In fact, it's now turned into almost a perfect repeat of the Beta versus VHS format wars of 1978-1990. Sony was almost the sole supplier of Beta-format VCR's, while Matsushita Electric (as Panasonic Corporation was known back then) offered very generous licensing terms for the VHS format. Fast forward (pun not intended!) to 2010: Apple sells its iPhone with its unique OS all by itself, while Google has licensed Android to all the major cellphone manufacturers, especially the best-known brands: LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson. As such, by the end of 2010 all the cellphone manufacturers I've mentioned will offer cellphones based on Android 2.2 (code-named FroYo), and these combined will probably outsell the iPhone by almost two to one.
Actually, I think for compatibility reasons when these new solid-state high-capacity drives arrive they'll still be using the Serial ATA-II interface, if only for one reason: compatibility with current hardware.
Sure it may not be as fast as RAM itself, but with no more access speed limits imposed by the speed of the spinning disk and the seek times of read-write heads, we get boot times, data access times and data indexing times that will still be many times faster than Western Digital's VelociRaptor Serial ATA-II drive running at 10,000 rpm. Imagine booting Ubuntu Linux 9.10 desktop edition--graphical interface and all!--in maybe 10-12 seconds!:-)
One of the reasons why I did get a TiVo HD XL DVR was because Comcast was going to turn off all the analog channels above 30 in my area (which will happen in early May 2010). Since with the M-Card CableCARD installed my TiVo box can pick up all the digital channels, I don't have to worry because my TiVo box even accommodates an external Switched Digital Video (SDV) box if necessary.
Funny you should ask that because ever since I got my TiVo HD XL DVR, I had to wonder why I had to put up with the often extreme inconvenience of using a real VCR. And best of all, Comcast does not object to the use of a TiVo DVR, mostly because they will make money from M-Card CableCARD rentals and the fact TiVo users want to use a higher programming tier than normal.
I think HP's research could pave the way for solid-state disk (SSD) drives in the 3-4 TB storage capacity range about the size of today's 2.5" laptop drives, which will essentially end the reign of hard disk drives with spinning disc platters and moving read-write heads. Imagine being able to boot Windows 7 completely in about 5-6 seconds from the time the "disk" starts its boot sequence, or read-write access at essentially RAM speeds.
Alas, we'll start to run into this problem: current disk drive interfaces won't be able to keep up, unless we use the Serial ATA Revision 3.0 spec. We may have to go to Intel's Light Peak standard to take full advantage of these new generation of high-capacity SSD drives.
The problem with diesel engines up till now is that they couldn't even meet the EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 standard for exhaust emissions. It can be done now, but the cost is still prohibitively expensive (as the Mercedes-Benz BlueTec system shows all too clearly).
Recently, Ricardo Engineering demonstrated a modified Ford Duratorq turbodiesel engine using a special turbocharger/EGR unit that could meet Tier 2 Bin 5 without needing much in the way of other exhaust emission controls. Ricardo has said with some refinement and using modern diesel catalytic converters they could even make a turbodiesel engine meet the Super Ultra-Low Emissions Vehicle (SULEV) emissions standard, which means 90% less emissions than the average gasoline engine! An SULEV-certified turbodiesel engine means hybrid vehicle fuel economy and emissions output without the enormous expense of hybrid drivetrains.
Because here in the USA we impose taxes on _earning_ money, no wonder why American businesses large and small are moving both blue-collar and white-collar jobs out of the USA, corporate headquarters included! No wonder why we have problems with unemployment.
Maybe it's time to completely rethink our national taxation system and switch to taxing consumption instead. This is the gist of FairTax (H.R. 25/S. 296--yes, it's a real bill in Congress) that would end all forms of income taxation--along with repealing the 16th Amendment--in favor of a singular 23% consumption tax, with a "prepayment" once a month to every legal household in the USA to pay for the consumption tax up to the Federally-defined poverty level. Note that this tax does not apply to business-to-business sales, sales of used goods (including sales of existing homes), and college tuition.
