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Maybe we'll get a new song when the blight eradicates the Cavendish. The one you're refering to was written during the demise of the Gros Michel:

"(Some of the shortages during that time entered the fabric of popular culture; the 1923 musical hit ÃâYes! We Have No BananasÃâ is said to have been written after songwriters Frank Silver and Irving Cohn were denied in an attempt to purchase their favorite fruit by a syntactically colorful, out-of-stock neighborhood grocer.)"

At least someone is working to find a new commercial king:

http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2005-06/can-fruit-be-saved

And the lesson of the Cavendish, as far as the growers are concerned, is that a single variety can last up to 50 years, not that a single variety is extra susceptible to disease.

I thought the Popular Science article was much better: http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2005-06/can-fruit-be-saved

You could make it a giant digital picture frame which automatically displays your pictures when you upload them, and then use it as a nice gift for your mother.

The key to wireless power is resonance. Think of a wineglass that shatters when an opera singer hits just the right note. When the voice matches the glass's resonant frequency--the tone you hear when you tap the glass--the glass efficiently absorbs the singer's energy and cracks. Using magnetic induction and two identical copper coils that resonate at the same frequency, the MIT scientists successfully powered a 60-watt lightbulb from a power source seven feet away. The team called their invention WiTricity, short for "wireless electricity." Next up: sending the juice even farther and more efficiently.

The key to wireless power is resonance. Think of a wineglass that shatters when an opera singer hits just the right note. When the voice matches the glass's resonant frequency--the tone you hear when you tap the glass--the glass efficiently absorbs the singer's energy and cracks. Using magnetic induction and two identical copper coils that resonate at the same frequency, the MIT scientists successfully powered a 60-watt lightbulb from a power source seven feet away. The team called their invention WiTricity, short for "wireless electricity." Next up: sending the juice even farther and more efficiently.

Achieving the terminal velocity of a .50 cal sniper bullet, it would actually take approximately 18 seconds for the projectile to hit its intended target. Sheer forces and wind resistance at that range can theoretically be overcome by the GPS targeting that you're talking about (Read: railguns being implemented today http://www.popsci.com/military-aviation-space/article/2008-02/navy-tests-32-megajoule-railgun), but since we're talking ultra-high tech, a nice little EMP burst could take out any surveillance devices/monitoring systems that might interfere with one's ability to stay alive.

Here. I don't know if the article is yet open the public, I subscribe to the magazine so I have full access to the article. But none the less it gives a minor history of exoskeletons and expectations of them. One of popsci's better articles.

I whole-heartedly disagree with your comments about extending Drupal beyond its core. Admittedly if you try using Drupal without installing any modules you'll get pretty limited functionality. If you want something to work differently, you can install one of the thousands (yes, thousands) of contributed modules or write your own using Drupal's API (which is actually pretty good, and it got even better in Drupal 6).

For theming, you can use a stock theme (like the default Garland), you can grab one of many contributed themes, or you can create your own (from scratch or using an existing theme as a starting point). Drupal sites don't have to look like Drupal the same way WordPress sites don't have to look like WordPress.

Just like any other system, Drupal is only as customizable as the amount of work you're willing to put into it. A lot of WordPress sites out there use stock Kubrick, just as many Drupal sites use stock Garland. But a lot of people choose to customize their sites by creating custom themes and writing custom code (or using freely available modules).

Want some examples of sites that use Drupal that look nothing like your basic Drupal install and have plenty of unique functionality? Have a look at Popular Science*, FastCompany, or MTV UK.

* Disclaimer: I work for the company that built PopSci's new site and was one of the developers that worked on the site.

Well, first of all, modules in Drupal are code plugins. The stuff you move from one side of the page to another is a "block". :-)

Drupal is great for getting something out quickly, but yes, for any serious site you are going to be using numerous "contrib" modules (the add-on systems you mention). Drupal's architecture is built around letting add-on modules do the powerful stuff, while core is an engine to enable them to do powerful stuff.

