Technology

LAS VEGAS - A former New Jersey gaming regulator, who now runs the world's largest independent gaming-equipment testing lab, said new technology is impacting tribal casino operators as much as those who run U.S. commercial gambling halls. "In Indian gaming, new technology is not always born out of innovation," said James Maida, president and chief executive officer of Gaming Laboratories International (GLI) in Lakewood, N.J., during a panel discussion Thursday, the final day of the Global Gaming Conference here.

C&D Technologies Inc., a Blue Bell-based maker of energy-storage products and backup power systems, has hired Christian Rheault as its new president and chief executive officer. Rheault had been senior vice president of global business operations for Kulicke & Soffa Industries Inc. until the maker of semiconductor and LED assembly equipment moved its corporate headquarters to Singapore from Fort Washington. Taken by private by Angelo, Gordon & Co. in January, C&D had been led by interim CEO David L. Treadwell since May, after Minnesota-based MTS Systems Corp.

Jim Young , raised in Apple Computer's hometown of Cupertino, Calif., developed the notoriously successful face-and-body comparison-voting site HotOrNot.com back in pre- Facebook days, while he was warming up for his doctoral dissertation at Berkeley. Cheyenne Ehrlich , raised in a meditation center, developed ClickTheButton.com , a PayPal predecessor, while he was an undergraduate at Vassar, and went on to help build firms in Silicon Valley and East Asia, from his home on the Hawaiian island of Maui.

As the political conventions wind down, and the campaigns crank into overdrive, there are plenty of smartphone applications to add to the arsenal for following the presidential election. Each of this week's offerings is free, and all but one are available for both Android and Apple devices. Ad Hawk by the Sunlight Foundation, available from Google Play and the App Store, tells which groups are behind political advertisements. The Sunlight Foundation is a nonpartisan group that advocates for government transparency.

Election officials are finding that new technology enables efficient elections, even eliminating the need for voters to show photo ID. However, obtaining identification documents to register remains a hurdle for the elderly and minorities who lack those resources. Electronic poll books, which essentially are computer software that load digital registration records, are used in at least one county in27 states, including Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia. In Pennsylvania, Bradford and Washington Counties used some of the federal voting-act money to install the electronic poll books, according to the Department of State.

There was a 66.67-percent chance that Jai Williams would wind up playing his college basketball in Philadelphia. That number is now 100. The 6-8, 240-pound Williams, a rising senior and power forward at Philadelphia Electrical & Technology Charter, Monday committed to Saint Joseph's. His runner-up school was La Salle. Other offers came from Temple, Drexel, Virginia Commonwealth and Niagara. "I wanted to stay close to home, so my family could come see me play," said Williams, who lives near 42nd and Parkside, roughly 3 miles from Hawk Hill.

Scheduled for a September showroom debut, the extensively redesigned 2013 Mercedes-Benz GL turns out to be more than a superb sport ute. In the name of safety, comfort, saving petrol, on and off-road traction, and fording streams up to two feet deep, this largest and most costly of the Benz SUVs also proves a technological treasure trove. There's enough standard and optional hardware and software here to cause an UberGeek to OD. If the GL could stage an orgy attended by algorithms and artificial intelligence instead of decadent Romans, it would easily outdraw one of Caligula's mixers.

WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif. - Google, so far, has won the search-engine wars. Now it wants to target international crime, including Mexico's powerful drug cartels. Eric Schmidt, Google Inc.'s executive chairman, has taken a keen interest in Mexico, where more than 47,500 people have been killed in drug-related violence since 2006, when President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against the cartels. Schmidt recently visited most of Mexico's most violent cities, Ciudad Juarez, where civic leaders asked if he could help.

The fast pace of technological progress over the last two decades has led to a growing lag between the introduction of new communications devices and the privacy laws that regulate their usage. This has allowed law enforcement authorities to exploit the situation.   The New York Times recently reported that several major cellphone companies have been receiving an increasing number of requests for data from legal authorities at every level. A congressional inquiry led by Rep. Edward Markey (D., Mass.)

Goal-line technology may be used in major soccer competitions as soon as December after the sport's rule-making body sanctioned its introduction on Sunday following high- profile errors at the 2010 World Cup and the recent European Championship. The International Football Association Board unanimously approved allowing the Hawk-Eye and GoalRef systems, which use technology to tell whether the ball has crossed the goal line. The systems will aid officials, who will still base their rulings on what they see on the field.