CS74N: Digital Dilemmas

People

Instructor
Prof. David L. Dill
Gates 344
5-3642

Administrative Associate
Mary Jane Swenson
Gates 279
3-0748

Calendar

This is an approximate and incomplete schedule of classes. Please check this page frequently.

Scheduling may change, and assignments and other details will be added over time.

Class
 Date
 Topic/Speaker
 Assignment
1
 Tuesday, Apr 3 Introduction
Before Thursday's class:
  • Read about Moore's law in WikiPedia. Check the "Other formulations" section for network speed.
  • Read Kryder's law in this article.
  • Ignore the babel of different protocols, but compare the relative speeds of current iPhones and 4G technologies such as WiMAX (just google it). But also see the current status of bandwidth to homes.
  • (easy) assignment: Before Thursday's class, based on the readings
    • Estimate the speed to download transfer the contents of a blu-ray disc (50GB) over a network at current network speeds.
    • How long will it take with the networking technology of 2022?
    • How many Blu-ray movies could be stored on a typical laptop hard drive now?
    • How will this change by 2022?
    Write down all your assumptions. Before Thursday's class, email me your analysis with subject line "CS74N assignment 1". I am "dill@cs.stanford.edu".
2
 Thursday, Apr 5
 Computer and networking basics
Discussion on technology prognostication
 Read these for next Thursday:
3
 Tuesday, Apr 10
 How computers work I. Organize into groups and begin working on the first project.
4
 Thursday, Apr 12
 Intellectual property and file sharing
Guest: Lauren K. Schoenthaler
Senior University Counsel, Stanford University
5
 Tuesday, Apr 17
 Discussion of readings on intellectual property
6
 Thursday, Apr 19
 More discussion of readings and computer basics. Read the Wikipaedia entry on SOPA before Tuesday.
7
 Tuesday, April 24 Mitch Stolz, Staff Attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, on recent copyright enforcement initiatives.
We will start discussing these readings/videos on May 1:

Read about internet voting for May 3:

8
 Thursday, Apr 26
 Presentations of project 1 conclusions by student groups.
9
 Tuesday, May 1
 Discussion of readings/video on electronic voting.
Assignment: Project on elections. Presentations will be Tuesday, May 15
10
 Thursday, May 3
 Guest: David Jefferson

11
 Tuesday, May 8
 Discussion of readings on internet voting. Read the "Modern Cryptography" section of the Wikipedia page on Wikipedia page on Cryptography (symmetric key cryptography and public key cryptography).
12
 Thursday, May 10
 Cryptography basics. HTML, HTTP, cookies, etc.
Privacy readings -- for discussion Thursday, May 17.

Tracking by large web services:

ISPs and "clickstream" data.

13
 Tuesday, May 15
 Student presentations for elections project.
14
 Thursday, May 17
 Discussion of Privacy Readings (assigned May 10)
15
 Tuesday, May 22
Naomi B. Waltman, Esq. Senior Vice President & Associate General Counsel CBS
16
 Thursday, May 24
 Jonathan Mayer
17
 Tuesday, May 29
18
 Thursday, May 31
19
 Tuesday, June 4