Considering the number of kidney transplants done in the US every year (13,000 in 2002, according to the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients), it shouldn't be too much of a surprise that there are some interesting webs of connection between recipients. Here's an amusing one from Baltimore, courtesy of …

A new film into which Mel Gibson has poured over US$25M is causing contention among Christians and Jews even before its release scheduled for next March, according to an article in the New York Times. The Passion, is a retelling of the final hours of the life of Jesus …

The Pew Forum on Religion in Public Life has just released a report entitled Religion and Politics: Contention and Consensus. I have read a couple of articles about this survey, but being able to look at the raw questions is interesting. The survey covers a large number of issues in …

I read with interest a pretty rational article from the New York Times this morning. This is likely the first article to reasonably explain what has been seen since the invasion and what the intelligence services worldwide were seeing before it, but it still leaves room for debate. The basic …

I'm still in the process of downloading copies of the latest Panther Server and Client (I have to do so quickly, because Apple's now sending me three pestering messages a week asking me to see if they've fixed my bugs reported in 10.2). However, there are plenty of other …

I came in half way through this paper session, because I had started the day in Fluids and Smoke. The two papers that I witnessed in this session concentrated on lighting and reflections in human tissues and hair, and both had some interesting insights. Image-based Skin Color Simulation by Extracting …

The last day of SIGGRAPH 2003 (Thursday) was the only day during the week that forced paper-goers to choose between multiple sets of papers. The first and last sessions provided this problem, giving way to five paper write-ups with a few fewer papers each than the previous days. As usual …

The Belgian legislature has voted to change the controversial human rights prosecution law such the court now only has jurisdiction when Belgian citizens or property are involved. According to this article from BBC News, the only thing standing in the way of this bill becoming law is the formal signature …

Makayama software (makers of video encoding software for handheld phones) have released software to compress movies using Apple's QuickTime so that they can be watched on a Sony Ericsson P800. The software costs $9.99 and can be purchased online. A two hour movie can be compressed to fit on …

A story from the Scotsman tells that Harvard Law School is in the process of readying over one million pages of documentation from the Nuremberg war crimes trials online. 6,700 pages of documents on the "Doctor's Trial" (about medical experiments carried out by 23 doctors in the Third Reich …

According to an article from CNet this morning that Minnesota Republican, Norm Coleman has sent a letter to the RIAA asking for specifics about their subpoena operation. The lawmaker has said that he is concerned that the industry is using a "shotgun" approach that could harm innocent people. For their …

According to an article from CNet, the Department of Homeland Security is preparing to fund $1B per year in Homeland Security research. So, grab your friends and ready your proposals, because the funding gates are open. Patterned after the Department of Defense's DARPA, HSARPA is intended to provide funding for …

With all of the recent discussions on profiling and the CAPPS system for airport profiling, it appears that one issue was lost: is profiling actually more effective than random searches. According to an article on ACFNewssource, a set of MIT graduate students have put together a paper detailing why random …

The OpenGL ARB (Architecture Review Board) and SGI have announced that version 1.5 of the international graphics standard will be released including the OpenGL Shading Language. Key improvements: OpenGL Shading Language (OGLSL), which provides a vendor-neutral method for high-performance vertex and fragment shaders as well as shader objects. These …

In a story that just continues to get larger and stranger, yet another Baby Bell (this time Pac Bell) is standing up for your rights to privacy. On the heals of Verizon standing firm until an appeals loss earlier this year, PacBell has filed suit against the RIAA claiming that …

Despite recent news of layoffs and accelerated retirements in the Metro design and construction group, it appears that Northern Virginia is still planning to phase in Metro from DC to Dulles Airport, albeit in phases. This according to an article from the Washington Post. The project is supposed to be …

According to a press release by NASA, the ozone layer is still being depleted, but the rate at which it is occurring is on the decrease. Although not yet to the point where we'll be getting back to the pre-CFC state, it does show progress in reversing man-made pollution. There …

Since I've got a DVD version of the 2003 Electronic Theater presentation, I figured I'd do a showing of it before I leave to go to the Canyon. The plan is to do the showing next Sunday (8/10) afternoon at 5pm. Please RSVP if you are interested in coming …

Finding Nemo, Pixar's summer release, has broken $315M in gross revenues, giving it the number one spot for 2003, trumping The Matrix Reloaded by almost $40M so far. Here are some other interesting facts: Nemo has now surpassed Fellowship of the Ring (by a couple million bucks) Nemo is now …

I know, you're sick of hearing me complain about these guys, but here are some more choice complaints from users and musicians. A lengthy article of complaints from a Windows 2000 user who has bought tracks from BuyMusic.com enumerates the following problems: You must download each track in an …