Foreign engineers will change our economic world; prepare yourself By Sanford Forte
WE'RE hearing a lot these days about economic distress. What we're not hearing enough about are global economic and business changes that hit our manufacturing, technology and financial sectors -- and lead to job displacement. These changes will not abate; if anything, they will accelerate.
It's more complex than just ``globalization.'' It's a series of technology and capital transfers that have fundamentally changed our industrial and technological playing field. The rest of the world is close to fielding robust post-industrial infrastructure, and learning to outplay the best of us.
The National Science Foundation reports that China graduated nearly 200,000 engineers in 1999 from good universities that get better by the year. By comparison, American Universities graduate a mere 60,000 undergraduate engineers annually.
Combined, India and China produced nearly 26 percent of the world's newly minted engineers in 1999. Excluding Japan (where engineering wages are higher), Asian economies graduated 320,000 engineers in 1999 alone.
Wages for Chinese engineers range from roughly $4 to $8 per hour. Engineers from many other Asian nations (excepting Japan) command little more than that. These well-trained engineers are all perfectly capable of working ``on the wire'' for engineering firms all over the world -- and they are doing just that.
China has some 18 million people migrating from the interior to the coastal manufacturing provinces every year. This represents a virtually limitless source of low-cost labor for the next 10 or 20 years. It will feed China's surging consumer demand. Don't believe for a minute that China's (or the Pacific Rim's) economic development will be mostly fueled by American-made products and technology. It won't.
China is already the largest manufacturer of consumer electronics products in the world, and within three years will be the world's largest automotive manufacturer.
Manufacturing is migrating from Pacific Rim economies (Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, India) to China, leaving large workforces and technology infrastructures behind. Those displaced workers are migrating to the technology service sector, and already posing a competitive threat to high-tech service sectors in the developed West.
India already has Six Sigma (a universal measure of quality that strives for near perfection) technology and consulting firms equal to our very best, offering superb technology solutions at cut-rate prices.
Roughly 47 percent of Americans are directly or indirectly dependent on technology for their livelihood; keep this number in mind when considering how the ``Law of Lowest Wages and Costs'' has already -- and will increasingly -- impact our economy and lifestyle.
Bottom line: We in Silicon Valley -- and America -- are in for a long, somewhat painful ride. We will be challenged like never before. Americans will, after a time of readjustment and pain, finally have to ask what ``enough'' is . . . and that's a good thing.
It's a good thing because the seemingly never-ending upward spiral of promised prosperity that Americans have recently taken as their birthright has come at real cost: disintegration of families, environmental degradation, unhealthy xenophobia borne of the fear of ``losing advantages'' that we so dearly enjoy.
After the looming crisis fully takes hold, after the scapegoating of politicians, foreign nations and immigrants has run its course, Americans will search inward for values and ways of life that don't depend on maintaining material hegemony that is in excess of ``enough.''
We can be prosperous without obsessing about prosperity, that is, sacrificing our very lives and identities to some abstract definition of ``success.'' I predict a resurgence of interest in things spiritual, a more relaxed defi
This is too important an issue to just point to a link; here's the body of the text for the link above, written by Sanford Forte for the Merc News in San Jose a month ago; his article says it all: http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/59188 24.htm
"Foreign engineers will change our economic world; prepare yourself By Sanford Forte
WE'RE hearing a lot these days about economic distress. What we're not hearing enough about are global economic and business changes that hit our manufacturing, technology and financial sectors -- and lead to job displacement. These changes will not abate; if anything, they will accelerate.
It's more complex than just ``globalization.'' It's a series of technology and capital transfers that have fundamentally changed our industrial and technological playing field. The rest of the world is close to fielding robust post-industrial infrastructure, and learning to outplay the best of us.
The National Science Foundation reports that China graduated nearly 200,000 engineers in 1999 from good universities that get better by the year. By comparison, American Universities graduate a mere 60,000 undergraduate engineers annually.
Combined, India and China produced nearly 26 percent of the world's newly minted engineers in 1999. Excluding Japan (where engineering wages are higher), Asian economies graduated 320,000 engineers in 1999 alone.
Wages for Chinese engineers range from roughly $4 to $8 per hour. Engineers from many other Asian nations (excepting Japan) command little more than that. These well-trained engineers are all perfectly capable of working ``on the wire'' for engineering firms all over the world -- and they are doing just that.
China has some 18 million people migrating from the interior to the coastal manufacturing provinces every year. This represents a virtually limitless source of low-cost labor for the next 10 or 20 years. It will feed China's surging consumer demand. Don't believe for a minute that China's (or the Pacific Rim's) economic development will be mostly fueled by American-made products and technology. It won't.
China is already the largest manufacturer of consumer electronics products in the world, and within three years will be the world's largest automotive manufacturer.
Manufacturing is migrating from Pacific Rim economies (Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, India) to China, leaving large workforces and technology infrastructures behind. Those displaced workers are migrating to the technology service sector, and already posing a competitive threat to high-tech service sectors in the developed West.
India already has Six Sigma (a universal measure of quality that strives for near perfection) technology and consulting firms equal to our very best, offering superb technology solutions at cut-rate prices.
Roughly 47 percent of Americans are directly or indirectly dependent on technology for their livelihood; keep this number in mind when considering how the ``Law of Lowest Wages and Costs'' has already -- and will increasingly -- impact our economy and lifestyle.
Bottom line: We in Silicon Valley -- and America -- are in for a long, somewhat painful ride. We will be challenged like never before. Americans will, after a time of readjustment and pain, finally have to ask what ``enough'' is . . . and that's a good thing.
It's a good thing because the seemingly never-ending upward spiral of promised prosperity that Americans have recently taken as their birthright has come at real cost: disintegration of families, environmental degradation, unhealthy xenophobia borne of the fear of ``losing advantages'' that we so dearly enjoy.
After the looming crisis fully takes hold, after the scapegoating of politicians, foreign nations and immigrants has run its course, Americans will search inward for values and ways of life that don't depend on maintaining material hegemony that is in excess of ``enough.''
Here's an article http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/5918824.htm that goes into a more stark reality, with hope for promising change on the near-log-term horizon.
We're witnessing a *structural* shift that's permanent. There is no way to reverse the distribution of technology-based intellectual capital, and the financial capital that supports it, worldwide.
Essentially, for the first time in the collective history of the IT sector (and a few others), we're on a level (maybe even tilted in favor of others) playing field.
This is a prescient interview. The market for gaming would explode if game publishers consciously took the time to embed learning scenarios into games.
If this was done in a way that didn't seem pedantic; that didn't detract form the 'fun' or 'challenge' of the game; that permitted the player to branch to new experiences once certain 'pedagogic principles' were mastered; gaming would reach a new plateau - both in terms of cultural influence and sales. Every parent would run out and but a game console, no questions asked.
This is the most compelling way to help people to "fail on the way to mastery".
Imagine that a parent hears that little Suzy will do better in school (or on her SAT's) if she plays games that help her to learn the principles of elementary geometry, grammar, etc. as a part of playing the game, *without her consciously realizing it*. Clever game design could accomplish this. (Why isn't Wolfram Publishing authoring math game?)
Of course, in many cases, conscious awareness that directed learning is taking place could also be permitted, as long as the game's design created stimulating scenarios that compel participation.
This is really just the very beginning for games as learning tools. Years ago, in cognitive science seminars, it became clear that the best 'artificial' way we had to instill learning skills was through simulation. This is still true, and remain so for some time.
Really, games are immersive, simulative, experiences. They will become more immersive, and sophisticated (in terms of simulation) as time goes on, processors get faster, broadband becomes a non-issue, and designers realize that learning can be fun.
The future for this sort of thing is absolutely unlimited. In fact, there's no reason why serious simulations and models of very complex environments won't eventually be brought before very sophisticated learners (politicians, medical professionals, genetic designers, etc.) to help them "think through" potential consequences of their actions.
Frankly, this is the most important pedagogical development in that last 100 years, if not longer. It will have import far into the future.
Thanks for your considered, and thoughtful responses
Currently, California creates a 'framework' for every K-12 topic (or general area, like language development). Commercial publishers then take those frameworks and build content around them. Open source authors could do the same thing. If the state employed those authors, or contracted them, so much the better.
The final step for text approval is through the State Board of Education text selection committee. Books that pass muster are then permitted for adoption by districts.
Open source textbooks would *have* to honor the framework documents to get through peer approval within the state board - that's a given. Thus, all materials have to meet a framework requirement. However, that's what the publishers currently have to do anyway. There's no reason the State itself, by adding some curriculum experts/outside contractors to do the appropriate filtering and writing, could not publish its own K-12 books.
I spent 15 years in the textbook publishing industry; thus, I can speak with some authority on this issue.
The economics of open source textbook publishing are a 'no brainer'. We're looking at the State self-publishing, and then reverse licensing content. There are *immediate* savings (this is easily shown) on the front end (marketing, rotalty and inventory costs), and licensing revenue on the back end.
