[From AssociatedPress.com]

TROY, N.Y. (AP) — Edd Hifeng barely merits a second glance in “Second Life.” A steel-gray robot with lanky limbs and linebacker shoulders, he looks like a typical avatar in the popular virtual world.

But Edd is different.

His actions are animated not by a person at a keyboard but by a computer. Edd is a creation of artificial intelligence, or AI, by researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, who endowed him with a limited ability to converse and reason. It turns out “Second Life” is more than a place where pixelated avatars chat, interact and fly about. It’s also a frontier in AI research because it’s a controllable environment where testing intelligent creations is easier.

“It’s a very inexpensive way to test out our technologies right now,” said Selmer Bringsjord, director of the Rensselaer Artificial Intelligence and Reasoning Laboratory.

Bringsjord sees Edd as a forerunner to more sophisticated creations that could interact with people inside three-dimensional projections of settings like subway stops or city streets. He said the holographic illusions could be used to train emergency workers or solve mysteries.

But first, a virtual reality check.

Edd is not running rampant through the cyber streets of “Second Life.” He goes only where Bringsjord and his graduate students place him for tests. He can answer questions like “Where are you from?” but understands only English that has previously been translated into mathematical logic.

“Second Life” is attractive to researchers in part because virtual reality is less messy than plain-old reality. Researchers don’t have to worry about wind, rain or coffee spills.

And virtual worlds can push along AI research without forcing scientists to solve the most difficult problems – like, say, creating a virtual human – right away, said Michael Mateas, a computer science professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

Continue reading this story at AssociatedPress.com

How to make a sawed-off USB Key

“Holy crap– somebody just went and TORE MY FREAKING USB CABLE IN HALF while it was still attached to my laptop!!!

No– wait– sorry. That’s just my USB drive. My bad. Never mind.”

Read more here.

From DailyTech,

NVIDIA’s already candid CEO Jen-Hsun Huang had more than a few things to say during the company’s financial analyst meeting today. An hour into the call Huang began to ad lib; clearly something was on his mind.
“We’re going to open a can of whoop ass,” he told analysts, who quickly broke out into laughter.

Click here to read more.

Dan “Shoe” Hsu, former editor-in-chief of Electronic Gaming Monthly (EGM), has announced that he is leaving Ziff Davis to pursue personl interests. Site Director Sam Kennedy appears to be taking over in Shoe’s role as Editorial Director of 1UP Networks.

This announcements follows the previous announcement that Games For Windows magazine would transition to an Online-Only format, with the physical magazine closing it’s doors.

Read more at Joystiq.

The third installment to the Stargate television series has been revealed. Being in development for more than a year now, this new series is being created by the co-creators of Stargate Atlantis, Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper.

From the exclusive information set to GateWorld.com, it appears that the basis of the series is centered around how the StarGates got on the many planets in the universe.

Read more at GateWorld.com

Much like the AppleTV (at least in outer-design), the Myka is gearing up to be a digital media and content delivery system based on BitTorrent technologies.

Myka calls it “the magic box you’ve been waiting for.”

BitTorrent, for those not in the know, is a way of transfering large files to many users, using the bandwidth of those users for all transfers. Rather than one user sending a file to one other user, one user instead pulls the content from multiple users at once. However, once users turn off their BitTorrent clients, a source of the file is lost and depending on the total number of sources and ’seeds’ (users that have 100% of the file), the overall downloads speeds and final transfer suffer.

With the Myka, the potential for Torrent management could make this box a great competitor for the AppleTV, as well as open it up to more user generated content. The box, theoreticly, could activate, throttle, and turn off transfers at will depending on the number of users currently sharing the file. This, however, is not mentioned on the Myka website and is mearly wishful thinking on my part.

As for the specs of the device:

• WiFi Enabled – 802.11/g
• Ethernet Connector
• HDMI, Composite, S-Video and SPDIF ports
• Internal Hard Drive ranging from 80GB ($299.00) to 500GB ($459.00)
• Front and Rear USB ports for future expansion
• 16 MP of Flash Memory (I assume for software updates)
• 256MB DDRAM
• Runs on a varient of Linux
• Supports MPEG-2, H.264, VC1, WMV9, DivX 3, 4 and 5, MPEG-4 Video codecs
• 4:3 (full-screen) and 16:9 (wide-screen)
• Standard & High Definition Formats: 480i, 480p, 576i, 576p, 720p, 1080i (i hope support for 1080p is added before release)
• MPEG, MP3, AAC and WMA Audio Codecs
• 32-levels of volume with mute
• Outputs in Mono, Stereo and Dolby Digital

Currently Myka is taking pre-orders for this device, but I suggest waiting until it is released and keep an eye out for any bugs or hot-fixes. Best to be a 2nd generation adopter than a 1st gen one.

[From SaveTheInternet.com] “There was huge turnout at today’s public hearing in Boston on the future of the Internet. Hundreds of concerned citizens arrived to speak out on the importance of an open Internet. Many took the day off from work — standing outside in the Boston cold — to see the FCC Commissioners. But when they reach the door, they’re told they couldn’t come in.”

Click here to continue the story.