We will perform general trend analysis, behavior patterns, and statistical modeling to better understand our users and thus how to better serve them. This analysis, if shared with a third party, will not include any personally identifiable information about our end-users.
So they will sell info on the top 100 porn sites!? or just demographics to people who wanna sell to the "moral compass" group.
This is an example of someone having an idea that ought to be welcome here. Rather than removing choices or limiting activity- people are given new choices to use if they so wish.
The nitpick: uh the fact that it IS here means it was welcome here, how many thousands of people just went to that page because of slashdot?
And in general this is a "guilt tool" to me that means its a way for one person to have power over another using guilt as the medium. The primary use I see for this is for parents for their kids, which would seem to be a valid use.
This "first line of defense against temptation" crap is a joke because a) newstands, b) how hard really could it be to circumvent.
I like the mumbo jumbo on the website about building bonds of accountability to push us forward into excellence, something along those lines, at 4 bucks a month I see them lookin to cash in on excellence.
Unless is your isp this "service" is something that could have been an generated report autoemailed to you from the software that you put on the "watchee's" computer. Unless they do added value stuff like put little arrows next to all the porn sites or something.
If they were really thinkin right they could collect alot of this great information that their customers provide and sell it to the porn sites or somenthing, I mean any site where people still go even when they know someone is watching must be good stuff!
Isn't this what slashdot aims to be? Using technology to help people communicate better. You see the way social networks are formed by the friends lists, the way some people are famous (or infamous) etc.
Technology can facilitate it and broaden the scope of the social group, but it doesn't really change the social dynamic that forms time and again.
In the case of cellphones, it lets a social group form that in previous decades might have only been able to form in a neighborhood, but cellphones let them be far flung over a large city like LA or NYC where friends live in different section and can use the cellphones to coordinate meet ups where as before everyone would just go around the corner or down the street etc...
I sorta think of slashdot as a representative discussion group, where sometimes people say something, sometimes they moderate (vote) for someones who has said something that they think should be heard. And bouncers to chuck out the people who start shouting incoherently. Anyway it lets (or some would say attempts to let) the number of people that can have a meaningful discussion be much larger.
This has happened with every meaningful technological invention, including WRITING. People naturally form social groups around technology, not because of technology.
My initial impression was what alot of people had said, if posts are allowed before the article goes live you will have a rapidly growing split between the subscribers and the rest. Various people have gone onto why this would happen. Something along the lines of stuff that is not near the top doesn't usually get modded much if at all.
This is not really a problem when everyone is on the same playing field, but when you have this "have/havenot" situation, it makes things worse, especially if you allow posts AND moderations in this "preview" period.
The parent makes a point that if you DO NOT allow posts at all, you stiffle the spontaneous comments, this may or may not be a bad thing, but it is probably a thing for moderaters to deal with.
I thought that perhaps, allow people to post but they would not be shown until the article goes "live" for the unsubscribers. And then at least then it would not be the subs modding the subs, it would be everyone modding the subs. Not such a great solution, but better.
I think that the problem that needs to be addressed is that stuff that is posted early has much more weight. Also, if the article is not even readable by the time it goes live due to slashdotting by the subscribers, then you will lean towards intelligent discussion by the subscribers, and speculation by the rest, further compounding the problem.
Possible solutions/situations for "preview"
1. No Posting (sucks for the subscribers to wait) 2. Allow Posting and Moderation (makes a split) 3. Allow Posting but NO Moderation until "live" (little more fair) 4. Allow Posting but have the posts unavail until "live" (above would allow replies, this wouldn't) 5. Something like 4. but seed the posts into the discussion in random fashion (seems unworkable)
These ones are kinda sarcastic, although not totally unrealistic take them that way:
6. Let people filter subscribers. (kind of a joke, but at least then you would give a choice, don't see this happening) 7. Let people pay to move their posts up (might as well get that money! haha)
My personal feeling now is that I don't bother to comment anymore on articles from the day before, or articles near the bottom of the front page when I first look at/. for the day.
