A new magazine called H+ has launched and I have an article in its first edition (“Science Fiction Gets Funding”). It’s edited by cyberculture icon RU Sirius and is published by Humanity Plus (aka the World Transhumanist Association). Here’s some media coverage of the launch: Boing Boing, Kurzweil.net.

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The financial crisis currently consuming the U.S. has led tech industry leaders, such as Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, to speak out in favor of quick Congressional action. Tech stocks, as well as general stocks, have plummeted, and there is confusion over why this crisis is happening and spreading so fast. One explanation that makes a lot [...]

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Nine months after Barack Obama, John McCain has unveiled his own technology plan for America. At last, both candidates can be graded for their long-term friendliness to the tech sector. You can read my analysis here, but the upshot is that Obama has multiple weaknesses, particularly when it comes to taxes, property rights, labor and [...]

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When it comes to the Internet, Republican presidential candidate John McCain recently said that he’s “an illiterate who has to rely on his wife for any assistance he can get.” In an era where the Internet is playing an ever greater role, does such an admission matter, and does it say anything important about the [...]

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More than 200 scientists and longevity activists gathered at UCLA recently to discuss advancements in repairing humans. New technology is making it possible to imagine a world with ever greater life spans, but old world issues pervaded the discussions. The Methuselah Foundation’s Aubrey de Grey organized the event and kicked it off with a theoretical [...]

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Last week, President Bush signed into law the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA), which will protect individuals from employer and insurance discrimination based on the results of high-tech gene tests. Fighting discrimination is a good idea, but the lack of opposition to GINA points to some potentially serious problems. GINA passed the Senate unanimously and [...]

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At last week’s UCLA Technology & Aging Conference, representatives from Intel, Microsoft, Qualcomm, Toyota and other big-name firms discussed how technology is reshaping lifestyles for older individuals. However, important policy implications directly connected to these new tools went unspoken. RFID (radio frequency identification) tags that can monitor the status of older individuals, face-recognition video systems [...]

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As baby boomers are repainting the aging landscape, new products dedicated to fighting aging are cropping up. However, these products aren’t only for older generations — younger groups could also utilize them to detect problems early on. Read more here.

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Google’s recent announcement that it is creating a home for personal health records online is a natural outgrowth of Silicon Valley’s Web 2.0 consumer Internet focus. The question this raises is whether a market-driven system is better for keeping health records than one run by the government. Groups like the World Privacy Forum worry that [...]

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This week marked the anniversary of the announcement that the satellite radio firms Sirius and XM plan to merge, yet so far the companies have not been allowed to consummate the marriage. That’s because regulators are standing in the way, backed by well-heeled Washington lobbyists out to prove that ridiculous ideas still have an impact [...]

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The next generation of parents is set to embrace genetic testing of kids for diseases that may occur later in life, according to a study published in the American Journal of Medical Genetics. This is big news given that many medical professionals oppose the practice and there is a movement in Congress to secure genetic [...]

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At this week’s Digital Life Design (DLD) conference in Germany, renowned scientists Craig Venter, Ph.D., and Richard Dawkins wowed the audience with a conversation about genes and information technology. They discussed how evolution is becoming man-made, which brings up a number of interesting issues. “Genetics has become a branch of information technology,” Dawkins opined. There’s [...]

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Hillary Clinton is my friend. On MySpace, that is. If I were going to vote for the first candidate that responded to my social networking “friend” request, it would be her. Of course, that’s a silly idea, but with all the hoopla over politicians using new technologies, one might ask: How has Web 2.0 changed [...]

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New data released this week shows that human evolution is speeding up — an interesting development given that many in the scientific community are hopeful that humans can take greater control over the process. At a recent conference in San Diego, scholars discussed how various religious orders may perceive radical life extension, one potential path [...]

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Many telecom observers were stunned this week when Verizon announced it would open up its network to “wireless devices, software and applications not offered by the company.” This change in policy is good for consumers and worth closer examination, especially on the business side. Verizon’s “walled garden” required consumers to use a Verizon-chosen phone in [...]

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Presidential candidate Ron Paul (R-Texas) became the “Internet” candidate this month when 36,672 people contributed more than US$4 million online to his campaign in a single 24-hour period. This impressive feat demonstrates the power of an open source culture, a lesson that should not be lost when it comes to other important issues. The campaign [...]

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America’s first baby boomer, Kathleen Casey-Kirschling, recently signed up for the Social Security benefits that she will start to collect in January. The new phase of life that she and her generation are entering is creating demand for new industries that affect everyone, one of which involves “brain fitness.” Brain fitness is exactly what it [...]

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At a time when most people agree that Google or Apple have replaced Microsoft as the tech industry’s top player, government regulators on two continents are going retro, pushing old antitrust arguments. This backward-looking thinking threatens innovation for all companies and needs to stop now. While the technology community has moved from obsessing over operating [...]

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This week, Dr. Gordon Lithgow, associate professor at the Buck Institute, showed up in San Francisco and spoke to a packed house on aging, new technologies and why interdisciplinary connections are helping to unravel the mysteries of growing old. While politics often slows down progress, computer scientists can play a role in speeding things up. [...]

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Google’s mapping service just introduced a new feature called “Street View,” offering detailed photos of addresses in San Francisco, New York, Las Vegas, Denver and Miami. While the company might not be breaking any privacy laws, the service raises concerns that need to be addressed. The photographs are not live and were taken from a [...]

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