Lastly, and possibly related to DDT removal, is a tracheal mite, Acarapis woodi, that kills off entire colonies. I don't think they've found any bees with defenses against the mites, nor against varroa jacobsoni, another deadly mite.
I could have sworn that the africanized honeybees were immune to the mites? I must be wrong...
Ever hear the Joni Mitchell song that goes, "Hey farmer farmer, take away the DDT now. Give me spots on apples, but leave me the birds and the bees, please."
I see the evoloution of blades to the evolution of automobile transmissions - first you had a 3 speed, then 4, 5, 6, and I think there is some car now that has an 8 speed manual. But - continiously variable transmisissions ("analog") are now appearing as well.
While your thoughts on the future of razor blade technology and its direction may certainly be correct, your knowledge on vehicle transmissions certainly isn't.
The purpose of a transmission is to provide optimum torque for the wheels while maintaining efficiency (power and fuel-wise), along the non-linear power curve of a given engine. The best way to do this is, of course, with a CVT. This has been known since the industrial revolution and steam engines, never mind today's automobiles. The main issue holding back CVTs from being deployed widely in automobiles has been one of material science, and not availabilty.
CVTs have been around for a very long time, but due to the fact that the majority of them need to utilize "soft" parts (belts and whatnot) and rely on friction to function properly, these parts tended to fail quickly in daily operation. Manufacturers who tried such transmissions in the past tended to get "bit" by the market deeming their products as "faulty" since wear and tear on the soft parts would cause the need for frequent adjustments and replacements of those parts over the life of the vehicle. It has only been fairly recent that designs for CVTs and the materials used in them have gotten to the point where they are as (or more, in some cases) reliable as an automatic transmission. Honda, I believe, has been on the forefront of such developments.
In the past, and for most current models, though, regular transmissions (both manual and automatic) tend to be the most reliable, as they are composed almost entirely of "hard" components made of metals. Soft components tend to only be certain bushings and seals for oil. However, these soft components do not allow for continuously variable operation so, in order for the power curve for the engine to be matched properly, the more "steps" (quantization?), the smoother the shifting (as well as efficiency). There is an upper limit to how many steps you can have - friction and other losses eventually eat up gains made, but there is also a size factor to be considered (which is why you only see extremely large number of gears in manual transmissions used in freight trucks and buses - there is plenty of space).
Hmm - and now I am thinking of your "infinite" bladed razor - if we submit that such a razor is powered, I wonder how/if something like a spiral or helical blade device (perhaps with a cutter bar/bars - similar to a reel mower) would work? Would it have advantages over the traditional bladed (whether they vibrate linearly or rotate on an axis, the blades are straight, and not curved like I am proposing) power razors available today?
Too bad I don't have the money to pursue patenting this idea...
Why is it such a problem to pay such an amount of money which serves to enhance humanity's knowledge about the universe and its place within it, but not a problem to pay similar (hah!) amounts of money to maim and kill other pockets of humanity on the other side of the globe (or even right next door), which does nothing to improve our lot as a species (indeed - it serves more to cause suffering to the species in the long term)?
Honestly, if we were a rational species, we would first do everything we could to eliminate irrationality in the species, by whatever methods possible (starting with proper, rational education, first and foremost) - so that in the end we could stop paying money perpetuating irrationality in all of its forms (from religion to war, among others), and instead use that money to uplift the species as a whole toward more lofty goals (like, oh, I don't know - maybe preserving the species by seeking better methods to get out of this egg basket and start colonies elsewhere).
One of my favorites was bilingual people who'd had a stroke and lost one language but not the other. Completely mystifying.
Not mystifying at all if you subscribe to the theory that the brain is (mostly) nothing more than a pattern recording and playback system, as posited by more than a few AI researchers, including fairly recently by Jeff Hawkins, in his book "On Intelligence", wherein he describes a method by which we may be able to successfully replicate the cerebrum in hardware/software for a variety of tasks.
If our brain (and by association, our "self") is nothing more than such a mechanism (in the form of a very complex and highly connected neural network), the fact that certain neural pathways and nodes which identify certain patterns for speech can be lost, while others can still work, isn't that much of a mystery - it is just a routing issue. Perhaps the brain, on sensing irritation/inflammation connected with certain types of speech (perhaps everyday speech), routes around those speech patterns as a protection mechanism to allow healing of the vocal tract, when the user won't just shut up and quit irritating them. However, over a protracted length of time not speaking (or speaking "abnormally", such as singing), those pathways/nodal "weights" (however these connections between neurons, axons, and dendrites work - I am speaking of weights in the form of a neural network, which is simply a model, of course) get lowered to the point where the route is completely lost, causing the condition - even though the vocal tract is now healed and could be operated normally. Finding another route (in essense, learning to speak again, like baby's first words) for the neural pathways (or strengthening the old route where possible) seems perfectly possible, and obviously (in the Scott's case) doable.
What I want to know is why (seemingly?) nobody has tried this approach before (hell, I would have thought about it had I known and taken an interest in the problem - I honestly thought it was a physical issue with the vocal cords, not a neurological problem)?
Finally - this is obviously a good reason why you should not continue trying to speak when you have "lost your voice" or are hoarse - you may actually lose your voice, permanently!
If you have listened to her show for any length of time, you also know that she goes in for "treatments" quite regularly - what these "treatments" are, though, I don't know (perhaps they are the botox injections Scott wrote about?)...
A sure recipe for reducing overall voter turnout. Working people with day jobs have trouble taking time off to vote once per year.
People are greedy or lazy, or worse - both.
The truth is, your employer cannot fire you from a job in the US for going to vote on national voting day. To threaten or actually fire an invidual because they performed their duty (yes, DUTY) as a citizen is tantamount to election fraud - no different than threatening or actually firing an individual because they didn't vote the way you wanted them to. Can you say "lawsuit"?
So, where does that leave us?