I think this would be similar to new articles if I know that the chance that my comment will even be read is slim.
Why bother wasting the time to contribute to a discussion if a situation arises where you have to pay to be heard, this does not seem in the spirit of slashdot, I say this:
8. Don't allow posts before the live period, but allow subscribers to filter out the future posts so they don't have to deal with the situation of wanting to post right after reading the article.
At the very least use (3) Posting but No moderation.
It will come with a fancy cable to hook up to rgb or something and a mouse or something stupid and it will come with a disc with this software on it. If it ever happens microsoft will just own it, but I really don't see this happening unless it was supercrippled to make linux seem like a toy to newbies.
Kind of off topic but I just have to say, Monster cables are about marketing and technobabble more than quality. Alot of people call Monster the BOSE of cables. You get a decent cable for 2x, 3x the price of a regular good cable. They are anti-competative, alot of stores ONLY carry monster because monster has an agreement that they won't carry anything else. (this is from a store manager's mouth). You won't get a a bad cable for the most part, just paying alot for hype and limited retail options.
I am in the similar situation, but recently got HDTV content! I have a 65" RPTV and previously only DVD's really made it shine.
I'd say right now if you are in the market for a LARGE SCREEN tv, you would be a fool if you didn't get one that suppords some sort of HDTV. (specifically 1080i)
My cable company only has 4 channels of HDTV content, it was an extra 5 dollars a month over the digital cable we had previously. HBO, SHO, NBC and ABC (no cbs I think its because of the local stations).
You thought DVD's looked good, wait until you see them in 1080i!
One of the problems of a large screen is you typically have to be fairly far back from the screen not to see the pixelation of ntsc, even the best interpolation can only do so much (and the the question whether to go bars on the side, or some sort of stretched format for the 16:9 tv)
All that is GONE with HDTV. The shows look beautiful, (the few there are). I'm about to watch Kingpin in HTDV and the amount of detail you can see is phenomenal.
I find that with drama's the best part about it is you get all this detail in the actors eyes. This might sound strange but it really lets you appreciate good acting.
Course you can also see stuff like small scars, rough skin, etc. Only problem i have seen with HDTV is that some encoding seems to be better than others, sometimes fast action will pixelate slightly if there is a huge flash, I see this more on the network television HDTV over the HBO, SHO HDTV.
If you have the money and want to get state of the art (or even just a 16:9 format TV) its 100% worth it. Even for the 4 channels, and I dont' like sports. (they have an HDTV NBA channel i didn't bother getting)
Get something with DVI if you can. I have the firewire a previous poster mentioned, the chance this format will actually be used is slim, the DRM on dvi is stronger.
Its kind of strange not to be able to timeshift anymore if you want the quality, but the news of HDTV Tivo gives me hope.
I think the extra 5 dollars a month for the service pays for itself in the 1080i movies I get from the pay channels, just 1 DVD rental a month pays for it. Previously I was in the boat of the Parent poster where only DVD gave me any sort of quality content.
(BTW I can not get satellite because I have an obstructed view of the southern sky)
Re:Big legal mistake...(or a stall tactic)
on
Kazaa Fights Back
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
"So, let's take bids now on the remaining lifetime of Kazaa. I say: 9 months.
And here is the REAL issue, if anyone thinks a judge in California (even a federal) is going to rule against the RIAA, well they have alot more faith in the impartiality of judges.
Its about time, as long as they keep playing their legal shell games they can conduct business as usual and keep "raking in" (as Wired put it) the money.
More than likely the judge will be sitting there finding any reason to rule against them. No judge with any hope of a political future would invalidate all the copyrights the RIAA represents. Its just a stall for time (and since RIAA asked for summery judgement, so do they). Sharmen most likely has the resources to tie this up in court for a long time with countersuits and appeals and such. Especially since the RIAA can't really do the type of thing they did with napster with the injunction. (which will be the next thing the RIAA asks for now they have gotten a ruling that the US has juristiction over this non US company).
