When you "burn" a CD-R, you are just heating up an organic dye and making it change color (go clear). This happens with about 20-30mW of laser power, about 1/100th the power of the laser i'm talking about. If you focus the laser down to a pinpoint, lasers in that class will _enventually_ heat things like dark paper, black plastic enough to just start to burn. It takes 30 secs or so to start things on fire at that power level... 3W makes em burst into flame instantly!!
Actually, I was amazed that the thing barely gets hot at all. It consumes a full 5A at 3V, so it is taking in 15W and putting 3 of that out in light, so it's actually only dissipating about 12W or so of heat.
The diode package is a small 1/2" dia. gold can embedded in a slab of beryllium copper(?). I have the thing screwed directly into the positive battery terminal on the battery clip holder.
During operation, I tend to use short bursts, and after about 10-15 minutes of blowing things up it just starts getting warm. Continuously, it would probably heat to dangerous temps within 1-2 minutes. A simple CPU cooling fan/heatsink combo would be more than adequate for continuous operation, which the diode _was_ designed for.
You also must realize that that entire 3W is concentrated into the diameter of the fiber optic. I think they are about 60 micro-meters inner core diameter, so the power distribution is something on the order of a KW per square mm. LOTSA power in a VERY small area!
The beam isn't collimated out of the fiber, so after about 1/4" or so, the beam diverges enough that it doesn't set things on fire. I have a simple collimator from a laser diode, and with a little tweaking, I can set things afire from 8 to 10 inches away!! That is REALLY cool.
Actually it's a single diode putting out 3W at 808 nm. They currently sell for around $400.00 (US).
I've got it mounted to the outside of a dual D-Cell battery holder clip (from Radio Shack, of all places!) with a small power switch and a current limiting resistor in series.
These are used as printer's plate thermal developing units in larger arrays.
These are also used as pumps for DPSS (Diode Pumped Solid State) lasers. I've got a nice chunk of KTP used to double 1064nm down to 532 (green), but I need to find a large piece of Nd:YVO (Vanadate) which transforms the 808 up to 1064nm. This is how most of the green laser pointers work, they have a diode similar but smaller, putting out about 100-500mW at 808 nm and using similar crystals to transform the frequency to 532 nm.
We think of microwaves in terms of microwave ovens. These operate on an EXACT frequecy just below 2.4 GHz that is the precise resonance frequency of water molecules. This makes things boil from the inside, and we tend to generalize this to all microwave behavior.
Microwaves that are NOT at that magical resonance frequency just cause simple tissue heating effects, like a strong RF transmitter. At least until you get upwards in frequency toward gamma and x-rays where the energy becomes known as "ionizing radiation".
At that point, the energy can knock around the nucleotides that make up DNA and cause mutations, cancer, etc. (a Bad Thing).
Especially a battery operated, portable Death Ray!
I just picked up a 3 Watt laser diode at a Hamfest recently. It's whats at the core of the med-pack and portable med-pens displayed. This thing is really fucking cool. It will make paper and wire insulation, plastic, etc. burst into flame from about 1/4 inch away.
The diode is made by Spectra Diode Labs (SDL) and channels 3 Watts of optical energy at 808 nanometers into a fiber optic. I have that clamped into a standard mechanical pencil to hold the fiber and allow it to be directed with some control.
The spot that appears is very scary because it appears weak red, about 5 mW of visible light energy is present but 98 % of the optical power is invisible in the infrared spectrum.
I haven't tried any home laser surgery yet, but it makes a dandy wire stripper or marking scribe. I also use it to open sealed ni-cad battery packs and change cells for walkie-talkies, etc.
In the article they mention that Open-source solutions were not on their "list" of applications that people use; that actually makes sense - those apps are not produced by BSA-affiliated entities, so the BSA isn't interested in apps people use that aren't the IP of one of their gang.
What I would like to know is if the Open-source s/w is being lumped into those dollar estimates, what price value do they give to, say, Star Office?