Almost half the price of a K-12 book comes from marketing costs, royalties, and inefficient warehousing.
Further savings are realized down the road - say 10 years - when portable devices in the classroom are ubiquitous. If states don't get control of content, can you imagine little Johnny or Jane streaming the Preamble of the Constitution and paying Prentice Hall a micropayment for the privilege? That's where we're heading if states don't get control of content in their respective educational envronments.
As for the increased costs of textbooks, there's no reason this should be happening. Publishers manage to keep the cost of trade books down...why not textbooks? It's a fact that some publishers offer *the very same* university level textbooks (also outrageously priced) overseas, printed on cheaper paper, for a fraction of the going price in North America).
Open source textbook publishing is not rocket science, or obscure, as a publishing model. It *will* happen, and it's only a metter of time.
I will admit that this model may be just a tad ahead of where the market, or educational bureaucratic sensibilities, are at the moment.
Consider what cost-plus licensing of this material (and the process) to other states would mean - i.e. *billions* of dollars saved, and put back into parts of our state educational systems that need it most.
Another query had to do with why legislation would be required to start something liek this.
California used to publish its own textbooks back in the 50's. They were pretty awful. The reason for this was that there was no distributed source of information, or people, that could work on books; they (the books) were penned by just one or two authors. That situation has changed. We now have the internet, digital media, etc., etc.. There is no excuse for not looking into this aggressively, publishing a single curricular area as a pilot, and taking it from there.
The state legislated itself out of the publishing business in the early 50's, and gave the power to publish K-12 material to private enterprise. Thus, it would have to legislate itself back into the publishing 'business'.
Again, thanks for all your considered comments. We will be adding more information and updates to our site as we progress; we're in this for the long haul, until it's a reality.
Please feel free to write with ideas. We can be sourced from our web site. http://www.opensourcetext.org
What's lost in the argument over who 'owns' fibre infrastructure is the fact that American taxplayers have subsidized much of its installation.
What's astounding is that many companies, having gained the permission to tap the communication resources of a community through that community's legal procedures, should then be able to hold that community hostage to pricing models that have no basis in current reality.
For instance, consider that the cost of bulk broadband to feed DSL has dropped almost 80% in the last several years. Have we seen a concomitant drop in DSL prices? This points to just *one* of the problems that we (America) faces if we give over the right to control broadband distribution to the telecommunications majors.
"Pure" music distribution is on the horizon
on
Open Source Music
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Little-by-little, musicians and producers are finding interesting new ways to distribute - and get paid for - their music. A recent model that has a band offering limited release recordings for a lot of money. They'll make their money on the first 100 subscribers, at $1200@, and then do another release, and so on. This is just one of dozens of new distribution ideas out there.
http://www.billboard.com/bb/daily/article_displa y. jsp?vnu_content_id=1859066
The market is busy at work for optimal music distribution, and that market has already written the epitaph of the music majors.
Innovative models like the above - including Opsound - are popping up all over the place. Soon there will be many ways to get the music content you want without having to deal with the majors.
For artists however, the current system is random, in addition to being not-at-all profitable except for the very highest echelon artists - those that already have a recording success under their belt. Also, it's not often that that even successful artists can create one song after another that consistently please their fans. There is a lot of waste and inefficiency in the system.
One long term answer to the above dilemma will be based on technologies that are currently in their infancy. Consumers will someday be able to know what elemental parts of a song - things like specific keys, harmonies, melodic structures, etc. appeal to them - really, appeal to those parts of their brain that cognate music in ways that please them.
Once these technologies mature, music distribution will be geared more toward pleasing a specific cognitive taste. Services will be created to decipher and forward appropriate music to consumers for review, based on an analysis of their inherent cognitive tastes. Many of these models will be predictive, and be able to intelligently suggest what new music, from artists never before experienced, would be pleasing to a specific customer's ear.
New technologies like the ones hinted at above will open up the international market for music. This will create a music distribution renaissance that dwarfs the current 'world' music and 'majors' scene.
Corroborating some of the above - and looking forward to the near-long-term - music distribution is going to be singles-only, and probably based on a peer-to-peer system that results in a floating price for content. Content that is good, and in demand, will cost more than content that few people (relatively speaking) care about.
All music distributed this way will have to be interoperable amongst many digital devices. If you buy the song file, it will be yours to do with as you please. Nothing else - long term - will work. There is no DRM system that can't/won't be broken.
The only leverage that large music producers have at this time is legacy content. Consumers want access to that. Also, many major acts, hyped by the music distribution machine, are under contract and producing under the current system. Thus, current content is still in demand, but decreasing, as evidenced by the majors failure to produce as much of it as they did in the past [In their dying throes, the majors, via the RIAA, are attempting to blame their decrease in music CD production on illegal file-sharing - a proven red herring]
The catch - for the majors - is that mostly everything from the legacy vaults is already recorded somewhere as Mp3's, or on CD/DVD w/o DRM. The same is happening to currently produced, and distributed, content. Unless the majors find a very smooth, seamless way to inexpensively distribute their content, their game is over - because everyone will soon have what they need from pirated sources. This will really be a shame if it happens; but the intransigent majors, lacking imagination, will only have themselves to blame.
Billly Gates writes: "Verizon will be extremely pissed about this. They will throw everything they have to prevent it. Maybe even sue as well as continue the usual heavy lobbing the baby bells are known for." --------
You're right. And that's where 'political will' comes in. Politicians, municipal leaders, and the Congress would have to be willing to stand up and recognize that there is a clear value in giving municipalities the right to operate their own networks. There are clear precedents for this with municipally-run utilities. Structurally, this is a no-brianer.
A clear case that can be made for citizens 'owning' the 'communicative assets' that they represent. Why shouldn't citizens, and the communities that represent them, decide where the profits from the use of their 'communicative assets' (represented as communicative capital) go?
This is a basic question, and it will have a signifiacant impact on whether America ever experiences optimal efficiencies and economies form universal broadband.
As of today, universal, affordable, broadband deployment has been mostly *constrained* by the major telecommunications groups. That's something to consider, and do something about.
It comes down to who owns your capacity to communicate.
One more thing: This group has lobbied several Congressional principals; Joe Lieberman - D-CT, Barbara Boxer - D-CA; George Allen - R-GA, and John McCain - R-AZ. Many senior staffers have been very impressed with this model.
One example: Consider that a community could put into play a wireless network that taps into already-existing backbone fiber.
Newer technologies from companies like Vivato, Proxim and Motorola[Canopy] (with more on the way) would permit universal broadband (with no truck rolls!) within a very short time.
The city would be able to employ local IT skill, take a portion (80%) of the subscriber profits, and roll that revenue over to finish out fiber deployment (if they decided that this was a prudent thing to do).
The TeloPhase model makes more semse than anything I've seen, as a hopeful model for the *fast* deployment of universal municipal broadband.
Also there is good information available for their business case http://www.telophase.org/Library_Files/TeloPhase_C ommunity-Based_Networks_BP.pdf
and a presentation that goes into elementary detail on the model, here - http://www.telophase.org/Library_Files/TeloPhas e_C ommunity-Based_Networks_Presentation.pdf
It's entirely possible for communities to take control of their citizen's communicative assets, turn those assets into 'community capital', and keep communication-based profits at home, rather than sending those profits to large communication conglomerates who are attempting to recover from broken telecom models at the consumer's expense.
If the political will is there, the TeloPhase model, and others similar to it, are the future and hope of universal broadband.
*Mobility* is the name of the game from here on. Design focus should be more on technology usability issues, rather than how to make human beings adapt to the 1980-90's version of fixed workststions. Thank goodness, the latter are goin away.
Sure, there is a need for better fixed workstation ergonomics, but very few organizations will spend the capital necessary to deploy this sort of thing on a wide scale.
There's probably a niche market in design and graphics shops for things like this, mostly as a design statement to impress clients.
If innovations like this were cheap, we *might* see them make the residential office markets.
Re:Standards will change too : win-win
on
Brain Privacy
·
· Score: 1
There's an argument to be made for that. Humans didn't evelove in anonymous groups. It's only recently that anonymity has come to be accepted as the 'norm'. Whether one likes anonymity or not, we do pay a social price for it. If that price (cost) becomes too much to bear, then technology might (ironically) help us to become more transparent to one another, again.
There is no way to stop this
on
Brain Privacy
·
· Score: 1
The ability to 'read' cognitive states will not only happen - as it already has in some medical applications - but will be used by government and private industry alike. This is guaranteed to happen as long as large institutional entities need personal information - gained from monitoring - to hedge against various risks to their respective enterprises.
Ray Kurzweil and others (Vernor Vinge among them) talk about a technological 'singularity' that is fast (exponentially) approaching. It's a place where technologies like the one discussed in the article begin to progress so fast that there is no way to keep full track of, or control them. Cognitive scanning is simply another one of those technologies.
