What a coincidence North Korea hacks Sony USA and then its Internet goes down. I have to wonder why Sony pictures would decide to make an assassination movie about a live ruler of a country. This movie was doomed from the start because it starred Seth Rogen. That is just my opinion by the way. Is it just a coincidence President Obama had vowed to respond to the major cyber-attack which was blamed on North Korea? It is amazing to me we actually asked China to shut down servers and routers used by North Korea which are running through Chinese networks. On top of that we also asked China to identify North Korea hackers operating in China and send them back to North Korea. At the time of the writing of this article China had not responded to our requests, as if anyone thought they would. They probably resented our asking them to do this since they are one of the few countries with relations with North Korea and they might even think it was wrong to make this film.

On the other side of the hack to Sony, Sony wants to punish the person who posted leaked Sony documents by having Twitter suspend his account. Here is something many may not know, Sony did not encrypt the data of its employees making it easy to steal once you were into their records. I have been saying for years people who have other people’s data have a duty to protect it and if they fail to do this a hefty fine should ensue and they should also be responsible for any financial damage to anyone whose data was stolen from their site. No company wants to hear me say this and it doesn’t look like any such laws will be passed anytime soon in Washington. The lobbyists who work for these large companies are just too powerful.

Google has done it, they have created a car which can drive itself anywhere and they aim to prove it, but first they have to wait for government permission to put it on the road. This car is the first fully functional prototype of their self-driving car and they want to test it on the Bay Area public roads in 2015. The director of Transportation policy SPUR stated, "I can imagine these cars starting in closed, campus environments, or cordoned-off test areas with low-speed roads where the risk of collision, injury or death is much lower." This type of car may not appeal to people over a certain age but, it surely will to the younger generation. Can you imagine taking a snooze while the car drives you to work and parks itself and then sounds a signal that you have arrived?

The chairman of Dish Network is saying things will change due to the battle between content providers and some channels will be cut from Pay-TV. I believe the future may be even more different than he suspects with content providers like Netflix, Amazon and Hulu creating their own programs. An example of this is the series Marco Polo created for Netflix. It is as good as anything created by any of the major cable channels and I believe a sign of things to come.

The airbag recall has now hit some of the exclusive brands of autos with BMW being asked by regulators to expand its recall of airbags. One has to wonder how this was not seen earlier by any of the auto makers.Β  Did you wonder why the airbags were being recalled? The reason is when they inflate they can tear loose from their mounting. The chemical propellant in the bags was improperly handled when the bags were manufactured and if your car is in a humid area the risk is even greater. It certainly doesn’t help when most of the car manufacturers have the same airbag supplier.

Just when most people thought Blackberry was finished we find out that they have partnered with Boeing to produce a self-destructing phone. Yes it is being called a spy phone. The actual name of the phone is the Boeing Black. It will be powered by Google’s Android operating system. The idea is for the phone to self-destruct if anyone tampers with it. The phone will also encrypt all calls. The encryption is felt might make it attractive to corporations. Here is the announcement, "We're pleased to announce that Boeing is collaborating with BlackBerry to provide a secure mobile solution for Android devices utilizing our BES12 platform," BlackBerry CEO John Chen said, "That, by the way, is all they allow me to say."

In an attempt to save the Amazon Fire phone, Amazon has launched a huge update. There are the cool things being added to the phone such as a multi-language translation capability, improved battery life, a new photo tool, custom ringtones and hundreds of bug fixes. The updated operating system is known as Fire OS 3.6.5 and you can get the phone with a two year contract from AT&T for 99 cents. Will this save the phone? In my opinion NO!

It must be nice to be a billionaire and be able to get many of your ideas listened to and even created. Elon Musk has an idea for a transportation system known as a Hyperloop. You know Musk he is the CEO of Tesla Motors and founder of SpaceX. The idea is to create a 600 mile per hour transportation system and now some engineers and scientists are saying it is feasible. It would be a sort of pneumatic tube system where a capsule containing people would be rushed along. This is not the first time this idea has been put forward. A man named Beach created a similar system in the year 1870 in New York City before the subway system. Tammany Hall, the city government at the time was run by the infamous Boss Tweed. Tweed was making money on the street cars and didn’t want competition so he crushed the idea. A short run was created as a demo and ran for three years, but only for one block.

I have always found it amazing when we come up with things which seem like very modern ideas only to find that we had something similar in the past. I have seen this happen quite a few times. Sometimes we don’t realize it and then discoveries are made and we find out our idea isn’t new. In the case of the Hyperloop I am sure Musk must have known about Beach’s attempt over 100 years ago, but it doesn’t make his suggestion any less valid.