What the RIAA CAN do is stop US business from doing business with them and dry up their revenue, which kills up the incentive to keep fighting an expensive legal battle.
I think we will probably equate this to the wild-west period of the internet eventually. Either p2p will be defacto, or the corporations will lock things down good and tight, which has historically happened? (don't fence us in!)
anyway I'm no lawyer, but the "legal" part is all just window dressing anyway.
People made music before the invention of the phonograph, and this war was fought over sheet music as well, the sheet music companies would higher bouncers to watch for people writing down notes in the audience. However back then, they won (or became irrelevent as they morphed into the recording industry).
The music industry does not equal music.
I'm not so sure they'll go away, the less money the make the less money they have to influence politicians, the less powerful they become and the more realistic and monopolistic they will be. Independent Labels will be able to exist again in this more competative environment and the fat cow of the current music industry will be transformed into a much leaner, healthier animal. The Star Machine will roll on, but music might be the stuff they give away for free so you will buy the dvd-video, concert footage of whatever multimedia star (notice they all are now, the "musician" has given way to the "performer") is currently hot.
Of course the conglomerates, frustrated at losing money because they can no longer afford the excesses will become like cornered rats and who knows what they they will do. There is talk of the "p2p tarriff" on all broadband accounts, I think that if they can get it applied to blank cd-r's that can and are used for data and a myrid of other things, they can get their tarrif, this will fund their lawyers who will constantly crack down on this activity you just paid for. And of course the isps will cite this as a reason there is more traffic and another reason to cut the upload bandwidth yet again.
It'll be an interesting day when someone bottles "nothing" and sells it to you. Anyone interested in "Nike" brand bottle of nothing? Doesn't do anything, but looks GREAT on your shelf!! It will impress people too.
Isn't that the vacuum tube, I think nothing already became obsolete.
I got one of these UPS's, I have a 500W unit (BK500) when I registered my sn on the website it said I had a 350W unit. So I call up and they say it hasn't shown up on their system or whatever... Anyway, he did say it would ship without the battery. I think that is the only difference between the BK350 and the BK500 (they look the same outside anyway), but there might be a power load difference too. This thing has been on for at least 8 months now, turned off only the 5 or 6 times the power has gone out. Would think this problem would show up by now, I got it 1/2 on carpet too no less. They say to disconnect it immediatly blah blah but my uptime....
The two "dream" situations wifi seems to enable are
1) the dream of being able to access information anywhere, anytime (cyberpunk/matrix)
2) the dream of this being free/unencumbered by legacy corporations clinging onto their monopolistic infrastructure.
Now i don't know if these are mutually exclusive or what, but it apparently is enough to fuel a drive to get a piece of this new "real estate". Its the gold rush mentatlity.
I agree, this was a fantastic set of 9 novels that really flesh out the world and although written over 15 (or so) years the technology of a world envisioned in the early eighties still holds pretty fresh and new even today and all the books mesh really well.
did you READ the original article? the one at techreview.com? Apparently they model every compenent of the copier in software and it has a model of that internally, and can use that model to optimize printing speed based on internal sensors. Its alot more than a "driver".
Re:Doesn't it seem....
on
Immobile Robots
·
· Score: 3, Informative
I don't think the guy who wrote this article really understood exactly what they are talking about.
I'd like to preface by saying this is a fantastic concept that could revolutionize the way we think about troubleshooting and diagnostics of hardware.
from the original article:
Say you're making 70 copies of a booklet. Even before you press the Start button, a machine running PARC's model can predict that stapling will be the slowest part of the job and communicate this fact to other components of the machine, allowing them to run concurrently and without creating a big backup. Another advantage, Bobrow says, is that the DocuColor controller models are built from smaller models hard-wired into each component. When a new station such as a scanner or sorter is added, it transmits its internal model to the central controller, providing a painless software upgrade.