For instance, if you're building a complex site without the CCK and Views modules, you're missing 2/3 of what Drupal has to offer. You can build sites that look and function nothing like "normal Drupal" without touching core code if you know where to "bend" it, and there are a large number of places where Drupal is designed to bend. No, you can't crank out the NYTimes web site in a weekend, but you can't do that with any CMS, and any CMS vendor that claims they can is lying to you. :-)

A small sampling of Drupal sites launched in the last year or two:

http://www.imamuseum.org/
http://artsci.wustl.edu/
http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections
http://www.motogp.com/
http://gigaom.com/
http://donna.be/
http://www.fastcompany.com/
http://www.flipkowlier.be/
http://popsci.com/
http://rockband.com/

And several dozen from SonyBMG Music, such as:
http://www.pinkspage.com/
http://www.avrillavigne.com/
http://jenniferlopez.com/
http://britney.com/

You can do very non-Drupaly sites with Drupal if you learn to embrace contrib modules. :-)

(Disclaimer: I worked on several of the sites listed above.)

The key to wireless power is resonance. Think of a wineglass that shatters when an opera singer hits just the right note. When the voice matches the glass's resonant frequency--the tone you hear when you tap the glass--the glass efficiently absorbs the singer's energy and cracks. Using magnetic induction and two identical copper coils that resonate at the same frequency, the MIT scientists successfully powered a 60-watt lightbulb from a power source seven feet away. The team called their invention WiTricity, short for "wireless electricity." Next up: sending the juice even farther and more efficiently.

There was an article in this month's Popular Science about suits like this. If this kind of thing trips your trigger that article is worth a read.

I didn't interpret the /. description or the underlying article as an advertisement. The subject of the piece is a just a prototype or proof-of-concept. Separately, but on a related note Popular Science has an article discussing how nVidia argues that the best bang for your computer buck is not to pay more for a faster CPU, but rather to upgrade your graphics card. Here is the link: http://www.popsci.com/gear-gadgets/article/2008-04/forget-cpu-buy-better-graphics-card

The Glen Canyon Dam was almost the site of a much larger flood in 1983, when it was nearly overtopped.

http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=&q=%22the+1983+flood+at+glen+canyon%22&btnG=Google+Search
http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2003-03/water-vapor-almost-busts-dam

The cavitation damage to the solid rock of the spillway walls was truly incredible.

For an exciting telling of the story, search Google Video for "Challenge at Glen Canyon". (You will be instantly reminded of every National Parks visitors center you have been in.)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1358563539762136744

I don't actually know them personally; I'm familiar with the wiki because I used it extensively when I was setting-up/figuring out my give-one-get-one (G1G1) XO. The reason that I say that the management at OLPC is accessible is that one of the people that helped me via the wiki was Walter Bender, the president of OLPC.

I absolutely agree with you, however, that the biggest problem that OLPC has right now (in light of "competition" from Asus and other quarters) is its apparent unwillingness to make the XO generally available to the US and European public. Nicolas Negroponte has made a number of statements to the effect that selling the laptop to consumers would create a market for the laptops and would provide an incentive for individuals receiving laptops gratis (from government or charity) to sell the laptops, or an incentive for criminals to steal laptops from children. It is my view, however, that *in general* even very poor people will see the value of the laptop as an educational tool and will not choose to sell it, and that controls, procedures, and compensating incentives could be created to limit the impact of the exceptions (including criminality). Furthermore, if OLPC meets its very aggressive goals and distributes millions of laptops around the world, a market will inevitably come to exist; OLPC would do better to anticipate it and take advantage of it, rather than fight it. Aren't you more likely to buy an XO from a Peruvian fourth-grader through ebay if you can't buy it from Walmart than if you can? I think so.

By not selling the XO laptop directly to consumers, OLPC is hurting itself in a number of ways. First, it is failing to take advantage of the economies of scale provided by consumer markets (economies of scale that it needs). In some ways, it is also creating a perverse incentive for laptops to be transferred from third-world children to first-world consumers (as I describe above). Most significantly, however, it is giving the impression to government buyers in its target markets that there is something wrong with their product. As someone with experience doing business in Latin America, I can tell you for certain that a product that has not gained wide acceptance by US consumers is treated sceptically. That's not to say that there is a bias against locally-produced products; rather, there has been a history of many poor countries being a "dumping ground" of inferior or obsolete products that cannot be sold in Europe or the US. From the perspective of an over-worked bureaucrat, one clear sign that dumping is not taking place is that the product being sold is also being sold in the US or Europe. A common sign that dumping *is* taking place is that the product is *not* being sold in the US or Europe.

"The Anonymity Experiment" in the Feb issue of Popular Science. "During a week of attempting to cloak every aspect of daily life, ... " http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-02/anonymity-experiment

Popsci has another take on the Home of the the Future.

