Iridium failed because it tried to pay for billions of dollars in satellite technology with a few subscribers spread between Outer Mongolia and Antarctica. Penguins, while noble and proud mascots, just don't have that kind of cash.
I gotta think satellite radio will fail for the same reasons. Urban areas have much cheaper access to many things, including radio, and much more choice. Even if the local radio broadcasts suck, the urban areas have cheap internet access. And there just aren't enough rural folk to make the radio bird economical.
To all those who point to the Hughes death stars pumping 800 TV channels down to the starving masses... I have one word: bandwidth. If the internet could support the TV bandwidth, those sats would be dead big time.
On the other hand, maybe the Iridium satellite buyers could start to broadcast radio to bolster their business!
I think you hit the nail on the head. I also wonder for analog cellular when the appropriate frequency synthesizers and tracking front-ends were available in the AMPS bands at reasonable cost? I would guess not until the 80's. I can remember CB's from the 70's with a crystal for each channel, and TV's with those awful rotary-dial tuners clunking between the channels. Obviously this was commercially the cheapest thing to produce. Seems so primitive now. Modern ICs for the job are a far cry from what was available in the 60's.
pre-existing AMPS (American Mobile Phone System aka Analag) networks
Ironically, AMPS stands for Advanced Mobile Phone Service, which as you correctly point out is analog narrow-band FM. Maybe Antiquated Mobile Phone System would be better!
The highly intelligent and semi-famous Dr. Bill Wattenburg, former Los Alamos scientist and part-time radio talk show host at KGO-AM San Francisco, had
this
to say last month.
Basically he is saying deregulation, the sale of existing public plants to private companies, and politically-driven denial of the need for new power plants over the past decade have combined to create the existing situation.
Another interesting thing he has said in the past (no link, sorry) is that if a small fraction of the EPA's money spent on dubious programs were put into insulating people's homes, California could clean its air faster, and lower its energy demands much more dramatically and quickly.
But it's just not popular politically.
Definitely the funniest geek T has to be Martin on the Simpsons with his Wang T-shirt on the school bus saying something like I hope this commotion takes the attention away from my shirt!
A quick search at the USPTO for DEKA and Kamen yields some 39 patents. Broadly, the categories are:
medical equipment related to fluid transport... eeeeeeew!
human transportation over rough terrain/stairs
If this is any indication of what IT is, my bet is on the transport (see patents 5,701,965 5,971,091 and 5,975,225). I can't see selling that many Catamenial collectors (patent 6,168,609).
Linux running on non-desktop systems, like a handheld for example, do not necessarily map to console to the framebuffer. All the boot time messages exist on a serial port or something where a terminal may connect for development purposes.
In this case, placing some meaningful graphics on the screen is not only much prettier than the blank screen: it is a critical way of communicating to the user that the system is booting!
Just saying ZDNet out loud, one must cringe. It sounds like something that should be served in a Italian restaurant. "Come to the Olive Garden to sample our new ZDNet." See?
Even those of us speaking the Queen's English must agree. Zed-Dee-Net is pretty close to Teddy-Net, something my 3-year-old might enjoy.
Here's an idea - just put a few dozen LEDs in series in one direction across the AC line to match the forward-bias voltage of a hunder-some-odd volts. Do it twice, in parallel, with the second string connected the other way to it lights on the other half of the AC cycle. Do this all on one chip (a few dozen LEDs on one chip, like millions of transistors in a CPU). Now you have a direct light bulb replacement. No fancy power supplies, extra electronics, or extra cost.
A number of the negative statements about Java have been attributed to the JVM. I agree that the JVMs out there are generally poor for embedded apps, but is that really the core problem? Is embedded JVM too slow or is Java itself inherently inappropriate?
It's easy to forget how Sun's picoJava cores got canned. According to Sun starting in 1996 the answer to poor embedded JVMs was to announce a silicon chip that executed Java directly.
picoJava I was a JVM-like execution engine, executing bytecodes in silicon. That was too limiting though, so Sun announced picoJava II, introducing about 50 new opcodes so it could be used for C and C++! Sun even hired MetaWare to write a C compiler for their Java chip!
