Ridley Scott's war on terror - Boston Globe By Rebecca DiLiberto | In the 30-plus years Ridley Scott has been making films, he’s covered all manner of subjects, from fencing... R. Richard Hobbs | nyc.locationscout.us Weblog - Podcasts powered by Odiogo Less

Internet, Broadband, Akamai Gregory T. Huang wrote: Wade wrote today about Cambridge, MA-based Akamai’s second quarterly “State of the Internet” report, which details such trends as broadband connections by state and country, number of Internet-connected devices, and amounts of attack traffic and malware. In terms of Internet connection speeds, South Korea is tops with 64 percent of all connections (to Akamai’s content distribution servers) having a speed of 5 megabits per second or greater. Within the U.S., which comes in sixth globally, Delaware is tops, with 66 percent of its Internet connections being 5 megabits per second or faster. At the opposite, “narrowband” end of the spectrum, Wade wrote, “the state of Washington tops the list, with 21 percent of all Internet connections taking place at the glacial speed of 256 kilobits per second or less.” And things in Washington seem to be getting worse, not better: it was one of four states on Akamai’s “narrowband top 10″ list where the percentage of slow connections actually increased in the second quarter of 2008, compared to the first quarter. (Perhaps the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation—which is known in part for its programs to improve Internet connectivity in U.S. libraries—can do something about its home state.) What’s going on here? Is it that more people are coming online, but starting with slow connection speeds? Are the Internet service providers with the most market share providing a lower standard of service? Is there inherent geographical bias in the data from Akamai’s servers? It’s hard to say, because Akamai didn’t release its raw data, but the full report is available here. Of course, if you live in Washington, you may want to go grab a coffee while you download the 1.5-megabyte PDF file. Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

Internet, Broadband, Akamai Wade Roush wrote: The global network of 34,000 content distribution servers built by Cambridge, MA-based Akamai allows the company to gather massive amounts of data on Internet usage—information that it distilled and published for the first time back in May. Now the company has published its second quarterly “State of the Internet” report, detailing trends such as the number of Internet-connected devices and broadband connections in each country and providing a fascinating overall picture of the Internet and its growing pains. While the number of people and organizations using the global information network continued to increase, for example, so did the volume of attack traffic and malware. In addition to statistics collected by Akamai’s servers, the report brings together numerous published reports of incidents around the Internet—such as the repeated Internet outages in Vermont in May and June as equipment failures, fires, and bridge construction damaged a fiber ring owned by Level 3 Communications, and the bizarre story of the Epilepsy Foundation website, which was hacked by attackers who posted hundreds of flashing images designed to induce seizures in visitors with photosensitive epilepsy. But the most valuable part of Akamai’s report is the data from its own network—information that can’t be found anywhere else. While China was the largest source of attack traffic in the first quarter of 2008, for example, Akamai found that Japan leaped into first place in the second quarter; some 30 percent of all worms, viruses, and denial-of-service attacks originated from Internet addresses there. (China fell to third place, while the United States hung on to its second-place status, generating 22 percent of attack traffic.) The number of unique Internet Protocol addresses detected by Akamai’s network—each address representing a separate Internet-connected device—grew 5 percent in the second quarter, to some 346 million worldwide. Nearly 30 percent of those addresses were in the United States, and about 10 percent were in China, with Japan, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, South Korea, Canada, Spain, and Italy next in line. But when IP addresses are measured per capita, the Scandinavian countries continued to lead: Sweden leads the world with 0.42 unique IP addresses per citizen, followed by Norway, Iceland, and Finland. The United States is in seventh place with 0.34 IP addresses per person. Akamai also tracks the speed at which the citizens of various countries can access the Internet. South Korea held on to its lead in this area, with 64 percent of all Internet connections boasting a speed of 5 megabits per second or more. The United States places sixth globally in broadband penetration, with only 26 percent of all connections beating 5 megabits per second, though the number of broadband connections here is increasing fast (the 26 percent figure is a 29 percent improvement on the first quarter). Within the United States, two of the smallest states, Delaware and Rhode Island, continued to have the largest proportion of citizens enjoying broadband: 66 percent of all Internet connections in Delaware exceed 5 megabits per second, and 43 percent in Rhode Island. New York, Connecticut, Oklahoma, Nevada, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and the District of Columbia round out Akamai’s “Top 10″ list of U.S. states with the largest percentage of broadband connections. At the opposite, “narrowband” end of the spectrum, the state of Washington tops the list once again, with 21 percent of all Internet connections taking place at the glacial speed of 256 kilobits per second or less. (Greg has more to say about that over at Xconomy Seattle.) Akamai’s full report is available here. How quickly you can download the 1.5-megabyte PDF file will depend, of course, on where you live. Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail explores the BrickFair LEGO festival in DC. LEGO fans of all ages share their creations, films and knowledge with the rest of LEGO Land. Distributed by Tubemogul. Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK, must-read tech-talk, offers in the field video interviews with startup founders, authors and other social media and web technology related experts. Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail explores the BrickFair LEGO festival in DC. LEGO fans of all ages share their creations, films and knowledge with the rest of LEGO Land. Distributed by Tubemogul. Less