From what I understood, this thing is able to emulate/simulate itself in software (this is the jargon'ed up "models") the fact that they build each "addon" with its own simulation in rom or such is such a great idea, so the copier itself is able to add that into its interal simulation, this is a pretty impressive feat, (think about MAME).
THEN they build in some sort of diagnostic software that is able to use that internal simulation + sensors (the weak link in all this) to determine problems and come up with alternative ways of accomplishing a given task.
This is where things delve into the AI aspects, thats pretty high-level. I think an analogy would be instead of having a health manual for people in the 15th century. that lists stuff like "cut finger, clean and keep covered", you teach them about bacteria and why things get infected. Maybe the give a man a fish he eats for a day, teach a man to fish he eats for a lifetime (and can teach others.. etc) analogy applies here as well.
It does seem more productive to write software that is better able to use a simulation to solve problems than to have solutions each and every individual problem a device might ever encounter.
I think the main application for this kind of software is in really expensive stuff people expect to (hope)work forever. (space probes, copiers, cars) so that's why all this bs about immobot, blah blah, probably some fancy name they had to give the research when it was time to shop for funding and the commercial applications had to be extremly obvious.
I wonder if they are using neural net type stuff, genetic algorithms to help with the diagnostics, that would seem the most obvious choice. Wonder if they paired this up with the FPGA stuff (there was a slashdot post about it but i can't find the link now) that can program its own hardware....
The recognition scheme is quite impressive. It could tell the difference between different denominations of currency. It even recognized me as long as I was wearing the shirt I had on when my image was originally captured. It didn't know me from Adam when I put on another shirt.
They should make a Mac version so Steve Jobs could get one of these, doesn't he only wear black turtlenecks or something?
I had the most fun driving the ER1 around using my home wireless connection. Because my laptop is wireless-capable, I could control the unit from my desktop computer and see everything the robot could see through that computer.
Maybe they should market this as a superduper babycam that yuppies can use to track high-tech their babies, they seem to have no problem buying baby-wipe warmers, and what not.
It says the onboard battery power is 3 hours, and given that most laptops can last this long.. they should make a charger it can dock into so you can charge it from anywhere in the world (and have it charge the laptop too).
It has a lot of potential when you add this internet connectivity to the robot, a way to check out the house for the paranoid right?, use it as a security alarm so it emails you if it detect motion? hahah i can see how it could have some practical uses but it looks to me like they figured if they sold enough of these to schools for some hands on robotics in a kit, they could make enough money to stay afloat.
Seems as though Verizon is secure enough in its monopoly to have the balls to say right out they can do whatever they want, and not only that tney have a RIGHT to it!
So, "FarScape" only attracted a bunch of geeks and nerds. That's what's called a "high-saturation demographic." Sure, it's not very appealing to advertisers trying to sell basketball shoes; but for the company selling video games, or computer software, or pocket protectors...advertising on "FarScape" is money well-spent. You're pitching to an audience which might be 90% favorable to your product -- as opposed to betting on the more mixed demographics watching, say, "Trading Spaces" or "Emeril Live."
They probably think we all have tivo's and replayTV's and such...
This sounds like it was made to try to soak up some of that dot.com money by offering a pr friendly way for people/corps to donate their money. You donate to the non-profit, get a tax break, or you can buy up a buncha simputers and ship them off to india and broken or used as dishes or something. Encore, the company that licenses its os to the non-profit probably makes a big profit. Its all about PR and someone capitalizing on a perceived need "third world computer literacy" that someone cared about for a minute or two.
FCC already ruled that broadband was an "information service" so that certain laws do not apply to them.
IE the fix is in, don't expect the FCC to help.
UPS delivered my Asus A7N8X (nforce2) board TODAY. Several online retailers had them in stock fri (when I ordered mine).
Now just waiting for the processor I won in the AMD Reality Check thing to arrive and I'm all set!