Sun's microJava 701, based on the picoJava II core, was supposed to be a standard product produced and shipped in commercial quantities. However, Sun cancelled those plans in 1999. The microJava 701 was produced in small sample lots, but ultimately its death was hastened by poor demand and lack of commercial acceptance.
The same can be said of Java-on-silicon generally. With a few notable exceptions, several high-powered semiconductor manufacturers have failed to bring Java ICs to market despite initally signing on with Sun. Fujitsu, Siemens, IBM, Sun, NEC, and Rockwell/Collins fill out the list of no-shows to the Java-chip game.
Yes there are a few chips out there like Ajile Systems (former Rockwell/Collins technology), and Patriot Scientific, but if Sun and all these other big boys can make Java-on-silicon fly, what does that say about Java in the embedded space?
Actually, protective relaying in large power systems are designed with very sensitive equipment to quickly detect relatively small currents which would normally indicate a problem, like a lightning strike or short-circuit, and shut down transmission lines. This is preferred to having flying balls of molten aluminum falling to earth, or having a dangling wire electrocute nearby farm animals.
As it turns out, solar activity mimicks the non-balanced currents found in bona fide power-system faults. And these transmission lines, being hundreds of miles long, make like great antennas to pick up the solar interference.
The power system simply shuts down because the equipment senses a fault. No damage.
This satellite, on the other hand, is designed to be exposed to the spaceborne fields and such, and it might be fully expected that over time, the materials used would degrade to the point of causing failure. Destructive testing at it's finest...
Anyone else find it ironic that in the published report the graphs look a lot like they were done in M$ Excel (at least to me it looks that way)? I guess it still shows that even us open-source pundits find it convenient to stick with commercial apps sometimes.
One might have tried putting the benchmark data into either the MySQL or Postgres open-source DB, then whip up a bit of Perl or Python or something and fire it through some open-source tools for graphics.
Does anybody doing this sort of thing on a regular basis have any suggestions?
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Iridium failed because it tried to pay for billions of dollars in satellite technology with a few subscribers spread between Outer Mongolia and Antarctica. Penguins, while noble and proud mascots, just don't have that kind of cash.
I gotta think satellite radio will fail for the same reasons. Urban areas have much cheaper access to many things, including radio, and much more choice. Even if the local radio broadcasts suck, the urban areas have cheap internet access. And there just aren't enough rural folk to make the radio bird economical.
To all those who point to the Hughes death stars pumping 800 TV channels down to the starving masses... I have one word: bandwidth. If the internet could support the TV bandwidth, those sats would be dead big time.
On the other hand, maybe the Iridium satellite buyers could start to broadcast radio to bolster their business!
I wondered why this site suddenly appeared a few days ago...
I think you hit the nail on the head. I also wonder for analog cellular when the appropriate frequency synthesizers and tracking front-ends were available in the AMPS bands at reasonable cost? I would guess not until the 80's. I can remember CB's from the 70's with a crystal for each channel, and TV's with those awful rotary-dial tuners clunking between the channels. Obviously this was commercially the cheapest thing to produce. Seems so primitive now. Modern ICs for the job are a far cry from what was available in the 60's.
Won't be able to say ..these 280 million tacos ought to provide adequate sustinence for the Dr. Who marathon...
We've secretly replaced the formations found in this mine shaft with new Folger's crystals: let's see if the miners can tell the difference...
Foreman: Usted nos creería haber substituido éstos por los cristales de Folger?
Miner #1: ?Cristales de Folger? Imposible! ?Realmente?
pre-existing AMPS (American Mobile Phone System aka Analag) networks
Ironically, AMPS stands for Advanced Mobile Phone Service, which as you correctly point out is analog narrow-band FM. Maybe Antiquated Mobile Phone System would be better!
The highly intelligent and semi-famous Dr. Bill Wattenburg, former Los Alamos scientist and part-time radio talk show host at KGO-AM San Francisco, had this to say last month.
Basically he is saying deregulation, the sale of existing public plants to private companies, and politically-driven denial of the need for new power plants over the past decade have combined to create the existing situation.
Another interesting thing he has said in the past (no link, sorry) is that if a small fraction of the EPA's money spent on dubious programs were put into insulating people's homes, California could clean its air faster, and lower its energy demands much more dramatically and quickly. But it's just not popular politically.
