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π Panopticon
The panopticon is a type of institutional building and a system of control designed by the English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the 18th century. The concept of the design is to allow all prisoners of an institution to be observed by a single security guard, without the inmates being able to tell whether they are being watched.
Although it is physically impossible for the single guard to observe all the inmates' cells at once, the fact that the inmates cannot know when they are being watched means that they are motivated to act as though they are being watched at all times. Thus, the inmates are effectively compelled to regulate their own behaviour. The architecture consists of a rotunda with an inspection house at its centre. From the centre the manager or staff of the institution are able to watch the inmates. Bentham conceived the basic plan as being equally applicable to hospitals, schools, sanatoriums, and asylums, but he devoted most of his efforts to developing a design for a panopticon prison. It is his prison that is now most widely meant by the term "panopticon".
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- "Panopticon" | 2023-10-28 | 33 Upvotes 15 Comments
- "Panopticon" | 2020-01-14 | 92 Upvotes 42 Comments
- "Panopticon" | 2014-06-30 | 38 Upvotes 8 Comments
π DataHand
The DataHand keyboard was introduced in 1995 by DataHand Systems, Inc. It was invented by Dale J. Retter and was produced by Industrial Innovations as early as 1992. The keyboard consists of two completely separate "keyboards", one for the left hand and one for the right, that are molded to rest the user's hands on. This allows the user to place each hand wherever it is most comfortable to them. Each finger activates five buttons, the four compass directions as well as down. The thumbs also have five buttons, one inside and two outside as well as up and down. The button modules in which the fingers rest are adjustable to best fit the user's handsβeach side can be independently moved up and down, towards the palm or farther away.
This ergonomic layout allows for all typing to occur without any wrist motion, as well as without any finger extension. The keyboard layout is initially similar to a QWERTY keyboard, but the middle two columns of keys (i.e. H,Y,G...) have been delegated to sideways finger movements, and all of the keys outside of the main three rows are accessed through two additional modes, including a mode for mousing. There are three primary modes all together: letters, number and symbols, and function / mouse mode. Some practice is required. However, eventual typing speedups are possible.
Also of note is the button designβinstead of being spring-loaded, the buttons are held in place with magnets and are activated using optical sensors. This was done in order to dramatically reduce the finger workload while optimizing tactile feedback.
This unconventional keyboard was seen in the Jodie Foster movie Contact (1997) as the pilot's controls for the futuristic spaceship; and the spy movie Stormbreaker (2006). The Industrial Innovations version was featured on the television series Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. A black model is used by Agent Grasso while searching for Amanda Givens' Jeep in Shadow Conspiracy (1997), starring Charlie Sheen.
After the initial prototype was released in 1995, DataHand has released the Professional and Professional II with new bodies. The Professional II also has extended programming capabilities over the Professional, being able to record macros of keystrokes for convenient use.
DataHand Systems, Inc. announced in early 2008 that it was ceasing to market and sell its keyboards. The company web site states that due to supplier issues, the company will not sell the DataHand keyboard "until a new manufacturer can be identified". However, the company plans a final, limited production run to satisfy existing customers. In January 2009, the company's website started taking orders for a "limited number of new DataHand Pro II units".
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- "DataHand" | 2020-01-18 | 81 Upvotes 52 Comments
- "DataHand" | 2014-01-29 | 111 Upvotes 63 Comments
π Ignaz Semmelweis
Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (German: [ΛΙͺΙ‘naΛts ΛzΙmlΜ©vaΙͺs]; Hungarian: Semmelweis IgnΓ‘c FΓΌlΓΆp [ΛsΙmmΙlvΙjs ΛiΙ‘naΛts ΛfylΓΈp]; 1 July 1818 β 13 August 1865) was a Hungarian physician and scientist of German descent who was an early pioneer of antiseptic procedures and was described as the "saviour of mothers". Postpartum infection, also known as puerperal fever or childbed fever, consists of any bacterial infection of the reproductive tract following birth and in the 19th century was common and often fatal. Semmelweis discovered that the incidence of infection could be drastically reduced by requiring healthcare workers in obstetrical clinics to disinfect their hands. In 1847, he proposed hand washing with chlorinated lime solutions at Vienna General Hospital's First Obstetrical Clinic, where doctors' wards had thrice the mortality of midwives' wards. The maternal mortality rate dropped from 18% to less than 2%, and he published a book of his findings, Etiology, Concept and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever, in 1861.
Despite his research, Semmelweis's observations conflicted with the established scientific and medical opinions of the time and his ideas were rejected by the medical community. He could offer no theoretical explanation for his findings of reduced mortality due to hand-washing, and some doctors were offended at the suggestion that they should wash their hands and mocked him for it. In 1865, the increasingly outspoken Semmelweis allegedly suffered a nervous breakdown and was committed to an asylum by his colleagues. In the asylum, he was beaten by the guards. He died 14 days later from a gangrenous wound on his right hand that may have been caused by the beating.
His findings earned widespread acceptance only years after his death, when Louis Pasteur confirmed the germ theory, giving Semmelweis' observations a theoretical explanation, and Joseph Lister, acting on Pasteur's research, practised and operated using hygienic methods with great success.
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- "Ignaz Semmelweis" | 2025-07-13 | 10 Upvotes 1 Comments
π Differential Power Analysis
In cryptography, power analysis is a form of side channel attack in which the attacker studies the power consumption of a cryptographic hardware device (such as a smart card, tamper-resistant "black box", or integrated circuit). The attack can non-invasively extract cryptographic keys and other secret information from the device.
