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Undersea deposits

reformulating coal and tar sand

capturing feedlot methane

using plasma to burn carboniferous waste

Where am I gonna find a 500mi cord that'll fit in the trunk[?]

Electric isn't going anywhere for most of America's driving requirements

if you get your ice water from an un-electric fridge.

Fuck that: don't give developing countries $100 computers, give them the $1000 ones that are being wasted on the so called developed countries - hey they're already developed, so they shouldn't need them, right?

Although I empathize with your troubles teaching spoiled kids, I have to say I found the technologies mentioned in this /. post pretty amazing, and found them to be in sharp contrast with what is being done in my own country.
I live in Brazil and just today I read in the morning newspaper about PC Conectado, which is supposed to be Brazil's answer to the problem of computer technology for the masses, and I found those technologies (the $100,00 laptop, the simputer, and the loband thing) to be quite an advance in terms empowering technology, concepts, and efforts to bring technology to the people.
The PC Conectado, in contrast, will sell for R$1,400 (that's US$ 535 at today's exchange rate). The high-fallutin' high-priests of Brazil's Free Software community are ecstatic because it'll come loaded with F/OSS software. That's good, but Brazil's minimum wage is R$ 260,00 ( = US$ 99 ), so PC Conectado is way expensive. In fact, it appears to be a stripped-down PC, and costing around what a stripped-down PC costs. It's not as cheap as it ought to be. Wal-Mart, the cheapo department store in USA, has 'puters for less (I've checked here today.)
So, in contrasting these 3 projects with the PC Conectado, I found nice food-for-thought. Here are my 2 cents futurology and thoughts:
1) While Free Software is nice, it may not be what people want, because it might not correspond to what people expect. It might just be that when people learn they can't play Windows warez games or office software in PC Conectado, they will uninstall GNU/Linux. Currently, for medium wage jobs in Brazil, the job market demmands some expertise in Windows software, and some might want to buy a PC to get that expertise and hone skills in Excel or whatever. If your hardware allows shifting to Windows, will they stick to GNU/Linux? I don't think so...
2) What is really needed is cheap hardware. You can't cheat like PC Conectado. You need $ 100 laptops. Cheap means cheap.
3) If you have custom hardware, there is no "turning back" to proprietary software.
4) Research groups must focus on new concepts. Old concepts will not only cost more, they might backfire. When you take low income populations, their whole model of what's "top" might be what is the dominant technology (and we know that's not the best choice).
5) Internet access is not a luxury. It's as much of a luxury as library access is a luxury. "The net is the computer." (TM Sun Microsystems) :-)
6) Hand in hand with this custom new hardware an net technologies, we need to teach children what computer programming is.Developing countries do *not* need government-subsidized programs to teach people to use Microsoft software. In the long run, this will empower developing countries and create a virtuous circle.
So, IMHO, "the $1000 ones [computers] that are being wasted on the so called developed countries" isn't gonna cut it. I really think governments of developing world must foster research groups with innovative ideas.

Your points are well taken, although I will note that countering video taped "proof" has paid off for most of the NYC Republican Nat'l Convention protestors. Yes, I read your comment about this not being "the point" of the mall exercise in the story.

I believe that Steve Mann was making the point of the unfairness and potential for abuse of ubiquitous recording devices throughout all of our lives. The necessity of proving one's identity at even the most mundane transaction while the person asking for proof does not have to do the same. Lack of trust - by everyone - brings all of us down and damages society in general.

So, the point isn't that he was trying to engage mall employees in philosophical discussions, he was trying to get all of us to wonder just why we put up with this surveillance without thinking about what we're losing from it. Don't forget that sure a Mall is private property, but it's still designed for public access. If the property owner can record me in their public access location, why can't I record them? This isn't someone's truly private property, like their home, but a publicly accessible property that is privately owned. What gives them the right to surveil me while removing my right to video them?

Citizen Video Undoes RNC Protest Prosecutions

For those who want more, the best links on for intelligent green reading:

WorldChanging.com -- which also has an article about wave power.

TreeHugger, which is already linked in the story.

Dave Pollard, which writes very insightfully about lots of things including environmental philosophy.

Green Car Congress, where you can get the best news about green mobility, cool cars & industrial developments.

IDFuel, which is more about design but covers some of the same ground as TreeHugger.com

FuelCellWorks for all the latest news about fuel cells.

Grist Magazine, for news and a touch of humor, plus lots of interviews.

For those who want more, the best links on for intelligent green reading:

WorldChanging.com -- which also has an article about wave power.

TreeHugger, which is already linked in the story.

Dave Pollard, which writes very insightfully about lots of things including environmental philosophy.

Green Car Congress, where you can get the best news about green mobility, cool cars & industrial developments.

IDFuel, which is more about design but covers some of the same ground as TreeHugger.com

FuelCellWorks for all the latest news about fuel cells.

Grist Magazine, for news and a touch of humor, plus lots of interviews.

It turns out that Polystyrene (aka styrofoam) is also a viable and cost-effective building material, currently being planned for deployment in Afghanistan by the Federation of American Scientists. According to this blog entry, "the New Harmony House (in New Harmony, Indiana) was built using this material as a demonstration, with impressive results (including the house using 50-70 percent less energy than a conventionally-constructed home)."