Definitely the funniest geek T has to be Martin on the Simpsons with his Wang T-shirt on the school bus saying something like I hope this commotion takes the attention away from my shirt!
A quick search at the USPTO for DEKA and Kamen yields some 39 patents. Broadly, the categories are:
If this is any indication of what IT is, my bet is on the transport (see patents 5,701,965 5,971,091 and 5,975,225). I can't see selling that many Catamenial collectors (patent 6,168,609).
Linux running on non-desktop systems, like a handheld for example, do not necessarily map to console to the framebuffer. All the boot time messages exist on a serial port or something where a terminal may connect for development purposes.
In this case, placing some meaningful graphics on the screen is not only much prettier than the blank screen: it is a critical way of communicating to the user that the system is booting!
The classical piece is called Also Sprach Zarathustra by Richard Strauss. check here
I guess an OCR was used on the original document. Here's a funny one.
...compromising emanations are delectable as both electromagnetic and acoustic signals...
Even those of us speaking the Queen's English must agree. Zed-Dee-Net is pretty close to Teddy-Net, something my 3-year-old might enjoy.
'cuz Uranus was a hole!
Here's an idea - just put a few dozen LEDs in series in one direction across the AC line to match the forward-bias voltage of a hunder-some-odd volts. Do it twice, in parallel, with the second string connected the other way to it lights on the other half of the AC cycle. Do this all on one chip (a few dozen LEDs on one chip, like millions of transistors in a CPU). Now you have a direct light bulb replacement. No fancy power supplies, extra electronics, or extra cost.
All royalties gladly accepted.
A number of the negative statements about Java have been attributed to the JVM. I agree that the JVMs out there are generally poor for embedded apps, but is that really the core problem? Is embedded JVM too slow or is Java itself inherently inappropriate?
It's easy to forget how Sun's picoJava cores got canned. According to Sun starting in 1996 the answer to poor embedded JVMs was to announce a silicon chip that executed Java directly. picoJava I was a JVM-like execution engine, executing bytecodes in silicon. That was too limiting though, so Sun announced picoJava II, introducing about 50 new opcodes so it could be used for C and C++! Sun even hired MetaWare to write a C compiler for their Java chip!
Sun's microJava 701, based on the picoJava II core, was supposed to be a standard product produced and shipped in commercial quantities. However, Sun cancelled those plans in 1999. The microJava 701 was produced in small sample lots, but ultimately its death was hastened by poor demand and lack of commercial acceptance.
The same can be said of Java-on-silicon generally. With a few notable exceptions, several high-powered semiconductor manufacturers have failed to bring Java ICs to market despite initally signing on with Sun. Fujitsu, Siemens, IBM, Sun, NEC, and Rockwell/Collins fill out the list of no-shows to the Java-chip game.
Yes there are a few chips out there like Ajile Systems (former Rockwell/Collins technology), and Patriot Scientific, but if Sun and all these other big boys can make Java-on-silicon fly, what does that say about Java in the embedded space?
One man's opinion.
knock out power to large sections of Canada
Actually, protective relaying in large power systems are designed with very sensitive equipment to quickly detect relatively small currents which would normally indicate a problem, like a lightning strike or short-circuit, and shut down transmission lines. This is preferred to having flying balls of molten aluminum falling to earth, or having a dangling wire electrocute nearby farm animals.
As it turns out, solar activity mimicks the non-balanced currents found in bona fide power-system faults. And these transmission lines, being hundreds of miles long, make like great antennas to pick up the solar interference.
The power system simply shuts down because the equipment senses a fault. No damage.
This satellite, on the other hand, is designed to be exposed to the spaceborne fields and such, and it might be fully expected that over time, the materials used would degrade to the point of causing failure. Destructive testing at it's finest...
Anyone else find it ironic that in the published report the graphs look a lot like they were done in M$ Excel (at least to me it looks that way)? I guess it still shows that even us open-source pundits find it convenient to stick with commercial apps sometimes. One might have tried putting the benchmark data into either the MySQL or Postgres open-source DB, then whip up a bit of Perl or Python or something and fire it through some open-source tools for graphics. Does anybody doing this sort of thing on a regular basis have any suggestions?