You do not need to have a modded PS2 to use QCast Tuner (broadq's product). I recently looked into getting this cause I thought I'd be able to watch my divx in 480i at least on my hdtv but this isn't really supported yet, but they say they are working on it. They say it works on any unmodded ps2 in their faq, I assumed it was true.
http://forum.broadq.com/6/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=250608123& f=220603153&m=1106004021
This technology was funded by DARPA (defense money) for uses where they need to have a battery in sensors in a missile that is sealed in and have it last for quite a long time. (the example they gave) So whatever these get used for military and medical will probably be the first applications because this is where the longevity properties are really neccessary. After a while it will filter into consumer use...
Increasing the efficiency of devices is great, but if this really pans out they could change they way we view electronics. (think about NEVER having to change a battery, or worry about plugging something in, it just works for 50 years)
I read the article, they will probalby call them Nickel-Copper batteries and just leave out the fact that it is really nickel-63 (the radioactive element they are currently using).
If they can really get 50 years of use out of them, why make battery's at all? I don't see why current battery makers would start making batteries that never have to be replaced. Seems to me it is alot more likely companies will include this as a feature (sorta like laptop co's do now, better battery being a feature you can buy) or just something to set it apart from the pack... until the tech develops enough where everything just becomes self powered. Everything really rests on how cheap/available the nickel-63 is.
As far as waste goes I'd rather have the "environmental impact" of this 1 battery vs 50 years of disposable batteries, hell even rechargable (NiMH or Li-Ion) have maybe 4-5 years of life.
The impact this could have on how we live could dramatically change (truly no wires needed for anything)but the battery co's and the oil co's will probably see things differently and play up the "radioactive" threat to see this fail.
Slashdot Mirror
So they will sell info on the top 100 porn sites!? or just demographics to people who wanna sell to the "moral compass" group.
The nitpick: uh the fact that it IS here means it was welcome here, how many thousands of people just went to that page because of slashdot?
And in general this is a "guilt tool" to me that means its a way for one person to have power over another using guilt as the medium. The primary use I see for this is for parents for their kids, which would seem to be a valid use.
This "first line of defense against temptation" crap is a joke because a) newstands, b) how hard really could it be to circumvent.
I like the mumbo jumbo on the website about building bonds of accountability to push us forward into excellence, something along those lines, at 4 bucks a month I see them lookin to cash in on excellence.
Unless is your isp this "service" is something that could have been an generated report autoemailed to you from the software that you put on the "watchee's" computer. Unless they do added value stuff like put little arrows next to all the porn sites or something.
If they were really thinkin right they could collect alot of this great information that their customers provide and sell it to the porn sites or somenthing, I mean any site where people still go even when they know someone is watching must be good stuff!
Isn't this what slashdot aims to be? Using technology to help people communicate better. You see the way social networks are formed by the friends lists, the way some people are famous (or infamous) etc.
Technology can facilitate it and broaden the scope of the social group, but it doesn't really change the social dynamic that forms time and again.
In the case of cellphones, it lets a social group form that in previous decades might have only been able to form in a neighborhood, but cellphones let them be far flung over a large city like LA or NYC where friends live in different section and can use the cellphones to coordinate meet ups where as before everyone would just go around the corner or down the street etc...
I sorta think of slashdot as a representative discussion group, where sometimes people say something, sometimes they moderate (vote) for someones who has said something that they think should be heard. And bouncers to chuck out the people who start shouting incoherently. Anyway it lets (or some would say attempts to let) the number of people that can have a meaningful discussion be much larger.
This has happened with every meaningful technological invention, including WRITING. People naturally form social groups around technology, not because of technology.
My initial impression was what alot of people had said, if posts are allowed before the article goes live you will have a rapidly growing split between the subscribers and the rest. Various people have gone onto why this would happen. Something along the lines of stuff that is not near the top doesn't usually get modded much if at all.
/. for the day.
This is not really a problem when everyone is on the same playing field, but when you have this "have/havenot" situation, it makes things worse, especially if you allow posts AND moderations in this "preview" period.
