The Haversian Canal

[Edit 5 July 2008: a kindly commentor below points to a video of how this hoax is done]

The OLPC peripherals mailing list is *consumed* with how to deliver power to these laptops. One recent thread called for manufacturing alternators. While I applaud the idea of manufacturing alternators, perhaps exporting scrapped alternators is another viable alternative. Alternators are something that requires access to industry, not only for machining but also bearings, copper wire, case castings, and enamel. The one place you're likely to find all those things outside a manufacturing plant is in motor rewind shops. I suspect the highest concentration of motor rewind shops is to be found within two kilometers or so of any port. Certainly the biggest rewind shops will be near the ports.

how many alternators are we talking about? I tossed this to my brother and dad . . . seems like there might be a medium-sized business opportunity for anyone interested in exporting scrapped alternators out of the US for resale in port cities or possibly further distribution inland, using local motor rewind shops as the local agents? Presumably, the US has the highest concentration of scrapped automobiles per capita. I'm guessing one scrap yard per 100,000 people (range: 50,000 to 500,000)? In the export scenario, instead of a design, you need a table of parameters for, say, the top 50 to 500 most common alternators. Some necessary information would be:

1) what are the input requirements of an XO power supply
2) what are the input requirements of US and European car batteries
3) given a motive force (water wheel, windmill, etc), how to pick an alternator
4) given an alternator *and* a motive force, how to optimize

Actually, this might make a *very* useful Activity for the OLPC, and a relatively simple one, for someone to design.

And one would need an entrepreneur who thinks they can fill shipping containers with alternators. You'd need short-haul truckers to get batches to a loading facility, load a container, put it on a ship, offload it, and get it taken to a distributor for shipment to motor rewind shops. Can a motor rewind shop alone sell or distribute that many alternators?

My sense is, on the US side, New Jersey would be a could place to start: New York and Philadelphia nearby, literally tens of millions of scrapped alternators, plenty of port access, and plenty of export businesses. Houston, San Diego, LA, and Miami would also be good. I'm not familiar enough with San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle to even guess. Baltimore might be good. Harvest DC and Baltimore.

As for the most common alternators in scrap yards, I'm pretty sure they'll be American models, so you may only need a table of parameters with the top 50 designs! Perhaps there's someone from Detroit, or someone from one of the big three automakers, who might know someone, or a phone number to call?

Another model might be that of www.bookfinder.com, which provides a metasearch of all used books from all known vendors, around the world. Instead of searching all book stores, search all scrappers. I garuntee they have their inventory databased. For anyone interested, alternatorfinder.com is not currently registered.

I, for one, am in medical school now, so no need to worry about competition from me!

The original title was "Political Bias in Censorware?", but considering even military projects that might have the potential of spreading democracy are also censored, I can't say this is a liberal-vs-conservative sort of thing. It's unambiguously the neoconservative flavor of fascism . . .

Secure Computing is a network security company originally funded by DARPA. It has parlayed those tax payer development dollars into profitable business in such enlightened countries as Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and China. China purportedly has their own home-grown proxy filter, but Secure Computing is happy to 'add value' ('subtract freedom'?) for Chinese corporate and government computing. Their SmartFilter proxy prevents people from accessing websites and comes with a pre-loaded set of banned websites. They claim that what's banned is entirely decided by the customer, but the customer only chooses categories for exclusion. Secure Computing decides what's in the categories.

Here are some screenshots from a standard Dell desktop at Pensacola Naval Hospital in Florida. I suspect there are quite a few more examples to be had. If you want to help circumvent this crap, check out PeaceFire and CGIProxy. There is a complete Windows installer for CGIProxy, Circumventor.

Colby Buzzell -- banned

Rush Limbaugh -- allowed

Tor -- banned

Fox News -- allowed

Salon.com -- banned

James Dobson's Focus on the Family -- allowed

Daily Kos -- banned