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TOP STORIES FOR FRIDAY, AUGUST 19, 2005 TeraGrid to Receive $150 Million from NSF Purdue Announces New Cyber Center Campuses Still Working to Change Student Download Habits Arizona High School Drops Textbooks for iBooks Wi-Fi Initiative Supports Municipal Networks TERAGRID TO RECEIVE $150 MILLION FROM NSF The National Science Foundation (NSF) has announced that over the next five years it will provide an additional $150 million to the TeraGrid, beyond the $98 million it has already spent on the project. The TeraGrid, which came online in late 2004, is a coordinated system of computing devices, storage capacity, and databases at eight member institutions linked by a high-speed network. John R. Boisseau, director of the Texas Advanced Computing Center, one of the member institutions, said the TeraGrid is "providing a whole fabric for computational science." Scientists at member institutions have access to more than 40 teraflops of processing power and can move enormous amounts of data across the network in relatively little time. Arden L. Bement Jr., director of the NSF, said the complex scientific problems that the TeraGrid is helping to solve are a key factor in "the development of the next generation of cyberinfrastructure." Chronicle of Higher Education, 19 August 2005 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/daily/2005/08/2005081901t.htm PURDUE ANNOUNCES NEW CYBER CENTER Acting on a recommendation from a cyber infrastructure advisory committee, Purdue University has announced a new Cyber Center that will coordinate computing resources across the university. Officials said the new center will increase the university's research capabilities and will serve as an incubator for new technologies developed at the university. Ahmed Elmagarmid, professor of computer science and director of the center, said work at the center will initially focus on sensor technology and wireless sensor networks, which he said could be applied to homeland security. James Bottum, vice president for IT at Purdue, said the center will capitalize on "the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of research and the use of information technology for the discovery process." Early funding for the center comes from a Lilly Endowment; the university hopes to draw another $25 million in outside funding for the center over the next three years. Federal Computer Week, 18 August 2005 http://www.fcw.com/article90140-08-18-05-Web CAMPUSES STILL WORKING TO CHANGE STUDENT DOWNLOAD HABITS Despite the availability of legal online music services on a growing number of college and university campuses, many students continue to get their music from illegal P2P downloads. At American University in Washington, D.C., only about half of the 3,800 students use the Ruckus music service. A similar percentage was reported for the 10,000 students of the University of Rochester, who have access to Napster. Pennsylvania State University estimates that about 40 percent of its 70,000 students use the Napster service provided to them. For students willing to risk being sued by the entertainment industry and downloading computer viruses, incentives for illegally downloading songs include the ability to copy the songs to CDs and to portable devices and to keep the music after they have left college. Officials from legal online music services acknowledged the hurdles in persuading all college students to abandon illegal file sharing, but they said that offering the services to college students will prove to be beneficial in the long term. San Jose Mercury News, 19 August 2005 http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/12426744.htm ARIZONA HIGH SCHOOL DROPS TEXTBOOKS FOR IBOOKS Trading printed textbooks for electronic texts, Empire High School in Arizona issued iBook laptops to all of its 340 students when they started the fall semester. Empire High is a new school, conceived as one that does not use printed textbooks, though it does include a library with printed books. According to Calvin Baker, the superintendent of the Vail Unified School District, which includes Empire, the idea was to move technology from being an add-on component of education to a central role. In addition to having no printed textbooks, the school incorporates technology deeply into the curriculum and the design of the facility, which features a school-wide wireless network. Balancing the risks introduced by such technology, the school's network uses a central filter to control inappropriate downloads or distracting applications such as chats and instant messaging. Homework assignments submitted by computer are checked by another application against published material and against other students' work for plagiarism. Wired News, 18 August 2005 http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,68578,00.html WI-FI INITIATIVE SUPPORTS MUNICIPAL NETWORKS A group of leading technology companies has started a program to offer cities resources and discounts to encourage development of wireless networks, both for city services and for residents. The "Digital Communities" program is supported by Intel, Cisco, Dell, and IBM, among others, and more than a dozen cities around the world are currently participating. Organizers of the program believe that wireless municipal networks have the potential to improve services and save money in areas including emergency responders, such as firefighters and police, and civil servants, such as meter readers and building inspectors. Beyond city services, wireless networks allow cities to provide Internet access to all of their citizens, including poor and otherwise underserved communities, argue supporters. In addition to saving money over other communication systems for city workers, the networks can create revenue for cities that choose to charge for Internet access. Taipei, Taiwan, one of the cities involved in the program, is planning to use the network to create an online university program for its 2.63 million residents. CNET, 18 August 2005 http://news.com.com/2100-7351_3-5838623.html ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your settings, or access the Edupage archive, visit http://www.educause.edu/Edupage/639 Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE RESOURCES The EDUCAUSE Resource Center is a repository for information concerning use and management of IT in higher education. 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