- Caltech will implement an open-access policy on 1 January 2014 that automatically grants the Institute non-exclusive rights to disseminate faculty scholarly papers, effectively removing copyright barriers for posting research on Caltech websites.  

- The OpenWorm project published its “movement validation plans” in a public Google Doc, and contributors are seen as broadly sympathetic to transhumanism and mind-uploading because Langton Labs participants dominate the effort.  

- nemaload (nemaload.davidad.org, GitHub org nemaload) is an OpenWorm-related data-extraction toolchain that pasky worked on full-time for six months; kanzure noted its conceptual overlap with tangiblebit, a FabLab-era CAD system reminiscent of SKDB.  

- A technical debate on cryptocurrency mining incentives concluded that ASIC-dominated algorithms (e.g., Bitcoin) discourage general-purpose, free-software-compatible hardware, whereas CPU-friendly or frequently-changing algorithms (e.g., Primecoin) better preserve user freedom and hardware reusability.  

- Two papers were highlighted showing how twin-sperm studies can trace early post-blastocyst somatic mutations, because sperm from twins serve as a bulk source of developmental rather than meiotic mutations due to early gonad formation.  

- juri_ proposed a free-software policy favoring proof-of-work algorithms that remain CPU-friendly to avoid incentivizing single-purpose ASICs that become e-waste and cannot run free software; kanzure distilled this into a concise policy statement.  

- Participants discussed the possibility of fully open-source ASICs fabricated with open tools as a way to reconcile high-performance mining with free-software ideals.  

- DIY ultrasound neurostimulation was explored: achievable spatial resolution is ~1 mm with 0.5 MHz ultrasound (better than TMS), and a curated literature folder is available at http://diyhpl.us/~bryan/papers2/neuro/ultrasound/.  

- ThomasEgi outlined an experimental 160×144-electrode array (Game Boy resolution) to interface directly with the 3 mm optic nerve for a vision prosthesis, noting mechanical insertion without damaging neural tissue as the key challenge.  

- kanzure linked to the new SynBio Axlr8r (http://www.synbioaxlr8r.com/), a startup accelerator focused on synthetic biology, and highlighted Philip Moriarty’s UK EPSRC molecular-nanotechnology grant extension (EP/G007837/1) from October 2013 to March 2014.