Basically, an employer can choose to not pay you for the hours you didn't work (if you are an hourly wage earner) - thus we are left with "greed" on the part of a citizen, who believes that their hour of time is worth more than their own voice (however small it is, of course) for government. People who work minimum wage jobs simply believe their voice is worth less than a double quarter-pounder value meal at McDonalds.
If it isn't greed, then it is simply laziness. Polling stations are open for some pretty long hours (12 or more, IIRC) on the weekday that voting is held on. Now, unless you are holding down two separate full-time minimum wage jobs, and they are located next to each other, I guarantee you that you have time somewhere in the day during polling hours to make it to the voting booth and spend 15-20 minutes voting. Now, you may get some pay docked (in which case if the money is more important, you fall into the category of "greed" - see above), but if you show up late and your employer fires (or threatens to fire) you - guess what? You have reason for legal action against your employer - lawyer up and make some bank!
Disregarding the cost issue (and it is something that should be studied, because cost is a big issue), having multiple elections per year sounds like a good solution - maybe it will get people more interested in their government and the process as a whole. Unfortunately, I doubt this is going to happen, as people seem more likely to choose to give up their voice in the process, in exchange for a little silver (and believe me, this doesn't just occur with only hourly minimum wage earners - you see it across all economic strata), or simply for the chance to sleep in an extra hour (or go home earlier).
Thus the sheeple get the government they deserve, and they shouldn't bleat about it when it doesn't suit them. After all, they didn't participate in the process, now did they?
And if you're mentioning the liberal bias, you know what they say: if you're 20 and not liberal you have no heart, and if you're 30 and not conservative you have no brain.
...if you are of any age, and are still applying meaningless labels (because the definitions seem to change yearly) to demean individuals or groups, you're simply pointless...
In fact, I am almost certain that these have been made to work (and/or they sell them to work) with PDAs and cellphones, as well as regular laptops and such. What you are describing is called a "wearable", with some elements of AR (augmented reality). The pioneer in this field is Steve Mann...
Interesting! I didn't know this - thank you for the link. Looks like (in some manner) they are using the eye's own lens to image the retina - that can't be easy (whether doable by DIY or not is unknown)...
Yes - they do have an LCD or OLED display in just about everything today, at cheap prices - but have you looked at the resolution of those things? Let's just say you would be lucky to get a 640x480 VGA display so cheap. If you have ever used a "high-end" HMD from the mid-to-late 1990's, you would know what such resolution looks like when magnified for a large field-of-view (FOV): it brings a whole new meaning to the word "pixelization".
I know - I have used such HMDs in the past, and I currently own others.
To make the image any more sharp, you have to limit your FOV, which throws immersion right out the window. You can either have a large FOV, or better image clarity, but the only way you will have both will be to throw a lot of money at it. At that point, you are paying for high-quality optics and small, lightweight XGA or better LCDs (pretty much the same small LCDs you find in high-end video projectors) - and you will still be either "legally blind" or have severe near-sightedness (if you were to attempt to read a simulated eye chart). I have yet to see an HMD that uses DLP - if there is one, it is likely a small box with a bundle of fiber-optic light-pipes feeding the image to the eyes, because of the need for multiple DLPs or a spinning color wheel.
The resolution of the cheapo LCDs you see are either QVGA or worse for most products. I dare to say that a 640x480 dual-screen HMD could be built and sold to the masses for a price-point under $500.00 - but due to there not being a large enough market and the fact that people would scream at such a low resolution (though for some gaming it might be "ok") - it just isn't worth it to make it. If you want an HMD, your best best is to either buy one secondhand (I have personally bought two different "pro-level" HMDs manufactured in the 1990's off of ebay for under $300.00 each), or build it yourself. People did homebrew their own HMDs back in the day, and you can still do it today.
Just don't expect great performance (and good luck on the 3D tracking part).
VRML, unfortunately, was an idea way ahead of its time (remember, at the time 14.4 kbps modems ruled and 486's with SVGA were the rage). If VRML had come out today, with the broadband we now enjoy coupled with the horsepower of the desktop (both raw CPU, ram, graphics and storage), the experience would be so much different. Couple in VRML's later capabilities of scripting and interaction via Java and other languages - you could likely have WoW in a browser (or an HMD).
VRML's issue was that it came out in an era where common people didn't have access to the CPU horsepower and bandwidth needed to render it effectively (this can even be seen with the VRML designers of the day - many of them had access to and developed with SGI workstations, and enjoyed bandwidth only available at the time to universities and other large institutions to transfer the data around - believe me, on this kind of setup, which we have available today, VRML is compelling).
I would be willing to bet that if somebody rolled their own VRML browser, with full VRML 2.0 (or whatever the last spec was) capabilities, added some AJAX Web 2.0 components in, then created a central server ala MySpace - where people could share 3D models, avatars, etc while building a community, it would likely take off. Linden Labs (Second Reality), to a point, has done just this, with the exception that they aren't using VRML, so no one can easily build their own clients and such. But that doesn't mean somebody couldn't come along tommorow and upstage them. Make the whole thing P2P (with no central server), and things might get really interesting.
One other thing - if anybody out there does this - please don't make the same mistake Linden Labs has made! Please provide an easy to use interface that allows full screen rendering, and provide a system to allow interfacing to the controls of the avatar via USB or some other way. I would so much love Second Reality more if I knew I could interface my HMD, 3D Tracker, and other equipment to the browser they provide - so I didn't have to use the keyboard/mouse/joystick, and everything was truely immersive (the granularity of the provided controls isn't enough to interface with currently without causing simulator sickness from twitchy motion).
You must be highly susceptible to simulator sickness. Most people have some experiences of it, though fewer have it using a monitor for 3D viewing than others. To combat it, there are a few things to try (they may or may not work for you) - mainly, have good lighting and sit back far enough to see the area around the monitor (basically, you are trying to minimize immersion here, instead of maximise it as most people do). As you play, move as you would (or could) for the motion being simulated on screen.
