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Until very recently, technology had a clear, if boring, purpose: by taking care of the Little Things, it enabled us, its human masters, to focus on the Big Things. "Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible, uninteresting work, culture and contemplation become almost impossible," proclaimed that noted connoisseur of contemplation Oscar Wilde. Fortunately, he added a charming clarification: "Human slavery is wrong, insecure and demoralizing. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends." ...Alas, most designers, following Wilde, think of technologies as nothing more than mechanical slaves that must maximize efficiency. But some are realizing that technologies don't have to be just trivial problem-solvers: they can also be subversive troublemakers, making us question our habits and received ideas. Recently, designers in Germany built devices - "transformational products," they call them - that engage users in "conversations without words." My favorite is a caterpillar-shaped extension cord. If any of the devices plugged into it are left in standby mode, the "caterpillar" starts twisting as if it were in pain. Does it do what normal extension cords do? Yes. But it also awakens users to the fact that the cord is simply the endpoint of a complex socio-technical system with its own politics and ethics. Before, designers have tried to conceal that system. In the future, designers will be obliged to make it visible. While devices-as-problem-solvers seek to avoid friction, devices-as-troublemakers seek to create an "aesthetic of friction" that engages users in new ways. Will such extra seconds of thought - nay, contemplation - slow down civilization? They well might. But who said that stopping to catch a breath on our way to the abyss is not a sensible strategy?

China has nothing comparable to the research, industrial and economic resources of the United States. Yet the Chinese are blowing us away in the technology race to the future

see esepciallty "get a better deal from your cable provider" & "saving files & photos on cloud"

it is precisely because science is so powerful that we need the humanities now more than ever. In your science, mathematics and engineering classes, you're given facts, answers, knowledge, truth. Your professors say, "This is how things are." They give you certainty. The humanities, at least the way I teach them, give you uncertainty, doubt and skepticism. The humanities are subversive. They undermine the claims of all authorities, whether political, religious or scientific. This skepticism is especially important when it comes to claims about humanity, about what we are, where we came from, and even what we can be and should be. Science has replaced religion as our main source of answers to these questions. Science has told us a lot about ourselves, and we're learning more every day. But the humanities remind us that we have an enormous capacity for deluding ourselves. They also tell us that every single human is unique, different than every other human, and each of us keeps changing in unpredictable ways. The societies we live in also keep changing-in part because of science and technology! So in certain important ways, humans resist the kind of explanations that science gives us.

In a globalized economy, the countries that pay the most and offer the greatest chance for advancement tend to get the top talent. South America's best soccer players generally migrate to Europe, where the salaries are high and the tournaments are glitzier than those in Brazil or Argentina. Many top high-tech workers from India and China move to the United States to work for American companies. And the United States, with its high salaries and technological innovation, is also the world's most powerful magnet for doctors, attracting more every year than Britain, Canada and Australia - the next most popular destinations for migrating doctors - combined.

'Adrienne Asch, an internationally known bioethicist who opposed the use of prenatal testing and abortion to select children free of disabilities, a stance informed partly by her own experience of blindness, died on Nov. 19 at her home in Manhattan. She was 67. 'In an article in The American Journal of Public Health in 1999, Professor Asch laid out her philosophy in no uncertain terms: "If public health espouses goals of social justice and equality for people with disabilities - as it has worked to improve the status of women, gays and lesbians, and members of racial and ethnic minorities - it should reconsider whether it wishes to continue the technology of prenatal diagnosis," she wrote. 'She added: "My moral opposition to prenatal testing and selective abortion flows from the conviction that life with disability is worthwhile and the belief that a just society must appreciate and nurture the lives of all people, whatever the endowments they receive in the natural lottery." '

God knows, there was great literature before there was the codex, and should it pass away, there will be great literature after it. But if we stop reading on paper, we should keep in mind what we're sacrificing: that nonlinear experience, which is unique to the codex. You don't get it from any other medium - not movies, or TV, or music or video games. The codex won out over the scroll because it did what good technologies are supposed to do: It gave readers a power they never had before, power over the flow of their own reading experience. And until I hear God personally say to me, "Boot up and read," I won't be giving it up.

iPhone aps to alter photos ($1-3)

Especially Virgin Mobile's Novatel, via Sprint 3G (except no roaming) - only $40/mo. Only connection to desktop must be wireless (no USB connector for communication). Need wall charger. No contract; sign on & "pre-pay" as needed. Can provide high-speed for laptop OR computer.

Better Calling for Less: With a solid signal, smart-phone users of Wi-Fi phone applications (e.g., with Skype) should have good sound quality and no dropped calls, in WiFi zone (instead of using cell towers, etc.)

Small, competent, 12 megapixels, 3-in screens, hi-def video capture, image stabiliz'n, face recognition, zoom 10-12X. BUT: still shutter lag, low-light noise, blown-out highlights.

Palm Pre- & Pixi-Plus phones via Sprint & Verizon - advtgs include multitasking (eg, music while checking email), BECOMES WiFi hot spot (which others can use w/i 150 ft) at $40 extra/mo. "Good for non-techies"

See esp. recycling options