Since that app isn't on their list, how can they lump it in with the values given? I would have guessed that Star Office would occasionally get the MS-Office box checked erroneously, but they are careful to mention that the applist is VERY specific, so how can this happen?
Just wondering, since this doesn't seem to make sense.
You must not have read right. No one was injured, actors were faking it. The only "injury" was the pusher of the buttons being shaken and distraught because they THOUGHT they caused someone near-fatal pain.
True, the Theremin was invented way before the other stuff, but have you heard one? It sounds like a wounded cat in heat fighting with a violin, and although it IS slectronic and produces tones, it definitely would not be considered music.
As far as the abuse of an instrument, as in trying to mimic existing sounds, I don't agree. Due to the early crudeness of the Moog gear, it actually had a totally unique sound of its own. I do agree it's an academic use of multitracking technology to do what we use MIDI sequencers for nowadays.
Actually, it's called "Plain Sight Seizure". Probable cause means he "thinks" he saw a flash of a bag or may have "heard" a cry for help. PSS means he DEFINITELY saw a bag sitting on the seat, etc.
If you want to start with early historical electronic music, the very first (even before Kraftwerk) was Walter Carlos's "Switched On Bach" series of albums. One of the others in the series was called "The Well-Tempered Synthesiser" and another was called "4 Seasons" or "Sonic Seasonings" (something like that, it's been 20 years since I have seen them).
These albums were masterworks of Symphonic music done with very early Moog synthesiser technology. The synths of the day were totally separate modules in little boxes conntected by jungles of patchcords. The Moog Carlos used was not even capable of playing chords (monophonic), so by using multi-track tape recording technology, each instrument's part was added to the total mix. An interesting side-note, Walter underwent a Sex change operation and is now known as Wendy Carlos. She (now) did the soundtrack for the movie "Tron" by Disney.
Also in the '70's was Mike Oldfield. He is also a virtuoso and can (and does) play about every instrument in the orchestra, and makes heavy use of synthesizer and procesing technology. He's best known for the Soundtrack from "The Exorcist", "Tubular Bells". He's not that well known in the U.S., but he's released about 24 albums thru the present.
Another electronic virtuoso is Vangelis. He, like Mike Oldfield is a one-man show. He writes, performs and engineers everthing himself. His music was some of the early work that started the "New Age" type music. He's also done a few very good albums in collaboration with Jon Anderson from Yes.
Newer stuff of interest would be some of the Demo albums from Telarc, "Time Warp" by Erich Kunzel and "Bachbusters" by Don Dorsey, a fitting tribute to the earlier "Switched-On Bach" forbearance, with 20 years newer and better technology. These albums in fact are COMPLETELY synthetic, the sounds were digitally generated in a wave table synthesizer, digitally mixed and mastered to CD, and digitally recovered and played back in your system, it only becomes analog at your D/A converter for the first time!
Finally, my other fave would have to be Alan Parsons. He's brilliant. I'm sure you've heard of him. His original claim to fame for having done the Mixing and Engineering of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" album. He also engineered Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat". His work with "The Alan Parsons Project" was an interesting mix of modern electronic technology, smooth rock, and symphonic style. He was one of the first people to use a Vocoder (early speech synthesiser) and all of the recordings he did were in fact full digital recordings, mastered on a Sony PCM-1610 digital tape machine. "Heart" and Peter Gabriel also used this for their masters, BTW, that's why they sound so good!
"Shock the Monkey" may be a further reference to it, (I haven't been able to figure out any other deep meaning in the song) but "We Do What We're Told" from the album So, is subtitled "Milgrim's 37", no doubt there.
Hmmm... Been a while.... The story is called "Button. Button", by Alfred Bester. I don't remember which anthology it was in, probably one of the 100's of 1960's paperbacks in my basement.
