Mechanical engineers flock to hardware hackathon MakeMIT
Approximately 200 students gathered in Lobdell Dining Hall last Saturday to participate in the first phase of MakeMIT, a hardware hackathon organized by TechX. While the past year has seen college hackathons (including TechX’s very own HackMIT) increase in both scale and number, most of the emphasis has been on software, with few options for non-computer science students to get in on the action.
Student innovators may get new legal resource
President L. Rafael Reif sent a letter to the MIT community Saturday evening clarifying the Institute’s support for the student creators of Tidbit, the Bitcoin-harvesting hackathon project, which was the subject of a subpoena from the State Attorney General of New Jersey served to Jeremy L. Rubin ’16. The response, which also includes a proposal for a new “resource for independent legal advice” for students, comes after Professor Hal Abelson PhD ’73; Ethan Zuckerman, director of the MIT Center for Civic Media; and Nathan Matias G released a widely-circulated open letter advocating that MIT take an official stance on the matter.
Open letter calls on MIT to do more in Tidbit's legal battle
An open letter circulated online Thursday urged MIT to take a stand on a pending court case involving Jeremy L. Rubin ‘16, who was served a subpoena by New Jersey for documents, correspondence, and code associated with a Bitcoin-related project called Tidbit.
NEWS BRIEFS
In an email sent out to MIT undergraduates, the Undergraduate Association (UA) requested student input to questions that had originally been posed in the Abelson report, “MIT and the Prosecution of Aaron Swartz,” written by Professors Hal Abelson PhD ‘73 and Peter A. Diamond. President L. Rafael Reif and the Academic Council, MIT’s senior academic and administrative leaders, agreed that the report required an open discussion in the MIT community about personal ethics, MIT’s obligations to the extended community, and lessons MIT can learn from the hacker culture. Such a conversation had previously occurred with faculty members and graduate students before the UA reached out to the undergraduate community.
Gavin begins work as first Frank Stanton Chair
Politics has been part of human culture, and the subject of scholarly inquiry, for millennia. But only 70 years have passed since the epochal arrival of nuclear weapons, and our understanding of nuclear proliferation, deterrence, and arms control, and their complex relationships with traditional political issues, is still a work in progress.
IN SHORT
Applications for EECScon are due Friday, February 14th. If you are an MIT undergraduate performing research in an EECS-affiliated lab or an EECS undergraduate performing research anywhere, and would like to show your work to the MIT community, apply to present at EECScon, which is being held Apr. 16.
Haldun Anil elected as next president of IFC Exec Board
This year the Interfraternity Council (IFC) will be led by Haldun Anil ’15, a member of Theta Chi who will serve as the president of the newly-elected executive board. The organization, according to Anil, has hopes of “bettering communication to outside entities” and working towards a state where “we as a campus are much more connected and there is a stronger bond in [the] community.”
Startups need room to grow
TWELVE MILES wasn’t always a long haul. But for the types of companies that fill Cambridge’s Kendall Square and Boston’s Seaport, a dozen miles might as well be an eternity. Biogen Idec found this out in 2010, when the Cambridge biotech giant moved some of its workers from Kendall to a shiny corporate campus in Weston. The Weston digs were a quick car ride away from Biogen’s researchers in Kendall, but within a year, Biogen execs were laying plans to return to Kendall Square.
REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: CLASS OF 1967 DISCUSSES MIT YEARS:
A forum entitled “Before and After — The MIT Experience,” took place Sunday in W20’s Mezzanine Lounge from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., featuring four speakers from the Class of 2017 and three from the Class of 1967.
NEWS BRIEFS
Leland Cheung MBA ‘10 recently announced a bid for Massachusetts’ lieutenant governor position, under the Democratic Party. Cheung, a graduate of MIT’s Sloan School of Management and Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, is serving his second term on the Cambridge City Council. According to the Boston Globe, Cheung is planning on investing six figures into his upcoming campaign. He stated in an interview with the Globe, “I think I have an opportunity to help the Democratic ticket in November.”
REPORTER’S NOTEBOOK: 2016 Ring Premiere is true to tradition
Last Friday evening, I joined my fellow members of the Class of 2016 as we came together to watch the unveiling of this year’s Brass Rat design. Before the doors even opened, we already had a class-bonding experience — waiting outside Kresge in freezing temperatures.
FROM THE ARCHIVES:
Editor’s Note: This article originally ran 11 years ago in Issue 3 of Volume 123 of The Tech on Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003.
News Briefs
Jeremy L. Rubin ’16 has sought help from the Electronic Frontier Foundation after receiving requests from the New Jersey attorney general’s office for documents and code related to a hackathon project he worked on with three other MIT students.
MIT add/drop system moves to digital format
A new online application was introduced to the MIT community on January 27, allowing students to add, drop, and change courses via their own electronic submissions. A number of key forms are also expected to go paperless in the near future.
Mixed feelings about death penalty for Tsarnaev
He lost his right leg and endured more than 20 operations. Shrapnel remains in his heart and elsewhere in his body, remnants of the Boston Marathon bombings that killed three and injured more than 260.
CORRECTIONS
An article in Tuesday’s issue of The Tech about Chancellor Cindy Barnhart PhD ‘88 neglected to include her graduation year.
William Ware, MIT alum, engineer, dies
Willis H. Ware, an electrical engineer who in the late 1940s helped build a machine that would become a blueprint for computer design in the 20th century, and who later played an important role in defining the importance of personal privacy in the information age, died Nov. 22 at his home in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 93. His death was confirmed by his family.