My house wouldn't be built around gimmicky crap like auto moodlighting or suggesting recipies. Mine would be more practical innovation. Bathrooms and kitchens coated in titanium dioxide treated to dissapate dirt and mildew. It'll have a 3D fabrication Printer to print out dishes or maybe even chair parts when we have extra company. Automated machines to cut the grass (if I don't go with bio-engineered no-mow grass.) The construction itself will be steel framed and built using modular panels but build to be reconfigurable (relativly.) Replacing drywall with bolted or snap-in-place steel-backed panels (the exposed surface side could be bare steel, have wood glued on, wallpapered, etc.) allowing for me to access the interior portions of the wall with ease. My particular aesthetic would be bare steel panels, with cables run along the outside in bundles, but it would be easy to reconfigure it to appear 'classical' with the wires hidden behind the now covered panels. I want my home of the future to be flexable, low(er) maintenance, and something that will last.

Popsci has another take on the Home of the the Future.

My house wouldn't be built around gimmicky crap like auto moodlighting or suggesting recipies. Mine would be more practical innovation. Bathrooms and kitchens coated in titanium dioxide treated to dissapate dirt and mildew. It'll have a 3D fabrication Printer to print out dishes or maybe even chair parts when we have extra company. Automated machines to cut the grass (if I don't go with bio-engineered no-mow grass.) The construction itself will be steel framed and built using modular panels but build to be reconfigurable (relativly.) Replacing drywall with bolted or snap-in-place steel-backed panels (the exposed surface side could be bare steel, have wood glued on, wallpapered, etc.) allowing for me to access the interior portions of the wall with ease. My particular aesthetic would be bare steel panels, with cables run along the outside in bundles, but it would be easy to reconfigure it to appear 'classical' with the wires hidden behind the now covered panels. I want my home of the future to be flexable, low(er) maintenance, and something that will last.

Popsci has another take on the Home of the the Future.

My house wouldn't be built around gimmicky crap like auto moodlighting or suggesting recipies. Mine would be more practical innovation. Bathrooms and kitchens coated in titanium dioxide treated to dissapate dirt and mildew. It'll have a 3D fabrication Printer to print out dishes or maybe even chair parts when we have extra company. Automated machines to cut the grass (if I don't go with bio-engineered no-mow grass.) The construction itself will be steel framed and built using modular panels but build to be reconfigurable (relativly.) Replacing drywall with bolted or snap-in-place steel-backed panels (the exposed surface side could be bare steel, have wood glued on, wallpapered, etc.) allowing for me to access the interior portions of the wall with ease. My particular aesthetic would be bare steel panels, with cables run along the outside in bundles, but it would be easy to reconfigure it to appear 'classical' with the wires hidden behind the now covered panels. I want my home of the future to be flexable, low(er) maintenance, and something that will last.

Popular Science wrote an article about this plane: Article

That treaty hasn't stopped us here in the grand US of A from researching the things.

You mean like the Cavendish Banana?

GM needs to come out with some crazy stuff like this soon because they're failing in their core products.

What does it say about the outcome of the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray battle? I want to buy my player now!

I don't know about Google, but the latest bid on Intrade's real-money market that "Blu-Ray Disc sales will outnumber HD-DVD disc sales in the US in 2008" is 85.0 out of 100. Popular Science's fake-money market is $87 out of $100 for "Will Toshiba stop manufacturing HD-DVD machines by the end of 2009?".

I wonder what you would learn from the PopSci Prediction Exchange (PPX)? I've been playing around with it a little bit, but it seems to act more like a commodities market than an actual stock exchange.

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/aviationspace/9f42e2e6fb5c6110vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd/5.html

A few things here. First, Nanosolar's factory seems well along, but those prices will come only after it's up to speed and has been making and selling product for a bit. Second, the key figure is 30 cents per watt (Is this your PopSci article?). Pretty awesome if they can make it. It would break natural gas as a peak load generator during daylight. But these press blurbs don't indicate whether Nanosolar can deliver on those promises. Finally, the solar cells make up only a portion of the total cost of a solar power system. You also have the mounting frame and electronics (eg, grid inverter, power regulator, etc). In some places, due to low solar influx, even free solar panels won't make the system cost effective.

"CEO Martin Roscheisen claims that once full production starts early next year [2008], it will create 430 megawatts' worth of solar cells a year--more than the combined total of every other solar plant in the U.S. The first 100,000 cells will be shipped to Europe, where a consortium will be building a 1.4-megawatt power plant next year."

