Sci/tech tidbits in and around New Hampshire
Russian effort to crack Tor comes to an end
Speaking of the anonymous-websurfing tool Tor, as we were two posts ago, Bloomberg Business reports that Russian efforts to crack the system, which is popular with dissidents in authoritiative places like, for example, Russia, have failed: The Kremlin was willing to...
Ig, Ig, Ig Nobel!
NHPR uses me for occasional easy content, so it's only fair that I use them for occasional easy blog posts. For example, this one - which urges you to check out my discussion with New Hampshire All Things Considered host Peter Biello about that most wonderfully weird...
Talking Tor – not talkin’ trash – with NH Public Radio
I did my best not to sound ignorant on the NH Public Radio talk show The Exchange today, discussing the West Lebanon, NH, library that got in a bit of a kerfuffle over hosting a Tor node. You can listen to it at their website here - it starts about 40 minutes into the...
Boston firm gets first bitcoin-dealing license, in NY state
The Globe reports (here) that Circle Internet Financial in Boston has gotten the first bitcoin-dealing license ("bitlicense," of course) from New York state. Circle Internet Financial, based in Boston, has outlined security, capitalization, controls against money...
‘Natural’ supplements often contain potent drugs
When it comes to supplements, you and I are guinea pigs, unlike with real drugs, where lab rats (and sometimes guinea pigs) are the guinea pigs. Vox explains why in a good article (read it here) today: To remove a supplement from the market, the FDA first has to prove...
What’s white and white, and prickly all over? Albino porcupine, of coure
Albino animals don't usually do well in the wild, because they're easy to be spotted by prey and predators when it's not snowy (there's a reason that snowshoe hares change color as winter comes) and because melanin is important in the development of the retina and...
NH will never be truly geeky without more Ig Nobel winners
So far as I can tell, there was no New Hampshire connection among any of the winners of the 2015 Ig Nobel awards. Throughout the 25 years this prestigious award has been given, the Granite State's only Igs have been: Four NH doctors were among the 976 authors of a...
Oops … never mind (was: Northern Lights alert)
OK, I'm doing too many things at once ... I linked to an Accu-Weather story about Northern Lights coming that is from last year! (As was pointed out by a couple of commenters.) Move along, nothing to see here.
Ig Nobel prize show was its usual dignified self
I attended 15 Ig Nobel prize awards in a row down at Harvard but have missed the last couple, including last night's - so I'll have to depend on news coverage to tell you how this annual celebration of scientific goofiness went: Guardian: A man stung dozens of times...
If Pilgrim nuclear shuts down, how will the grid react?
The Globe reports that the owners of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station on the coast south of Boston say they may have to shut because safety upgrades are too expensive. A succession of unplanned shutdowns of its reactor in recent years, and inspections that revealed...
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