There Is Loud Laughter Everywhere, Head Like A Kite’s second full-length album, and first for Mush, is an expert blend of electronic rock production and pure pop-songcraft built on a bed of pillaged found-sound from cities the Seattle based band visited on their 2006 US tour. No stranger to sharing the stage with big names on national and international turf, ringmaster Dave Einmo has assembled some of Seattle’s finest for the album including members of The Long Winters, Smoosh, Radio 4, Crooked Fingers, and Preston School Of Industry. Whether it be guest vocals from Asya Smoosh and Graig Markel, added inspiration from touring drummer Trent Moorman, or the production of Brian Deck (Modest Mouse, Iron & Wine) each track is flavored with the perfect additions to the epic songwriting and big-beat electronic production that is Head Like A Kite’s forte. There Is Loud Laughter Everywhere strikes the balance between art and craft and is the finest sonic road-trip in the Mush catalog. If you enjoy great music that somewhat explores the general sound Folk Implosion forayed into once-upon-a-time, make sure pick up the album at e-music or at the Mush Records store. DOWNLOAD | SUBSCRIBE | SUBSCRIBE TO ALL Spread It Around: Hide Sites Less

News: Location services / Location from file for photography for a print psa campaign for U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) (Washington, D.C.) Ad Agency: Plowshare Group (Stamford,... R. Richard Hobbs New York City area Location and Production Services for Film, Photo, Video and TV web: http://www.rrhobbs.us/ Click here to play Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail spends the day with the Dash Express GPS system. Frank tours the Washington, DC area testing out the new gadget and gives his somewhat frank opinion all along the way. Distributed by Tubemogul. Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK, must-read tech-talk, offers in the field video interviews with startup founders, authors and other social media and web technology related experts. Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail spends the day with the Dash Express GPS system. Frank tours the Washington, DC area testing out the new gadget and gives his somewhat frank opinion all along the way. Distributed by Tubemogul. Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail talks widgets with Justin Thorp of Clearspring a DC area startup company. Find out what Clearspring is doing for publishers and advertisers. Is Clearspring soon to be acquired? Distributed by Tubemogul. Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK, must-read tech-talk, offers in the field video interviews with startup founders, authors and other social media and web technology related experts. Less

Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK & co-founder of TECH cocktail talks widgets with Justin Thorp of Clearspring a DC area startup company. Find out what Clearspring is doing for publishers and advertisers. Is Clearspring soon to be acquired? Distributed by Tubemogul. Frank Gruber of SOMEWHAT FRANK, must-read tech-talk, offers in the field video interviews with startup founders, authors and other social media and web technology related experts. Less

The United States has the highest per capita incarceration rate of any country in the world. In the state of Washington alone, prison rates have roughly tripled since the mid-1970s. Do these statistics make for safer communities? read more Less

Seattle’s Stuporhero is back with their third and latest album, Weightless, and they are pleased to announce that it’s available as a free download here on their website. In addition to high quality 320 kbps MP3s, they are offering AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format) and FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) files. More from Stuporhero: “We thought long and hard about what to do with this new batch of songs and determined that the typical avenues of producing, distributing, and promoting an album are cost prohibitive to the band at this time. We’ve decided that releasing the music for free is the best hope we have at present to achieve our goal, which is for our music to be heard, shared, and hopefully enjoyed by as many people as possible. While we’re in the generous spirit, we’re also offering free downloads of our first two albums, It Would Be Nice To Wake Up and Last Star Shining. Also available for free download on our website is Lo-Fi Lounge Volume 1, a collection of 4-track demos and studio outtakes.” Please help them spread the word. Life is expensive…Stuporhero songs are free! DOWNLOAD | SUBSCRIBE Spread It Around: Hide Sites Less

VC, funding, investment Gregory T. Huang wrote: Pacific Northwest venture deals are making a comeback of sorts. Second-quarter investment numbers for Washington are up compared with the same period last year, according to data released over the weekend by Dow Jones VentureSource. In the second quarter of 2008, there were 25 venture deals in Washington worth a total of $302 million—an 8.7 percent increase over the $278 million invested in the second quarter of 2007. This bucks the national trend in which many regions, such as the San Francisco Bay Area and New England, reported substantial declines compared with the same period last year. The second-quarter tally in Washington was also a 39 percent increase over the $217 million invested in the first quarter of this year. However, the current pace of 50 deals (worth some $519 million) done through the first half of the year still lags 2007’s year-end total of 114 deals worth $1.3 billion. Investments in biotechnology, medical devices, software, and Internet led the way, with Bellevue, WA-based Light Sciences Oncology raking in $40.1 million for the top spot. Also making a splash was Wetpaint, a consumer-Wiki website based in Seattle that raised $25 million, and ReliOn, a fuel-cell energy company based in Spokane, WA, which raised $23 million—the latter reflecting a national trend of increased investment in energy and utilities. Here’s a roundup of the top 10 Pacific Northwest VC deals in 2Q08, along with the investors: 1. Light Sciences Oncology (Bellevue, WA)—$40.1million Investors: undisclosed 2. Wetpaint (Seattle, WA)—$25.0 million Investors: Accel Partners, Duff Ackerman & Goodrich, Fidelity Ventures, Frazier Technology Ventures, Trinity Ventures 3. ReliOn (Spokane, WA)—$23.0 million Investors: Buerk Dale Victor, Chrysalix Energy Management, Enterprise Partners Venture Capital, Oak Investment Partners, PCG Asset Management, Robeco Group 4. Talyst (Bellevue, WA)—$20.0 million Investors: AIG Global Investments, Ignition Partners, OVP Venture Partners 5. Immune Design (Seattle, WA)—$18 million Investors: Alta Partners, Column Group, Versant Ventures 6. Pelago (Seattle, WA)—$15.0 million Investors: Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Reliance Technology Ventures, Trilogy Equity Partners, T-Venture Holding 7. NexPlanar, formerly Neopad (Hillsboro, OR)—$14.5 million Investors: BlueRun Ventures, Intel Capital, InterWest Partners 8. Fate Therapeutics (Seattle, WA)—$12.9 million Investors: Arch Venture Partners, OVP Venture Partners, Polaris Venture Partners, Venrock 9. Verdiem (Seattle, WA)—$12.0 million Investors: Catamount Ventures, Falcon Technology Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Phoenix Partners, Westly Group 10. Ontela (Seattle, WA)—$10.4 million Investors: Hunt Ventures, Oak Investment Partners, Steamboat Ventures, Voyager Capital Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