Here is the Petagon Climate Report) which was leaked through The Observer.
An interview whith one of its athors (Doug Randall) is here.
The BBC has some reactions from scientists on it.

India is not the only place where hightech can leapfrog the usual progression of roads, electrification, waterworks and other infrastructure development. Though Worldchanging.org is relatively overexposed on /. , you may enjoy reading a short and inspiring piece there about how much a modest budget and some dedicated nerds can do to bring the internet to remote villages in S.E. asia [and what people who haven't got two floppies to rub together or even electricity find useful about internet connection.] And I'd actually like to have that laptop when I go camping so I wouldn't suffer those infamous internet withdrawals.

I checked for articles on "patents" at Scientific American...they have published over 140 in the last 6 or so years counting columns, articles and letters and virtually every one of them levels scathing criticism at what stupid things we allow to be patented or how patents have retarded progress in some very important technologies [their 2001 article on how many drug companies are suing and counter suing is scary, I wish they'd just spend the money on finding the cures!] The alarm Groklaw sounds about the software industry has already come to pass in parts of the biotech industry and the solution that some of us espouse for permiting the unfettered advance of software, open source, has been embraced by Worldchanging.org and by BIOS an organization that wants, in their words, to "develop and validate a new means for the cooperative invention, improvement and delivery of biological technologies, drawing inspiration from the open source software movement to forge a 'protected commons' of knowledge and technology."
I think the thing that has kept software innovation from stalling out completely in a patent litigation tarpit has been the combination of open source and the fact that you can often bring a software idea to market for vastly less venture money than a new drug takes. Those VC's and big pharma's do all they can to see that such big gambles pay off. But trying to own and "idea" when everybody and his sister are working get an idea that solves the same problem is bound to make for friction, duplication and loose-loose litigation. If you get out there first with something people really need and you don't gouge your customers, just staying one innovation ahead of the competion can keep you in business and maybe even make you some money. One machine vision startup I worked for NEVER patented a really significant advanced technique, preferring to keep it a trade secret because they took out a patent, competitors would find a way around it more easily than they could reverse engineer it. 20 years later, they are still in business. Its much harder to spend nearly a billion dollars on a new drug and still keep it a secret until you are making sales.

Screw the ICC, I'll give you some reasons why this won't work, bitches.

1. After reading the article, the closest thing I could find to an actual point is the suggestion that UN "sherpas" could be more effective and populist by doing some of their work online. I wouldn't exactly call that a "marriage" of the UN and the internet, it's more like adding modern technology to internal UN processes.

2. "sherpas"? Seriously, that nutcase is calling mid and low level diplomats "sherpas". here's a place with real sherpas. And they're already online. OH SMACK, UN bitches, you just got an information technology beatdown from a bunch of professional hikers in the Himalayas. UN IT department gets "served" by a pack of llamas!

3. You'll notice I called the article guy a nutcase in #2. Well, he calls himself "Bruce Sterling, Worldchanging Ally#1" What is he, some kind of super hero? Does he hang out at the World Changing Headquarters in spandex with Captain Planet, sidekick Democracy Boy, and Womens' Rights Woman? Check out what he's standing in front of in his picture: read about all their stunning adventures in this month's edition of Amazing Stories--featuring the fearsome Ghost of Mars!!!

But just click on the "Worldchanging Ally#1 link in the article. You'll see the home of the Viridian Curia, a secretive mailing list of the world's most powerful superheroes. They apparently trade links to modern art reviews, and make comments like "(((Christmas is coming. Are you Viridian? Go buy something "Tech Nouveau" and flaunt it! Give it to your best friends! Go consume it, for heaven's sake! Waste not an hour.)))"

Yes, they surround everything in triple parentheses. They don't even match parentheses between lines. That's sooo TECH NOUVEAU, omg omg.

But it gets better. Follow the link in Viridian Curia (viridian curia???) site to worldchanging.com. Down the page you'll see lots of fun superhero plotting against evil, like this review of a book reminiscing about their greatest battles against the evil Globalization Cabal of Ultimate Doom. It includes a comment by the famous Dr. Menlo himself, to his site www.corpse.org. Exquisite Corpse (yes they actually call it that!) is a site mascotted by a pair of dancing multicolored day-glo skeletons and secret communiqes from the great Doctor Menlo himself describing the Battle in Seattle. booyah!

4. wow that was some good shit. but getting back on topic here, let's look at the one crazed article slashdot did link to. Last paragraph-the #1 Worldchanging ally lays the smackdown with his name-dropping superpowers! Actual quote: "bigger than the self-appointed Davos Forum, faster and smarter than the Porto Alegre contingent, less cranky than the Soros initiatives, less creepy than Bilderberg, more potent than MoveOn, and faster-spreading than Napster." Well, I've heard of Napster and Soros. So maybe name-dropping isn't his most awesome power. But he sure is into this superhero stuff!