The test was called Milgrim's 37. Peter Gabriel wrote a really creepy song about it called "We do what we're told". There were 37 buttons of "increasing pain" (higher voltage) applied to a test subject. Actually the subjects were actors, simulating greater pain as higher numbers were pushed. The actual subjects were the button-pushers who actually thought they were shocking people. They did as they were told, and applied what they thought were horifically painful shocks to random people they didn't know because they could get away with it.
Well, he submitted it to the Patent review board at this large company, who shall remain nameless, and the people there were so interested they actually submitted it to the Patent office. It was only turned down due to the kiddie Ant farm being too close in form and function, and using it as a picture window wasn't unique enough.
This is absolutely the best thing that could happen - getting more and more ridiculous patents approved. This will prove to people once and for all the USPTO is obviously approving these things in their sleep. Pretty soon the books will be bulging with absurd patents, and someone will call for a review of ALL the patents issued, and whether or not they actually were deserved and worthy of continued enforcement. A buddy of mine that used to work for a very large electronics manufacturer actually submitted a patent for a picture-window Ant Farm as a joke, and was almost awarded it!
That's how it starts. You are asked to give up a "reasonable" right you don't use often. You say, "Oh, that's ok, I can do without that particular right, if its for (insert rallying phrase here)". Then it happens again. And again we agree and allow our rights to be taken away, slowly, one at a time. Evermore, they keep chiseling away, one little freedom at a time, until... THEY'RE ALL GONE!!
Can be produced my Monkeys on Typewriters, so maybe someone's DNA may prove a new Top-40's hit tune! The DNA song from the Clone Wars - "It's a catchy tune, but I've heard it before!"
Ah, I see. I was referring to the cartoon where a bunch of equations on the left side of the chalkboard and the answer was on the right side and in the middle was a nebulous cloud, labeled, step 2... etc...
Slashdot Mirror
Try searching for "boob"
When you "burn" a CD-R, you are just heating up an organic dye and making it change color (go clear).
This happens with about 20-30mW of laser power, about 1/100th the power of the laser i'm talking about. If you focus the laser down to a pinpoint, lasers in that class will _enventually_ heat things like dark paper, black plastic enough to just start to burn. It takes 30 secs or so to start things on fire at that power level... 3W makes em burst into flame instantly!!
Actually, I was amazed that the thing barely gets hot at all. It consumes a full 5A at 3V, so it is taking in 15W and putting 3 of that out in light, so it's actually only dissipating about 12W or so of heat.
The diode package is a small 1/2" dia. gold can embedded in a slab of beryllium copper(?). I have the thing screwed directly into the positive
battery terminal on the battery clip holder.
During operation, I tend to use short bursts, and after about 10-15 minutes of blowing things up it just starts getting warm. Continuously, it would probably heat to dangerous temps within 1-2 minutes. A simple CPU cooling fan/heatsink combo would be more than adequate for continuous operation, which the diode _was_ designed for.
You also must realize that that entire 3W is concentrated into the diameter of the fiber optic. I think they are about 60 micro-meters inner core diameter, so the power distribution is something on the order of a KW per square mm. LOTSA power in a VERY small area!
The beam isn't collimated out of the fiber, so after about 1/4" or so, the beam diverges enough that it doesn't set things on fire. I have a simple collimator from a laser diode, and with a little tweaking, I can set things afire from 8 to 10 inches away!! That is REALLY cool.
Actually it's a single diode putting out 3W at 808 nm. They currently sell for around $400.00 (US).
I've got it mounted to the outside of a dual D-Cell battery holder clip (from Radio Shack, of all places!) with a small power switch and a current limiting resistor in series.
These are used as printer's plate thermal developing units in larger arrays.
These are also used as pumps for DPSS (Diode Pumped Solid State) lasers. I've got a nice chunk of KTP used to double 1064nm down to 532 (green), but I need to find a large piece of Nd:YVO (Vanadate) which transforms the 808 up to 1064nm.
This is how most of the green laser pointers work, they have a diode similar but smaller, putting out about 100-500mW at 808 nm and using similar crystals to transform the frequency to 532 nm.