Imagine that you're living 20 years in the future when genetic testing and cognitive scans help an insurance company - or the government (if we ever get universal health care) - predict your propensity for violent behavior. Can you imagine tests and monitoring like this *not* being performed at the individual level - especially if they're truly predictive, and can result in intervention, thus 'saving' you and the 'insuring' agency from relative pain? I can 'imagine' that they won't, but they will; the system will demand it.
We are moving at breakneck speed toward a fundamental change in what we perceive to be human. This will begin to happen - as it already has - in ways that seem to violate everything most humans in free societies hold dear - privacy, individual rights and liberties, etc.
The only way to prevent this sort of thing from being truly disruptive is to build some kind of 'meta-monitoring' into medical, and other surveillance technologies that give individuals the right to 'review and change/question' the data that has been collected on them - including all cognitive monitoring.
Again, the problem is that these technologies are progressing at faster and faster rates. I doubt that most individuals (including legislators) have even the faintest idea about how to move on these issues because everyone is still perceiving change in many of these areas as moving at a linear rate, instead of the exponential rate represented by the steadily upward-sloping curve of technology development.
The question looms. Will we be able to get a grip on this stuff before it is so well insinuated into culture that future humans take it for granted, with all that implies? The times, they are a'changin'
Wireless technlogy is progressing at 1.7x the speed of Moore's Law - pretty amazing.
Look at what is already available from places like Vivato, Motorola (Canopy) and Proxim - and this is *just* the beginning - wireless technologies weren't a serious factor just 5 years ago.
Add in cogntive radio, software defined radio, ad hoc and mesh networks, etc., and you have a wirelss technology juggernaut forming that is unstoppable.
Of course, the solutions will keep coming, and there will be confusion in the market, but that didn't stop the auot, the PC, or the digital media.
First, I wish them well, but the current Gibson management has a history of failed and ill-supported attempts to make new technology work in the music industry.
Also, Gibson's shotgun-like litigious actions within the music industry within the past decade have caused the music industry to put little faith in its supporting a technology standard of *any* kind. The past actions of its current management will make music instrument manufacturers think twice (or more)before they adopt or even license Gibson technology.
Some history:
1) Gibson completely blew their opportunity as once-owners of the Oberheim name (which they inherited as part of a purchase). Poorly-defined and ill-marketed products killed the Oberheim brand; meddling by ownership didn't help...(recently the Oberheim name returned to its rightful owner, Tom Oberheim, who is nicely rebuilding the brand).
2) Gibson bought Zeta Violin (a very innovative manufacturer of electronic violins and basses), and with it the services of the gifted engineer who who started Zeta. They had this engineer cobble together a MIDI substitute called ZIPPY. This at a time when MIDI was just getting a head of steam up. Gibson's ownership wanted to replace MIDI and collect license fees. Forget about helping to nurse a just-getting-off-the-ground standard, or MIDI). Talk about bad timing. ZIPPY died, and the engineer had a hand in regaining Zeta (a fine company these days).
3) Next was Gibson's infamous purchase of Opcode Systems, a few years back. Opcode was a primary manufacturer of music software and hardware at the time - one of the best. They created the OMS standard, which the Mac music community was widely dependent on. They promised Opcode's then-owner an opportunity to start a little R&D Group and come up with a few new things. The whole thing died in an acrimonious lawsuit, and in the offing, Gibson destroyed Opcode, and OMS. What a waste.
4) Unrelated to technology (at least computer technology) is Gibson's recent purchase of the once-renowned Baldwin Piano Company. Gibson has chosen to take even this famous music industry name, and make it a laughingstock. At this year's NAMM (National Association of Music Manufacturers) show they presented Baldwin pianos in gaudy, bright colors with graffiti-like drawings on them (for instance, one bright yellow grand had a desert scene painted on it with a Hummer riding across the desert floor in the the background - unbelievable!). I can see doing this to one piano, but the whole damn line? The instruments are laughable, and a blight on the once-reknowned Baldwin name.
5)Gibson is run like a personal playpen and funhouse by current management, who is out of touch with market reality (and a few others); however, Gibson has good, dedicated people. For their sake I hope this technology cathes on.
6)Other companies will be coming forward with technologies like this, and others. Let's wait and see if Gibson maintains its consistency in things having to do with technology, and screws this one up.
Certainly, if this technology did catch on, *any* music instrument manufacturer licensing it would have to be *very* wary of Gibson's current management's penchant to sue fast and hard for any real or even (and especially) perceived violation of licensing or other agreements. This company is vulture-like when it comes to the law. Gibson is a great example of a company who is purchased by a management with a few crazy ideas and a lot of money. They come in, buy a well-established company with good products and dedicated peopl,e and make it a personal plaything. Gibson, and the music industry deserve better.
Mikael Pawlo wrote: "Computer games are art and should be treated with the equal respect we treat Rembrandt's painting " ***** Pawlo's argument, and all other arguments like it - namely that 'art' (something that is essentially without definition) deserves a status that gives whatever art happens to be at the moment special status - is bankrupt.
Essentially, this is a free speech issue, and will be resolved one way or the other as individuals argue the right, or not, of certain individuals (namely, children of impressionable age) to have access to games that promote violence.
'Art' exists within the context of community - period. It's absurd to claim special status for something that has no more redeeming value than any other activity (a good example would be creative plumbing, or assembly-line work [yes, it's possible]) that exist as one of a number of necessary functions that give individuals a sense of purpose and contribution to community.
The sooner anyone who calls herself an artist begins to understand that, the better off we'll all be - especially those who define themselves as artists.
Re:Robots will never do Tai Chi (Tajiquan) - Why?
on
Tai Chi Robots
·
· Score: 1
This is one of the reasons it's laughable to hear about a 'Tai Chi Robot' - what a joke!
The real irony is that the Chinese - starting with the Communist Chinese - have done more to discredit the real thing than anyone else.
What your wife is experiencing is working with someone who has mastered 'rooting', or 'grounding'.
It's a very small part of what Taijiquan is, at base.
I've had some exposure to the best people (not much, but enough to know the difference), and believe me, they are amazing!
I know one Chinese martial arts practitioner who is tops in his art. He sparred (full contact)with Chen Xiao Wang several years ago, and came away saying that Chen was the best martial artist he had ever encountered.
The real pity is that there are many people who know just enough to impress someone with partial skill, and that's OK, as far as it goes.
However, if your wife ever gets a chance to see one of the people I listed (or go to the web sites I listed and check out other top people in different Taiji styles), she will be pleasantly surprised.
Again, there's no New Age magic in what the best practitioners do; rather it's mastering an astounding series of very intuitive and counter intuitive exercises that develop exceptional movement or - if one wants to take the pain (the Chinese call it 'eating bitter') and spend the time - fighting skills.
Robots will never do Tai Chi (Tajiquan) - Why?
on
Tai Chi Robots
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Some facts:
Robots can't do Tai Chi, they can only *mimic* Tai Chi movement...why?
Tai Chi (also called 'Taijiquan' - meaning "body as fist") is a legitimate martial art that has been bastardized in China and the West; it has also become something of a New Age phenonenon.
Why can't a robot do leigitimate Tai Chi? Because training in authentic Tai Chi involves exercises that essentially, over time, 1) dramatically retrain muscle fascia; 2) develop enormous leg strength in the practitioner (necessary; 3) teach the practitioner that *all* movement is controlled from the center (this is where the New Age people get it wrong, as we're talking about *literal* control from the area - front to back - just below the belly button (dantien). This latter quality is what's hard to imagine until one meets a practitioner who has it right. There simply aren't many of these people left, and those who are left tend to be very restrained about teaching everything openly.
Here are some good, authentic places to start - everything below is the 'real deal': http://www.sixharmonies.org/
http://www.neijia.com/
Others to look for: Chen Xiao Wang Chu Tian Cai Chen Zheng Lei Wang Xian Chen Qingzhou
Anything done by any of the above is the 'real deal'. There are also other good practitioners in other 'styles' of taiji. The above group is form Chen Style, the first Taiji style. Zhu Tian Cai The reason that Tai Chi exercises are performed slowly is to train the body to move, resting on very strong legs, and allowing the "center" to "leverage" the ground for striking and other martial moves. It's virtually impossibelto describe what this quality 'feel's like. There's no mystery to it however, as it can be trained to various levels depending on the physical ability and dedication of the practitioner.
Unfortunately, there are too few authentic Tai Chi practitioners out there who are teaching the "real deal".
Good Tai Chi practice doesn't have to be martial, **but the quality and basics of correct movement HAVE to be present** for it to be called legitimate Tai Chi.
Simply doing Tai Chi 'forms' fluidly is not doing Tai Chi.
In sum, the real physical dynamics and requirements of Tai Chi cannot be simulated by a robot. A robot may *mimic* moves that look like Tai Chi, but that's all.
Tech predictions ignore basic social change
on
Christmas in 2050
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
It's amusing to see this sort of thing. Implicit are assumptions made about how current behavior will not change, but will itself be applied, or adopted wholesale, to new technology. This is, in fact, the reverse of what happens.
We saw this sort of thing in the 50's with predictions about vacuum cleaner robots, almost always accompanied by an image of a very happy woman (assumed to be a housewife). No one could imagine the Women's Movement just one decade hence.