What you are running into with simulator sickness is mainly your eyes seeing one thing, and your ears telling your brain differently (balance). If you are as susceptible as you claim, you probably have a difficult time watching first-persone views of car chases, roller coaster riding, airplane stunts, etc. You probably don't have a problem with everyday walking around and tasks (and if you do, see a doctor immediately!). This is because in day-to-day life, all your senses are working together and telling your brain the same thing, and nausea/simulator-sickness doesn't kick in. There is also the effects of small field-of-views, frame-rate, sensor lag, and such - but this is only usually an issue in motion platform systems and/or full immersion systems (ie, cockpit flight trainers, full-immersion HMD systems, etc).
As I noted before, all people experience this to some extent or another (sit blindfolded in a slowly spinning chair nodding your head around, and you most likely will spew). The best way (and most expensive) to combat it is to provide accurately timed (near-zero lag) sensory responses just like you would have in the real world to the external simulated view on the monitor or in the HMD/simulator. This is very tough to do, and if the timing is off, it just makes the situation worse. Various companies have even tried vestibular stimulation as a means to combat this (and/or heighten the experience) - one company in the late 1990's even came out with a prototype and API dev kit for Windows using this system - not that it went anywhere.
If you have never experienced true immersive VR, with a quality HMD and 3D hand tracking, you just can't understand it. In a true immersive environment, you have to have visual body cues (what you called "avatar hands") to orient yourself, because your HMD blocks out all other visual cues. Being a "floating head" in 3D space is very disorienting, which is why most VR simulations at minimum ground you vertically with simulated "gravity", so at least you have that frame of reference.
Within a desktop 3D view (ala "Desktop VR"), such representations don't make much sense. But in a situation where you have (near) perfect immersion, it can sometimes mean the difference between getting work done and falling down (literally). Unfortunately, HMDs which offer this experience are few and far between, and cost many $$$ (second mortgage kind of money). Ideally, you want (at miniumum) QSXGA resolution (2560 x 2048) and 60-70 degrees horizontal/45-50 degrees vertical field-of-view coverage - so that the FOV extends outside your peripheral vision area, and still maintains a pixel-per-degree ratio that doesn't put you in the "legally blind" category (although, even at QSXGA resolutions, you are still likely nearsighted). BTW, as far as I know, no one manufactures such an HMD.
Honestly, for real work, I can see augmented reality (using a see-through HMD) as being much more functional for the day-to-day working world, and it also wouldn't hinder the use of a real keyboard/monitor combination for regular 2D work. The ability to have virtual representations of data in 3D floating around you in your workspace, while simultaneously using a regular keyboard and monitor, seems like it would have some practical uses in the real-world.
One big thing holding back 3D input devices (besides lack of need) is patents. During the early 1990's, before the takeoff of the commercial internet, but after the concept of VR hit the masses, everyone and their brother were building 3D input devices, and patenting the hell out of them. Just look into the VPL DataGlove patent mess for one extreme example. Most likely, we probably won't get any real 3D input (or output) devices for the masses until sometime between 2010-2020, when the patents of the past start to run out.
You are only "dumb" if you voted for them because they were "most popular" or "most likely to win" - if you voted your conscience each and every time, then you did your job as a voter properly.
Furthermore, I don't think voting for Clinton was necessarily a "dumb" thing - we have had (and currently do, IMHO) far worse examples of men "leading" the country. Say what you will about Clinton, but his actions felt like they have far less impact on my day-to-day life than the current shmuck (although I think he was wrong on "don't ask, don't tell" and the passage of the DMCA). One could argue that "he balanced the budget and left a surplus", but a lot of this also happenned in the second term, with a Republican -controlled Congress (so, maybe we can also argue that the Republican-controlled Congress had an idea what was going to happen in the near future, and they "balanced" the budget and built a "surplus" to "pay" for the future - our present - "war").
Myself - I voted third-party in the last two presidential elections (though I would've voted for Dean had he not been shafted by the media circus). Not because I thought either had a chance in hell of becoming president, but because I felt that each represented my viewpoints and ideas of how the country should be run. Whether they lost or won, I knew I had made the right choice, and could stand by it regardless. I typically do the same thing for state representatives and other local government, unless the choice, for lack of a better word, "sucks" - then I just vote for the guy who isn't in office (unless he is such a dimwit or extremist I can't even stomach it), just to maybe stir things up. Otherwise, it is a write-in (depending on how I feel, it is myself, something stupid, or the original guy, even if he isn't running!).
On a final note, this year I plan to vote "no" to every proposition on the ballot. A proposition is nothing more than a new law or a change to an existing law. The way I figure it, they want to muck with everything each and every year, I think "we the people" need to stop giving them the chance! If "we-the-people" can't figure out how to operate within the convoluted mess of legal code we already have, then tough darts! We need to work with the system we have for a while, and honestly study the process and where it fails and why (I swear, if there is one institution that could go for some hard-core top-to-bottom process-mapping ala "six sigma and similar approaches", it is our government).
Whether this is true or not, what I wonder if people here realize just how long IBM has been around - in one form or another, IBM has been around since (roughly) 1890.
That was the year the US Government needed a faster, better, more accurate method to tally the census figures for the nation. By constitutional mandate, it was decreed that the census needed to be counted every 10 years. The census prior to the 1890 census had just been totalled by the time 1890 rolled around (it took 7 years to total the 1880 census) - it was feared that the new census would not be totalled before the next one was due, putting everything further behind. A new system was needed.
After various trials and tests, Herman Hollerith's electro-mechanical tabulation system, utilizing punch cards, won the day, processing the census in 2.5 years. His company and machines went on to perform many other functions with businesses (most notably with railroads and some department stores), governments, and other institutions which needed such processing.
Hollerith's company, the Tabulating Machine Company, later merged with others and was named the Computing Tabulating Recording (CTR) Corporation. Later, under the direction of Thomas J. Watson, the company was renamed "IBM".
Is it really any wonder about their patent portfolio regarding information technology?
Seriously, you might want to do a bit of research before posting, it might answer your questions! I will admit, it does seem like he is all over the place, but given his job, one would expect him to be...
