Type 4) form constant: hexagonal lattice
Mathematica code:
h[x_, y_] := Polygon[Table[{Cos[2 Pi k/6] + x, Sin[2 Pi k/6] + y}, {k, 6}]]
HexagonalLattice[t_] :=
Graphics[
{EdgeForm[Thickness[.01]], White,
Table[
h[3 i + 3 ((-1)^j + 1)/4 + Cos[Pi/6] t, Sqrt[3]/2 j + Sin[Pi/6] t],
{i, 15}, {j, 45}]},
ImageSize -> 500, PlotRange -> {{7, 46.2}, {1.8, 39.8}}]
ListAnimate[
Table[
HexagonalLattice[t],
{t, 0, 3.105, .345}]]
f[x_, y_] := {Log[Sqrt[(x)^2 + (y)^2]], ArcTan[x, y]}
ListAnimate[
Table[
ImageTransformation[
HexagonalLattice[t] ,
f[#[[1]], #[[2]]] &, DataRange -> {{-Pi, Pi}, {-Pi, Pi}}],
{t, 0, 3.105, .345}]]
Yep, Google Just Patented Background Noise
In 2008, Google applied to patent a system that analyzes the environments surrounding mobile phones — temperature, humidity, sound — by way of sensors embedded in those phones. The technology would be mainly used, Google said in its filing, for (yes) “advertising based on environmental conditions.” It would provide another information layer, beyond quaint little GPS, that would target ads based not just on users’ immediate locations, but on their immediate environments. So, the filing noted, detections of hot weather could serve up ads for air conditioners; or, inversely, winter coats. Or the phone sensors might detect, say, the distinctive sounds of an orchestra being tuned, and combine that information — the user is at a concert — with location data and local events data to figure out which concert the user is attending. And then serve ads (for nearby restaurants, orchestral CDs, local violin teachers) based on that intel.
Cool, no? And also totally creepy?
Well. This week, Google was granted its patent. The firm has officially patented background noise. (And also: cold. And also: warmth.)
There are huge privacy concerns here, obviously, one of them being that the ability to track devices’ background noises would seem to imply the ability to track all their noises. And “it is important to respect the privacy of users,” Google acknowledges in the patent, noting that monitor-tracking will be opt-out-able and that “a privacy policy” specifying which, and how, sensor-gathered information would be used “may be provided to the user.” One wonders about the legality of the hypothetical operation in the 12 states that require everyone recorded to consent to that recording. The sound the phone picks up may just be an advertising signal for an algorithm to Google, but the law could see it differently.
These might be moot points, anyway. There’s no indication, as yet, that Google has plans to implement the “environmental condition” technology, GeekWire points out. But it bears repeating nonetheless, both as a whoa and as an insight into how the firm is thinking about the role it’ll play in our digital future: Google has patented background noise.
And all for the purpose of serving you ads.
[Image: A rendering of Google’s latest patent. Note the lines: “environmental condition” and “ad server.”]
Welcome to the Brain Bank
Visit the brain bank at Harvard, the world’s largest repository where more than 7,000 human brains are donated, stored, and used for research.
Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich
Every Third Reich fangirl knows this one! Cultured, with great skill in playing the violin, but also a sportsman - a successful fencer; the smart and daring chief of the Reich Security Office who was banned from flying sorties over the Eastern Front because he was just too valuable to be lost in battle; the main authority over the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia until 1942, when he was assassinated by the Czech resistance (with support of the UK secret service), to be sadly missed by a wife and 4 kids, along with many colleagues, including his immediate boss (and likely close friend) Heinrich Himmler. While alive, he was known as a womanizer - he even established a brothel for “intelligence-gathering purposes” and was generally referred to as the “Blond Beast”; quite a sexy beast indeed! :)


![theatlantic:
Yep, Google Just Patented Background Noise
In 2008, Google applied to patent a system that analyzes the environments surrounding mobile phones — temperature, humidity, sound — by way of sensors embedded in those phones. The technology would be mainly used, Google said in its filing, for (yes) “advertising based on environmental conditions.” It would provide another information layer, beyond quaint little GPS, that would target ads based not just on users’ immediate locations, but on their immediate environments. So, the filing noted, detections of hot weather could serve up ads for air conditioners; or, inversely, winter coats. Or the phone sensors might detect, say, the distinctive sounds of an orchestra being tuned, and combine that information — the user is at a concert — with location data and local events data to figure out which concert the user is attending. And then serve ads (for nearby restaurants, orchestral CDs, local violin teachers) based on that intel.
Cool, no? And also totally creepy?
Well. This week, Google was granted its patent. The firm has officially patented background noise. (And also: cold. And also: warmth.)
There are huge privacy concerns here, obviously, one of them being that the ability to track devices’ background noises would seem to imply the ability to track all their noises. And “it is important to respect the privacy of users,” Google acknowledges in the patent, noting that monitor-tracking will be opt-out-able and that “a privacy policy” specifying which, and how, sensor-gathered information would be used “may be provided to the user.” One wonders about the legality of the hypothetical operation in the 12 states that require everyone recorded to consent to that recording. The sound the phone picks up may just be an advertising signal for an algorithm to Google, but the law could see it differently.
These might be moot points, anyway. There’s no indication, as yet, that Google has plans to implement the “environmental condition” technology, GeekWire points out. But it bears repeating nonetheless, both as a whoa and as an insight into how the firm is thinking about the role it’ll play in our digital future: Google has patented background noise.
And all for the purpose of serving you ads.
[Image: A rendering of Google’s latest patent. Note the lines: “environmental condition” and “ad server.”]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1aqsaoGQA1qcokc4o1_500.jpg)


