Category: Link

What is a trolley? (link)

I recently found a great set of posts about what a trolley is and how they work at Nathan Vass’ website.  The short version is that a trolley is an electric bus that gets its power from overhead lines.  There are many advantages to using a bus with rubber tires over a train (can change lanes, can avoid obstacles, climb hills without wheel-spin) and many advantages to using an electric bus over a diesel bus, the main reason being torque to climb the hills of San Francisco.

Part i is here
Part ii is here

I originally became interested in the topic last year when I visited San Francisco.  There were many things I liked about the city that appealed to different interests of mine (city planning, green spaces, diverse cultures), but one of the things that stuck out to me was the infrastructure for the trolley system.  This was not something I had expected.

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When you look up while downtown, just below the common sight of power lines at the top of the utility poles, you see what looks at first like a rats nest of electric wires.  This is especially so around intersections in the road.  But upon further examination, patterns emerge.  I noticed that the wires were running in pairs of parallel tracks, and where one track crossed another, one of the pairs would have some extra hardware.

edit_Muni_trolleybus_wires_at_Haight

I only spent a moment trying to figure out what they could be used for when one of the Muni buses (a trolley) passed me on the street.  These are quiet, exhaust-smell free giants of public transportation that I was instantly in love with.  And this post isn’t about public transportation overall, but if you need an explanation as to why it is good and how a bus can greatly reduce congestion, this GIF explains it beautifully.

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Information Security News: Call for Papers: Cyber Security in International Relations

Information Security News: Call for Papers: Cyber Security in International Relations.

Forwarded from: Brent Kesler <bdkesler (at) nps.edu>

Call for Papers: Cyber Security in International Relations
Submissions due: February 1, 2011

Strategic Insights, an online journal published by the Center on 
Contemporary Conflict at the Naval Postgraduate School, is seeking 
scholarly papers on the role that cyber security and information and 
communications technology (ICT) play in international relations and the 
strategic thinking of state and nonstate actors. This issue of SI seeks 
to inform policy makers and military operators of lessons drawn from 
real-world experience with computer and IT issues.

We seek assessment and analysis based on real-world events, not 
speculation regarding potential threats and perceived vulnerabilities. 
Papers that test or develop political theories and concepts are 
encouraged. We hold a broad definition of cyber security, and encourage 
submissions on a range of ICT topics related to threats to national 
security and individual liberties, responses to such threats from states 
and non-state actors, and emerging issues offering an over-the-horizon 
view of cyber security.

However, all submissions should be empirically based; we do not intend 
to publish work purely devoted to editorial opinion, threat 
anticipation, or policy advocacy. Submissions therefore should attempt 
to map capabilities based on available sources or game out real-world 
implications based on empirical data; any "digital Pearl Harbor" 
scenarios should attempt to measure the extent of the damage--tangible, 
social, or political--that could occur.

Sample Topics:

* Use of cyber attacks to influence government behavior (e.g., 2007 
  Estonia attacks)

* Cyber attacks as a force multiplier in conventional conflicts (e.g., 
  2008 Georgia attacks)

* Internet as a critical resource for political and social movements 
  (e.g., the Green Movement in Iran, electioneering in Moldova, Red 
  Shirt Movement in Thailand)

* Governments' efforts to contain popular movements that organize via IT 
  (e.g., shutting down or containing flash mobs, Chinese monitoring of 
  the Dalai Lama, software filtering and surveillance technologies)

* The role of information technology strategies in the US and other 
  states' foreign policy (e.g., US State Department intervention to 
  prevent Twitter shut-down during protests following the 2009 Iranian 
  elections)

* Regional cyber-conflicts (e.g., North and South Korea, India and 
  Pakistan, Israelis and Palestinians)

* Espionage and secrecy in a networked world (e.g., China and Google, 
  Wikileaks)

* Information technologies, civil liberties and privacy (e.g., RIM 
  Blackberry and Chinese, Indian and US efforts at surveillance;  
  Wikileaks; the Safe Harbor dispute)

* Strategic implications of cyber attacks against critical 
  infrastructures

* Innovative cyber attacks (e.g., Stuxnet and the Iranian nuclear 
  program)

* International cooperation to manage cyber-security and IT issues 
  (e.g., Internet governance, WSIS, ICANN, WIPO)

Submission Details: Submissions should be addressed to SI Editor Brent 
Kesler and sent in MS Word compatible format to ccc (at) nps.edu. They 
should range from 10 to 20 pages, double spaced, or 3,000 to 6,000 
words. For more information on submission guidelines, please consult:

http://www.nps.edu/Academics/Centers/CCC/Research-Publications/StrategicInsights/submissions.html

Time to put on the big thinking hat!