I would start out with a cheap USB web camera. First, I would hack it in some manner to allow it to macro-focus. I would go down to goodwill or a pawn shop and pick up the cheapest, most busted VHS video camera being sold. From this I should be able to get much of the optical components and the needed eyecup.
I would attempt to obtain a fake eyeball of some sort. While it wouldn't work perfectly, it would give me some sort of method by which to focus with. Mounted with some tape to the eyecup, and then positioned in front of the webcam, I would be able to determine the focus fairly quickly.
I would then set up some kind of "ring illumination", wherein I would create a "ring" of LEDs - red/green/blue/IR - through which the webcam would peer. Focussing again might have to be adjusted. This ring would be set up in such a fashion so that I could trigger which set(s) of LED's would be active at once - likely via USB control, too.
Once I had that set up, and focussing correct, I would then work on the software. For this DIY project, I would simply set things up to take multiple image captures of my own eye, process the images through some filters to reduce the information to just my iris (cue on the white of eyeball, and black of the pupil), then (in some manner), use these images to create an "eigeniris" image, some kind of "average" of all the images I took (over several days or months, in different levels/conditions, so as to have the best average available). Then, the software could take an image, compare it to the "eigeniris", determine if it falls within range, and use that to trigger or deny access (to whatever).
That would be the route I would take if I was doing this. Overall, the hardware portion seems the simplest to implement - the software is where you will bog down. Just like any other pattern recognition project, I would imagine...
I was under the impression that retinal scans were less acceptable because they were more invasive. From what I understand, in order for the system to get an accurate scan, it has to keep your eyeball immobile. To do that, a vacuum ring is used, the scan occurs, then the vacuum is released. In other words, the machine requires you to open your eye really wide, then it touches and holds onto your eyeball for a brief moment while it scans the retina. Between this discomfort, and the chance for infectious eye problems being passed between users, retinal scanning has been "back-burnered". Retinal scans are thus only used where the required security needs outweighs the comfort (during or after scanning) of the user.
I want to note that if you do this, make sure to use little of the shred material at one shot, or have a screened chimney cap in place on your chimney. The reason for this is because you can get a very hot and quick roaring fire going with shredded paper, and if your draft is good, a lot of smoke, sparks and burning paper might leave your chimney still burning (or smoldering, at minimum). Still, shredded paper is a great firestarter.
Also, if you have the time and don't mind a little mess, take the shreds, put them in a metal pail and mix with some kerosene, until you have a "mush". Pour the mush into a metal form (like a pipe with a cap), and have a tamper to squeeze out the excess kerosene. Place the resulting "brick" or "log" on a metal rack (with a drip tray underneath) to "dry". Once dry, wrap in a bit of newspaper (if you will use fairly immediately) or in wax paper (if you plan to use it after a period of time). You will be left with a nice, hot burning "log" of paper, not too much unlike the "logs" you can buy at the store. Store outside on a metal rack, uncovered (but not directly exposed to the elements).
I disagree with the article in one area. I don't think it would take tens of thousands of years. I think it would happen MUCH faster then that.
I fully agree with you here - all one has to do to "prove" this is to visit some of the "urban exploration" and "urban ruin" photography sites that exist on the 'net. Plenty of photos to prove that once man "leaves", nature quickly takes over (some of the pics I have seen are beautiful in a stark and disturbing way)...
Is it me, or is that a really dumb design? Half the disc is missing, the other half has wires and electronics, things need to be balanced just right...anybody remember those odd-shaped audio CDs you would sometimes find? Anybody remember how they would sometimes damage your player's drive from excess vibration, or sometimes they would break/splinter while they were played (generally only in a high-speed player - not at standard redbook 1x speed, though vibration could still be an issue).
So - why did they make this device like this? I would have designed it to be all optical - imagine an optical waveguide molded or embedded in some way into the surface of the disk. One end would terminate in a custom device (not even sure if it could be built - but I bet it could) - some tiny SMT-like LED/photovoltaic device - thus that it could communicate with light, but also recieve light pulses for power and communication. I already know that an LED, with a high enough reverse-bias on it, can act similar to a phototransistor - so it is only a step away from making a combo device that can turn the light into electricity to briefly power the chip, much like passive RFIDs. The waveguide for the light acts as the physical communication channel while also providing power. Probably need a small capacitor to hold the charge briefly as well. Put the communication end of the waveguide on the same area as a "non-standard" track, and have the laser/optical assembly of the drive (with extra firmware and processing on the drive, of course) communicate with the chip.
Heck, aside from the funky LED/photovoltaic device, the rest is mostly off-the-shelf - just the drive firmware (or a new drive design) would have to be developed. The system I have just described would work the same as the system described in the article, you wouldn't lose disc space due to chunks cut off, it would be less likely to shatter at higher rotational speeds, and the reader and the drive become one.
Yes - I realize I just described a way the "man" (*IAA) could use this - but I am not anyone special - if I can think of this, I am sure somebody else already has. Furthermore, if not, I could now use this post (right) to block any possible patenting attempts on such a device, since it represents "prior art"...
Why is it annoying? Aside from the fact that you have to update a hosts file (ugh), you should just have a cron job (or equiv) on each of those computers to pull down the new hosts file and install it, at some "low usage" time (depending on where the computers are located geographically/timezone-wise). An even better solution would be: if those machine are individual workstations, set up a "host file server" at each group of computers location - and have them pull from their local "cache" copy on that server. Then, each of the servers grabs from the central hosts file publishing server at low usage times (of course, it is likely that those 100+ machines are the servers for 100+ locations, in which case the first solution is more appropriate). Another possibility would be similar, but instead it would be distributed: first, set up a periodic cron task (say every 12 hours) to keep the time on each server equal to the time on one of a randomly picked server in a pool within each time zone (if they are distributed across time zones - if not, it becomes simple). Have a seperate cron job that runs every hour or so and randomly picks on servers in its own time zone to check and see if the time and checksum on that servers hosts file is the same as the calling server's host file. If the time/checksum is different, have it grab the hosts file from there. If a server has to ask another server outside of the time zone (maybe one can be dedicated to do this?), then hours would have to be added/subtracted depending on what timezone it is in - but overall, you should be able to set things up so it can compare the times, and make sure that the times (+/- for timezones) match. Then, you just publish on your one machine, and all of the other machines (over a few hours) automagically via a distributed system, update their hosts files, because it changed on one machine and the neighbors noticed - let's call this the "keeping up with the Jones'" method of distributed file propagation...
