Michael Shermer’s Baloney Detection Kit

Michael Shermer from Skeptic Magazine (and columnist in SciAm) took Carl Sagan’s idea that we need a Boloney Detection Kit to sift through all the boloney out there, and proposed this solution.

The summary of it is as follows:

1. How reliable is the source of the claim?
2. Does the source make similar claims?
3. Have the claims been verified by somebody else?
4. Does this fit with the way the world works?
5. Has anyone tried to disprove the claim?
6. Where does the preponderance of evidence point?
7. Is the claimant playing by the rules of science?
8. Is the claimant providing positive evidence?
9. Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory?
10. Are personal beliefs driving their claim?

Google ponies up $1/2 BILLION fine to DOJ

As per JetLaw's June7th article, google is looking at coughing up some serious coin (even for google) for showing "illegal online pharmacy ads".

"Google is facing a $500 million dollar fine “in connection with a potential resolution of an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice into the use of Google advertising by certain advertisers,” they disclosed in their 10-Q last week."

HuffPosts August 24th article points out that google chose to settle paying the full half billion so that they would not face criminal charges.

"It sends a clear message to both Google and to others that contribute to America's pill problem that they will be held to account for endangering the health and safety of the residents of this district and to persons all across the United States," said Neronha, who described the forfeiture as one of the largest in U.S. history.

It will be interesting to see how this will change how you get your adds included in Googles AdSense.

As a (Jan 24, 2012) followup, slashdot notes that

PC Magazine reports that the U.S. government used convicted con artist David Whitaker, owner of an online business selling steroids and human growth hormone to U.S. consumers, to help federal agents in a sting operation against Google when he began advertising with Google with advertisements that included the statement 'no prescription needed,' clearly violating U.S. laws.

War Flying

geek.com has a writeup about Mike Tassey and Richard Perkins who built a very cool remote RC plane that scans the airwaves below it, tracks wifi nets, and pen tests them. It runs the full backtrack suite on the plane, and can be remotely managed, but it can also do everything (fly and sniff) on its own.

The "World's Largest" Stop Motion Animation Was Created With A Nokia N8

Known as the best phone in the world with the worst UI, here's a cute video made with the Nokia N8. (and a short writeup of it in FastCompany.)

Gulp. The world's largest stop-motion animation shot on a Nokia N8. from Nokia HD on Vimeo.