VC, deals, Private Equity Robert Buderi wrote: Despite a near complete shutdown of the IPO market, U.S. private equity fundraising remained reasonably strong throughout the first half of this year—185 funds brought in $133 billion, coming in just under last year’s record pace, according to a new report Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst. The venture capital segment performed particularly well, with 72 funds taking in $11.5 billion, up 15 percent from the $10 billion raised by 62 funds in last year’s first half. In Washington, four private equity funds raised $532 million, representing less than half of one percent of the total. But that was up sharply from the $66 million raised by two funds a year earlier. It’s possible to take a glass-half-full or glass-half-empty view on the overall private equity figures. The total of $132.7 billion was just 3 percent off the record $137.2 billion raised by U.S. private equity firms in the first half of 2007. Pretty good for a down economy. At the same time, Dow Jones reports, it was the first year-over-year falloff in fundraising since 2003. So the party could be breaking up. The biggest downturn in dollar terms came in the buyout/corporate finance category, which fell from $107.5 billion in the first half of 2007 to $85.5 billion in 2008. The Funds of Funds and Secondary categories also saw significant declines. Still, the drops were almost offset by the venture capital and mezzanine funding categories. The venture segment showed gains in both the numbers of funds and dollars raised. And mezzanine fundraising set a new first-half record with $24 billion raised by seven firms—compared to just $2.3 billion last year. Almost all of it came from the $20 billion GS Mezzanine Partners V LP fund, but even without including that deal the category saw a large percentage gain. Washington fared best in the venture capital category, where three funds—the $250 million Madrona Venture Fund IV, the $240 million Maveron Equity Partners IV, and the $2 million Founder’s Co-op fund—raised $492 million, about 4 percent of the total. That was up more than seven-fold from the $66 million raised by two funds a year earlier. The state’s only other contribution to overall fundraising this year was $40 million garnered by Unitus Equity Fund II in the buyout/corporate finance category. European private equity firms, meanwhile, saw strong gains in the year’s first half, with $61 billion invested in 80 funds, compared to $52.5 billion last year. “The differing fortunes of European private equity funds are an indication that limited partners are shifting some attention away from the U.S., where the economy is seen as particularly weak and where many of LPs are over-concentrated,” Jennifer Rossa, managing director of Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst, said in a statement. Comments | Permalink | Share |  E-mail Less

Happy Independent’s Day. Today we bring you a glowing nugget from the new, yet fire-tested Seattle, Washington group Search/Rescue. The song is entitled Fireflies from S/R’s debut 10 song CD, “The Compound”, released in late February - right before their March performance in Austin, Texas. I managed to catch them at Spiro’s and was lucky enough to have a great vantage point up near the stage-front to soak up most of their performance (see attached picture). Thankfully the crowd wasn’t too packed as they didn’t have a bunch of Vampire hipsters swarming the venue. A familiar face whom I helped judge a music event with here in LA walked though the doors halfway in which really cast a surreal air over most of the set. Search/Rescue was formed from the ashes of Gatsby’s American Dream and Acceptance, and subsequently reforged into this brand new promising project. They are apparently the first clients announced under the new Eyeball Management roster. Their album “The Compound” is available on iTunes.  Go treat yourself! [cs] DOWNLOAD | SUBSCRIBE Spread It Around: Hide Sites Less

Eugene Grant and the Campaign for a Brighter Future Together perform at the Trash Bar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on June 26th. "Forward, Brighter Days" is a call to rise above the toxicity of our politics and embrace our common values. eugenegrant.us/site/music/forward_brighter_days Less

Eugene Grant and the Campaign for a Brighter Future Together perform at the Trash Bar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, on June 16th. "The Beast" is a song about the federal budget. eugenegrant.us/site/music/the_beast Less