We will (see Kurzweil) experience ever increasing rates of change in technology over the next 50 years; along with that will be slower (but faster than linear) changes in human behavior. The latter are the *really* hard predictions.
One nice change might be to find a way to do away with the compulsive consumption (the latter word used to mean both "using things up" and "deadly disease") that defines our most popular holiday (in the West), and turn it into something more functional, useful, and fulfilling. (btw, all the latter adjectives imply massive behavior change as well, which might happen as the developed world begins to learn the lesson about what 'enough' is).
In keeping with the season, here's 'Santabot' http://mywebpages.comcast.net/ctrevas/santabot.htm l getting ready to give a hearty "heave-ho,ho'ho" to most of the predictions in the reported article.
1) Aerie bought all remaining Ricochet assets for well under $5M - all the existing hardware, and patent rights. They have hundreds of semi's (trucks) full of Ricochet hardware sitting in a warehouse yard (in Denver, I think). That equipment, and Ricochet's IP, along with some clever attepmts to re-leverage this service back into a commercial arena is all that Ricochet really is. Read on...
2)Aerie *did not* get rights to the municipal utility poles that the Ricochet hardware is mounted on. They are renegotaiting rights to those poles at rates far below what Ricochet was able to extract (this will not be as easy as it sounds, and will be enormously time consuming - Aerie doesn't have a lot of time. Ricochet *did* pay too much for these rights, but again, it will take too much time for Aerie to renegotiate with municipalities. (see #3)
3. Aerie has just so much cash to burn. They were doing another network play that was failing when the Ricochet 'oppotunity' came along. They used some of the cash from their last funded venture to secure the Ricochet assets. Here's the rub: that money will run out within a year - maybe sooner. Aerie needs to procure 'x' subscribers by the end of the year to continue. (I've forgetten the exact number, but it was in the tens-of-thousands - around 50-60 thousand within the year, I think, maybe a few ten-thousand more).
Why do they need that number? Because they have to be able to manufacture additional modems and other equipment when their current stored supply runs out. This is a highly leveraged play in an environment that has very substantial new players coming forward.
Ricochet is now just a leveraged asset play compared to others efforts that are doing R&D, have product, a brand that didn't fail, etc. Thus, it's all but almost over for Ricochet. This is a 'last gasp' leveraged play they will garner some nominal level of excitement and buzz because Ricochet was popular in the press when it was operating. Futher, Aerie announced a lot of this many months ago, but in the near-long-term it will not be enough, time and money are disappearing.
4)They're signing up regional 'rights-holders'to sell sevices into their respective regions - they've done this in LA and Denver - I know they're working on a few more. (btw, they're keeping the SF Bay area to themselves, because they think they can generate enough subscriptions themselves to real estate, medical, and municipal groups to make their subscriber requirement in the region [byw, the Bay area loved Ricochet]))
5)If they (Aerie) don't achieve critical mass sufficient to be able to continue to manufacture additional equipment *or* they run out of money (and I wouldn't count on them getting additional rounds if they don't meet very critical milestones), then they're toast (even if they do meet milestones, their VC(s) will be sweating). I think Aerie had about $8M left when they did the Ricochet purchase. (btw, I don't quite remember what the *exact* purchase price of the Ricochet assets was - it could have been way under $5M, the number I stated earlier...however, that doesn't change the fact that Aerie is running on borrowed time).
Aerie is - with due respect - a bottom feeder - trying to leverage a once good business idea and technology who's time has come and almost gone.
Again, what's crucial here is that for those buying into Ricochet a second time, there is no guarantee that they won't get stranded again. Frankly, I think they will get stranded.
Frankly, if I were Aerie, I would find a partner willing to aggressively do something with the patents, look for regional providers who were community based (even not-for-profits, or non-profits) and license what they've got to already enabled communities for reasonable rates. In other words, open this thing up. It won't happen though, because this is all about a limited leveraged play that is already hanging by a thread.
Aerie doesn't have the *time* to build out, because they have a venture funder breathing down their back. Good money is not chasing bad these days - it's all but over. There are many community wireless-based ways they could go with this, but it probably won't happen, as they have a very tunnel vision view of what's possible in this domain.
Bottom line: there are commercial (e.g. real estate)professionals who will re-up with Ricochet *in already enabled communities* as soon as it becomes available. Ricochet will get some subscribers; however, it won't be enough to sustain Aerie long term, and the whole thing will either get re-sold (probably just the IP), fold altogether, or get parceled out to the already enabled municipalities as a cool emergency backup wireless system.
If Aerie does manage to survive, Ricochet has little promise of long-term continuance because again, this is a highly leveraged play controlled by a company (Aerie) that is simply tryiong to re-distribute a service - that's all. Even if they succeed short term, it will take a large miracle to get the additional cash to build out new communities, improve their technology, and meet hard charging, better-funded competition.
The carrier sector - AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, British Telecom, etc. - will soon begin to find its weighty physical and capital infrastructure too expensive to maintain in the face of innovations like cognitive radio, ad hoc networks, mesh networks, and rapid - faster than Moore's Law - increases in the power and speed of communications processing.
These developments are already beginning to spark a worldwide communications renaissance that will lead to heretofore unimagined personal communications and small business development possibilities. Most carriers - like AT&T - will resist the above developments and try to hang on to current business models. Those that migrate to innovative, affordable services will survive, the others will fall away in failure.
In fact, BT's research group has *already* advised that company to start thinking about selling off infrastructure in favor of starting up a nimble, applications/service-based business.
Money will be made at the top as communications carriers roll each other up, but it's just prolonging the inevitable an bloodbath.
1) Aerie bought all remaining Ricochet assets for well under $5M - all the existing hardware, and patent rights. They have hundreds of semi's (trucks) full of Ricochet hardware sitting in a warehouse yard (in Denver, I think). That equipment, and Ricochet's IP, along with some clever attepmts to re-leverage this service back into a commercial arena is all that Ricochet really is. Read on...
2)Aerie *did not* get rights to the municipal utility poles that the Ricochet hardware is mounted on. They are renegotaiting rights to those poles at rates far below what Ricochet was able to extract (this will not be as easy as it sounds, and will be enormously time consuming - Aerie doesn't have a lot of time. Ricochet *did* pay too much for these rights, but again, it will take too much time for Aerie to renegotiate with municipalities. (see #3)
3. Aerie has just so much cash to burn. They were doing another network play that was failing when the Ricochet 'oppotunity' came along. They used some of the cash from their last funded venture to secure the Ricochet assets. Here's the rub: that money will run out within a year - maybe sooner. Aerie needs to procure 'x' subscribers by the end of the year to continue. (I've forgetten the exact number, but it was in the tens-of-thousands - around 50-60 thousand within the year, I think, maybe a few ten-thousand more).
Why do they need that number? Because they have to be able to manufacture additional modems and other equipment when their current stored supply runs out. This is a highly leveraged play in an environment that has very substantial new players coming forward.
Ricochet is now just a leveraged asset play compared to others efforts that are doing R&D, have product, a brand that didn't fail, etc. Thus, it's all but almost over for Ricochet. This is a 'last gasp' leveraged play they will garner some nominal level of excitement and buzz because Ricochet was popular in the press when it was operating. Futher, Aerie announced a lot of this many months ago, but in the near-long-term it will not be enough, time and money are disappearing.
4)They're signing up regional 'rights-holders'to sell sevices into their respective regions - they've done this in LA and Denver - I know they're working on a few more. (btw, they're keeping the SF Bay area to themselves, because they think they can generate enough subscriptions themselves to real estate, medical, and municipal groups to make their subscriber requirement in the region [byw, the Bay area loved Ricochet]))
5)If they (Aerie) don't achieve critical mass sufficient to be able to continue to manufacture additional equipment *or* they run out of money (and I wouldn't count on them getting additional rounds if they don't meet very critical milestones), then they're toast (even if they do meet milestones, their VC(s) will be sweating). I think Aerie had about $8M left when they did the Ricochet purchase. (btw, I don't quite remember what the *exact* purchase price of the Ricochet assets was - it could have been way under $5M, the number I stated earlier...however, that doesn't change the fact that Aerie is running on borrowed time).
Aerie is - with due respect - a bottom feeder - trying to leverage a once good business idea and technology who's time has come and almost gone.
Again, what's crucial here is that for those buying into Ricochet a second time, there is no guarantee that they won't get stranded again. Frankly, I think they will get stranded.
Frankly, if I were Aerie, I would find a partner willing to aggressively do something with the patents, look for regional providers who were community based (even not-for-profits, or non-profits) and license what they've got to already enabled communities for reasonable rates. In other words, open this thing up. It won't happen though, because this is all about a limited leveraged play that is already hanging by a thread.
Aerie doesn't have the *time* to build out, because they have a venture funder breathing down their back. Good money is not chasing bad these days - it's all but over. There are many community wireless-based ways they could go with this, but it probably won't happen, as they have a very tunnel vision view of what's possible in this domain.