I don't know how old you are, but once upon a time, one of the main ways a dedicated computer hobbyiest learned to program was by typing in code into the machine from a magazine - or by getting a floppy/tape of the code and loading it. At all steps (with the exception of some ML programs), you had the code, you could learn from it. In the business world it was similar: a lot of code was "passed around" (some legal, some not) on tapes (magnetic and paper), floppies, printouts and trade journals, for users to use and learn from.
Now, more often than not, this code was only "open source" in the fact that anyone could read and type it in. It was shareable. It wasn't, however, something you could typically make money off of, because if it wasn't copyrighted by the author, it was by the publisher (the magazine or book publisher). Still, it formed a corpus of knowledge that many other people could draw upon to help their business grow, or to learn to write their own (and then contribute it back, sometimes).
I look at open source as the evolution of this - a vast repository of code to help others, whether it is professionally, recreationally, or just to learn from. We don't have magazines anymore (Is Dr. Dobbs Journal still around?) to educate the next generation of programmers who may or may not be in school for the purpose, so the modern concept of Open Source fills that niche. I look upon writing open source as giving of myself to the next generation of software developers, for whatever my code is worth to them to learn from, just as I benefitted from the "open source" code in magazines of the past, which was a stepping stone on the way to where I am today. My open source is a method of "paying it forward", which while it doesn't help me directly, may in fact help someone I don't know - someone who may not even be born yet.
I can't say "thank you" to the past, so I might as well say it to the future...
Then it should be at least made available in some mpeg format - yes, these are patent protected as well (although IIRC, mpeg-1 isn't anymore?), but I think what the original poster cares about is portability and viewing on a wide range of platforms, and not just Windows (this would mean DVD-R and CD-R burns as well on DVD players, for instance). On this front, mpeg is the obvious choice. Unfortunately, you can't easily apply DRM or other "rights manglement" to it - but for something from an NGO wanting to distribute information far and wide, wouldn't you want it to go to the widest audience possible?
In the end, it doesn't matter - they will likely go with quicktime or real video (and we can pray that we can read them using mplayer and the "illicit" codec DLLs package)...
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I could have sworn that the africanized honeybees were immune to the mites? I must be wrong...
Ever hear the Joni Mitchell song that goes, "Hey farmer farmer, take away the DDT now. Give me spots on apples, but leave me the birds and the bees, please."
BTW - the song is called Big Yellow Taxi...
While your thoughts on the future of razor blade technology and its direction may certainly be correct, your knowledge on vehicle transmissions certainly isn't.
The purpose of a transmission is to provide optimum torque for the wheels while maintaining efficiency (power and fuel-wise), along the non-linear power curve of a given engine. The best way to do this is, of course, with a CVT. This has been known since the industrial revolution and steam engines, never mind today's automobiles. The main issue holding back CVTs from being deployed widely in automobiles has been one of material science, and not availabilty.
CVTs have been around for a very long time, but due to the fact that the majority of them need to utilize "soft" parts (belts and whatnot) and rely on friction to function properly, these parts tended to fail quickly in daily operation. Manufacturers who tried such transmissions in the past tended to get "bit" by the market deeming their products as "faulty" since wear and tear on the soft parts would cause the need for frequent adjustments and replacements of those parts over the life of the vehicle. It has only been fairly recent that designs for CVTs and the materials used in them have gotten to the point where they are as (or more, in some cases) reliable as an automatic transmission. Honda, I believe, has been on the forefront of such developments.
In the past, and for most current models, though, regular transmissions (both manual and automatic) tend to be the most reliable, as they are composed almost entirely of "hard" components made of metals. Soft components tend to only be certain bushings and seals for oil. However, these soft components do not allow for continuously variable operation so, in order for the power curve for the engine to be matched properly, the more "steps" (quantization?), the smoother the shifting (as well as efficiency). There is an upper limit to how many steps you can have - friction and other losses eventually eat up gains made, but there is also a size factor to be considered (which is why you only see extremely large number of gears in manual transmissions used in freight trucks and buses - there is plenty of space).
Hmm - and now I am thinking of your "infinite" bladed razor - if we submit that such a razor is powered, I wonder how/if something like a spiral or helical blade device (perhaps with a cutter bar/bars - similar to a reel mower) would work? Would it have advantages over the traditional bladed (whether they vibrate linearly or rotate on an axis, the blades are straight, and not curved like I am proposing) power razors available today?
Too bad I don't have the money to pursue patenting this idea...
Honestly, if we were a rational species, we would first do everything we could to eliminate irrationality in the species, by whatever methods possible (starting with proper, rational education, first and foremost) - so that in the end we could stop paying money perpetuating irrationality in all of its forms (from religion to war, among others), and instead use that money to uplift the species as a whole toward more lofty goals (like, oh, I don't know - maybe preserving the species by seeking better methods to get out of this egg basket and start colonies elsewhere).
Not mystifying at all if you subscribe to the theory that the brain is (mostly) nothing more than a pattern recording and playback system, as posited by more than a few AI researchers, including fairly recently by Jeff Hawkins, in his book "On Intelligence", wherein he describes a method by which we may be able to successfully replicate the cerebrum in hardware/software for a variety of tasks.
