Chad's News

I’ve been a member of USAA since 1986 and have had a USAA checking account for quite some time. USAA is by far the best bank I’ve ever used. Even though it’s located in Texas, it deals with military members scattered throughout the world, and therefore makes long-distance banking quite easy.

USAA offers different services, based mainly on whether or not you (or a parent/spouse) is serving or has served in the military. Membership has its privileges, and I recommend joining if you qualify. But many of the banking services are available to the general public. The USAA website has more information about membership requirements and benefits, and the linked article discusses the banking aspect in more detail.

Link: http://consumerist.com/…

This year’s Ig Nobel prizes were awarded on October 1st. It was a fairly weak field, but here are some of the better ones (see the linked article for the full list):

• Medicine: Donald L. Unger, of Thousand Oaks, California, USA, for investigating a possible cause of arthritis of the fingers, by diligently cracking the knuckles of his left hand — but never cracking the knuckles of his right hand — every day for more than sixty (60) years.
• Veterinary Medicine: Catherine Douglas and Peter Rowlinson of Newcastle University, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, UK, for showing that cows who have names give more milk than cows that are nameless.
• Peace Prize: Stephan Bolliger, Steffen Ross, Lars Oesterhelweg, Michael Thali and Beat Kneubuehl of the University of Bern, Switzerland, for determining — by experiment — whether it is better to be smashed over the head with a full bottle of beer or with an empty bottle.
• Chemistry: Javier Morales, Miguel Apátiga, and Victor M. Castaño of Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, for creating diamonds from liquid — specifically from tequila.

Link: http://improbable.com/…
(via Neatorama)

The linked article has the best days and times to buy 14 different products.

Link: http://www.billshrink.com/…

An abridged version of Star Wars by a three year old girl. It’s pretty amazing how much she knows.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/…
(via SciFi Squad)

Here’s a neat chess set you can make from nuts and bolts. The instructions are in a flickr photo stream.

Link: http://www.flickr.com/…
(via Lifehacker)

Whenever I hear an expert say that life would not be possible if some physical constant or feature of the Earth had been slightly different, I remind myself that it’s really life as we know it that would not be possible.

Link: http://xkcd.com/…

I remember hearing about the Tweel and thinking what a great idea it was—no more flat tires and no more wasted gas or uneven wear due to improper inflation. Unfortunately, Michelin hasn’t done much with the technology. But now there’s another contender in the airless tire arena. Let’s hope this military technology makes its way to the consumer market sometime soon.

Link: http://www.gizmag.com/…
(via Neatorama)

Over the past several years there have been many cases of people and institutions getting in trouble because of poorly-secured wireless networks (e.g., the now-famous T.J. Maxx credit card theft). The linked article has another example, this time a home user whose network was used to illegally transmit child pornography. In these situations, the police confiscate your computer equipment with no warning. Then it’s up to you to get a lawyer, defend yourself in court, and try to get your stuff back.

While the official Chad’s News position is that there is no such thing as wireless security, it’s still possible to make intrusion difficult enough that you’ll be left alone. For starters, use the WPA2 security protocol. If your wireless router does not support WPA2, then consider getting a newer one. Also, be sure that your router has the latest firmware updates. Finally, there are a few additional steps you can take—none of which will work against a determined hacker, but which will make your system less tempting. The absolute worst situation is to have no wireless security at all. It’s the computer equivalent of leaving your car with doors unlocked, windows down, and keys in the ignition.

Link: http://www.komando.com/…

Lifehacker performed some non-scientific speed tests on the latest versions of popular browsers. As expected, Google Chrome completely destroyed the others in the JavaScript category. This is why I use Chrome for Facebook—Firefox just can’t handle it on my underpowered machine. The only reason I stay with Firefox is because of its wide variety of extensions. Note that I was a bit surprised to see that Apple’s Safari also had very fast JavaScript processing.

Link: http://lifehacker.com/…

Ever wondered why human babies take so long to become functional, while many animals are able to walk and take care of themselves shortly after birth? It comes down to brain and pelvis size. If the baby’s brain was large enough for it to be self-sufficient, both the mother and the baby would die during birth.

When our ancestors started walking on two legs, it reduced the size of the human pelvis, thus making the birth canal smaller. In addition, the human brain got bigger, requiring a larger birth canal. Obviously something had to give. What happens is that the baby is born with an immature brain that’s small enough to allow passage through the birth canal. Then the brain continues to develop afterward.

Link: http://www.scientificamerican.com/…
(via Neatorama)

Here at the Chad’s News network command center, we have long been aware of the difference between the hard disk capacity reported in decimal bytes by the manufacturer and the the same capacity reported in binary bytes by Windows. In fact, I was once published in a print magazine after the editors incorrectly answered a question on the subject.

Most computer programmers and system engineers already know why one kilobyte (KB) can either be 1000 or 1024 bytes, and the more experienced ones know that a kibibyte (KiB) is always 1024. For others, the linked article explains all. I found the most useful part of the article to be Tables E and F, which list the measurement type used for various protocols and computer components.

Link: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/…

As I grow older, I’m amazed to see the creation of technologies that I once read about in science fiction books. The Japanese government is spending $22 billion on a project to put a large solar panel array in orbit that will generate energy and beam it down to the Earth.

Link: http://www.scientificamerican.com/…
(via digg)