I found this paragraph from the conclusion really interesting:
"Newell even talked about a trend he sees happening in the future that he calls the "Post-GPU Era." He predicts that as more and more cores appear on single chip dies, companies like Intel and AMD will add more CPU instructions that perform tasks normally handled by the GPU. This could lead to a point where coders and gamers no longer have to worry if a certain game is "CPU-bound" or "GPU-bound," only that the more cores they have available the better the game will perform. Newell says that if it does, his company is in an even better position to take advantage of it."
This is almost certainly why AMD has bought out ATI - they see that the future is about integrating everything on the motherboard into one IC, and AMD wants the CPU to be that point of integration. For more, see:
Why not think about the problem from a higher level? The reason you need backup is because the grid isn't completely reliable. Why not remove your dependence on the grid instead of trying to paper over it's failures?
Install a gigantic solar system / battery storage. Or, a natural gas power plant under your control. Or even wind power. Here in California I bet you could even save money in the long run...
Eric
People have been speculating about the licensing of OS-X to Dell, etc ever since Apple's transition to Intel. I wrote a set of scenarios talking about that here:
Essentially, Apple can make it work only if they tightly restrict the hardware & models that other companies are allowed to install OS-X on. Imagine for instance that Dell can sell OS-X, but only on *three* different machines, each of which is approved only after lengthy technical review by Apple engineers. Apple wins because Dell can leverage its business customers to sell to an entirely different market than Apple currently has access to. Dell wins because it gives them some serious product differentiation from HP and Gateway - who Apple will never license to. It all depends on Apple maintaining the control over the number of different models and hardware drivers that Mac OS-X must support.
Eric
The stereo system has a huge (12"x4") graphics display on the front that dances around then the unit is "off" - I wasn't at all surprised to find it used 22W in that mode. I was rather more surprised to find how little extra it required to actually make noise ("music") - it would seem that it's not just the display on the front which remains powered up but most everything on the inside as well.
I do mean the 32" RCA, yes. It doesn't seem to draw even 1W when it's "off" - so it doesn't suffer from the vampire power draws that many newer sets are supposed to have.
I learned that my Stereo system consumes 22W when on "standby" and only about 35W when in use - what a total waste! So I put it on a power bar. My older TV is 0W standby, and all the newer Wall Warts that I have seem to be OK as well - 4 of them together only rate 1W. Your milege may vary:-)
You've hinted at the real reason that the iPod is maintaining it's dominance - it's the DRM rules that the labels are imposing on everyone. Because everyone has to lock down their devices and music, nobody can play with an open strategy - and thus nobody can make an offering that is much better than Apple. Unless and until the labels agree to a DRM-less music store, Apple will maintain it's crushing market share.
The right path is taking all the stuff that's currently on the motherboard and putting it into the CPU. Including some serious chunk of flash memory and (of course) several gigs of ram. This is because performance is already heavily determined by the communications speed between all these things, and putting them in the same IC would allow multi-giga-hertz communication channels.
Man, I am astounded by the negativeness of the slashdot community as exhibited in the comments. We all want to live longer, healthier lives. This $3M is going to fund research which might help us do that. As such, it's a great thing!
The SENS project is an effort to fight the causes of aging, not the symptoms, such as increased chance of heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, etc. etc. As such, a primary result of SENS would be what's been called "the longevity dividend": a slowing of aging equivalent to an extra 7 years of life HALVES the rate all of these deadly diseases at any given age, resulting in trillions of dollars of savings for the medical system as a whole. In a sense, it points out the insanity of our current system, where we spend trillions fighting things after they happen but are unwilling to spend even a few million bucks on research which might delay all of those things for a least a few years, if not indefinably.
Again, I just want to say that slashdotters should be ashamed of themselves for speaking out against something which could have such hugely positive results. When your mom (grandma, uncle, etc) dies even though this type research might have saved her, then maybe you to will understand that postponing aging and death is the great moral cause of our time. We have the technology, all we need is the will!
