The Geek Guide to the Upcoming Fall TV Season

By Casey Lynn
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

You may recall that last Fall we gave you the heads-up on some new, potentially geeky TV shows. Of course, as a whole that batch didn’t fare so well; Eleventh Hour, Life on Mars, My Own Worst Enemy, and Knight Rider (shocker!) all got the ax. Only two turned out to be hits: Fringe will be returning to NBC in the Fall with new cast member Leonard Nimoy, and the second season of True Blood begins airing on HBO on June 14.

Now that the major networks have announced their Fall line-ups, here’s hoping that this year’s new science fiction and fantasy shows will be more successful! Below is a rundown of some new shows that geeks might want to set their TIVOs for in the Fall, along with news on which old favorites will live to see another season.

Day One (NBC)

Described as a cross between Cloverfield and Lost, this new science fiction series is about a group of apartment dwellers in California dealing with the end of the world. It was created by Jesse Alexander, a former producer for Heroes, Lost, and Alias. The small band of survivors include a former marine, a computer genius from MIT, and a couple of obligatory hot girls, who have to try to rebuild society while unraveling the mystery of why the event took place. Also, this show isn’t starting until the Spring. Apparently NBC is looking to push this one hard because they’re putting it into the comfy Heroes time slot.

Eastwick (ABC)

Based on the 1987 film and/or the John Updike novel, this show is another version of The Witches of Eastwick. It stars Rebecca Romijn (remember the blue body paint and strategically-placed prosthetics in X-Men?), Lindsay Price (from the newly canceled Lipstick Jungle), and Jamie Ray Newman as suburbanites with supernatural powers. I can just hear the elevator pitch for this one: “It’s Harry Potter meets Desperate Housewives!”

V (ABC)

In the recent tradition of classic Sci-Fi reboots, V is a new version of the 1983 miniseries about a race of aliens called “the visitors” that arrive on Earth. The reboot stars Elizabeth Mitchell from Lost as a Homeland Security agent and the gorgeous Morena Baccarin (Inara from Firefly) as the leader of the aliens, and at least the pilot features another one of Joss Whedon’s pet actors, Alan Tudyk. The producer is the same guy who did The 4400, but the producer of the original series is not involved. The trailer actually looks pretty good; maybe this one is stepping up to fill some of the void left by the end of Battlestar Galactica.

Vampire Diaries (CW)

This newest in the line of the CW’s teenage dramas is based on a series of YA novels that were published in the early 90’s. The story centers on a high school girl torn between two vampire brothers, one good and one evil. This one’s kind of a no-brainer, an attempt to cash in on the recent Twilight craze. Even the books’ author wrote another book in the series after a fifteen-year hiatus. The show will probably be a hit, but if you’re over the age of sixteen, I’d just skip it and watch True Blood instead.

Also, don’t forget: there are some new shows coming up from the SciFi channel as well.

And the news on the existing geeky TV fare out there? Along with Fringe and True Blood, Heroes (NBC), Chuck (NBC), Big Bang Theory (CBS), The Mentalist (CBS), Ghost Whisperer (CBS), Numb3rs (CBS), and Dollhouse (FOX – yay, that one was a nail biter!) have all been renewed. Meanwhile, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (FOX), Pushing Daisies (ABC), and Reaper (CW) have been canceled. And Medium, which was canceled by NBC, has been picked up by CBS.

For an idea of what the schedule looks like for now, TV Guide has a handy grid.



Google Chrome 2.0 Released

Even though the jump from version 1.0 to 2.0 sounds dramatic, Google Chrome 2.0 doesn’t look all that different from its predecessor at first glance. However, the browser now renders pages 25% to 35% faster and is apparently a lot more stable than before. Unfortunately, Mac and Linux users will still have to wait a while to get their own version of Chrome.

[Google Chrome 2]

Using iPhones to Track Students

By Casey Lynn
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

schoolThe headline to this story from a Japenese newspaper is “Aoyama Gakuin U. To Hand Out Free iPhones to Students.” I guess whether you see it that way or as “using iPhones to track students” is kind of a glass half empty or half full kind of thing. But it’s not as if they’re Santa Claus, giving away free phones as a philanthropic gesture. They’re “phasing out traditional methods of taking attendance” in favor of using the GPS tracking on iPhones to determine whether students are in school or not. Maybe they should just skip the phones altogether and start embedding in students’ hands those little RFID chips that are put into pets.

I am suddenly reminded of Cory Doctorow’s YA near-future novel Little Brother (which you can read for free), which describes a lot of fun ways that an American high school uses technology to control its students. These include gait recognition cameras, RFID tags in library books (“It was another of those legal loopholes: the courts wouldn’t let the schools track us with arphids, but they could track library books, and use the school records to tell them who was likely to be carrying which library book.”), and of course, the philanthropic gesture of providing every student with a laptop – which only runs Windows Vista4Schools, an operating system filled with spyware and keyloggers that send data to the school.

So maybe I’m being a glass half empty by finding the iPhone thing to be pretty creepy, but it’s all about baby steps. Because if you’re concerned that the government is spying on you, it’s nothing compared to what schools can get away with.