I didn't read anything about them not wanting/being able to sell to the American market, it's just that their first order was placed by a European company. Unfortunately I didn't really further research this since I have a Histology exam in 2hrs and I should probably make my way over to campus.

One company Google has invested in is Nanosolar, whose solar tech Popular Science named Top Innovation of the Year 2007. They are already delivering 30 cents per watt and can't build factories fast enough to meet demand.

It's a rain of red cells that multiply like yeast yet have no detectable DNA. All earth based-life contains DNA, these cells do not appear. And this is just the tip of their unusual properties:

http://education.vsnl.com/godfrey/
http://www.earthfiles.com/news.php?ID=1337&category=Environment

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/2c21c0f98d07b010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_rain_in_Kerala
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/06/02/red.rain/index.html

Alien life, in some sense, has likely already found us.

And on a side note, I would encourage everyone to take a look at Linda Moulton Howe's work at Earthfiles.com. As is always the case, if there is an interesting phenomena on the planet, she does a more in-depth, facsinating job reporting on it than anyone else dare.

"Cheapest? It is by far the most expensive."

Not Nanosolar cells, according to the article:

"even if they were 100% efficient, unless you cover hundreds of square miles they still wouldn't produce enough power to even generate within an order of magnitude how much power a large coal power plant produces."

You should have done some calculations.

Incident solar energy at 40 Degrees latitude is ~600W per square meter. Given an average of 8 daylight hours, at your (impossible) 100% efficiency this is 4.8KWh per square meter per day.
So that is 4.8 Gigawatt hours of solar energy per square kilometer per day. Hazelwood Power Station, Victoria, Australia (AFAICT the largest power station in my state) produces 1.6GW of electricity, or 38.4GWh per day. The area of the Open-Pit mine, cooling pond and power station are currently over 15 square kilometers.

At 100% efficiency, you would need 8 square kilometers to produce the equivalent amount of power as this power station in a day. Of course, these solar cells claim 19.5% efficiency, so you would need to cover 42 square kilometers with these panels.

Anyway, unlike Coal Power stations you can put solar panels on your roof, (with more than enough energy to power your house), so area is not really an issue.

---- James hopes he hasn't made any horrendous errors

That's the claimed cost, but in practice there've always been cost overruns, and between 1.8 and 3.5 billion is normal. I was generous in splitting the difference.

As far as the cost of solar power, the answer is that we simply don't know yet. The costs for the thermal designs you're quoting come from pilot plants with levelized costs amortised over 25 years. Extremely low operating costs mean that plants with a lower construction cost (which you'd expect as experience is gained from building the pilot plants) and/or greater working lifetimes (again, likely given the low impact nature of the generation process) will be much more cost-effective than the pilot plants.

As well, the direct solar power options are getting cheaper too. Pairing efficient photovoltaics with a flow battery could mean a large proportion of a household's energy requirements could be produced in situ, saving infrastructure and transmission costs.

There are other options too - in many parts of the world where thermal gradients are steep, Hot Dry Rock reactors can be built which are again have very low operating costs.

I'm not saying there is no place for nuclear power at all, but today's oversized, monolithic generators are high cost, high risk ventures, and rely on yet another scarce resource to function. Do we really want uranium wars like the oil ones we're dealing with now?

Let's spread the load around a little.

here's a some links:
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/flat/bown/2007/green/item_65.html
http://www.ice-energy.com/Default.aspx?tabid=163

It doesn't defy anything IMO. We only get around half the energy from the gas as usable mechanical force (in theory). The rest is waste heat.

This simply uses the heat otherwise wasted by a regular otto cycle engine. BMW already has a way of doing the same that's conceptually simpler to understand. Although theirs is more mechanically complex and seems to lend itself to inefficiencies.

Sam

BMW Has already made plans to incorporate steam engines in their vehicles (and retrofit them in previous models)

Documenting, as the invevitable next step, every impractical wish list available (i.e. Flying Car, Regional Heliocopter Airports, internet connected toasters, space elevators, and hydrogen fuel cell cars): Popular Mechanics and Popular Science.

I'm really not that cynical, and I like the magazines, but reporting on likely, sensical new technology is not their forte (or mission).

Here without the ads and annoying background.

It will use the same basic logical steps to solve a problem, just faster and / or in parallel - and this may appear magical looking at the solution but if you sat down and examined the 'recipe', assuming it will tell you, it will be possible to follow the reasoning.

