2005

A group of German and Australian scientists have developed a new way of producing hydrogen from sunlight using genetically engineered algae. The scheme produces 13 times as much of the gas than a previous method of getting tiny plants to make it, and according to the team leader, it might be commercialised within five years,…

Spyblog discusses the leaked report in this weekend’s Observer that the intelligence services were considering as long ago as the summer of 2004 whether it was wise to have agents start posting to jihadi “websites” – bulletin boards presumably – in order to gain the trust of their members and persuade them against turning to…

The German election campaign is cranking up to as close to a throbbing wave of intensity as you are likely to find in modern Germany. Very soon, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder is going to take on the CDU’s Angela Merkel in a televised debate. Merkel has always had to do it tough in the CDU, as…

Longstanding TYR colleague Kathryn Cramer has given over her blog lock, stock and barrel to providing sources of satellite imagery and geographic data, Google Earth/Maps hacks and such to those seeking information from New Orleans. The quality of what is available, and the depth of information (overlaying addresses, depths of water and damage reports onto…

Jacques Chirac worked as a taxi driver in New Orleans as a student back in 1953. Who knew? The frantically prolific David MacDuff has an interesting article about the White Guard in Chechnya, 1919. It seems they did far better than today’s Russian army in dealing with a Chechen guerrilla insurgency, through a combination of…

The FCC has got in touch with BoingBoing, begging for backbone networks geeks and kit…but no-one wants to mention Telecoms Sans Frontieres. Funny that. They have access to world-class network engineering companies and their own satellite backhaul – but they are French. I can’t pick any other possible explanation. Sad, isn’t it?

Christopher Hitchens on Newsnight: They’re not mostly Americans – really from the isthmus and the Caribbean. It’s a sign the American dream still exists that they are willing to live below sea level for it But, of course… There is of course a shared humanity Surely there is. You unforgivable whore. It might once have…

Well, I promised to insult Leeds RLFC as much as I dissed Hull, so here goes. This weekend saw a Challenge Cup final that lived up to the billing I gave it. I said the Leeds/Hull grudge intensity would rock the Pennines even though it was played in Cardiff, and – yes. The match was…

The BoingBoingers are running at top speed trying to bring light, or more accurately TCP/IP data access, to the darkness of refugees fleeing New Orleans. Now, much as I respect the BB team and the brilliance of Cory Doctorow, this is not terribly smart. There is already an outfit that specialises in bringing communications technology…

Anthony Wells has a typically encyclopaedic post up regarding Ken Clarke’s entry to the Tory leadership campaign. There’s all the usual Wellsian statsy goodness, and some very interesting points about just how popular the lover of, ahem, smoky late night jazz is, despite being unfashionable on Europe and, as AW points out, frequently despised when…