2017, is part ultramodern masterpiece—sleek solar panels, a facade made of energy-conserving fluoropolymer “pillows,” spiraling green spaces—and part 11th-century castle. West Point professor Clifford J. Rogers, an expert in medieval military history, walks us through some features that the Normans would find quite normal.

(link) [Wired]

07:53 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

06 Sep 2010
The Web Is Dead

Sure it is...

Two decades after its birth, the World Wide Web is in decline, as simpler, sleeker services — think apps — are less about the searching and more about the getting. Chris Anderson explains how this new paradigm reflects the inevitable course of capitalism. And Michael Wolff explains why the new breed of media titan is forsaking the Web for more promising (and profitable) pastures.

(link) [Wired]

09:31 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

03 Sep 2010
GCC - 'We make free software affordable'

Fascinating history of the most widely used compiler suite.

GCC and GNU Emacs are the two facets of the GNU operating system that have probably done more than any other to take GNU and free software from idealistic concept to a utilitarian reality.

(link) [The H Open Source]

22:17 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

14 Aug 2010
Oracle's Java Suit Gives Jolt

I got tired of Java's failed "write once, run anywhere" promise years ago - and if this kind of legal wrangling heats up, maybe more developers will discover the joys of like I did.

Oracle Corp.'s legal action against Google Inc. reverberated through Silicon Valley, prompting fears that court battles over Java software may spread beyond cellphones to other tech sectors.

(link) [WSJ Online]

06:58 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

11 Aug 2010
Surgery and sightseeing on your boss' dime

I bet you can get some sweet deals on surgery in India...

Tina Follett and her husband Patrick are in Panama on a two-week all-expenses paid trip. But Tina isn't on vacation. She's there to get surgery.

(link) [CNN]

20:44 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

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