If our brain (and by association, our "self") is nothing more than such a mechanism (in the form of a very complex and highly connected neural network), the fact that certain neural pathways and nodes which identify certain patterns for speech can be lost, while others can still work, isn't that much of a mystery - it is just a routing issue. Perhaps the brain, on sensing irritation/inflammation connected with certain types of speech (perhaps everyday speech), routes around those speech patterns as a protection mechanism to allow healing of the vocal tract, when the user won't just shut up and quit irritating them. However, over a protracted length of time not speaking (or speaking "abnormally", such as singing), those pathways/nodal "weights" (however these connections between neurons, axons, and dendrites work - I am speaking of weights in the form of a neural network, which is simply a model, of course) get lowered to the point where the route is completely lost, causing the condition - even though the vocal tract is now healed and could be operated normally. Finding another route (in essense, learning to speak again, like baby's first words) for the neural pathways (or strengthening the old route where possible) seems perfectly possible, and obviously (in the Scott's case) doable.
What I want to know is why (seemingly?) nobody has tried this approach before (hell, I would have thought about it had I known and taken an interest in the problem - I honestly thought it was a physical issue with the vocal cords, not a neurological problem)?
Finally - this is obviously a good reason why you should not continue trying to speak when you have "lost your voice" or are hoarse - you may actually lose your voice, permanently!
If you have listened to her show for any length of time, you also know that she goes in for "treatments" quite regularly - what these "treatments" are, though, I don't know (perhaps they are the botox injections Scott wrote about?)...
People are greedy or lazy, or worse - both.
The truth is, your employer cannot fire you from a job in the US for going to vote on national voting day. To threaten or actually fire an invidual because they performed their duty (yes, DUTY) as a citizen is tantamount to election fraud - no different than threatening or actually firing an individual because they didn't vote the way you wanted them to. Can you say "lawsuit"?
So, where does that leave us?
Basically, an employer can choose to not pay you for the hours you didn't work (if you are an hourly wage earner) - thus we are left with "greed" on the part of a citizen, who believes that their hour of time is worth more than their own voice (however small it is, of course) for government. People who work minimum wage jobs simply believe their voice is worth less than a double quarter-pounder value meal at McDonalds.
If it isn't greed, then it is simply laziness. Polling stations are open for some pretty long hours (12 or more, IIRC) on the weekday that voting is held on. Now, unless you are holding down two separate full-time minimum wage jobs, and they are located next to each other, I guarantee you that you have time somewhere in the day during polling hours to make it to the voting booth and spend 15-20 minutes voting. Now, you may get some pay docked (in which case if the money is more important, you fall into the category of "greed" - see above), but if you show up late and your employer fires (or threatens to fire) you - guess what? You have reason for legal action against your employer - lawyer up and make some bank!
Disregarding the cost issue (and it is something that should be studied, because cost is a big issue), having multiple elections per year sounds like a good solution - maybe it will get people more interested in their government and the process as a whole. Unfortunately, I doubt this is going to happen, as people seem more likely to choose to give up their voice in the process, in exchange for a little silver (and believe me, this doesn't just occur with only hourly minimum wage earners - you see it across all economic strata), or simply for the chance to sleep in an extra hour (or go home earlier).
Thus the sheeple get the government they deserve, and they shouldn't bleat about it when it doesn't suit them. After all, they didn't participate in the process, now did they?
Liteye Systems, Inc.
MicroOptical Corp
In fact, I am almost certain that these have been made to work (and/or they sell them to work) with PDAs and cellphones, as well as regular laptops and such. What you are describing is called a "wearable", with some elements of AR (augmented reality). The pioneer in this field is Steve Mann...
Interesting! I didn't know this - thank you for the link. Looks like (in some manner) they are using the eye's own lens to image the retina - that can't be easy (whether doable by DIY or not is unknown)...
I know - I have used such HMDs in the past, and I currently own others.
To make the image any more sharp, you have to limit your FOV, which throws immersion right out the window. You can either have a large FOV, or better image clarity, but the only way you will have both will be to throw a lot of money at it. At that point, you are paying for high-quality optics and small, lightweight XGA or better LCDs (pretty much the same small LCDs you find in high-end video projectors) - and you will still be either "legally blind" or have severe near-sightedness (if you were to attempt to read a simulated eye chart). I have yet to see an HMD that uses DLP - if there is one, it is likely a small box with a bundle of fiber-optic light-pipes feeding the image to the eyes, because of the need for multiple DLPs or a spinning color wheel.
The resolution of the cheapo LCDs you see are either QVGA or worse for most products. I dare to say that a 640x480 dual-screen HMD could be built and sold to the masses for a price-point under $500.00 - but due to there not being a large enough market and the fact that people would scream at such a low resolution (though for some gaming it might be "ok") - it just isn't worth it to make it. If you want an HMD, your best best is to either buy one secondhand (I have personally bought two different "pro-level" HMDs manufactured in the 1990's off of ebay for under $300.00 each), or build it yourself. People did homebrew their own HMDs back in the day, and you can still do it today.
Just don't expect great performance (and good luck on the 3D tracking part).
VRML's issue was that it came out in an era where common people didn't have access to the CPU horsepower and bandwidth needed to render it effectively (this can even be seen with the VRML designers of the day - many of them had access to and developed with SGI workstations, and enjoyed bandwidth only available at the time to universities and other large institutions to transfer the data around - believe me, on this kind of setup, which we have available today, VRML is compelling).
I would be willing to bet that if somebody rolled their own VRML browser, with full VRML 2.0 (or whatever the last spec was) capabilities, added some AJAX Web 2.0 components in, then created a central server ala MySpace - where people could share 3D models, avatars, etc while building a community, it would likely take off. Linden Labs (Second Reality), to a point, has done just this, with the exception that they aren't using VRML, so no one can easily build their own clients and such. But that doesn't mean somebody couldn't come along tommorow and upstage them. Make the whole thing P2P (with no central server), and things might get really interesting.
One other thing - if anybody out there does this - please don't make the same mistake Linden Labs has made! Please provide an easy to use interface that allows full screen rendering, and provide a system to allow interfacing to the controls of the avatar via USB or some other way. I would so much love Second Reality more if I knew I could interface my HMD, 3D Tracker, and other equipment to the browser they provide - so I didn't have to use the keyboard/mouse/joystick, and everything was truely immersive (the granularity of the provided controls isn't enough to interface with currently without causing simulator sickness from twitchy motion).