Not necessarily. I can give you one example right now: devices that were programmed genetically. They work, but we don't really understand how. Here is one example. I also remember an article about a researcher who worked on some sort of automata. The designs the algorithms came up with were masses of spaghetti code virtually impossible to decipher. One of the solutions even used an impurity in the silicon -- a capacitor or something that fluctuated between two states as the device heated up.

And what if a machine uses some weird quantum computing? We might not be able to follow that, either.

You do bring up a good point about the China knock-offs being very inexpensive, and often of high quality http://www.popsci.com/popsci/technology/e7e48a137b 144110vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html . So, perhaps China vs US is just not a typical comparison, huh?

It's cool that you're getting those experiences; I'm very jealous!

Ok, but CAN you bring the sugar bags onto the flight? It can be used as a rocket fuel and here; and as an explosive Sugar has a LOT of energy!

The basic mechanism for reflecting different colors is the same as used in "Zubbles", the yet to be released colored bubbles. The stucture dictates which color is reflected. Popular Science did a long article on the guy who went with this approach when trying to create colored bubbles for kids that didn't stain when popped:

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/0a03b5108e097 010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

Both use the same mechanism butterfly wings or an oil slick on water to reflect different light wavelengths.

Can they make this yet?

I want mine now.

CNN
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/BUSINESS/05/18/global. office.linustorvalds/
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/biztech/12/10/me ta.linux.reut/index.html
Cosmo
Ok you Got me. Maxim
http://www.maximonline.com/search/index.aspx?sTerm =linux&stype=1
Note, We need hot linux chix, stat.
Discover
http://discovermagazine.com/2004/jan/emerging-tech nology/?searchterm=linux Popular Science
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/how20/10160e0796b8401 0vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
And One of my favorite articles
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/how20/b39fea1a2b09701 0vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

My Point is Linux is everywhere, You'd be hard pressed to find a neihborhood that doesn't have 60% of the homes in it containing at least one linux based device. Tivo, Router, Spa, Cellphone, PDA, NAS, and that number is constantly growing. True most consumers don't know they use linux every day, from the webservers they visit to the phone they use, and that is a good thing. I don't care if there ever comes a day when "the Year of the Linux Desktop" happens because that year came for me 5 yrs ago.

My daughter has never known a Windows desktop, and she is perfectly happy.

Me, I still cringe when I have to load up the VM XP I use for testing windows builds of my software. (/rocking in shower, Still not clean, Still not clean.)

Now if you will excuse me, I have to browse the web on my Nokia 770, connected wirelessly through my Lynksys Router to check the prices on a new Dell Ubuntu laptop.

CNN
http://edition.cnn.com/2006/BUSINESS/05/18/global. office.linustorvalds/
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/biztech/12/10/me ta.linux.reut/index.html
Cosmo
Ok you Got me. Maxim
http://www.maximonline.com/search/index.aspx?sTerm =linux&stype=1
Note, We need hot linux chix, stat.
Discover
http://discovermagazine.com/2004/jan/emerging-tech nology/?searchterm=linux Popular Science
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/how20/10160e0796b8401 0vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
And One of my favorite articles
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/how20/b39fea1a2b09701 0vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

My Point is Linux is everywhere, You'd be hard pressed to find a neihborhood that doesn't have 60% of the homes in it containing at least one linux based device. Tivo, Router, Spa, Cellphone, PDA, NAS, and that number is constantly growing. True most consumers don't know they use linux every day, from the webservers they visit to the phone they use, and that is a good thing. I don't care if there ever comes a day when "the Year of the Linux Desktop" happens because that year came for me 5 yrs ago.

My daughter has never known a Windows desktop, and she is perfectly happy.

Me, I still cringe when I have to load up the VM XP I use for testing windows builds of my software. (/rocking in shower, Still not clean, Still not clean.)

Now if you will excuse me, I have to browse the web on my Nokia 770, connected wirelessly through my Lynksys Router to check the prices on a new Dell Ubuntu laptop.

http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/0203101256a23 110vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

New hotness, and the best fasteners ever built. Check out Popular Science's overview when it won the best tech for 2006.

Here are five ideas for a New Orleans House printed in Popular Science recently after Katrina hit. They are really good ideas.

ALSO, you might want to look into using these nails that were especially made for hurricanes/earthquakes. They will hold your house together a lot better.

Hope this works!