Bottom line: there are commercial (e.g. real estate)professionals who will re-up with Ricochet *in already enabled communities* as soon as it becomes available. Ricochet will get some subscribers; however, it won't be enough to sustain Aerie long term, and the whole thing will either get re-sold (probably just the IP), fold altogether, or get parceled out to the already enabled municipalities as a cool emergency backup wireless system.
If Aerie does manage to survive, Ricochet has little promise of long-term continuance because again, this is a highly leveraged play controlled by a company (Aerie) that is simply tryiong to re-distribute a service - that's all. Even if they succeed short term, it will take a large miracle to get the additional cash to build out new communities, improve their technology, and meet hard charging, better-funded competition.
There's good evidence indicating doing aerobic exercise accompanied by loud music does harm to hearing. Why? Because the large muscle demands for oxygen during aerobic exercise keeps that oxygen away from the fine attenuation muscles of the ear drums. The latter don't attenuate loud noises very efficiently under these conditions, so you put yourself at risk to hearing loss at by listening at even nominally loud levels while engaging aerobic activity.
Slashdot Mirror
This, from:
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/5918 824.htm
Foreign engineers will change our economic world; prepare yourself
By Sanford Forte
WE'RE hearing a lot these days about economic distress. What we're not hearing enough about are global economic and business changes that hit our manufacturing, technology and financial sectors -- and lead to job displacement. These changes will not abate; if anything, they will accelerate.
It's more complex than just ``globalization.'' It's a series of technology and capital transfers that have fundamentally changed our industrial and technological playing field. The rest of the world is close to fielding robust post-industrial infrastructure, and learning to outplay the best of us.
The National Science Foundation reports that China graduated nearly 200,000 engineers in 1999 from good universities that get better by the year. By comparison, American Universities graduate a mere 60,000 undergraduate engineers annually.
Combined, India and China produced nearly 26 percent of the world's newly minted engineers in 1999. Excluding Japan (where engineering wages are higher), Asian economies graduated 320,000 engineers in 1999 alone.
Wages for Chinese engineers range from roughly $4 to $8 per hour. Engineers from many other Asian nations (excepting Japan) command little more than that. These well-trained engineers are all perfectly capable of working ``on the wire'' for engineering firms all over the world -- and they are doing just that.
China has some 18 million people migrating from the interior to the coastal manufacturing provinces every year. This represents a virtually limitless source of low-cost labor for the next 10 or 20 years. It will feed China's surging consumer demand. Don't believe for a minute that China's (or the Pacific Rim's) economic development will be mostly fueled by American-made products and technology. It won't.
China is already the largest manufacturer of consumer electronics products in the world, and within three years will be the world's largest automotive manufacturer.
Manufacturing is migrating from Pacific Rim economies (Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, India) to China, leaving large workforces and technology infrastructures behind. Those displaced workers are migrating to the technology service sector, and already posing a competitive threat to high-tech service sectors in the developed West.
India already has Six Sigma (a universal measure of quality that strives for near perfection) technology and consulting firms equal to our very best, offering superb technology solutions at cut-rate prices.
Roughly 47 percent of Americans are directly or indirectly dependent on technology for their livelihood; keep this number in mind when considering how the ``Law of Lowest Wages and Costs'' has already -- and will increasingly -- impact our economy and lifestyle.
Bottom line: We in Silicon Valley -- and America -- are in for a long, somewhat painful ride. We will be challenged like never before. Americans will, after a time of readjustment and pain, finally have to ask what ``enough'' is . . . and that's a good thing.
It's a good thing because the seemingly never-ending upward spiral of promised prosperity that Americans have recently taken as their birthright has come at real cost: disintegration of families, environmental degradation, unhealthy xenophobia borne of the fear of ``losing advantages'' that we so dearly enjoy.
After the looming crisis fully takes hold, after the scapegoating of politicians, foreign nations and immigrants has run its course, Americans will search inward for values and ways of life that don't depend on maintaining material hegemony that is in excess of ``enough.''
We can be prosperous without obsessing about prosperity, that is, sacrificing our very lives and identities to some abstract definition of ``success.'' I predict a resurgence of interest in things spiritual, a more relaxed defi
This is too important an issue to just point to a link; here's the body of the text for the link above, written by Sanford Forte for the Merc News in San Jose a month ago; his article says it all:
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/59188 24.htm
"Foreign engineers will change our economic world; prepare yourself
By Sanford Forte
WE'RE hearing a lot these days about economic distress. What we're not hearing enough about are global economic and business changes that hit our manufacturing, technology and financial sectors -- and lead to job displacement. These changes will not abate; if anything, they will accelerate.
It's more complex than just ``globalization.'' It's a series of technology and capital transfers that have fundamentally changed our industrial and technological playing field. The rest of the world is close to fielding robust post-industrial infrastructure, and learning to outplay the best of us.
The National Science Foundation reports that China graduated nearly 200,000 engineers in 1999 from good universities that get better by the year. By comparison, American Universities graduate a mere 60,000 undergraduate engineers annually.
Combined, India and China produced nearly 26 percent of the world's newly minted engineers in 1999. Excluding Japan (where engineering wages are higher), Asian economies graduated 320,000 engineers in 1999 alone.
Wages for Chinese engineers range from roughly $4 to $8 per hour. Engineers from many other Asian nations (excepting Japan) command little more than that. These well-trained engineers are all perfectly capable of working ``on the wire'' for engineering firms all over the world -- and they are doing just that.
China has some 18 million people migrating from the interior to the coastal manufacturing provinces every year. This represents a virtually limitless source of low-cost labor for the next 10 or 20 years. It will feed China's surging consumer demand. Don't believe for a minute that China's (or the Pacific Rim's) economic development will be mostly fueled by American-made products and technology. It won't.
China is already the largest manufacturer of consumer electronics products in the world, and within three years will be the world's largest automotive manufacturer.
Manufacturing is migrating from Pacific Rim economies (Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, India) to China, leaving large workforces and technology infrastructures behind. Those displaced workers are migrating to the technology service sector, and already posing a competitive threat to high-tech service sectors in the developed West.
India already has Six Sigma (a universal measure of quality that strives for near perfection) technology and consulting firms equal to our very best, offering superb technology solutions at cut-rate prices.
Roughly 47 percent of Americans are directly or indirectly dependent on technology for their livelihood; keep this number in mind when considering how the ``Law of Lowest Wages and Costs'' has already -- and will increasingly -- impact our economy and lifestyle.
Bottom line: We in Silicon Valley -- and America -- are in for a long, somewhat painful ride. We will be challenged like never before. Americans will, after a time of readjustment and pain, finally have to ask what ``enough'' is . . . and that's a good thing.
It's a good thing because the seemingly never-ending upward spiral of promised prosperity that Americans have recently taken as their birthright has come at real cost: disintegration of families, environmental degradation, unhealthy xenophobia borne of the fear of ``losing advantages'' that we so dearly enjoy.
After the looming crisis fully takes hold, after the scapegoating of politicians, foreign nations and immigrants has run its course, Americans will search inward for values and ways of life that don't depend on maintaining material hegemony that is in excess of ``enough.''
We can be prosperous without obsessing ab
Here's an article http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/5918824.htm that goes into a more stark reality, with hope for promising change on the near-log-term horizon.
We're witnessing a *structural* shift that's permanent. There is no way to reverse the distribution of technology-based intellectual capital, and the financial capital that supports it, worldwide.
Essentially, for the first time in the collective history of the IT sector (and a few others), we're on a level (maybe even tilted in favor of others) playing field.
This is a prescient interview. The market for gaming would explode if game publishers consciously took the time to embed learning scenarios into games.
If this was done in a way that didn't seem pedantic; that didn't detract form the 'fun' or 'challenge' of the game; that permitted the player to branch to new experiences once certain 'pedagogic principles' were mastered; gaming would reach a new plateau - both in terms of cultural influence and sales. Every parent would run out and but a game console, no questions asked.
This is the most compelling way to help people to "fail on the way to mastery".
Imagine that a parent hears that little Suzy will do better in school (or on her SAT's) if she plays games that help her to learn the principles of elementary geometry, grammar, etc. as a part of playing the game, *without her consciously realizing it*. Clever game design could accomplish this. (Why isn't Wolfram Publishing authoring math game?)
Of course, in many cases, conscious awareness that directed learning is taking place could also be permitted, as long as the game's design created stimulating scenarios that compel participation.
This is really just the very beginning for games as learning tools. Years ago, in cognitive science seminars, it became clear that the best 'artificial' way we had to instill learning skills was through simulation. This is still true, and remain so for some time.
Really, games are immersive, simulative, experiences. They will become more immersive, and sophisticated (in terms of simulation) as time goes on, processors get faster, broadband becomes a non-issue, and designers realize that learning can be fun.
The future for this sort of thing is absolutely unlimited. In fact, there's no reason why serious simulations and models of very complex environments won't eventually be brought before very sophisticated learners (politicians, medical professionals, genetic designers, etc.) to help them "think through" potential consequences of their actions.
