I have been looking for something to replace my old clock radio with something that would allow me to wake up to any radio station or music that I wanted. Last week, I discovered Chumby. Chumby is a small, soft-sided device device with a 3.5 inch touchscreen. It connects to my home network via wi-fi and I can listen to any streaming radio stations or listen to any songs (non-DRM tracks only) by connecting my iPod to one of the USB ports on the back. It works fairly well and can be modified because the code is open source and linux-based. Chumby has only been available to the public for a few months, so there’s a few bugs that have to be worked out, but all in all, I’m pretty pleased with this clock radio replacement.
In my last post, I mentioned the large number of contacts I’ve gotten from job recruters this summer… well, this is a good thing because I was laid off from my job on Monday. So, I’m looking for contract or full-time positions as a PHP/MySQL developer in Seattle. Some technologies I have to offer include XML, CSS, HTML, PHP, MySQL, MVC frameworks (using Object-Oriented PHP). My resume can be found here.
Radio Frequency Identification, or RFID is used everywhere you look: building security, inventory tracking, electronic payment, and even for medical history. The big question is this: Is RFID secure? I started thinking about this as the number of RFID cards that I need to carry started to grow. I use these cards to get into buildings, open the garage door, and access FlexCar. This technology is much more convenient than using traditional keys or swipe cards, but RFID’s convenience could be it’s own undoing.
Here’s two stories which might make you second guess RFID security:
