1. 1. In Jan/Feb 2012, Google hosted a conference to which were invited
several leading technologists, scientists, and other innovators &
entrepreneurs to discuss some of the world's most interesting & difficul
problems. They called this an exercise in "moonshot thinking" i.e.
solutions that are just beyond what is currently feasible but just enough
within reality
Given the nature of the gathering (and that many videos were posted),
the gathering drew comparisons with TED. The name chosen for this
(and more are planned) is something that would often be the last line in
an algebra problem.
What?
5. 3.Kim Schmitz is a German computer programmer who has been to jail a
couple of times on charges of illegal hacking and infringing data
security. He turned into an entrepreneur in 2005, starting the site
Megaupload.com. This popular site was shut down in January 2012
after allegations of copyright infringement.
In 2005, he also changed his last name to something unusual, but very
appropriate. What's his last name now?
7. 4. The full title is "To promote prosperity, creativity, entrepreneurship, and
innovation by combating the theft of U.S. property, and for other
purposes". The short form is H.R. 3261. This was introduced by Lamar
Smith of Texas.
What is the acronym?
10. The rule that the Prize cannot be awarded posthumously. Steinman died
only days before the announcement, and the committee only discovered
this fact when they were trying to contact Steinman to inform him about
his award
11. 6. Michael Hart passed away in September 2011. The Economist in its
obituary for him, noted that on the night of the American Independence
Day in 1971, Hart, a student at University of Illinois in Urbana, began
typing out the American Declaration of Independence on a computer.
He then sent a link to friends saying they could download it for free.
Eventually, this voluntary act led to more books being written out, and
more volunteers joining what could now be termed a project. What
appropriate name did Hart give to this project?
12. Project Gutenberg which digitises books and
provides them for free. Johann Gutenberg, of
course, introduced the printing press.
13. 7. Wiki definition:
an aerial maneuver in which an airplane makes a complete rotation on
its longitudinal axis while following a helical path, approximately
maintaining its original direction. It is sometimes described as "a
combination of a loop and a roll".
This term also became an internet sensation in November 2011. What
two word term is it?
14. The term is "barrel roll". Google revealed a new "easter egg" in which
one could type "do a barrel roll" on the Google search engine to
cause the page to imitate a "barrel roll".
15. 8. The ____ ______Laureate 2012
The Norwegian Academy of Science and
Letters has decided to award the ___
___ for 2012 to
Endre Szemerédi
Alfréd Rényi Institute of Mathematics,
Hungarian Academy of Sciences,
Budapest, and Department of Computer
Science, Rutgers, The State University
of New Jersey, USA
"for his fundamental contributions to
discrete mathematics and theoretical
computer science, and in recognition of
the profound and lasting impact of these
contributions on additive number theory
and ergodic theory."
21. 11. Whose CV?
Wrote the open source port scanning
program 'Strobe'
Co-invented the 'rubberhose deniable
encryption' concept used in cryptography
wrote "Surfraw", a command line interface to
search engines
Contributor to the book: Underground: Tales
of Hacking, Madness and Obsession on
the Electronic Frontier
The man behind ________
25. 13. The World Science Fiction Society (WSFS) gives out the __X___
Awards each year for the best science fiction or fantasy works and
achievements of the previous year. The award is named after __X___
Gernsback, who founded the pioneering science fiction magazine
Amazing Stories and who is considered one of the "fathers" of the
science fiction genre
__X___ is also a 2011 American 3D adventure drama film based on Brian
Selznick's novel The Invention of ___X___ Cabret about a boy who lives
alone in a Paris railway station,directed by Martin Scorsese and written
by John Logan.
X please!
31. 16. Implementation of the ‘Aadhar’ project in Kerala became tougher,
due to a technical as well as legal snag. Dubbed as a ‘Kerala-specific
issue’, the three public enrolment agencies in Kerala involved in the
project – It@Schools, Keltronand the Akshaya Project found the issue
unacceptable due to one of Kerala’s laws. Which law and why?
32. Open Source Software
Kerala is the only state in India that mandates the use of Free Open
Source Software. The client enrolment software used in Aadhar,
however is only compatible with Windows. The three agencies only
use Linux operating systems.
33. 17. Where do you find these?
Pauline
Ben
Michelle
M.One was the spouse of a Microsoft employee who found a program
bug.
.One was a Microsoft employee who resigned in1995.
. .One is an employee's child that frequented the Microsoft work site.
36. These are all syndromes associated
with names of cities.
1. Jerusalem Syndrome - wherein tourists become religious zealots
to the point of acting like ancient prophets.
2. Stockholm Syndrome - wherein hostages become fond of their
captors.
3. Paris Syndrome - wherein mainly Japanese tourists experience
severe culture shock.
4. Florence Syndrome (aka Stendahl's Synrdrome) - wherein
tourists become overwhelmed by art.
37. 19. In Euclidean geometry, the _____ _____ theorem says that if a
point P is chosen inside rectangle ABCD then,
AP2 + PC2 =BP2+DP2
The theorem also applies to points outside the rectangle, although the
proof is harder to visualize in this case. This theorem is named as
such because when the involved line segments are drawn,they
somewhat resemble the _____ ______ .
39. 20. A notable landmark often featured
in photographs, video games and
visible from aerial-imaging websites
such as Google Maps, of the ghost
city called Prypiat, features a Ferris
wheel.
So, why is the city abandoned now?
43. 22. This project was first announced by Ian Murdock in
1993. He formed its name as a combination of the first
name of his then girlfriend Debra Lynn and his own
name.
45. 23. What?
Each piece bears a glyph (letter or character), symbolizing the
multilingualism of ________. They include the Cyrillic letter И (“i”), the
Greek letter Ω (omega), the Korean syllabic block 위 (wi), the Chinese
character 維 (wéi), the hindi letter िि at the left, the bengali letter উ, the
Kannada kagunita ವ (vi) at the bottom, the Hebrew (and also Yiddish)
letter ( וVav) and at the uppermost left the Armenian վ (vev). As with the
Latin letter “w”, these glyphs are in most cases the first glyph of the
name “__________” rendered in that language (for example, 維基大典
in Classical Chinese; similarly the japanese katakana ウィ makes the
sound “wi”)
The empty space at the top represents the (incomplete) nature of the
project, and languages yet to be added.
49. 25. If pressed along with ‘Shift’ in editable text, this key can
also be used to highlight all the characters after the cursor
in a certain line.
Identify the key.
