Video Game Addiction 'Not Mental Illness'
While the excessive use of video and online games is a problem estimated to effect about 10 percent of players, addiction experts at the American Medical Association's (AMA) annual meeting have refuted the idea that video-game addiction could be categorized as a mental disorder. Such a move, which would have eased the path for insurance coverage of video-game addiction, was blocked by the AMA because, according to experts, video-game use lacks the "complex physiological disease state akin to alcoholism or other substance-abuse disorders." The committee which initially proposed the idea says more research will continue to be done on the effects of excessive gaming. Read more
RFID Industry Hungry for Engineers
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) engineers are currently in high demand according to a recent article in IEEE-USA Today's Engineer. RFID, in brief, uses tags and readers to transmit the identity of an object or person through radio waves and is used for several different purposes such as tracking inventory, locating missing pets and providing detailed medical information in hospitals. The field, still in its infancy, is seeing a tremendous amount of growth, according to industry experts, and that growth is expected continue as more uses are found for this new technology. Learn more
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OnRec.com Recognizes IEEE Job Site
OnRec.com, the web-based magazine for online recruitment around the world, recently featured an article about the newly updated IEEE Job Site. The article highlights the additional content added to the IEEE Job Site geared towards getting more traffic – from both employers and job-seekers – to the site. Also noted is that the IEEE Job Site serves a potential audience of more than 2 million engineers, technology professionals, and senior-level managers worldwide. Read more
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Students Handle Tough Questions in Ethics Competitions
With corporate and government scandals in the news, the topic of ethics has taken center stage, especially in engineering. That's why the IEEE Ethics and Member Conduct Committee sponsors regional competitions to educate student members. In recent months, ethics competitions have been held during a student conference at the University of Cincinnati in Region 2; at Region 3's SoutheastCon 2007, in Richmond, Virginia; and at a Region 5 conference in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Read more
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Stuff You Don't Learn in Engineering School
Are you a workaholic? According to Carl Selinger, author of "Stuff You Don't Learn in Engineering School: Skills for Success in the Real World" (Wiley-IEEE Press), 44 percent of Americans consider themselves workaholics-and you might be one of them. Selinger's book discusses the line between being a devoted worker and feeling trapped. So what is the most important thing for a workaholic to do? According to Selinger, everyone should ask themselves what it is they really want to accomplish in both their career and personal life, and then ask how it is going. He also identifies several helpful tips for managing the busy demands of a challenging career. Read more
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IEEE Spectrum Tech Insiders Webinars Now on Demand
If you missed these recent live Webinars: "Multiphysics Simulation for Electrical Engineers", sponsored by COMSOL; "Navigating Your Career in Science and Technology", sponsored by Polytechnic University; and "Optimizing Nanoscale CMOS RFICs", sponsored by Ansoft, you can still view them in their entirety here
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Universities, Businesses Agree On Guidelines for IP, Shared Research
The University-Industry Innovation Summit Team, which encourages businesses and universities to share collaborative research, has announced a new set of guidelines to protect intellectual property. The guidelines are designed to weigh IT companies' and universities' policies and practices to determine appropriate licensing standards. They will be posted on the National Academies' University-Industry Demonstration Partnership site, the IBM university relations site, and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation site. Read more
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IEEE Presidents' Scholarship Awarded for 3-D Display Device
The IEEE Presidents' Scholarship, sponsored by the IEEE Foundation, was awarded to George Francis Hotz, a 17 year-old senior at the Bergen County Academies in Glen Rock, N.J., USA, at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair held in May. The US $10,000 Presidents’ Scholarship is awarded annually for outstanding achievement in understanding electrical engineering, information technology, or other IEEE fields of interest. For his winning project, entitled "I Want a Holodeck", Hotz designed and built a full color, high resolution, 360 degree viewable volumetric display, which displays 3-D objects in a hologram-type format. Read more
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Students Invited to Join Robotics Competition
Students interested in building and programming robots to operate in both virtual and real-world environments are invited to participate in the Robotics Competition to be held as part of the 2007 Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference. The conference, scheduled to take place 14-17 October 2007 in Orlando, Florida, USA is in it’s forth year and will focus on diversity in innovation. The Robotics Competition, new to the conference, will take place in two stages and involve locating objects in both simulated and physical disaster environments. Learn more
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New Titles Available from Wiley-IEEE Press Series
Discover the latest research in engineering from Wiley-IEEE. IEEE members receive 15% off all titles. Buy today
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College Students Compete to Build Eco-Friendly SUVs
The July issue of Spectrum magazine features an article about this year’s Challenge X, held in Detroit, Michigan, in which teams of college students compete to make an environmentally friendly sport utility vehicle that appeals to everyday consumers. The competition, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and General Motors, who donated brand-new Chevrolet Equinoxes to the 17 college teams, along with dozens of other sponsors, is in it’s third year and challenges students to build a sport-utility that uses less petroleum and emits fewer pollutants and greenhouse gases. Originally a three-year project, a fourth year has been added to the contest to allow the student teams to go on the road and seek public feedback. Learn more
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IEEE UCE/SPAM Filtering Service to Change from “OPT-IN” to “OPT-OUT”
To help reduce the increasingly large volume of unsolicited commercial email messages – commonly known as spam – being sent to ieee.org email addresses from outside sources, the IEEE UCE/spam filtering service will be changing from the current “opt-in” policy to an “op-out” policy.”
On 20 August 2007, a default spam filtering level, expected to reduce the volume of email sent to ieee.org addresses by 30 percent, will be applied to all IEEE email aliases. It is designed to filter out email that is extremely likely to be UCE/spam. In the past, this filtering service had to be individually activated by each user.
Those who do not wish to have the default spam filtering level applied to their IEEE email alias can select to “opt-out” at https://uce.ieee.org and choose the “No UCE/Spam filtering” option, or select a more aggressive filter level. After choosing this option, click on “Set UCE/Spam Filtering Level” button to save the changes. If no action is taken by 20 August, the default spam filtering level will be activated. Subscribers can opt-out of the filtering service at any time.
For more details on why the new policy was implemented, how the policy will improve email delivery through internet service providers and the aggressiveness of the service, visit https://uce.ieee.org/opt-out-info.html. Questions can be directed to member-services@ieee.org.
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