Simple power analysis (SPA) involves visually interpreting power traces, or graphs of electrical activity over time. Differential power analysis (DPA) is a more advanced form of power analysis, which can allow an attacker to compute the intermediate values within cryptographic computations through statistical analysis of data collected from multiple cryptographic operations. SPA and DPA were introduced to the open cryptology community in 1998 by Paul Kocher, Joshua Jaffe and Benjamin Jun.
π List of video games considered the best
This is a list of video games that multiple video game journalists and critics have considered to be among the best of all time. The games listed here are included on at least six separate "best/greatest of all time" lists from different publications, as chosen by their editorial staffs.
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- "List of video games considered the best" | 2021-03-07 | 38 Upvotes 12 Comments
π Kibbutz
A kibbutz (Hebrew: Χ§Φ΄ΧΦΌΧΦΌΧ₯β / Χ§ΧΧΧΧ₯β, lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim Χ§Φ΄ΧΦΌΧΦΌΧ¦Φ΄ΧΧβ / Χ§ΧΧΧΧ¦ΧΧβ) is a collective community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises. Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism. In recent decades, some kibbutzim have been privatized and changes have been made in the communal lifestyle. A member of a kibbutz is called a kibbutznik (Hebrew: Χ§Φ΄ΧΦΌΧΦΌΧ¦Φ°Χ Φ΄ΧΧ§β / Χ§ΧΧΧΧ¦Χ ΧΧ§β; plural kibbutznikim or kibbutzniks).
In 2010, there were 270 kibbutzim in Israel. Their factories and farms account for 9% of Israel's industrial output, worth US$8 billion, and 40% of its agricultural output, worth over $1.7 billion. Some kibbutzim had also developed substantial high-tech and military industries. For example, in 2010, Kibbutz Sasa, containing some 200 members, generated $850 million in annual revenue from its military-plastics industry.
Currently the kibbutzim are organised in the secular Kibbutz Movement with some 230 kibbutzim, the Religious Kibbutz Movement with 16 kibbutzim and the much smaller religious Poalei Agudat Yisrael with two kibbutzim, all part of the wider communal settlement movement.
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- "Kibbutz" | 2021-05-08 | 68 Upvotes 35 Comments
π Steve Jackson Games, Inc. vs. United States Secret Service (1993)
Steve Jackson Games, Inc. v. United States Secret Service, 816 F. Supp. 432 (W.D. Tex. 1993), was a lawsuit arising from a 1990 raid by the United States Secret Service on the headquarters of Steve Jackson Games (SJG) in Austin, Texas. The raid, along with the Secret Service's unrelated Operation Sundevil, was influential in the founding of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
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- "Steve Jackson Games, Inc. vs. United States Secret Service (1993)" | 2024-06-09 | 26 Upvotes 3 Comments
π Theory X and Theory Y management
Theory X and Theory Y are theories of human work motivation and management. They were created by Douglas McGregor while he was working at the MIT Sloan School of Management in the 1950s, and developed further in the 1960s. McGregor's work was rooted in motivation theory alongside the works of Abraham Maslow, who created the hierarchy of needs. The two theories proposed by McGregor describe contrasting models of workforce motivation applied by managers in human resource management, organizational behavior, organizational communication and organizational development. Theory X explains the importance of heightened supervision, external rewards, and penalties, while Theory Y highlights the motivating role of job satisfaction and encourages workers to approach tasks without direct supervision. Management use of Theory X and Theory Y can affect employee motivation and productivity in different ways, and managers may choose to implement strategies from both theories into their practices.
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- "Theory X and Theory Y management" | 2023-07-01 | 77 Upvotes 36 Comments
π Killing of Hind Rajab (2024)
Hind Rami Iyad Rajab (Arabic: ΩΩΨ― Ψ±Ψ§Ω Ω Ψ₯ΩΨ§Ψ― Ψ±Ψ¬Ψ¨; 3 May 2018 β 29 January 2024) was a five-year-old Palestinian girl in the Gaza Strip who was killed by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the Gaza war, which also killed six of her family members and two paramedics coming to her rescue.
Rajab and her family were fleeing Gaza City when their vehicle was shelled by the IDF, killing her uncle, aunt and three cousins, with Rajab and another cousin surviving and contacting the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) to ask for help while noting that they were being attacked by an Israeli tank. The cousin was later also killed and Rajab was left stranded in the vehicle for hours on the phone, as paramedics from PRCS attempted to rescue her. Both Rajab and the paramedics were later also found dead on 10 February after an Israeli withdrawal.
Israel claimed that there were not any troops present in the neighborhood and denied carrying out the attack. However, this was refuted by The Washington Post and Sky News's investigations relying on satellite imagery and visual evidence, which concluded that a number of Israeli tanks were indeed present and one had likely fired 335 rounds on the car that Rajab and her family had been in, with tank operators being able to see that the car had civilians including children in it. The Forensic Architecture investigation also concluded that an Israeli tank had also likely attacked the ambulance that came for Rajab.
In the aftermath of the killing, Western media outlets were criticized for their coverage of the incident, including for not attributing who killed Rajab and for their adultification of her. American student protestors occupied and renamed Hamilton Hall in her honor at Columbia University, drawing increased attention to the incident.
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- "Killing of Hind Rajab (2024)" | 2026-04-11 | 70 Upvotes 10 Comments
π Mars will have a 420 day since it has a 668 days a year
Various schemes have been used or proposed for timekeeping on the planet Mars independently of Earth time and calendars.
Mars has an axial tilt and a rotation period similar to those of Earth. Thus, it experiences seasons of spring, summer, autumn and winter much like Earth. Coincidentally, the duration of a Martian day is within a few percent of that of an Earth day, which has led to the use of analogous time units. A Mars year is almost twice as long as Earth's, and its orbital eccentricity is considerably larger, which means that the lengths of various Martian seasons differ considerably, and sundial time can diverge from clock time more than on Earth.