Honestly, can you use 4 cores in any of your current applications? I think the time is coming when the 30 year trend in faster CPUs will end. If you can't increase the mega-herts, and extra cores don't actually improve application performance, what will Intel and AMD do to keep improving their products?
I wrote an essay with some possible ideas: Computers in 2020
I believe that genetic engineering of ourselves and our children is inevitable, because of the huge positive gains it can give us. Who wouldn't want to give themselves or their children the kinds of advantages genetic engineering might bring?
That said, there is a social problem having to do with equality - equal availability of the treatments, equal treatment of people who have them, etc. This problem has always been here (think racism, sexism, etc), it gets more intense as we move into an era where people are potentially not even BORN equal. These social problems cannot be solved with technology - and they cannot be prevented by banning said technology either.
I found this interesting article yesterday, well worth a read if you want to see a more detailed exposition of the above argument. It's titled: Embracing Change with All Four Arms: A Post-Humanist Defense of Genetic Engineering
If we want to colonize space, and colonize it fast, the way to do that is to create viable land titles on the Moon, Mars, and any other body people want to live on. The value generated by making those title transferable at a distance ("the miracle of capital") will be more that sufficient to fund the trips to those places.
As to all those people who believe that "the world" should own space locations, and keep them as parks, or Utopias - that will be the easiest way to ensure that they remain completely unused by humanity, until it's *super* easy, whereupon those places will become slums and shanty towns, just like the unpropertied areas in third world countries today.
I think the first question these people should ask themselves is why they are storing their customers cc # at all? If you can avoid doing that, it's by far the most "secure" solution!
I remember playing all sorts of online games - hack and slash, RPG, TradeWars, strategy games, etc. All text based, but a lot of them just as cool as any game with graphics today - cooler, even, since the BBS ones supported hundreds of users! Graphics aren't everything in a game... in fact, graphics are hardly anything in the kinds of games I like to play:-).
There is a problem with all survey's, everywhere and at all time: people often don't do what they say, or say what they do. Everybody says "[I] think that software companies should be paid for their work and [I] support efforts to protect intellectual property" (from the article). But way fewer people actually head out to the local software shop and hand over hundreds of dollars for all the software they "borrowed" off the Jones nextdoor...
I don't see how anyone can take people at their word when they have obvious conflicts of interest and hypocracy...
About three months ago I got a call from Shaw, my cable modem company. They called to tell me that they were dropping the price of internet service from can$50 to can$40, retroactive as of three months before that, because of "increasing popularity of internet cable usage without corresponding television cable" (price for the combo was can$70 - and has remained at that, I believe).
So I'd say that all you Americans are just living in the wrong country - we're fine up here in the Great White North.
I know that at Queens University, the students don't buy individual packages of software anyway, at least not the engineers. We buy a $200 package of everything we'll need for our 4 years there - MS Office, good telnet client, Maple, matlab, etc. etc. So I don't know that this will make that much difference - it's not like the engineers have a choice...
Sun has already been fighting back advances from RedHat and IBM... I wonder if they will trigger a mass migration away from Sun?
Websurfing done right!StumbleUpon
Slashdot Mirror
I found this paragraph from the conclusion really interesting:
e rs_in_20.html
which is my prediction for how the whole field is going to evolve over the next 14 years.
"Newell even talked about a trend he sees happening in the future that he calls the "Post-GPU Era." He predicts that as more and more cores appear on single chip dies, companies like Intel and AMD will add more CPU instructions that perform tasks normally handled by the GPU. This could lead to a point where coders and gamers no longer have to worry if a certain game is "CPU-bound" or "GPU-bound," only that the more cores they have available the better the game will perform. Newell says that if it does, his company is in an even better position to take advantage of it."
This is almost certainly why AMD has bought out ATI - they see that the future is about integrating everything on the motherboard into one IC, and AMD wants the CPU to be that point of integration. For more, see:
Computers in 2020
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/02/comput
Why not think about the problem from a higher level? The reason you need backup is because the grid isn't completely reliable. Why not remove your dependence on the grid instead of trying to paper over it's failures?