By eliminating the entire current income tax system in favor of FairTax, we get these huge benefits:
1) We save ourselves somewhere between US$350 and US$500 BILLION per year in income tax compliance costs. 2) Congress can no longer use the income tax code to favor or punish financially even the smallest constituency--the most insidious form of corruption in the USA right now. 3) American residents and businesses will no longer need to hide their liquid assets outside the USA to keep them out of the reach of the IRS. That means the US$2 TRILLION now participating in the illegal cash-only underground economy and US$13 TRILLION in liquid assets sitting in offshore financial centers beyond US borders--both done as income tax dodges--return to the USA, providing a US$15 TRILLION liquidity boost to the US financial system that would start a new economic boom and then some--the world's largest "private bailout." 4) American businesses will no longer need to outsource jobs beyond US borders as a tax dodge. That could mean millions upon millions of jobs return to the USA under better tax circumstances, immediately lowering the unemployment rate. 5) Foreign companies will do a land rush to expand US operations, since the USA is now the world's largest legal income tax haven. 6) Shipping companies would quickly register their ships under the US flag, since there is no more taxes on the income earned from shipping for a US-flagged ship. That could mean hundreds of thousands of new and repatriated blue-collar jobs as new ships are now constructed and repaired at US ports free from income taxation.
Gutsy move maybe, but when YouTube--the world's largest video repository--is mostly H.264, unless Google is willing to recode all those YouTube videos in Ogg Theora format, you can forget about Ogg Theora being widely accepted as the HTML 5.0 video standard.
Because YouTube is now primarily H.264, I think Google--who owns YouTube and is one of the big proponents for HTML 5.0--will end up making H.264 as the primary video codec standard for HTML 5.0.
Nice try, but H.264 is such a widely used standard (it's the most prominent video codec for Blu-ray discs and YouTube is moving heavily into this format) that Ogg Theora will end up being a niche standard like the MKV format.
I wonder how high the compliance level of HTML 5.0 that Internet Explorer 9.0 conform to. If it can actually run Google Wave natively, then that would be quite an achievement, since Google Wave has to potential to be a really awesome collaborative tool, especially if you don't need to load an extra browser to run it.
They should have loaded an iPod with a lot of different types of classical music, put it on the standard iPod dock with audio out to connect to the speaker system and with built-in recharging, and hit the Play button. Playing "Fuer Elise" repeatedly is one thing, but playing a wide selection of classical music from Monteverdi to Shostakovich is quite something else.
I can also mention that the keyboards and mouse pointers provided by Apple for their current machines are pretty bad when it comes to ergonomics. (major thumbs down)
Meanwhile, on the PC side you can get excellent keyboards and mouse pointers with very good ergonomic feel. I use the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Desktop 7000 with its ergonomic wireless keyboard and mouse pointer and I could use the mouse pointer and keyboard all day without tiring out my hands and wrists.
In short, if Apple were to jump "whole hog" into supporting the enterprise market with large-scale iMac and Mac Pro installations, they need to provide standard keyboards and mouse pointers with good ergonomics. Maybe Apple should team up with Logitech to do this?
If you're seen the e-ink based electronic book reader such as the Sony Reader, I have to disagree with you. With e-ink, the text is very sharp and readable, and the weight of the PRS-600 Sony Reader with touchscreen interface is around 10 ounces--lighter than many hardback novels nowadays. If you're going on a trip and plan to read a lot, lot easier to carry one PRS-600 than carrying a whole bunch of books.
I believe SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft could sit on top of an Atlas V rocket for a manned launch. Remember, the Atlas V 551 probably has enough thrust to lift Dragon to the LEO necessary to dock with the International Space Station, so all the United Launch Alliance needs to do it man-rate that launcher.
....I've already moved on to using Firefox 3.5.7 and Chrome 3.0.195.38 as my primary web browsers. The reason is simple: IE 8.0 is dog slow at times in web page rendering.
I don't think the Mozilla Foundation is dumb enough to wait for new features for 3.6.x version security updates! I do think the version number could go as high as 3.6.15 (my guess) as security updates and the new features are "slipstreamed" in.
We'll probably see the Geck 1.9.3 engine "slipstreamed" in with automatic updates to Firefox 3.6. As such, don't be surprised by the end of 2010 we'll see Firefox up to Version 3.6.15 as all the new features are "slipstreamed" in.
In the end, besides the fuel consumption and noise problems, it was essentially FAA flight restrictions that pretty much ended the idea of large-scale use of really personal flying machines besides an airplane.
Interestingly, NASA's Highway in the Sky research project could finally make it possible for everyone to have their own personal flying machines, since we finally will have a system in place to control potentially tens of millions of personal flying machines that could fly as high as 250 meters off the ground.
However, unlike the waste from uranium-fueled reactors, thorium reactors create waste with far shorter half-lives--which means waste storage costs are WAY lower since you don't need the shielding of the waste to last thousands of years.
