Ted Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber, wanted to make sure his fellow Harvard University alumni knew what he has been up to. In an alumni report for the class of 1962, ahead of their 50th reunion, the Boston Globe reports that Kaczynski listed "8 life sentences" under the Awards section. If anyone wants to reach him, he listed his home address as "No. 04475-046, US Penitentiary—Max, P.O. Box 8500, Florence, CO 8126-8500.” In the back of the "Harvard and Radcliffe Classes of 1962 -- Fiftieth Anniversary Report," Kaczynski was listed in the state-by-state listings as a Colorado resident. "He’s more famous than anyone else in our class," Gary G. Peterson, a '62 Harvard grad, recently said in a separate article in the Harvard Crimson. ... Continue reading →

“When Fortuna spins you downward, go out to a movie and get more out of life.” - Ignatius J. Reilly, A Confederacy of Dunces John Kennedy Toole’s posthumously Pulitzer Prize-winning novel may finally be taking its protagonist’s advice: Vulture hears exclusively that Flight of the Conchords co-creator and The Muppets director James Bobin is in negotiations to at long last bring the picaresque paean to New Orleans to the big screen via producer Scott Rudin and Paramount Pictures. We hear the script will be fashioned by Cedar Rapids screenwriter Phil Johnston (who also co-wrote Alexander Payne’s forthcoming Nebraska) and that, perhaps best of all, the seemingly perfectly-matched Zach Galifianakis is attached to the project to star as Reilly. Now, of course, let's don’t get too ... Continue reading →

By Peter Schmidt Washington Lawyers for a white student who is challenging the race-conscious admissions policy of the University of Texas at Austin have told the U.S. Supreme Court that the dispute may give the justices reason to revisit, and potentially overrule, a landmark 2003 decision upholding the use of affirmative-action preferences to promote campus diversity. In the lower courts, the student's lawyers focused on arguing that the University of Texas's admission policy was too heavy-handed and unnecessary for diversity to comply with guidelines set forth by the Supreme Court in its 2003 Grutter v. Bollinger decision, involving the use of race-conscious admissions by the University of Michigan's law school. In a brief submitted to the Supreme Court on Monday, however, the lawyers entertain the ... Continue reading →

Navy communications tech has come a long way since this IT2 Alex Pattios manned the comms at the Military Sealift Operations Center in 2002. In a few months, the Navy's installing its first wireless network on three ships in the Mideast. Photo: U.S. Navy Bandwidth on Navy ships is a scarce, expensive commodity. For sailors using non-essential systems, like recreational computers? Dial-up speeds — if they’re lucky. But by the end of the year, for the first time, the Navy will put a 4G LTE wireless network aboard some of its ships, giving a whole new communications tool to sailors and Marines: their smartphones. By the end of 2012, the Navy confirms, three ships will receive a brand-new microwave-based wireless wide area network (WWAN): the ... Continue reading →

Copyright ©2008 by Richard Florida Continue reading →

Copyright ©2008 by Richard Florida Continue reading →