Thursday article links

3-D Video: Coming to Home Theaters? [Multichannel News]

We're still years away from seeing standards-based 3-D video on television screens, but the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers has created a task force that will develop standards for 3-D video on TV. Content producers want to replicate the success of recent 3-D movie releases on the small screen and consumers have shown interest in 3-D in their home theaters. This article details how this new task force wants to ensure the quality of the 3-D stream, so that viewers aren't getting headaches after watching.

During the FCC hearing earlier this week, Mark Cuban testified about the use of 3-D technology to broadcast sporting events. If you're interested in this new video technology, you should check out his blog post on it as well.

Vote for TitleTown USA [ESPN]

Speaking of sports, two cities that Insight serves are finalists for ESPN's TitleTown USA. Over the past few weeks, ESPN has been profiling cities across the nation that have a proud tradition of local teams winning championships. Louisville, Kentucky and Columbus, Ohio are both finalists for TitleTown USA, which will be determined by an online vote on ESPN's web site.

So, whether you're a Ohio State Buckeyes fan or root for the Louisville Cardinals, click over to ESPN to vote for your city. The results will be announced Monday on ESPN's Sportscenter. 

Verizon To Offer New FiOS Home Gateways [Broadband Reports]

I read yesterday that Verizon is rolling out new gateways for their fiber-to-the-home installations that use coax cable to transmit the broadband service through a subscriber's home to their individual devices. To Verizon I say, "Welcome to the party!"

I wrote last month about this emerging technology (called MoCA), and plans for telcos to deploy it. It's ironic because cable operators have used hybrid fiber-coax (HFC) technology to deliver broadband Internet to customers for years. Now, telephone companies like Verizon are suddenly "discovering" HFC and are now deploying it to their customers as well.

New Tool From Facebook Extends Its Web Presence [New York Times]

Facebook, the popular social networking web site, is currently hosting a conference for Facebook application developers. At that conference yesterday, the 24-year-old CEO of Facebook announced a new feature that will allow third-party web sites to connect to the information that Facebook users have posted in their profiles.

If you're a Facebook user, you'll be able to connect other sites to your profile information (I'm assuming this service will be opt-in). I'm sure that the third-party application developers at this conference are already dreaming up new ways to use the information we have in our Facebook profile. I'm looking forward to seeing how this new feature develops.

San Francisco Hack: Where Was the Oversight? [InternetNews]

Have you heard about the network administrator in San Francisco that took that city's entire governmental computer network hostage? Due to a complete breakdown in security protocols, one rogue employee managed to lock the other San Francisco city employees out of the city email system, payroll records, and law enforcement records.

According to this article, the employee has finally turned over the password to unlock the network to the city's mayor. Whew! Network security specialists will be analyzing this case for a while to determine how one employee was able to single-handedly gain total control of the city's network.