I remember as early as the 1910's everyone thought we were going to run out of crude oil within ten years. About a century later, much of the world's known oil supply has yet to be tapped using 2010 oil extraction technology, especially with the development of steam injection, CO2 injection and injection of detergent-like liquids which could revive a lot of supposedly "tapped out" oilfields. Indeed, the Russians are using these new technologies to extend the life of several known oilfields inside their country. And we now have the technology to extract oil in the VERY deep oceans, and that could open up potentially gigantic oilfields in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Norway.
In short, the shortage problem is more a political issue than technology issue. We know that Iraq and Iran have potential reserves that could equal everyone else in the Persian Gulf combined, but the unstable political situation in both countries have conspired against the use of current extraction technologies that could really open up these oilfields. Is it also small wonder why China is very interested in the Spratley Islands between Vietnam and the Philippines, which could be the location of a huge undersea oilfield?
When I read the article, they also noted that liquid flouride thorium reactors also need to a LOT less physical space than current light-water uranium fuel reactors. This means construction costs will also be way lower, making these reactors much more economically viable in the first place.
But thorium is more widely available. Indeed, I'm sure India would be interested in the liquid flouride thorium reactor because only Australia has more proven thorium reserves than any other country on Earth, and that makes it very viable as a fuel for nuclear reactors to power India's rapidly growing economy.
A big issue that made this problem worse is the fact Title 26, the Internal Revenue Code, actually ends of discouraging personal savings and capital investment in the USA because we impose taxes on the process of earning money.
Between the tax compliance costs estimated somewhere between US$350 to US$500 BILLION per year, American citizens and businesses sending around US$15 TRILLION in liquid assets out of the US financial system either by participating in the cash-only underground economy or using tax loopholes to funnel money to offshore financial centers to keep these assets beyond the reach of the IRS (care to explain all those "banks" located in various nations in the Caribbean?), and outsourcing millions of jobs for income tax reduction reasons, is it small wonder why the American economy is going downhill fast?
This explains why we see increasingly powerful movements to MASSIVELY overhaul our national taxation structure so it encourages American citizens and businesses to keep their personal savings and capital investments in the USA. Steve Forbes' flat tax plan and the even more radical FairTax plan have gained a lot of supporters because Americans are tired of all the disadvantages of the current income tax system.
What will REALLY end Adobe as a viable force is the arrival of HTML 5.0 standards for web browsers, which does most everything that Flash does. And that transition will happen faster in the next few years as the HTML 5.0 spec is finalized.
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In fact, it's now turned into almost a perfect repeat of the Beta versus VHS format wars of 1978-1990. Sony was almost the sole supplier of Beta-format VCR's, while Matsushita Electric (as Panasonic Corporation was known back then) offered very generous licensing terms for the VHS format. Fast forward (pun not intended!) to 2010: Apple sells its iPhone with its unique OS all by itself, while Google has licensed Android to all the major cellphone manufacturers, especially the best-known brands: LG, Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson. As such, by the end of 2010 all the cellphone manufacturers I've mentioned will offer cellphones based on Android 2.2 (code-named FroYo), and these combined will probably outsell the iPhone by almost two to one.
Actually, I think for compatibility reasons when these new solid-state high-capacity drives arrive they'll still be using the Serial ATA-II interface, if only for one reason: compatibility with current hardware.
Sure it may not be as fast as RAM itself, but with no more access speed limits imposed by the speed of the spinning disk and the seek times of read-write heads, we get boot times, data access times and data indexing times that will still be many times faster than Western Digital's VelociRaptor Serial ATA-II drive running at 10,000 rpm. Imagine booting Ubuntu Linux 9.10 desktop edition--graphical interface and all!--in maybe 10-12 seconds! :-)
Huh?
One of the reasons why I did get a TiVo HD XL DVR was because Comcast was going to turn off all the analog channels above 30 in my area (which will happen in early May 2010). Since with the M-Card CableCARD installed my TiVo box can pick up all the digital channels, I don't have to worry because my TiVo box even accommodates an external Switched Digital Video (SDV) box if necessary.
Funny you should ask that because ever since I got my TiVo HD XL DVR, I had to wonder why I had to put up with the often extreme inconvenience of using a real VCR. And best of all, Comcast does not object to the use of a TiVo DVR, mostly because they will make money from M-Card CableCARD rentals and the fact TiVo users want to use a higher programming tier than normal.
I think HP's research could pave the way for solid-state disk (SSD) drives in the 3-4 TB storage capacity range about the size of today's 2.5" laptop drives, which will essentially end the reign of hard disk drives with spinning disc platters and moving read-write heads. Imagine being able to boot Windows 7 completely in about 5-6 seconds from the time the "disk" starts its boot sequence, or read-write access at essentially RAM speeds.
