Clash of the cyberworlds

Battle for the Internet

Ideas and ideologies, images and reports of events, both minor and cataclysmic, fly on the Internet, swirling through cyberspace, gathering resonance, metamorphosing and touching millions of lives in different ways. Many of the ideas—and visuals—could be banal (as they very often are), some dangerous, others bringing promise of change. Some have the power to subvert, helping to stir and stoke the smouldering embers of political and social unrest as recent uprisings in north Africa, West Asia and Asia have shown. To many, the Internet is the rebel hero of our times, subverting conventional media and leaking news and information that governments would like to censor. Even a village in the remote reaches of Odisha’s Malkangiri district which may have no electricity is in some way linked to cyberspace through smart cell phones because mobile operators are increasingly turning Internet service providers (ISPs) and bringing the worldwide web to the conflict-ridden forests of central India.

Two technologies that shape our future

A tremor ran through the cutting- edge electric car industry last month. Mathieu Tenenbaum, working with French automaker Renault, was just another faceless name till then. But one espionage story that hit the newsstands made him infamous in a single stroke.

2008 A lunar odyssey

From a pariah after Pokhran II to scientific self esteem, India raced its way to the moon. Archita Bhatta tracked the nation's voyage to find what were its compulsions and urges to get there

Foss time in India

February 27-March 10, 2008. As the Secondary School Leaving Certificate (Class x) exams unfold across government schools in Kerala, students appearing for 'it Practicals' key in their answers into a computer that runs on foss, acronym for free and open source software. These students are comfortable with foss usage.

India's Chandrayaan programme is "ambitious"

Till 1999, India's space programme was focussed on application-driven projects. Sending satellites to space with an eye to immediate benefits. But that didn't mean that space scientists weren't nursing the desire to explore space from more of a pure science perspective.

Miles to go

For India, space is not the final frontier to be conquered. The country’s performance in solving mundane problems such as poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition may be dismal, but its space programme is soaring high. Its latest achievement: the May 5, 2005, launch of Cartosat-1, a satellite for mapmaking, with a 2.5 metre resolution. The 1,560 kilogramme (kg) Cartosat is the only satellite in the world with two panchromatic cameras positioned so as to measure even the elevation of the terrain mapped, allowing almost instant generation of 3-dimensional maps.

Why can't Indians access maps for 43 per cent of their country?

Hilltop to desktop Technology advances have transformed the way maps are made When the Survey of India (SoI) was set up 237 years ago, in Dehradun, map making was akin to pure art. It required steady hands and a keen eye, and demanded months, at times years, of painstaking labour. The first maps were made on parchment using brushes.

small in size, big problem

The Western world has come a long way in its drive to reduce air pollution from vehicles. Just over a decade back, the focus was on total suspended particulate matter (which includes natural dust too) and the black smoke vehicles emitted. Epidemiological evidence made governments shift the focus to respirable particles (particles smaller than 10 micron).

SSP falls prey to political machinations