We think of microwaves in terms of microwave ovens. These operate on an EXACT frequecy just below 2.4 GHz that is the precise resonance frequency of water molecules. This makes things boil from the inside, and we tend to generalize this to all microwave behavior.
Microwaves that are NOT at that magical resonance frequency just cause simple tissue heating effects, like a strong RF transmitter. At least until you get upwards in frequency toward gamma and x-rays where the energy becomes known as "ionizing radiation".
At that point, the energy can knock around the nucleotides that make up DNA and cause mutations, cancer, etc. (a Bad Thing).
Everyone should have a Death Ray.
Especially a battery operated, portable Death Ray!
I just picked up a 3 Watt laser diode at a Hamfest recently. It's whats at the core of the med-pack and portable med-pens displayed. This thing is really fucking cool. It will make paper and wire insulation, plastic, etc. burst into flame from about 1/4 inch away.
The diode is made by Spectra Diode Labs (SDL) and channels 3 Watts of optical energy at 808 nanometers into a fiber optic. I have that clamped into a standard mechanical pencil to hold the fiber and allow it to be directed with some control.
The spot that appears is very scary because it appears weak red, about 5 mW of visible light energy is present but 98 % of the optical power is invisible in the infrared spectrum.
I haven't tried any home laser surgery yet, but it makes a dandy wire stripper or marking scribe. I also use it to open sealed ni-cad battery packs and change cells for walkie-talkies, etc.
Yep, Everyone should have a Death Ray!
In the article they mention that Open-source solutions were not on their "list" of applications that people use; that actually makes sense - those apps are not produced by BSA-affiliated entities, so the BSA isn't interested in apps people use that aren't the IP of one of their gang.
What I would like to know is if the Open-source s/w is being lumped into those dollar estimates, what price value do they give to, say, Star Office?
Since that app isn't on their list, how can they lump it in with the values given? I would have guessed that Star Office would occasionally get the MS-Office box checked erroneously, but they are careful to mention that the applist is VERY specific, so how can this happen?
Just wondering, since this doesn't seem to make sense.
Those soft, yet crunchy pink things!
You must not have read right. No one was injured, actors were faking it. The only "injury" was the pusher of the buttons being shaken and distraught because they THOUGHT they caused someone near-fatal pain.
True, the Theremin was invented way before the other stuff, but have you heard one? It sounds like a wounded cat in heat fighting with a violin, and although it IS slectronic and produces tones, it definitely would not be considered music.
As far as the abuse of an instrument, as in trying to mimic existing sounds, I don't agree. Due to the early crudeness of the Moog gear, it actually had a totally unique sound of its own. I do agree it's an academic use of multitracking technology to do what we use MIDI sequencers for nowadays.
Actually, it's called "Plain Sight Seizure". Probable cause means he "thinks" he saw a flash of a bag or may have "heard" a cry for help. PSS means he DEFINITELY saw a bag sitting on the seat, etc.
If you want to start with early historical electronic music, the very first (even before Kraftwerk) was Walter Carlos's "Switched On Bach" series of albums. One of the others in the series was called "The Well-Tempered Synthesiser" and another was called "4 Seasons" or "Sonic Seasonings" (something like that, it's been 20 years since I have seen them).
These albums were masterworks of Symphonic music done with very early Moog synthesiser technology. The synths of the day were totally separate modules in little boxes conntected by jungles of patchcords. The Moog Carlos used was not even capable of playing chords (monophonic), so by using multi-track tape recording technology, each instrument's part was added to the total mix. An interesting side-note, Walter underwent a Sex change operation and is now known as Wendy Carlos. She (now) did the soundtrack for the movie "Tron" by Disney.
Also in the '70's was Mike Oldfield. He is also a virtuoso and can (and does) play about every instrument in the orchestra, and makes heavy use of synthesizer and procesing technology. He's best known for the Soundtrack from "The Exorcist", "Tubular Bells". He's not that well known in the U.S., but he's released about 24 albums thru the present.