[Image Source: Flickr]



Apple gossip-mongers keep taking the tablets

There are more rumors this week that Apple is planning a tablet computer – an internet-enabled device with a large touchscreen rather than a separate keyboard. But the excitement appears to be based on who the rumors come from, not the detail behind it.

The basics of the rumors have been floating around for some time: it’s arguably a natural market gap; the latest iPhone operating system’s code refers to new devices; Apple has filed patents (pictured) which appear to cover a tablet; and the firm has reportedly reached deals with Chinese suppliers for relevant components such as screens.

The sudden flurry of interest this week is down to a prediction by Gene Munster, an analyst for Piper Jaffray. He makes a career of advising investors about the likely moves which will affect company performance. In some cases his predictions appear to be based on fairly simple logic rather than insider information, but firms pay close attention to what he says, simply because he has such a strong (and lucrative) reputation on the line when he makes predictions.

Jaffray believes Apple will indeed launch a tablet computer, likely next year, for somewhere between $500 and $700. He also suggests the device will be able to download and run applications from the iTunes App Store.

Other reports from mainstream sources such as the Wall Street Journal and Reuters this week suggest the device may be larger than previously though, with a screen as large as 10 inches in diameter.

If these predictions do come true, the big question is whether consumers will see the device as filling a gap in the market, or if it will fall victim to the dual problem of coming across as both an expensive iPod touch and a low-spec MacBook.

Are we in control of our own decisions?

In the following video presentation, behavioral economist Dan Ariely, the author of Predictably Irrational, uses classic visual illusions and his own counterintuitive (and sometimes shocking) research findings to show how we’re not as rational as we think when we make decisions.

National Archives loses Clinton-era government data

When you work for a Federal body and lose a hard drive containing data for more than 100,000 people, it’s pretty embarrassing. But it must feel even worse when you describe yourself as “the nation’s record keeper.”

The National Archives and Record Administration agency, which keeps and maintains around 2% of government documents for legal and historical purposes, has lost a two terabyte hard drive containing records from the Executive Office of the President covering the Clinton administration.

The good news is that the records themselves are not lost to posterity as this was simply one of two hard-drive back-ups of the main tape cartridge records. The bad news is that the disk is reportedly unencrypted, though the NARA did not address that point in a press statement.

The disk contained a mix of records as it was a ‘snapshot’ of the data from computers belonging to staff who left their posts at the end of Clinton’s period in office. The NARA confirmed that the data did contain names and social security numbers for former Clinton staff and visitors to the White House during the time, which suggests security records may be involved. The disks apparently contained some details of operating procedures for both the White House and the Secret Service but it’s said there are no documents dealing with “national security”.

At the moment it’s not known whether the drive was stolen or merely misplaced, but NARA is offering a $50,000 reward for information which leads to its return. The agency is still working to identify people whose data was contained on the disks but says it will inform everyone concerned and offer them a credit monitoring service for a year.

Technorama’s Aluminum Facade Teaches About Wind Currents And Turbulence

In 2002, Technorama, a major science center in Switzerland, asked Ned Kahn to create an aluminum facade for its building, consisting of thousands of aluminum panels that move in the wind, teaching its visitors about air currents and the complex patterns of turbulence caused by them.

[Via OhGizmo]

Geeks in Bed: Less Selfish, More Adventurous

By Casey Lynn
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

geekinbedA recent study in the UK revealed that geeks are good in bed – or at least, less selfish than, for example, gym rats. Four out of five geeks agreed that your partner’s pleasure is more important than your own, as opposed to less than half of respondents who work in the sports and fitness industry. Also, tech industry professionals are far more likely to use sex toys (eight out of ten!).

Granted, this wasn’t exactly the most scientific study, based on survey results and a sample of only about 2000 British men and women who voluntarily answered a survey which happened to have been conducted by a video game website. But it’s interesting food for thought.  But then, around here there’s never been any doubt that geeks are sexy.

One delightful survey trend: those who are more interested in gadgets and new technology are also interested in experimenting with sex toys.

[Via SourceWire; Image Source: Flickr]

Google to end trips to the meter cupboard

Google says a tool it designed for householders to measure their electricity use is so successful that utility companies around the world have signed up to extend it across their customer base.

The technology, Google Power Meter, only works in homes with a ‘smart’ meter, an electronic device which measures power consumption in more detail than a standard dial meter. The Google software allows users to hook their computers up to the meter and analyze their usage, giving them a better idea of when and how they might be able to cut their power costs. The system appears to let users make a note of when particular devices are switched on and measure their direct effect on power consumption – and the associated costs.

The firm has now signed deals with six US power companies, plus firms in Canada and India, which already have smart meters in many or all of their customers’ homes. Google says the scheme is currently only available to some customers, but will be rolled out later this year.

Google is also working with Itron, a firm which helps 8,000 utility firms run smart meter schemes, to integrate Google Power Meter with its technology. Meanwhile General Electric says it is working on a project to produce smart meters which have the Google tool built-in directly.

The big change with Google’s system is that it harnesses the information from smart meters for the consumer’s use. Generally, smart meters are designed mainly to provide utility firms with more detail on patterns of use so that they can anticipate spikes in demand. There have been fears that ‘smart grids’ which connect such meters wirelessly could be vulnerable to hackers.