Install a gigantic solar system / battery storage. Or, a natural gas power plant under your control. Or even wind power. Here in California I bet you could even save money in the long run... Eric
People have been speculating about the licensing of OS-X to Dell, etc ever since Apple's transition to Intel. I wrote a set of scenarios talking about that here:
s cenarios.html
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2005/06/apple_
Essentially, Apple can make it work only if they tightly restrict the hardware & models that other companies are allowed to install OS-X on. Imagine for instance that Dell can sell OS-X, but only on *three* different machines, each of which is approved only after lengthy technical review by Apple engineers. Apple wins because Dell can leverage its business customers to sell to an entirely different market than Apple currently has access to. Dell wins because it gives them some serious product differentiation from HP and Gateway - who Apple will never license to. It all depends on Apple maintaining the control over the number of different models and hardware drivers that Mac OS-X must support. Eric
The stereo system has a huge (12"x4") graphics display on the front that dances around then the unit is "off" - I wasn't at all surprised to find it used 22W in that mode. I was rather more surprised to find how little extra it required to actually make noise ("music") - it would seem that it's not just the display on the front which remains powered up but most everything on the inside as well.
I do mean the 32" RCA, yes. It doesn't seem to draw even 1W when it's "off" - so it doesn't suffer from the vampire power draws that many newer sets are supposed to have.
I just finished a comprehensive audit of all the electricity drawing devices in my house:
o ld_energ.html
:-)
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/10/househ
I learned that my Stereo system consumes 22W when on "standby" and only about 35W when in use - what a total waste! So I put it on a power bar. My older TV is 0W standby, and all the newer Wall Warts that I have seem to be OK as well - 4 of them together only rate 1W. Your milege may vary
Dude, an even better name would have been "IceHound". A Hound is much more the "opposite" of fox than Weasel will ever be :-)
You've hinted at the real reason that the iPod is maintaining it's dominance - it's the DRM rules that the labels are imposing on everyone. Because everyone has to lock down their devices and music, nobody can play with an open strategy - and thus nobody can make an offering that is much better than Apple. Unless and until the labels agree to a DRM-less music store, Apple will maintain it's crushing market share.
d _open_ma.html
DRM and Open Markets
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/10/drm_an
The right path is taking all the stuff that's currently on the motherboard and putting it into the CPU. Including some serious chunk of flash memory and (of course) several gigs of ram. This is because performance is already heavily determined by the communications speed between all these things, and putting them in the same IC would allow multi-giga-hertz communication channels.
e rs_in_20.html
Digital Crusader: Computers in 2020
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/02/comput
some more info for anyone interested:
r ative_me.html
Timelines for Manipulating and Greatly Enhancing Human Regeneration
http://www.fightaging.org/archives/000929.php
Transhumanism: Regenerative Medicine
http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/05/regene
Man, I am astounded by the negativeness of the slashdot community as exhibited in the comments. We all want to live longer, healthier lives. This $3M is going to fund research which might help us do that. As such, it's a great thing!
g ing_the.html
The SENS project is an effort to fight the causes of aging, not the symptoms, such as increased chance of heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, etc. etc. As such, a primary result of SENS would be what's been called "the longevity dividend": a slowing of aging equivalent to an extra 7 years of life HALVES the rate all of these deadly diseases at any given age, resulting in trillions of dollars of savings for the medical system as a whole. In a sense, it points out the insanity of our current system, where we spend trillions fighting things after they happen but are unwilling to spend even a few million bucks on research which might delay all of those things for a least a few years, if not indefinably.