What you are running into with simulator sickness is mainly your eyes seeing one thing, and your ears telling your brain differently (balance). If you are as susceptible as you claim, you probably have a difficult time watching first-persone views of car chases, roller coaster riding, airplane stunts, etc. You probably don't have a problem with everyday walking around and tasks (and if you do, see a doctor immediately!). This is because in day-to-day life, all your senses are working together and telling your brain the same thing, and nausea/simulator-sickness doesn't kick in. There is also the effects of small field-of-views, frame-rate, sensor lag, and such - but this is only usually an issue in motion platform systems and/or full immersion systems (ie, cockpit flight trainers, full-immersion HMD systems, etc).
As I noted before, all people experience this to some extent or another (sit blindfolded in a slowly spinning chair nodding your head around, and you most likely will spew). The best way (and most expensive) to combat it is to provide accurately timed (near-zero lag) sensory responses just like you would have in the real world to the external simulated view on the monitor or in the HMD/simulator. This is very tough to do, and if the timing is off, it just makes the situation worse. Various companies have even tried vestibular stimulation as a means to combat this (and/or heighten the experience) - one company in the late 1990's even came out with a prototype and API dev kit for Windows using this system - not that it went anywhere.
Within a desktop 3D view (ala "Desktop VR"), such representations don't make much sense. But in a situation where you have (near) perfect immersion, it can sometimes mean the difference between getting work done and falling down (literally). Unfortunately, HMDs which offer this experience are few and far between, and cost many $$$ (second mortgage kind of money). Ideally, you want (at miniumum) QSXGA resolution (2560 x 2048) and 60-70 degrees horizontal/45-50 degrees vertical field-of-view coverage - so that the FOV extends outside your peripheral vision area, and still maintains a pixel-per-degree ratio that doesn't put you in the "legally blind" category (although, even at QSXGA resolutions, you are still likely nearsighted). BTW, as far as I know, no one manufactures such an HMD.
Honestly, for real work, I can see augmented reality (using a see-through HMD) as being much more functional for the day-to-day working world, and it also wouldn't hinder the use of a real keyboard/monitor combination for regular 2D work. The ability to have virtual representations of data in 3D floating around you in your workspace, while simultaneously using a regular keyboard and monitor, seems like it would have some practical uses in the real-world.
One big thing holding back 3D input devices (besides lack of need) is patents. During the early 1990's, before the takeoff of the commercial internet, but after the concept of VR hit the masses, everyone and their brother were building 3D input devices, and patenting the hell out of them. Just look into the VPL DataGlove patent mess for one extreme example. Most likely, we probably won't get any real 3D input (or output) devices for the masses until sometime between 2010-2020, when the patents of the past start to run out.
Furthermore, I don't think voting for Clinton was necessarily a "dumb" thing - we have had (and currently do, IMHO) far worse examples of men "leading" the country. Say what you will about Clinton, but his actions felt like they have far less impact on my day-to-day life than the current shmuck (although I think he was wrong on "don't ask, don't tell" and the passage of the DMCA). One could argue that "he balanced the budget and left a surplus", but a lot of this also happenned in the second term, with a Republican -controlled Congress (so, maybe we can also argue that the Republican-controlled Congress had an idea what was going to happen in the near future, and they "balanced" the budget and built a "surplus" to "pay" for the future - our present - "war").
Myself - I voted third-party in the last two presidential elections (though I would've voted for Dean had he not been shafted by the media circus). Not because I thought either had a chance in hell of becoming president, but because I felt that each represented my viewpoints and ideas of how the country should be run. Whether they lost or won, I knew I had made the right choice, and could stand by it regardless. I typically do the same thing for state representatives and other local government, unless the choice, for lack of a better word, "sucks" - then I just vote for the guy who isn't in office (unless he is such a dimwit or extremist I can't even stomach it), just to maybe stir things up. Otherwise, it is a write-in (depending on how I feel, it is myself, something stupid, or the original guy, even if he isn't running!).
On a final note, this year I plan to vote "no" to every proposition on the ballot. A proposition is nothing more than a new law or a change to an existing law. The way I figure it, they want to muck with everything each and every year, I think "we the people" need to stop giving them the chance! If "we-the-people" can't figure out how to operate within the convoluted mess of legal code we already have, then tough darts! We need to work with the system we have for a while, and honestly study the process and where it fails and why (I swear, if there is one institution that could go for some hard-core top-to-bottom process-mapping ala "six sigma and similar approaches", it is our government).
That was the year the US Government needed a faster, better, more accurate method to tally the census figures for the nation. By constitutional mandate, it was decreed that the census needed to be counted every 10 years. The census prior to the 1890 census had just been totalled by the time 1890 rolled around (it took 7 years to total the 1880 census) - it was feared that the new census would not be totalled before the next one was due, putting everything further behind. A new system was needed.
After various trials and tests, Herman Hollerith's electro-mechanical tabulation system, utilizing punch cards, won the day, processing the census in 2.5 years. His company and machines went on to perform many other functions with businesses (most notably with railroads and some department stores), governments, and other institutions which needed such processing.
Hollerith's company, the Tabulating Machine Company, later merged with others and was named the Computing Tabulating Recording (CTR) Corporation. Later, under the direction of Thomas J. Watson, the company was renamed "IBM".
Is it really any wonder about their patent portfolio regarding information technology?
Seriously, you might want to do a bit of research before posting, it might answer your questions! I will admit, it does seem like he is all over the place, but given his job, one would expect him to be...
I would attempt to obtain a fake eyeball of some sort. While it wouldn't work perfectly, it would give me some sort of method by which to focus with. Mounted with some tape to the eyecup, and then positioned in front of the webcam, I would be able to determine the focus fairly quickly.
I would then set up some kind of "ring illumination", wherein I would create a "ring" of LEDs - red/green/blue/IR - through which the webcam would peer. Focussing again might have to be adjusted. This ring would be set up in such a fashion so that I could trigger which set(s) of LED's would be active at once - likely via USB control, too.