5. And, as befitting his #1 status, Mr. Worldchanging unleashes a KAPOW! on his rivals with the bold statement "The Malaysian Super Corridor tries hard to look really Super." Dizzamn yo, when the Malaysians' translator gets back from his coffee break there's gonna be an earth-shattering epic gladiatorial tableaux in the inimitable Stan Lee style!!

6. ???

7. Profit!

8. But don't fret, you mere mortals who don't have Worldchanging Ally-class superpowers! from the article: "Here Kofi Annan offers you a personal invitation to log right on to the dizzy apex of global policy-making." Yes, much like the decoder ring in your ceral box or the mutant sea monkeys purchasable via mail order from the back of your fine comic book, YOU TOO can fight e

Screw the ICC, I'll give you some reasons why this won't work, bitches.

1. After reading the article, the closest thing I could find to an actual point is the suggestion that UN "sherpas" could be more effective and populist by doing some of their work online. I wouldn't exactly call that a "marriage" of the UN and the internet, it's more like adding modern technology to internal UN processes.

2. "sherpas"? Seriously, that nutcase is calling mid and low level diplomats "sherpas". here's a place with real sherpas. And they're already online. OH SMACK, UN bitches, you just got an information technology beatdown from a bunch of professional hikers in the Himalayas. UN IT department gets "served" by a pack of llamas!

3. You'll notice I called the article guy a nutcase in #2. Well, he calls himself "Bruce Sterling, Worldchanging Ally#1" What is he, some kind of super hero? Does he hang out at the World Changing Headquarters in spandex with Captain Planet, sidekick Democracy Boy, and Womens' Rights Woman? Check out what he's standing in front of in his picture: read about all their stunning adventures in this month's edition of Amazing Stories--featuring the fearsome Ghost of Mars!!!

But just click on the "Worldchanging Ally#1 link in the article. You'll see the home of the Viridian Curia, a secretive mailing list of the world's most powerful superheroes. They apparently trade links to modern art reviews, and make comments like "(((Christmas is coming. Are you Viridian? Go buy something "Tech Nouveau" and flaunt it! Give it to your best friends! Go consume it, for heaven's sake! Waste not an hour.)))"

Yes, they surround everything in triple parentheses. They don't even match parentheses between lines. That's sooo TECH NOUVEAU, omg omg.

But it gets better. Follow the link in Viridian Curia (viridian curia???) site to worldchanging.com. Down the page you'll see lots of fun superhero plotting against evil, like this review of a book reminiscing about their greatest battles against the evil Globalization Cabal of Ultimate Doom. It includes a comment by the famous Dr. Menlo himself, to his site www.corpse.org. Exquisite Corpse (yes they actually call it that!) is a site mascotted by a pair of dancing multicolored day-glo skeletons and secret communiqes from the great Doctor Menlo himself describing the Battle in Seattle. booyah!

4. wow that was some good shit. but getting back on topic here, let's look at the one crazed article slashdot did link to. Last paragraph-the #1 Worldchanging ally lays the smackdown with his name-dropping superpowers! Actual quote: "bigger than the self-appointed Davos Forum, faster and smarter than the Porto Alegre contingent, less cranky than the Soros initiatives, less creepy than Bilderberg, more potent than MoveOn, and faster-spreading than Napster." Well, I've heard of Napster and Soros. So maybe name-dropping isn't his most awesome power. But he sure is into this superhero stuff!

5. And, as befitting his #1 status, Mr. Worldchanging unleashes a KAPOW! on his rivals with the bold statement "The Malaysian Super Corridor tries hard to look really Super." Dizzamn yo, when the Malaysians' translator gets back from his coffee break there's gonna be an earth-shattering epic gladiatorial tableaux in the inimitable Stan Lee style!!

6. ???

7. Profit!

8. But don't fret, you mere mortals who don't have Worldchanging Ally-class superpowers! from the article: "Here Kofi Annan offers you a personal invitation to log right on to the dizzy apex of global policy-making." Yes, much like the decoder ring in your ceral box or the mutant sea monkeys purchasable via mail order from the back of your fine comic book, YOU TOO can fight e

A hard look at our patent system
NY Times briefly reviews a new book [NYTimes is not for the electronically homeless: you must be able to make up a username and an email address to get access] by two lawyers on just how F...ed up our patent system is. There are several trends underlined that some /. folk have already been hurt by. An interesting general theme is how various past attempts at reform have backfired in one way or another. For example lowering the bar for obtaining a patent has largely had the effect of moving the real debates about what is novel and who really invented it off to the courts. If GPL is more your idea of how to handle intellectual property, you might want to read the article at Worldchanging.org calling for patent reform and pointing to an alternative to the WIPO stand on international IP laws. You should probably be aware of all these sides of the issue if you think of yourself as a person who gets ideas that have commercial value.

I agree that we need Mars, but face it, we can't even keep a useful station in LEO, and we can't even live in the Gobi desert. We need to do a lot more small ecosystem research before we can do anythign useful there. Mars is an excellent goal, but Bush is just blowing smoke with his Mars plan. It's not designed to get us a permanent human settlement anywhere, it's designed to make it look like Bush's vision for the future involves something other than permanent war and abrupt climate change.