Again, I just want to say that slashdotters should be ashamed of themselves for speaking out against something which could have such hugely positive results. When your mom (grandma, uncle, etc) dies even though this type research might have saved her, then maybe you to will understand that postponing aging and death is the great moral cause of our time. We have the technology, all we need is the will!
http://fightaging.org/ http://www.sens.org/ http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/03/anti-a
I've used the Kill-a-Watt device and blogged about the energy usage of objects in my household - as the article says, it's fairly interesting to be able to gather detailed data like that. http://digitalcrusader.ca/archives/2006/08/househo ld_power_1.html
Honestly, can you use 4 cores in any of your current applications? I think the time is coming when the 30 year trend in faster CPUs will end. If you can't increase the mega-herts, and extra cores don't actually improve application performance, what will Intel and AMD do to keep improving their products? I wrote an essay with some possible ideas: Computers in 2020
This is old news... I blogged about a similar article on July 3rd. I have also written a review of manna.
By your descriptions, you're looking for StumbleUpon, a toolbar which adds all sorts of intelligent website locating tools.
I believe that genetic engineering of ourselves and our children is inevitable, because of the huge positive gains it can give us. Who wouldn't want to give themselves or their children the kinds of advantages genetic engineering might bring?
That said, there is a social problem having to do with equality - equal availability of the treatments, equal treatment of people who have them, etc. This problem has always been here (think racism, sexism, etc), it gets more intense as we move into an era where people are potentially not even BORN equal. These social problems cannot be solved with technology - and they cannot be prevented by banning said technology either.
I found this interesting article yesterday, well worth a read if you want to see a more detailed exposition of the above argument. It's titled: Embracing Change with All Four Arms: A Post-Humanist Defense of Genetic Engineering
Linux + Apache + MySQL + PHP
It's the ultimate Free Software combo... and it powers StumbleUpon just fine, thank you!
If we want to colonize space, and colonize it fast, the way to do that is to create viable land titles on the Moon, Mars, and any other body people want to live on. The value generated by making those title transferable at a distance ("the miracle of capital") will be more that sufficient to fund the trips to those places.
The Economic Viability of Mars Colonization
As to all those people who believe that "the world" should own space locations, and keep them as parks, or Utopias - that will be the easiest way to ensure that they remain completely unused by humanity, until it's *super* easy, whereupon those places will become slums and shanty towns, just like the unpropertied areas in third world countries today.
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
I think the first question these people should ask themselves is why they are storing their customers cc # at all? If you can avoid doing that, it's by far the most "secure" solution!
Websurfing done right! - StumbleUpon
I remember playing all sorts of online games - hack and slash, RPG, TradeWars, strategy games, etc. All text based, but a lot of them just as cool as any game with graphics today - cooler, even, since the BBS ones supported hundreds of users! Graphics aren't everything in a game... in fact, graphics are hardly anything in the kinds of games I like to play :-).
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
There is a problem with all survey's, everywhere and at all time: people often don't do what they say, or say what they do. Everybody says "[I] think that software companies should be paid for their work and [I] support efforts to protect intellectual property" (from the article). But way fewer people actually head out to the local software shop and hand over hundreds of dollars for all the software they "borrowed" off the Jones nextdoor...
I don't see how anyone can take people at their word when they have obvious conflicts of interest and hypocracy...
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
About three months ago I got a call from Shaw, my cable modem company. They called to tell me that they were dropping the price of internet service from can$50 to can$40, retroactive as of three months before that, because of "increasing popularity of internet cable usage without corresponding television cable" (price for the combo was can$70 - and has remained at that, I believe).
So I'd say that all you Americans are just living in the wrong country - we're fine up here in the Great White North.
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
Even spammers should be innocent until proven guilty. That's only fair, after all.
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
I know that at Queens University, the students don't buy individual packages of software anyway, at least not the engineers. We buy a $200 package of everything we'll need for our 4 years there - MS Office, good telnet client, Maple, matlab, etc. etc. So I don't know that this will make that much difference - it's not like the engineers have a choice...
Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon
Sun has already been fighting back advances from RedHat and IBM... I wonder if they will trigger a mass migration away from Sun? Websurfing done right! StumbleUpon