Another electronic virtuoso is Vangelis. He, like Mike Oldfield is a one-man show. He writes, performs and engineers everthing himself. His music was some of the early work that started the "New Age" type music. He's also done a few very good albums in collaboration with Jon Anderson from Yes.
Newer stuff of interest would be some of the Demo albums from Telarc, "Time Warp" by Erich Kunzel and "Bachbusters" by Don Dorsey, a fitting tribute to the earlier "Switched-On Bach" forbearance, with 20 years newer and better technology. These albums in fact are COMPLETELY synthetic, the sounds were digitally generated in a wave table synthesizer, digitally mixed and mastered to CD, and digitally recovered and played back in your system, it only becomes analog at your D/A converter for the first time!
Finally, my other fave would have to be Alan Parsons. He's brilliant. I'm sure you've heard of him. His original claim to fame for having done the Mixing and Engineering of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" album. He also engineered Al Stewart's "Year of the Cat". His work with "The Alan Parsons Project" was an interesting mix of modern electronic technology, smooth rock, and symphonic style. He was one of the first people to use a Vocoder (early speech synthesiser) and all of the recordings he did were in fact full digital recordings, mastered on a Sony PCM-1610 digital tape machine. "Heart" and Peter Gabriel also used this for their masters, BTW, that's why they sound so good!
And, in a variety of decorator colors, no less!
"Shock the Monkey" may be a further reference to it, (I haven't been able to figure out any other deep meaning in the song) but "We Do What We're Told" from the album So, is subtitled "Milgrim's 37", no doubt there.
Hmmm... Been a while.... The story is called "Button. Button", by Alfred Bester. I don't remember which anthology it was in, probably one of the 100's of 1960's paperbacks in my basement.
The test was called Milgrim's 37. Peter Gabriel wrote a really creepy song about it called "We do what we're told". There were 37 buttons of "increasing pain" (higher voltage) applied to a test subject. Actually the subjects were actors, simulating greater pain as higher numbers were pushed. The actual subjects were the button-pushers who actually thought they were shocking people. They did as they were told, and applied what they thought were horifically painful shocks to random people they didn't know because they could get away with it.
Actually it's one of my favorite short stories by Alfred Bester. Spoiler: It's his wife that dies.
Well, he submitted it to the Patent review board at this large company, who shall remain nameless, and the people there were so interested they actually submitted it to the Patent office. It was only turned down due to the kiddie Ant farm being too close in form and function, and using it as a picture window wasn't unique enough.
This is absolutely the best thing that could happen - getting more and more ridiculous patents approved. This will prove to people once and for all the USPTO is obviously approving these things in their sleep. Pretty soon the books will be bulging with absurd patents, and someone will call for a review of ALL the patents issued, and whether or not they actually were deserved and worthy of continued enforcement. A buddy of mine that used to work for a very large electronics manufacturer actually submitted a patent for a picture-window Ant Farm as a joke, and was almost awarded it!
That's how it starts. You are asked to give up a "reasonable" right you don't use often. You say, "Oh, that's ok, I can do without that particular right, if its for (insert rallying phrase here)".
Then it happens again. And again we agree and allow our rights to be taken away, slowly, one at a time. Evermore, they keep chiseling away, one little freedom at a time, until... THEY'RE ALL GONE!!
Yeah, but you gotta show the patent office at least one (possibly three?) working examples! Oh, well, back to the old Electronic Brain...
God, I'm so glad at least one person out there in the entire internet seems to have gotten the point. You are correct, sir!
Can be produced my Monkeys on Typewriters, so maybe someone's DNA may prove a new Top-40's hit tune! The DNA song from the Clone Wars - "It's a catchy tune, but I've heard it before!"
Ah, I see. I was referring to the cartoon where a bunch of equations on the left side of the chalkboard and the answer was on the right side and in the middle was a nebulous cloud, labeled, step 2... etc...