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Staring Down a Revolution: Questions for Sid Karin
Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE
CITY writes
"Since helping to found the San Diego Supercomputer
Center in the 1980s, Sid Karin has distinguished
himself as a national expert on digital technology and
its possibilities for scientific research. Go here for the full interview."
I guess this gives a whole new meaning to the term "dupe".
Its the first time I see a dupe inside itself.
Posted by timothy Posted by timothy
I think we'll see fewer bells and whistles and more fundamental and substantive shifts in how the technology basically works and how and when we choose/bother to use it.
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
A bicycle is technology.
KFG
He likens terabyte storage to the numerous technological revolutions of the past. His opinion is that at some point storage will become so plentiful in personal devices that the concept of "having it all" will be a reality. His first example is loading all recorded media onto a personal device. His second is storing photo-realistic images in car navigation systems. This is his revolution?
Having infinite storage is interesting, but if you consider the Internet to be the same type of thing, there are already limitations. First, you need to realize that 90% of everything is garbage. The other 10% may be useful, but to whom? The tiny fraction of a percent of all information that may be useful to you personally needs to be able to find its way to you. So we have tools like search engines to help us. They are slowly getting better, but the tide of information only comes in, so though the engines are getting better, the quality of results is increasingly getting worse.
What would I do with all recorded music? I couldn't possibly listen to it all in my lifetime. I'd need some sort of intelligent agent to find things that I'd like and play those so that I don't waste time listening to things I'm not interested in.
This isn't some future revolution. It's reality now, and for the most part it works okay.
What will we do with infinite storage? Probably just hoard more data, I think. There's only a small amount of data that is actually usable to any one person, expanding storage capacity isn't going to change that.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
"Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE CITY writes "Mark of THE CITY writes ">>STACK OVERFLOW
mailto:mrkwscha@yahoo.com Who posts their email address in the main story summary on Slashdot? This guys must be nuts!
So, now that we have a terabyte of space in out GPS we can use that to scroll ahead to find out the current gas price. How does that work? Won't that require access to the Internet or some other source to get current images anyways..? So that terabyte of space would be wasted because you're not going to be able to get that much current information that quickly!
I'm also confused on his ideas on buying a license for all music... and then playing $.16 for each song... Don't those ideas contradict themselves..?
I'm sure most people will think "I don't want to listen to half the music out there" and once they are done with that I'm sure purchasing a license for all music is going to be rather expensive, especially when you don't want a whole lot of it.
I personally would prefer to carry my iPod from place to place instead of paying $.16 for each of the thousands of songs I have...
Assuming I just have 1000 songs that all cost $.16
$.16 * 1000 = $160.00
I'm not gonna pay $160.00 for a home copy, and another $160 for a copy at work or on my laptop or whatever! I have better things to spend my money on!
i guess using the user check is not working since this has to be a bot i have seen it in other postings cmdrtaco better get of his ass and fix this and the moderation system or is this a cowboy neal problem.
He seems to have noticed the problems with the record industry's current business model, but he's not saying anything new. Next!
.. for someone else to dupe your post when you can dupe it while posting it. Duping just got alot smarter!
Maybe you cant follow me, but the mere fact that one can have all the books of a large library on your computer, fully indexed with the possibility to do boolean and regular searches is as much an revolution as thethe printing press, imho.
And just like that (the press), it will take decades to slowly get recognition to its worth.
There wont even the possiblilities of "Burning libraries" anymore if everybody can store the whole history and culture of his country/region/religion on his ipod mk9...
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
And who are we to say that fish don't need them?
Show me on the doll where his noodly appendage touched you.
People really need to not worry about asking questions regarding the stuff that the marketplace and consumers like slashdot readers will work out for themeselves.
/ ) was all but ignored by the people inside of NSF who should have listened to it instead of following their personal agendas. They just lifted the term "Cyberinfrastructure" to create the appearance of following along.
Karin is in a position to answer some really tough questions.
The questions that need to be answered are things like, how can peer review be improved to eliminate the cronyism that goes on? When will the National Science Foundation understand that persistent IT infrastructure for supercomputing is as critical as things like telescopes in hawaii and needs more than a 5 year vision and support structure? When will Congress recognie that cyberinfrastructure is a buzzword that no one knows how to apply? Cyberinfrastructure is a word that had no vision behind it and is headed down the path of just being a pot of money that all the science areas will divide among themselves at the _expense_ of any real infrastructure. Teragrid isn't an example either. That project was once a great concept, but everyone involved is competing with each other to stay alive, which means no one is truely working together. Teragrid has long since been forced off the path because the major centers don't want to let it succeed and most certainly don't want it to be a project through which their "partners" can be viewed as successful.
Sid and the leaders of his generation had a hand in getting the NSF to see reality once and setting the path. Now, NSF is trying to control and set a path itself instead of letting the visionaries and the scientists do it. The content of the Atkins report (http://www.communitytechnology.org/nsf_ci_report
Supercomputing, advanced storage, grid computing and next generation networks all are lagging behind in this country because the NSF doesn't listen to vision and can't create and sustain one of its own. They are into the playing of politics t hat they won't set up the foundation for infrastructure that could last long enough to make a difference without falling into funding battles every 3rd year. Given there isn't a 10 or 20 year vision and foundation, is it any surprise that the supercomputing centers are so busy protecting themselves from each other that serious attempts at visionary projects don't happen?
Fortunately, the Department of Energy appears to be taking up the slack for now. More power to DoE for recognizing and filling the gap, but its a sad state for NSF to be in.
Does he mean that the bell would have to be rung so that people will stay clear of the vehicle? If so, why not affix the bell to the car?
(From wikipedia)
...a backlash against these large speedy vehicles resulted in passing laws that self-propelled vehicles on public roads in the United Kingdom must be preceded by a man on foot waving a red flag and blowing a horn.
So, a vehicular-mounted bell wouldn't cut it - you needed the full servant-with-flag-and-horn set-up to remain lawful. This wasn't as hard as it might seem; at that time if you could afford a motor vehicle you could afford numerous servants. (And if you couldn't afford servants, you wouldn't be voting anyway and consequently didn't matter).
This was during the 19th century, but, to be fair, we're still capable of silly ideas now ;-)
This is where the serious fun begins.
using the time honored, "was it created before I was born" rule of thumb. . .
.1806. Liquid fuel wont save you. That's still pre WWI.
That is the rule of thumb for tradition, not technology.
They'll be technology to me when you mount lasers on 'em.
Invented in 1958. By your rule of thumb not technology, unless you are older than myself, and I'm turning grey.
Same year the integrated circuit was first actually produced, although the invention goes back some years, to the same year the first nuclear power plant went critical.
Ahhhh, but what about that modern icon of technology, rocket science and space exploration?
The multistage rocket dates from 1650 and the first animal launched into space and successfully recovered by parachute. .
On the other hand bicycle chainwheels are now so sophisticated that they can only be designed and cut by computer analysis and CAM, each individual tooth having a slightly different profile depending on where it lies in relation to the power stroke, other teeth and the size of the gear.
Be careful about your rules of thumb, or all your lights might go out. First city to city transmission of three phase AC current; 1891.
KFG