Frankly, this is the most important pedagogical development in that last 100 years, if not longer. It will have import far into the future.
Thanks for your considered, and thoughtful responses
Currently, California creates a 'framework' for every K-12 topic (or general area, like language development). Commercial publishers then take those frameworks and build content around them. Open source authors could do the same thing. If the state employed those authors, or contracted them, so much the better.
The final step for text approval is through the State Board of Education text selection committee. Books that pass muster are then permitted for adoption by districts.
Open source textbooks would *have* to honor the framework documents to get through peer approval within the state board - that's a given. Thus, all materials have to meet a framework requirement. However, that's what the publishers currently have to do anyway. There's no reason the State itself, by adding some curriculum experts/outside contractors to do the appropriate filtering and writing, could not publish its own K-12 books.
I spent 15 years in the textbook publishing industry; thus, I can speak with some authority on this issue.
The economics of open source textbook publishing are a 'no brainer'. We're looking at the State self-publishing, and then reverse licensing content. There are *immediate* savings (this is easily shown) on the front end (marketing, rotalty and inventory costs), and licensing revenue on the back end.
Almost half the price of a K-12 book comes from marketing costs, royalties, and inefficient warehousing.
Further savings are realized down the road - say 10 years - when portable devices in the classroom are ubiquitous. If states don't get control of content, can you imagine little Johnny or Jane streaming the Preamble of the Constitution and paying Prentice Hall a micropayment for the privilege? That's where we're heading if states don't get control of content in their respective educational envronments.
As for the increased costs of textbooks, there's no reason this should be happening. Publishers manage to keep the cost of trade books down...why not textbooks? It's a fact that some publishers offer *the very same* university level textbooks (also outrageously priced) overseas, printed on cheaper paper, for a fraction of the going price in North America).
Open source textbook publishing is not rocket science, or obscure, as a publishing model. It *will* happen, and it's only a metter of time.
I will admit that this model may be just a tad ahead of where the market, or educational bureaucratic sensibilities, are at the moment.
Consider what cost-plus licensing of this material (and the process) to other states would mean - i.e. *billions* of dollars saved, and put back into parts of our state educational systems that need it most.
Another query had to do with why legislation would be required to start something liek this.
California used to publish its own textbooks back in the 50's. They were pretty awful. The reason for this was that there was no distributed source of information, or people, that could work on books; they (the books) were penned by just one or two authors. That situation has changed. We now have the internet, digital media, etc., etc.. There is no excuse for not looking into this aggressively, publishing a single curricular area as a pilot, and taking it from there.
The state legislated itself out of the publishing business in the early 50's, and gave the power to publish K-12 material to private enterprise. Thus, it would have to legislate itself back into the publishing 'business'.
Again, thanks for all your considered comments. We will be adding more information and updates to our site as we progress; we're in this for the long haul, until it's a reality.
Please feel free to write with ideas. We can be sourced from our web site. http://www.opensourcetext.org
What's lost in the argument over who 'owns' fibre infrastructure is the fact that American taxplayers have subsidized much of its installation.
What's astounding is that many companies, having gained the permission to tap the communication resources of a community through that community's legal procedures, should then be able to hold that community hostage to pricing models that have no basis in current reality.
For instance, consider that the cost of bulk broadband to feed DSL has dropped almost 80% in the last several years. Have we seen a concomitant drop in DSL prices? This points to just *one* of the problems that we (America) faces if we give over the right to control broadband distribution to the telecommunications majors.
Little-by-little, musicians and producers are finding interesting new ways to distribute - and get paid for - their music. A recent model that has a band offering limited release recordings for a lot of money. They'll make their money on the first 100 subscribers, at $1200@, and then do another release, and so on. This is just one of dozens of new distribution ideas out there.
a y. jsp?vnu_content_id=1859066
http://www.billboard.com/bb/daily/article_displ
The market is busy at work for optimal music distribution, and that market has already written the epitaph of the music majors.
Innovative models like the above - including Opsound - are popping up all over the place. Soon there will be many ways to get the music content you want without having to deal with the majors.
For artists however, the current system is random, in addition to being not-at-all profitable except for the very highest echelon artists - those that already have a recording success under their belt. Also, it's not often that that even successful artists can create one song after another that consistently please their fans. There is a lot of waste and inefficiency in the system.
One long term answer to the above dilemma will be based on technologies that are currently in their infancy. Consumers will someday be able to know what elemental parts of a song - things like specific keys, harmonies, melodic structures, etc. appeal to them - really, appeal to those parts of their brain that cognate music in ways that please them.
Once these technologies mature, music distribution will be geared more toward pleasing a specific cognitive taste. Services will be created to decipher and forward appropriate music to consumers for review, based on an analysis of their inherent cognitive tastes. Many of these models will be predictive, and be able to intelligently suggest what new music, from artists never before experienced, would be pleasing to a specific customer's ear.
New technologies like the ones hinted at above will open up the international market for music. This will create a music distribution renaissance that dwarfs the current 'world' music and 'majors' scene.
Corroborating some of the above - and looking forward to the near-long-term - music distribution is going to be singles-only, and probably based on a peer-to-peer system that results in a floating price for content. Content that is good, and in demand, will cost more than content that few people (relatively speaking) care about.
All music distributed this way will have to be interoperable amongst many digital devices. If you buy the song file, it will be yours to do with as you please. Nothing else - long term - will work. There is no DRM system that can't/won't be broken.
The only leverage that large music producers have at this time is legacy content. Consumers want access to that. Also, many major acts, hyped by the music distribution machine, are under contract and producing under the current system. Thus, current content is still in demand, but decreasing, as evidenced by the majors failure to produce as much of it as they did in the past [In their dying throes, the majors, via the RIAA, are attempting to blame their decrease in music CD production on illegal file-sharing - a proven red herring]
The catch - for the majors - is that mostly everything from the legacy vaults is already recorded somewhere as Mp3's, or on CD/DVD w/o DRM. The same is happening to currently produced, and distributed, content. Unless the majors find a very smooth, seamless way to inexpensively distribute their content, their game is over - because everyone will soon have what they need from pirated sources. This will really be a shame if it happens; but the intransigent majors, lacking imagination, will only have themselves to blame.
Billly Gates writes: "Verizon will be extremely pissed about this. They will throw everything they have to prevent it. Maybe even sue as well as continue the usual heavy lobbing the baby bells are known for."
--------
You're right. And that's where 'political will' comes in. Politicians, municipal leaders, and the Congress would have to be willing to stand up and recognize that there is a clear value in giving municipalities the right to operate their own networks. There are clear precedents for this with municipally-run utilities. Structurally, this is a no-brianer.
A clear case that can be made for citizens 'owning' the 'communicative assets' that they represent. Why shouldn't citizens, and the communities that represent them, decide where the profits from the use of their 'communicative assets' (represented as communicative capital) go?
This is a basic question, and it will have a signifiacant impact on whether America ever experiences optimal efficiencies and economies form universal broadband.
As of today, universal, affordable, broadband deployment has been mostly *constrained* by the major telecommunications groups. That's something to consider, and do something about.
It comes down to who owns your capacity to communicate.
One more thing: This group has lobbied several Congressional principals; Joe Lieberman - D-CT, Barbara Boxer - D-CA; George Allen - R-GA, and John McCain - R-AZ. Many senior staffers have been very impressed with this model.
One example:
Consider that a community could put into play a wireless network that taps into already-existing backbone fiber.
Newer technologies from companies like Vivato, Proxim and Motorola[Canopy] (with more on the way) would permit universal broadband (with no truck rolls!) within a very short time.
The city would be able to employ local IT skill, take a portion (80%) of the subscriber profits, and roll that revenue over to finish out fiber deployment (if they decided that this was a prudent thing to do).
The TeloPhase model makes more semse than anything I've seen, as a hopeful model for the *fast* deployment of universal municipal broadband.
Check out TeloPhase Communication Networks http://www.telophase.org
e st .pdf
C ommunity-Based_Networks_BP.pdf
s e_C ommunity-Based_Networks_Presentation.pdf
They've come up with one of the best models yet for utilizing community-based 'communicative capital' as leverage for increasing broadband.
They have a position paper here (recently solicited by the FCC)
http://www.telophase.org/Library_Files/FCC-Requ
Also there is good information available for their business case http://www.telophase.org/Library_Files/TeloPhase_
and a presentation that goes into elementary detail on the model, here -
http://www.telophase.org/Library_Files/TeloPha
It's entirely possible for communities to take control of their citizen's communicative assets, turn those assets into 'community capital', and keep communication-based profits at home, rather than sending those profits to large communication conglomerates who are attempting to recover from broken telecom models at the consumer's expense.
If the political will is there, the TeloPhase model, and others similar to it, are the future and hope of universal broadband.
*Mobility* is the name of the game from here on. Design focus should be more on technology usability issues, rather than how to make human beings adapt to the 1980-90's version of fixed workststions. Thank goodness, the latter are goin away.