The parent makes a point that if you DO NOT allow posts at all, you stiffle the spontaneous comments, this may or may not be a bad thing, but it is probably a thing for moderaters to deal with.
I thought that perhaps, allow people to post but they would not be shown until the article goes "live" for the unsubscribers. And then at least then it would not be the subs modding the subs, it would be everyone modding the subs. Not such a great solution, but better.
I think that the problem that needs to be addressed is that stuff that is posted early has much more weight. Also, if the article is not even readable by the time it goes live due to slashdotting by the subscribers, then you will lean towards intelligent discussion by the subscribers, and speculation by the rest, further compounding the problem.
Possible solutions/situations for "preview"
1. No Posting (sucks for the subscribers to wait)
2. Allow Posting and Moderation (makes a split)
3. Allow Posting but NO Moderation until "live" (little more fair)
4. Allow Posting but have the posts unavail until "live" (above would allow replies, this wouldn't)
5. Something like 4. but seed the posts into the discussion in random fashion (seems unworkable)
These ones are kinda sarcastic, although not totally unrealistic take them that way:
6. Let people filter subscribers. (kind of a joke, but at least then you would give a choice, don't see this happening)
7. Let people pay to move their posts up (might as well get that money! haha)
My personal feeling now is that I don't bother to comment anymore on articles from the day before, or articles near the bottom of the front page when I first look at
I think this would be similar to new articles if I know that the chance that my comment will even be read is slim.
Why bother wasting the time to contribute to a discussion if a situation arises where you have to pay to be heard, this does not seem in the spirit of slashdot, I say this:
8. Don't allow posts before the live period, but allow subscribers to filter out the future posts so they don't have to deal with the situation of wanting to post right after reading the article.
At the very least use (3) Posting but No moderation.
It will come with a fancy cable to hook up to rgb or something and a mouse or something stupid and it will come with a disc with this software on it. If it ever happens microsoft will just own it, but I really don't see this happening unless it was supercrippled to make linux seem like a toy to newbies.
Kind of off topic but I just have to say, Monster cables are about marketing and technobabble more than quality. Alot of people call Monster the BOSE of cables. You get a decent cable for 2x, 3x the price of a regular good cable. They are anti-competative, alot of stores ONLY carry monster because monster has an agreement that they won't carry anything else. (this is from a store manager's mouth). You won't get a a bad cable for the most part, just paying alot for hype and limited retail options.
I am in the similar situation, but recently got HDTV content! I have a 65" RPTV and previously only DVD's really made it shine.
I'd say right now if you are in the market for a LARGE SCREEN tv, you would be a fool if you didn't get one that suppords some sort of HDTV. (specifically 1080i)
My cable company only has 4 channels of HDTV content, it was an extra 5 dollars a month over the digital cable we had previously. HBO, SHO, NBC and ABC (no cbs I think its because of the local stations).
You thought DVD's looked good, wait until you see them in 1080i!
One of the problems of a large screen is you typically have to be fairly far back from the screen not to see the pixelation of ntsc, even the best interpolation can only do so much (and the the question whether to go bars on the side, or some sort of stretched format for the 16:9 tv)
All that is GONE with HDTV. The shows look beautiful, (the few there are). I'm about to watch Kingpin in HTDV and the amount of detail you can see is phenomenal.
I find that with drama's the best part about it is you get all this detail in the actors eyes. This might sound strange but it really lets you appreciate good acting.
Course you can also see stuff like small scars, rough skin, etc. Only problem i have seen with HDTV is that some encoding seems to be better than others, sometimes fast action will pixelate slightly if there is a huge flash, I see this more on the network television HDTV over the HBO, SHO HDTV.
If you have the money and want to get state of the art (or even just a 16:9 format TV) its 100% worth it. Even for the 4 channels, and I dont' like sports. (they have an HDTV NBA channel i didn't bother getting)
Get something with DVI if you can. I have the firewire a previous poster mentioned, the chance this format will actually be used is slim, the DRM on dvi is stronger.