Alas, we'll start to run into this problem: current disk drive interfaces won't be able to keep up, unless we use the Serial ATA Revision 3.0 spec. We may have to go to Intel's Light Peak standard to take full advantage of these new generation of high-capacity SSD drives.
The problem with diesel engines up till now is that they couldn't even meet the EPA Tier 2 Bin 5 standard for exhaust emissions. It can be done now, but the cost is still prohibitively expensive (as the Mercedes-Benz BlueTec system shows all too clearly).
Recently, Ricardo Engineering demonstrated a modified Ford Duratorq turbodiesel engine using a special turbocharger/EGR unit that could meet Tier 2 Bin 5 without needing much in the way of other exhaust emission controls. Ricardo has said with some refinement and using modern diesel catalytic converters they could even make a turbodiesel engine meet the Super Ultra-Low Emissions Vehicle (SULEV) emissions standard, which means 90% less emissions than the average gasoline engine! An SULEV-certified turbodiesel engine means hybrid vehicle fuel economy and emissions output without the enormous expense of hybrid drivetrains.
Because here in the USA we impose taxes on _earning_ money, no wonder why American businesses large and small are moving both blue-collar and white-collar jobs out of the USA, corporate headquarters included! No wonder why we have problems with unemployment.
Maybe it's time to completely rethink our national taxation system and switch to taxing consumption instead. This is the gist of FairTax (H.R. 25/S. 296--yes, it's a real bill in Congress) that would end all forms of income taxation--along with repealing the 16th Amendment--in favor of a singular 23% consumption tax, with a "prepayment" once a month to every legal household in the USA to pay for the consumption tax up to the Federally-defined poverty level. Note that this tax does not apply to business-to-business sales, sales of used goods (including sales of existing homes), and college tuition.
By eliminating the entire current income tax system in favor of FairTax, we get these huge benefits:
1) We save ourselves somewhere between US$350 and US$500 BILLION per year in income tax compliance costs.
2) Congress can no longer use the income tax code to favor or punish financially even the smallest constituency--the most insidious form of corruption in the USA right now.
3) American residents and businesses will no longer need to hide their liquid assets outside the USA to keep them out of the reach of the IRS. That means the US$2 TRILLION now participating in the illegal cash-only underground economy and US$13 TRILLION in liquid assets sitting in offshore financial centers beyond US borders--both done as income tax dodges--return to the USA, providing a US$15 TRILLION liquidity boost to the US financial system that would start a new economic boom and then some--the world's largest "private bailout."
4) American businesses will no longer need to outsource jobs beyond US borders as a tax dodge. That could mean millions upon millions of jobs return to the USA under better tax circumstances, immediately lowering the unemployment rate.
5) Foreign companies will do a land rush to expand US operations, since the USA is now the world's largest legal income tax haven.
6) Shipping companies would quickly register their ships under the US flag, since there is no more taxes on the income earned from shipping for a US-flagged ship. That could mean hundreds of thousands of new and repatriated blue-collar jobs as new ships are now constructed and repaired at US ports free from income taxation.
So what are we waiting for?
Gutsy move maybe, but when YouTube--the world's largest video repository--is mostly H.264, unless Google is willing to recode all those YouTube videos in Ogg Theora format, you can forget about Ogg Theora being widely accepted as the HTML 5.0 video standard.
Because YouTube is now primarily H.264, I think Google--who owns YouTube and is one of the big proponents for HTML 5.0--will end up making H.264 as the primary video codec standard for HTML 5.0.
Nice try, but H.264 is such a widely used standard (it's the most prominent video codec for Blu-ray discs and YouTube is moving heavily into this format) that Ogg Theora will end up being a niche standard like the MKV format.
I wonder how high the compliance level of HTML 5.0 that Internet Explorer 9.0 conform to. If it can actually run Google Wave natively, then that would be quite an achievement, since Google Wave has to potential to be a really awesome collaborative tool, especially if you don't need to load an extra browser to run it.
They should have loaded an iPod with a lot of different types of classical music, put it on the standard iPod dock with audio out to connect to the speaker system and with built-in recharging, and hit the Play button. Playing "Fuer Elise" repeatedly is one thing, but playing a wide selection of classical music from Monteverdi to Shostakovich is quite something else.
I can also mention that the keyboards and mouse pointers provided by Apple for their current machines are pretty bad when it comes to ergonomics. (major thumbs down)
Meanwhile, on the PC side you can get excellent keyboards and mouse pointers with very good ergonomic feel. I use the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Desktop 7000 with its ergonomic wireless keyboard and mouse pointer and I could use the mouse pointer and keyboard all day without tiring out my hands and wrists.