Sure, there is a need for better fixed workstation ergonomics, but very few organizations will spend the capital necessary to deploy this sort of thing on a wide scale.
There's probably a niche market in design and graphics shops for things like this, mostly as a design statement to impress clients.
If innovations like this were cheap, we *might* see them make the residential office markets.
There's an argument to be made for that. Humans didn't evelove in anonymous groups. It's only recently that anonymity has come to be accepted as the 'norm'. Whether one likes anonymity or not, we do pay a social price for it. If that price (cost) becomes too much to bear, then technology might (ironically) help us to become more transparent to one another, again.
The ability to 'read' cognitive states will not only happen - as it already has in some medical applications - but will be used by government and private industry alike. This is guaranteed to happen as long as large institutional entities need personal information - gained from monitoring - to hedge against various risks to their respective enterprises.
Ray Kurzweil and others (Vernor Vinge among them) talk about a technological 'singularity' that is fast (exponentially) approaching. It's a place where technologies like the one discussed in the article begin to progress so fast that there is no way to keep full track of, or control them.
Cognitive scanning is simply another one of those technologies.
Imagine that you're living 20 years in the future when genetic testing and cognitive scans help an insurance company - or the government (if we ever get universal health care) - predict your propensity for violent behavior. Can you imagine tests and monitoring like this *not* being performed at the individual level - especially if they're truly predictive, and can result in intervention, thus 'saving' you and the 'insuring' agency from relative pain? I can 'imagine' that they won't, but they will; the system will demand it.
We are moving at breakneck speed toward a fundamental change in what we perceive to be human. This will begin to happen - as it already has - in ways that seem to violate everything most humans in free societies hold dear - privacy, individual rights and liberties, etc.
The only way to prevent this sort of thing from being truly disruptive is to build some kind of 'meta-monitoring' into medical, and other surveillance technologies that give individuals the right to 'review and change/question' the data that has been collected on them - including all cognitive monitoring.
Again, the problem is that these technologies are progressing at faster and faster rates. I doubt that most individuals (including legislators) have even the faintest idea about how to move on these issues because everyone is still perceiving change in many of these areas as moving at a linear rate, instead of the exponential rate represented by the steadily upward-sloping curve of technology development.
The question looms. Will we be able to get a grip on this stuff before it is so well insinuated into culture that future humans take it for granted, with all that implies? The times, they are a'changin'
Wireless technlogy is progressing at 1.7x the speed of Moore's Law - pretty amazing.
Look at what is already available from places like Vivato, Motorola (Canopy) and Proxim - and this is *just* the beginning - wireless technologies weren't a serious factor just 5 years ago.
Add in cogntive radio, software defined radio, ad hoc and mesh networks, etc., and you have a wirelss technology juggernaut forming that is unstoppable.
Of course, the solutions will keep coming, and there will be confusion in the market, but that didn't stop the auot, the PC, or the digital media.
We will look back in 20 years and be amazed!
Be authentic, tell the truth (don't 'spin'), and do the best job given the time and money alloted.
Do these things, and you and your client will both win.
Check out the Connexions Project at Rice University http://cnx.rice.edu/ It's a very nice piece of work.
They're collaborating with Creative Commons
http://www.creativecommons.org
First, I wish them well, but the current Gibson management has a history of failed and ill-supported attempts to make new technology work in the music industry.
Also, Gibson's shotgun-like litigious actions within the music industry within the past decade have caused the music industry to put little faith in its supporting a technology standard of *any* kind. The past actions of its current management will make music instrument manufacturers think twice (or more)before they adopt or even license Gibson technology.
Some history:
1) Gibson completely blew their opportunity as once-owners of the Oberheim name (which they inherited as part of a purchase). Poorly-defined and ill-marketed products killed the Oberheim brand; meddling by ownership didn't help...(recently the Oberheim name returned to its rightful owner, Tom Oberheim, who is nicely rebuilding the brand).
2) Gibson bought Zeta Violin (a very innovative manufacturer of electronic violins and basses), and with it the services of the gifted engineer who who started Zeta. They had this engineer cobble together a MIDI substitute called ZIPPY. This at a time when MIDI was just getting a head of steam up. Gibson's ownership wanted to replace MIDI and collect license fees. Forget about helping to nurse a just-getting-off-the-ground standard, or MIDI). Talk about bad timing. ZIPPY died, and the engineer had a hand in regaining Zeta (a fine company these days).
3) Next was Gibson's infamous purchase of Opcode Systems, a few years back. Opcode was a primary manufacturer of music software and hardware at the time - one of the best. They created the OMS standard, which the Mac music community was widely dependent on. They promised Opcode's then-owner an opportunity to start a little R&D Group and come up with a few new things. The whole thing died in an acrimonious lawsuit, and in the offing, Gibson destroyed Opcode, and OMS. What a waste.
4) Unrelated to technology (at least computer technology) is Gibson's recent purchase of the once-renowned Baldwin Piano Company. Gibson has chosen to take even this famous music industry name, and make it a laughingstock. At this year's NAMM (National Association of Music Manufacturers) show they presented Baldwin pianos in gaudy, bright colors with graffiti-like drawings on them (for instance, one bright yellow grand had a desert scene painted on it with a Hummer riding across the desert floor in the the background - unbelievable!). I can see doing this to one piano, but the whole damn line? The instruments are laughable, and a blight on the once-reknowned Baldwin name.
5)Gibson is run like a personal playpen and funhouse by current management, who is out of touch with market reality (and a few others); however, Gibson has good, dedicated people. For their sake I hope this technology cathes on.
6)Other companies will be coming forward with technologies like this, and others. Let's wait and see if Gibson maintains its consistency in things having to do with technology, and screws this one up.
Certainly, if this technology did catch on, *any* music instrument manufacturer licensing it would have to be *very* wary of Gibson's current management's penchant to sue fast and hard for any real or even (and especially) perceived violation of licensing or other agreements. This company is vulture-like when it comes to the law. Gibson is a great example of a company who is purchased by a management with a few crazy ideas and a lot of money. They come in, buy a well-established company with good products and dedicated peopl,e and make it a personal plaything. Gibson, and the music industry deserve better.
Mikael Pawlo wrote: "Computer games are art and should be treated with the equal respect we treat Rembrandt's painting "
*****
Pawlo's argument, and all other arguments like it - namely that 'art' (something that is essentially without definition) deserves a status that gives whatever art happens to be at the moment special status - is bankrupt.
Essentially, this is a free speech issue, and will be resolved one way or the other as individuals argue the right, or not, of certain individuals (namely, children of impressionable age) to have access to games that promote violence.
'Art' exists within the context of community - period. It's absurd to claim special status for something that has no more redeeming value than any other activity (a good example would be creative plumbing, or assembly-line work [yes, it's possible]) that exist as one of a number of necessary functions that give individuals a sense of purpose and contribution to community.
The sooner anyone who calls herself an artist begins to understand that, the better off we'll all be - especially those who define themselves as artists.
This is one of the reasons it's laughable to hear about a 'Tai Chi Robot' - what a joke!
The real irony is that the Chinese - starting with the Communist Chinese - have done more to discredit the real thing than anyone else.
What your wife is experiencing is working with someone who has mastered 'rooting', or 'grounding'.
It's a very small part of what Taijiquan is, at base.
I've had some exposure to the best people (not much, but enough to know the difference), and believe me, they are amazing!
I know one Chinese martial arts practitioner who is tops in his art. He sparred (full contact)with Chen Xiao Wang several years ago, and came away saying that Chen was the best martial artist he had ever encountered.
The real pity is that there are many people who know just enough to impress someone with partial skill, and that's OK, as far as it goes.
However, if your wife ever gets a chance to see one of the people I listed (or go to the web sites I listed and check out other top people in different Taiji styles), she will be pleasantly surprised.
Again, there's no New Age magic in what the best practitioners do; rather it's mastering an astounding series of very intuitive and counter intuitive exercises that develop exceptional movement or - if one wants to take the pain (the Chinese call it 'eating bitter') and spend the time - fighting skills.
Some facts:
Robots can't do Tai Chi, they can only *mimic* Tai Chi movement...why?
Tai Chi (also called 'Taijiquan' - meaning "body as fist") is a legitimate martial art that has been bastardized in China and the West; it has also become something of a New Age phenonenon.
Why can't a robot do leigitimate Tai Chi? Because training in authentic Tai Chi involves exercises that essentially, over time, 1) dramatically retrain muscle fascia; 2) develop enormous leg strength in the practitioner (necessary; 3) teach the practitioner that *all* movement is controlled from the center (this is where the New Age people get it wrong, as we're talking about *literal* control from the area - front to back - just below the belly button (dantien). This latter quality is what's hard to imagine until one meets a practitioner who has it right. There simply aren't many of these people left, and those who are left tend to be very restrained about teaching everything openly.