Its kind of strange not to be able to timeshift anymore if you want the quality, but the news of HDTV Tivo gives me hope.
I think the extra 5 dollars a month for the service pays for itself in the 1080i movies I get from the pay channels, just 1 DVD rental a month pays for it. Previously I was in the boat of the Parent poster where only DVD gave me any sort of quality content.
(BTW I can not get satellite because I have an obstructed view of the southern sky)
People made music before the invention of the phonograph, and this war was fought over sheet music as well, the sheet music companies would higher bouncers to watch for people writing down notes in the audience. However back then, they won (or became irrelevent as they morphed into the recording industry).
The music industry does not equal music.
I'm not so sure they'll go away, the less money the make the less money they have to influence politicians, the less powerful they become and the more realistic and monopolistic they will be. Independent Labels will be able to exist again in this more competative environment and the fat cow of the current music industry will be transformed into a much leaner, healthier animal. The Star Machine will roll on, but music might be the stuff they give away for free so you will buy the dvd-video, concert footage of whatever multimedia star (notice they all are now, the "musician" has given way to the "performer") is currently hot.
Of course the conglomerates, frustrated at losing money because they can no longer afford the excesses will become like cornered rats and who knows what they they will do. There is talk of the "p2p tarriff" on all broadband accounts, I think that if they can get it applied to blank cd-r's that can and are used for data and a myrid of other things, they can get their tarrif, this will fund their lawyers who will constantly crack down on this activity you just paid for. And of course the isps will cite this as a reason there is more traffic and another reason to cut the upload bandwidth yet again.
I got one of these UPS's, I have a 500W unit (BK500) when I registered my sn on the website it said I had a 350W unit. So I call up and they say it hasn't shown up on their system or whatever... Anyway, he did say it would ship without the battery. I think that is the only difference between the BK350 and the BK500 (they look the same outside anyway), but there might be a power load difference too. This thing has been on for at least 8 months now, turned off only the 5 or 6 times the power has gone out. Would think this problem would show up by now, I got it 1/2 on carpet too no less. They say to disconnect it immediatly blah blah but my uptime....
Check out http://www.meshnetworks.com
The two "dream" situations wifi seems to enable are
1) the dream of being able to access information anywhere, anytime (cyberpunk/matrix)
2) the dream of this being free/unencumbered by legacy corporations clinging onto their monopolistic infrastructure.
Now i don't know if these are mutually exclusive or what, but it apparently is enough to fuel a drive to get a piece of this new "real estate". Its the gold rush mentatlity.
I agree, this was a fantastic set of 9 novels that really flesh out the world and although written over 15 (or so) years the technology of a world envisioned in the early eighties still holds pretty fresh and new even today and all the books mesh really well.
I enjoyed them immensly this summer.
did you READ the original article? the one at techreview.com? Apparently they model every compenent of the copier in software and it has a model of that internally, and can use that model to optimize printing speed based on internal sensors. Its alot more than a "driver".
from the original article: From what I understood, this thing is able to emulate/simulate itself in software (this is the jargon'ed up "models") the fact that they build each "addon" with its own simulation in rom or such is such a great idea, so the copier itself is able to add that into its interal simulation, this is a pretty impressive feat, (think about MAME).
THEN they build in some sort of diagnostic software that is able to use that internal simulation + sensors (the weak link in all this) to determine problems and come up with alternative ways of accomplishing a given task.
This is where things delve into the AI aspects, thats pretty high-level. I think an analogy would be instead of having a health manual for people in the 15th century. that lists stuff like "cut finger, clean and keep covered", you teach them about bacteria and why things get infected. Maybe the give a man a fish he eats for a day, teach a man to fish he eats for a lifetime (and can teach others.. etc) analogy applies here as well.
It does seem more productive to write software that is better able to use a simulation to solve problems than to have solutions each and every individual problem a device might ever encounter.