Once I had that set up, and focussing correct, I would then work on the software. For this DIY project, I would simply set things up to take multiple image captures of my own eye, process the images through some filters to reduce the information to just my iris (cue on the white of eyeball, and black of the pupil), then (in some manner), use these images to create an "eigeniris" image, some kind of "average" of all the images I took (over several days or months, in different levels/conditions, so as to have the best average available). Then, the software could take an image, compare it to the "eigeniris", determine if it falls within range, and use that to trigger or deny access (to whatever).
That would be the route I would take if I was doing this. Overall, the hardware portion seems the simplest to implement - the software is where you will bog down. Just like any other pattern recognition project, I would imagine...
I was under the impression that retinal scans were less acceptable because they were more invasive. From what I understand, in order for the system to get an accurate scan, it has to keep your eyeball immobile. To do that, a vacuum ring is used, the scan occurs, then the vacuum is released. In other words, the machine requires you to open your eye really wide, then it touches and holds onto your eyeball for a brief moment while it scans the retina. Between this discomfort, and the chance for infectious eye problems being passed between users, retinal scanning has been "back-burnered". Retinal scans are thus only used where the required security needs outweighs the comfort (during or after scanning) of the user.
Also, if you have the time and don't mind a little mess, take the shreds, put them in a metal pail and mix with some kerosene, until you have a "mush". Pour the mush into a metal form (like a pipe with a cap), and have a tamper to squeeze out the excess kerosene. Place the resulting "brick" or "log" on a metal rack (with a drip tray underneath) to "dry". Once dry, wrap in a bit of newspaper (if you will use fairly immediately) or in wax paper (if you plan to use it after a period of time). You will be left with a nice, hot burning "log" of paper, not too much unlike the "logs" you can buy at the store. Store outside on a metal rack, uncovered (but not directly exposed to the elements).
I fully agree with you here - all one has to do to "prove" this is to visit some of the "urban exploration" and "urban ruin" photography sites that exist on the 'net. Plenty of photos to prove that once man "leaves", nature quickly takes over (some of the pics I have seen are beautiful in a stark and disturbing way)...
So - why did they make this device like this? I would have designed it to be all optical - imagine an optical waveguide molded or embedded in some way into the surface of the disk. One end would terminate in a custom device (not even sure if it could be built - but I bet it could) - some tiny SMT-like LED/photovoltaic device - thus that it could communicate with light, but also recieve light pulses for power and communication. I already know that an LED, with a high enough reverse-bias on it, can act similar to a phototransistor - so it is only a step away from making a combo device that can turn the light into electricity to briefly power the chip, much like passive RFIDs. The waveguide for the light acts as the physical communication channel while also providing power. Probably need a small capacitor to hold the charge briefly as well. Put the communication end of the waveguide on the same area as a "non-standard" track, and have the laser/optical assembly of the drive (with extra firmware and processing on the drive, of course) communicate with the chip.
Heck, aside from the funky LED/photovoltaic device, the rest is mostly off-the-shelf - just the drive firmware (or a new drive design) would have to be developed. The system I have just described would work the same as the system described in the article, you wouldn't lose disc space due to chunks cut off, it would be less likely to shatter at higher rotational speeds, and the reader and the drive become one.
Yes - I realize I just described a way the "man" (*IAA) could use this - but I am not anyone special - if I can think of this, I am sure somebody else already has. Furthermore, if not, I could now use this post (right) to block any possible patenting attempts on such a device, since it represents "prior art"...
Why is it annoying? Aside from the fact that you have to update a hosts file (ugh), you should just have a cron job (or equiv) on each of those computers to pull down the new hosts file and install it, at some "low usage" time (depending on where the computers are located geographically/timezone-wise). An even better solution would be: if those machine are individual workstations, set up a "host file server" at each group of computers location - and have them pull from their local "cache" copy on that server. Then, each of the servers grabs from the central hosts file publishing server at low usage times (of course, it is likely that those 100+ machines are the servers for 100+ locations, in which case the first solution is more appropriate). Another possibility would be similar, but instead it would be distributed: first, set up a periodic cron task (say every 12 hours) to keep the time on each server equal to the time on one of a randomly picked server in a pool within each time zone (if they are distributed across time zones - if not, it becomes simple). Have a seperate cron job that runs every hour or so and randomly picks on servers in its own time zone to check and see if the time and checksum on that servers hosts file is the same as the calling server's host file. If the time/checksum is different, have it grab the hosts file from there. If a server has to ask another server outside of the time zone (maybe one can be dedicated to do this?), then hours would have to be added/subtracted depending on what timezone it is in - but overall, you should be able to set things up so it can compare the times, and make sure that the times (+/- for timezones) match. Then, you just publish on your one machine, and all of the other machines (over a few hours) automagically via a distributed system, update their hosts files, because it changed on one machine and the neighbors noticed - let's call this the "keeping up with the Jones'" method of distributed file propagation...
Now, more often than not, this code was only "open source" in the fact that anyone could read and type it in. It was shareable. It wasn't, however, something you could typically make money off of, because if it wasn't copyrighted by the author, it was by the publisher (the magazine or book publisher). Still, it formed a corpus of knowledge that many other people could draw upon to help their business grow, or to learn to write their own (and then contribute it back, sometimes).
I look at open source as the evolution of this - a vast repository of code to help others, whether it is professionally, recreationally, or just to learn from. We don't have magazines anymore (Is Dr. Dobbs Journal still around?) to educate the next generation of programmers who may or may not be in school for the purpose, so the modern concept of Open Source fills that niche. I look upon writing open source as giving of myself to the next generation of software developers, for whatever my code is worth to them to learn from, just as I benefitted from the "open source" code in magazines of the past, which was a stepping stone on the way to where I am today. My open source is a method of "paying it forward", which while it doesn't help me directly, may in fact help someone I don't know - someone who may not even be born yet.
I can't say "thank you" to the past, so I might as well say it to the future...
In the end, it doesn't matter - they will likely go with quicktime or real video (and we can pray that we can read them using mplayer and the "illicit" codec DLLs package)...