“As speculation built over the past few weeks about the possibility of Microsoft layoffs, one theory that gained some traction in Seattle’s startup community was that a sizable cutback could actually spur entrepreneurial energy in the region.”
“‘I don’t even think of it as a hiccup to be honest,’ said Lazowska, an adviser to Microsoft who believes the company will keep hiring. ‘I just think this is continual renewal, rather than something catastrophic.'”
Read the full TechFlash article here… Read more →
PetraVM secures funds to make software cheaper, more reliable
PetraVM, a new start-up founded by CSE’s Mark Oskin and Luis Ceze, raised $1.5M from Madrona Venture Group and WRF. PetraVM is out to improve the cost and reliability of software the people use every day — developing technology to enable effective and reliable use of now ubiquitous multi-core systems.
Read the Xcomony article here.
Read the TechFlash article here.
(Update: also see Brier Dudley’s Blog post Stealthy UW multicore software spinoff gets Madrona funding,… Read more →
Seattle’s technology universe
About a year ago, the Washington Technology Industry Association (WTIA) set out to map hundreds of high-tech companies in the region and their connections to one another. The resulting poster and website shows 781 companies from the region scattered in a virtual universe. The WTIA will debut the poster and website on at a morning reception on Thursday, January 22. CSE’s Ed Lazowska will be part of panel that will be on hand to share some of the early… Read more →
Esquire’s ‘Best and Brightest of 2008’ recognizes CSE connections
The December issue of Esquire highlights 28 ‘Best and Brightest 2008‘. Two of the articles have UW CSE connections:
Tapan Parikh, currently at Berkeley, is recognized for his UW thesis work in Esquire’s article: “Why the Real Hundred-Dollar Laptop Is a Cell Phone.”
Microsoft PhotoSynth, a collaborative effort with UW, is highlighted in: “How Microsoft Photosynth Built a Globe for the 21st Century.”… Read more →
Seattle Times: Lower demand for MBA and tech grads, but jobs are out there
Seattle Times technology reporter Benjamin J. Romano surveys the current job prospect landscape for MBA and tech graduates, talking to UW CSE professor Ed Lazowska and UW CSE PhD candidate Andrew Putnam. Bottom line: it’s no picnic, but it’s not as bleak as one might think, particularly for top candidates, and the internship process is still healthy. Most companies at the UW CSE Winter Recruiting Fair are offering internships only.
The full article is here.… Read more →
CNN Teams with PhotoSynth to Crowdsource Inauguration Coverage
CNN is harnessing Microsoft PhotoSynth technology to “crowdsource” the Tuesday inauguration of the 44th president of the United States, producting the first “synth” of a major historical event. Photos mailed to themoment@cnn.com will be processed in real time to create synths that will be available at The Moment site. CNN coverage starts at 5AM Eastern time (2AM Pacific).
Read the article announcing the collaboration and explaining how to participate here.
PhotoSynth technology grew out of collaborative research involving… Read more →
RFID’s security problem
Are U.S. passport cards and new state driver’s licenses with RFID truly secure? Not everyone is convinced that new security cards are a good idea. UW CSE’s Yoshi Kohno is quoted. See the full article in Technology Review‘s January/February issue.
We provided earlier coverage on Yoshi’s research and problems with RFID passport cards.… Read more →
Microsoft’s Songsmith provides the backup band
Microsoft has a new tool that automatically generates backup music to go with original melodies and lyrics sung into a computer.
Songsmith, which debuted today at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, lets people explore songwriting. The software first analyzes your vocal melody using existing pitch-tracking technology. Then an algorithm the researchers built selects musical chords that will go well with the melody. Songsmith evolved from MySong, a joint research project by Microsoft researchers Dan Morris… Read more →
Wired Jargon Watch Highlights “cloaker”
The regular and wonderful Wired Magazine feature Jargon Watch seeks out and exposes emerging English language words and phrases as they are minted to describe our changing world. In current issue 17.01, feature editor Jonathon Keats highlights the term cloaker, coined by CSE graduate student Tamara Denning in the paper Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder: New Directions for Implantable Medical Device Security (joint with Kevin Fu and Tadayoshi Kohno) to describe a device designed to keep… Read more →
Best Complexity Paper of the Year
Lance Fortnow calls UW CSE PhD candidate Prasad Raghavendra‘s paper Optimal algorithms and inapproximability results for every CSP? the best computational complexity paper of the year in a Computational Complexity blog entry 2008 Complexity Year in Review. Prasad is advised by Venkat Guruswami.… Read more →