I think the main application for this kind of software is in really expensive stuff people expect to (hope)work forever. (space probes, copiers, cars) so that's why all this bs about immobot, blah blah, probably some fancy name they had to give the research when it was time to shop for funding and the commercial applications had to be extremly obvious.
I wonder if they are using neural net type stuff, genetic algorithms to help with the diagnostics, that would seem the most obvious choice. Wonder if they paired this up with the FPGA stuff (there was a slashdot post about it but i can't find the link now) that can program its own hardware....
Maybe they should market this as a superduper babycam that yuppies can use to track high-tech their babies, they seem to have no problem buying baby-wipe warmers, and what not.
It says the onboard battery power is 3 hours, and given that most laptops can last this long.. they should make a charger it can dock into so you can charge it from anywhere in the world (and have it charge the laptop too).
It has a lot of potential when you add this internet connectivity to the robot, a way to check out the house for the paranoid right?, use it as a security alarm so it emails you if it detect motion? hahah i can see how it could have some practical uses but it looks to me like they figured if they sold enough of these to schools for some hands on robotics in a kit, they could make enough money to stay afloat.
Seems as though Verizon is secure enough in its monopoly to have the balls to say right out they can do whatever they want, and not only that tney have a RIGHT to it!
This sounds like it was made to try to soak up some of that dot.com money by offering a pr friendly way for people/corps to donate their money. You donate to the non-profit, get a tax break, or you can buy up a buncha simputers and ship them off to india and broken or used as dishes or something. Encore, the company that licenses its os to the non-profit probably makes a big profit. Its all about PR and someone capitalizing on a perceived need "third world computer literacy" that someone cared about for a minute or two.
FCC already ruled that broadband was an "information service" so that certain laws do not apply to them. IE the fix is in, don't expect the FCC to help.
UPS delivered my Asus A7N8X (nforce2) board TODAY. Several online retailers had them in stock fri (when I ordered mine). Now just waiting for the processor I won in the AMD Reality Check thing to arrive and I'm all set!
You do not need to have a modded PS2 to use QCast Tuner (broadq's product). I recently looked into getting this cause I thought I'd be able to watch my divx in 480i at least on my hdtv but this isn't really supported yet, but they say they are working on it. They say it works on any unmodded ps2 in their faq, I assumed it was true. http://forum.broadq.com/6/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=250608123& f=220603153&m=1106004021
Read the info on cornell's site.
This technology was funded by DARPA (defense money) for uses where they need to have a battery in sensors in a missile that is sealed in and have it last for quite a long time. (the example they gave) So whatever these get used for military and medical will probably be the first applications because this is where the longevity properties are really neccessary. After a while it will filter into consumer use...
Increasing the efficiency of devices is great, but if this really pans out they could change they way we view electronics. (think about NEVER having to change a battery, or worry about plugging something in, it just works for 50 years)
I read the article, they will probalby call them Nickel-Copper batteries and just leave out the fact that it is really nickel-63 (the radioactive element they are currently using).
If they can really get 50 years of use out of them, why make battery's at all? I don't see why current battery makers would start making batteries that never have to be replaced. Seems to me it is alot more likely companies will include this as a feature (sorta like laptop co's do now, better battery being a feature you can buy) or just something to set it apart from the pack... until the tech develops enough where everything just becomes self powered. Everything really rests on how cheap/available the nickel-63 is.
As far as waste goes I'd rather have the "environmental impact" of this 1 battery vs 50 years of disposable batteries, hell even rechargable (NiMH or Li-Ion) have maybe 4-5 years of life.
The impact this could have on how we live could dramatically change (truly no wires needed for anything)but the battery co's and the oil co's will probably see things differently and play up the "radioactive" threat to see this fail.
Seems like this is pretty close to what most people would call a "payoff".
Basically paying off the merchants for helping sheer the sheep. US the customers of possible revenue that they can dig out of us.