In short, if Apple were to jump "whole hog" into supporting the enterprise market with large-scale iMac and Mac Pro installations, they need to provide standard keyboards and mouse pointers with good ergonomics. Maybe Apple should team up with Logitech to do this?
If you're seen the e-ink based electronic book reader such as the Sony Reader, I have to disagree with you. With e-ink, the text is very sharp and readable, and the weight of the PRS-600 Sony Reader with touchscreen interface is around 10 ounces--lighter than many hardback novels nowadays. If you're going on a trip and plan to read a lot, lot easier to carry one PRS-600 than carrying a whole bunch of books.
I believe SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft could sit on top of an Atlas V rocket for a manned launch. Remember, the Atlas V 551 probably has enough thrust to lift Dragon to the LEO necessary to dock with the International Space Station, so all the United Launch Alliance needs to do it man-rate that launcher.
....I've already moved on to using Firefox 3.5.7 and Chrome 3.0.195.38 as my primary web browsers. The reason is simple: IE 8.0 is dog slow at times in web page rendering.
I don't think the Mozilla Foundation is dumb enough to wait for new features for 3.6.x version security updates! I do think the version number could go as high as 3.6.15 (my guess) as security updates and the new features are "slipstreamed" in.
We'll probably see the Geck 1.9.3 engine "slipstreamed" in with automatic updates to Firefox 3.6. As such, don't be surprised by the end of 2010 we'll see Firefox up to Version 3.6.15 as all the new features are "slipstreamed" in.
In the end, besides the fuel consumption and noise problems, it was essentially FAA flight restrictions that pretty much ended the idea of large-scale use of really personal flying machines besides an airplane.
Interestingly, NASA's Highway in the Sky research project could finally make it possible for everyone to have their own personal flying machines, since we finally will have a system in place to control potentially tens of millions of personal flying machines that could fly as high as 250 meters off the ground.
However, unlike the waste from uranium-fueled reactors, thorium reactors create waste with far shorter half-lives--which means waste storage costs are WAY lower since you don't need the shielding of the waste to last thousands of years.
I remember as early as the 1910's everyone thought we were going to run out of crude oil within ten years. About a century later, much of the world's known oil supply has yet to be tapped using 2010 oil extraction technology, especially with the development of steam injection, CO2 injection and injection of detergent-like liquids which could revive a lot of supposedly "tapped out" oilfields. Indeed, the Russians are using these new technologies to extend the life of several known oilfields inside their country. And we now have the technology to extract oil in the VERY deep oceans, and that could open up potentially gigantic oilfields in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Norway.
In short, the shortage problem is more a political issue than technology issue. We know that Iraq and Iran have potential reserves that could equal everyone else in the Persian Gulf combined, but the unstable political situation in both countries have conspired against the use of current extraction technologies that could really open up these oilfields. Is it also small wonder why China is very interested in the Spratley Islands between Vietnam and the Philippines, which could be the location of a huge undersea oilfield?
When I read the article, they also noted that liquid flouride thorium reactors also need to a LOT less physical space than current light-water uranium fuel reactors. This means construction costs will also be way lower, making these reactors much more economically viable in the first place.
But thorium is more widely available. Indeed, I'm sure India would be interested in the liquid flouride thorium reactor because only Australia has more proven thorium reserves than any other country on Earth, and that makes it very viable as a fuel for nuclear reactors to power India's rapidly growing economy.
A big issue that made this problem worse is the fact Title 26, the Internal Revenue Code, actually ends of discouraging personal savings and capital investment in the USA because we impose taxes on the process of earning money.
Between the tax compliance costs estimated somewhere between US$350 to US$500 BILLION per year, American citizens and businesses sending around US$15 TRILLION in liquid assets out of the US financial system either by participating in the cash-only underground economy or using tax loopholes to funnel money to offshore financial centers to keep these assets beyond the reach of the IRS (care to explain all those "banks" located in various nations in the Caribbean?), and outsourcing millions of jobs for income tax reduction reasons, is it small wonder why the American economy is going downhill fast?
This explains why we see increasingly powerful movements to MASSIVELY overhaul our national taxation structure so it encourages American citizens and businesses to keep their personal savings and capital investments in the USA. Steve Forbes' flat tax plan and the even more radical FairTax plan have gained a lot of supporters because Americans are tired of all the disadvantages of the current income tax system.
What will REALLY end Adobe as a viable force is the arrival of HTML 5.0 standards for web browsers, which does most everything that Flash does. And that transition will happen faster in the next few years as the HTML 5.0 spec is finalized.