Here are some good, authentic places to start - everything below is the 'real deal':
http://www.sixharmonies.org/
http://www.neijia.com/
Others to look for:
Chen Xiao Wang
Chu Tian Cai
Chen Zheng Lei
Wang Xian
Chen Qingzhou
Anything done by any of the above is the 'real deal'. There are also other good practitioners in other 'styles' of taiji. The above group is form Chen Style, the first Taiji style.
Zhu Tian Cai
The reason that Tai Chi exercises are performed slowly is to train the body to move, resting on very strong legs, and allowing the "center" to "leverage" the ground for striking and other martial moves. It's virtually impossibelto describe what this quality 'feel's like. There's no mystery to it however, as it can be trained to various levels depending on the physical ability and dedication of the practitioner.
Unfortunately, there are too few authentic Tai Chi practitioners out there who are teaching the "real deal".
Good Tai Chi practice doesn't have to be martial, **but the quality and basics of correct movement HAVE to be present** for it to be called legitimate Tai Chi.
Simply doing Tai Chi 'forms' fluidly is not doing Tai Chi.
In sum, the real physical dynamics and requirements of Tai Chi cannot be simulated by a robot. A robot may *mimic* moves that look like Tai Chi, but that's all.
It's amusing to see this sort of thing. Implicit are assumptions made about how current behavior will not change, but will itself be applied, or adopted wholesale, to new technology.
m l getting ready to give a hearty "heave-ho,ho'ho" to most of the predictions in the reported article.
This is, in fact, the reverse of what happens.
We saw this sort of thing in the 50's with predictions about vacuum cleaner robots, almost always accompanied by an image of a very happy woman (assumed to be a housewife). No one could imagine the Women's Movement just one decade hence.
We will (see Kurzweil) experience ever increasing rates of change in technology over the next 50 years; along with that will be slower (but faster than linear) changes in human behavior. The latter are the *really* hard predictions.
One nice change might be to find a way to do away with the compulsive consumption (the latter word used to mean both "using things up" and "deadly disease") that defines our most popular holiday (in the West), and turn it into something more functional, useful, and fulfilling. (btw, all the latter adjectives imply massive behavior change as well, which might happen as the developed world begins to learn the lesson about what 'enough' is).
In keeping with the season, here's 'Santabot' http://mywebpages.comcast.net/ctrevas/santabot.ht
1) Aerie bought all remaining Ricochet assets for well under $5M - all the existing hardware, and patent rights. They have hundreds of semi's (trucks) full of Ricochet hardware sitting in a warehouse yard (in Denver, I think). That equipment, and Ricochet's IP, along with some clever attepmts to re-leverage this service back into a commercial arena is all that Ricochet really is. Read on...
2)Aerie *did not* get rights to the municipal utility poles that the Ricochet hardware is mounted on. They are renegotaiting rights to those poles at rates far below what Ricochet was able to extract (this will not be as easy as it sounds, and will be enormously time consuming - Aerie doesn't have a lot of time. Ricochet *did* pay too much for these rights, but again, it will take too much time for Aerie to renegotiate with municipalities. (see #3)
3. Aerie has just so much cash to burn. They were doing another network play that was failing when the Ricochet 'oppotunity' came along. They used some of the cash from their last funded venture to secure the Ricochet assets. Here's the rub: that money will run out within a year - maybe sooner. Aerie needs to procure 'x' subscribers by the end of the year to continue. (I've forgetten the exact number, but it was in the tens-of-thousands - around 50-60 thousand within the year, I think, maybe a few ten-thousand more).
Why do they need that number? Because they have to be able to manufacture additional modems and other equipment when their current stored supply runs out. This is a highly leveraged play in an environment that has very substantial new players coming forward.
Ricochet is now just a leveraged asset play compared to others efforts that are doing R&D, have product, a brand that didn't fail, etc. Thus, it's all but almost over for Ricochet. This is a 'last gasp' leveraged play they will garner some nominal level of excitement and buzz because Ricochet was popular in the press when it was operating. Futher, Aerie announced a lot of this many months ago, but in the near-long-term it will not be enough, time and money are disappearing.
4)They're signing up regional 'rights-holders'to sell sevices into their respective regions - they've done this in LA and Denver - I know they're working on a few more. (btw, they're keeping the SF Bay area to themselves, because they think they can generate enough subscriptions themselves to real estate, medical, and municipal groups to make their subscriber requirement in the region [byw, the Bay area loved Ricochet]))
5)If they (Aerie) don't achieve critical mass sufficient to be able to continue to manufacture additional equipment *or* they run out of money (and I wouldn't count on them getting additional rounds if they don't meet very critical milestones), then they're toast (even if they do meet milestones, their VC(s) will be sweating). I think Aerie had about $8M left when they did the Ricochet purchase. (btw, I don't quite remember what the *exact* purchase price of the Ricochet assets was - it could have been way under $5M, the number I stated earlier...however, that doesn't change the fact that Aerie is running on borrowed time).
Aerie is - with due respect - a bottom feeder - trying to leverage a once good business idea and technology who's time has come and almost gone.
Again, what's crucial here is that for those buying into Ricochet a second time, there is no guarantee that they won't get stranded again. Frankly, I think they will get stranded.
Frankly, if I were Aerie, I would find a partner willing to aggressively do something with the patents, look for regional providers who were community based (even not-for-profits, or non-profits) and license what they've got to already enabled communities for reasonable rates. In other words, open this thing up. It won't happen though, because this is all about a limited leveraged play that is already hanging by a thread.
Aerie doesn't have the *time* to build out, because they have a venture funder breathing down their back. Good money is not chasing bad these days - it's all but over. There are many community wireless-based ways they could go with this, but it probably won't happen, as they have a very tunnel vision view of what's possible in this domain.
Bottom line: there are commercial (e.g. real estate)professionals who will re-up with Ricochet *in already enabled communities* as soon as it becomes available. Ricochet will get some subscribers; however, it won't be enough to sustain Aerie long term, and the whole thing will either get re-sold (probably just the IP), fold altogether, or get parceled out to the already enabled municipalities as a cool emergency backup wireless system.
If Aerie does manage to survive, Ricochet has little promise of long-term continuance because again, this is a highly leveraged play controlled by a company (Aerie) that is simply tryiong to re-distribute a service - that's all. Even if they succeed short term, it will take a large miracle to get the additional cash to build out new communities, improve their technology, and meet hard charging, better-funded competition.
The carrier sector - AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, British Telecom, etc. - will soon begin to find its weighty physical and capital infrastructure too expensive to maintain in the face of innovations like cognitive radio, ad hoc networks, mesh networks, and rapid - faster than Moore's Law - increases in the power and speed of communications processing.
These developments are already beginning to spark a worldwide communications renaissance that will lead to heretofore unimagined personal communications and small business development possibilities. Most carriers - like AT&T - will resist the above developments and try to hang on to current business models. Those that migrate to innovative, affordable services will survive, the others will fall away in failure.
In fact, BT's research group has *already* advised that company to start thinking about selling off infrastructure in favor of starting up a nimble, applications/service-based business.
Money will be made at the top as communications carriers roll each other up, but it's just prolonging the inevitable an bloodbath.
1) Aerie bought all remaining Ricochet assets for well under $5M - all the existing hardware, and patent rights. They have hundreds of semi's (trucks) full of Ricochet hardware sitting in a warehouse yard (in Denver, I think). That equipment, and Ricochet's IP, along with some clever attepmts to re-leverage this service back into a commercial arena is all that Ricochet really is. Read on...
2)Aerie *did not* get rights to the municipal utility poles that the Ricochet hardware is mounted on. They are renegotaiting rights to those poles at rates far below what Ricochet was able to extract (this will not be as easy as it sounds, and will be enormously time consuming - Aerie doesn't have a lot of time. Ricochet *did* pay too much for these rights, but again, it will take too much time for Aerie to renegotiate with municipalities. (see #3)
3. Aerie has just so much cash to burn. They were doing another network play that was failing when the Ricochet 'oppotunity' came along. They used some of the cash from their last funded venture to secure the Ricochet assets. Here's the rub: that money will run out within a year - maybe sooner. Aerie needs to procure 'x' subscribers by the end of the year to continue. (I've forgetten the exact number, but it was in the tens-of-thousands - around 50-60 thousand within the year, I think, maybe a few ten-thousand more).
Why do they need that number? Because they have to be able to manufacture additional modems and other equipment when their current stored supply runs out. This is a highly leveraged play in an environment that has very substantial new players coming forward.
Ricochet is now just a leveraged asset play compared to others efforts that are doing R&D, have product, a brand that didn't fail, etc. Thus, it's all but almost over for Ricochet. This is a 'last gasp' leveraged play they will garner some nominal level of excitement and buzz because Ricochet was popular in the press when it was operating. Futher, Aerie announced a lot of this many months ago, but in the near-long-term it will not be enough, time and money are disappearing.
4)They're signing up regional 'rights-holders'to sell sevices into their respective regions - they've done this in LA and Denver - I know they're working on a few more. (btw, they're keeping the SF Bay area to themselves, because they think they can generate enough subscriptions themselves to real estate, medical, and municipal groups to make their subscriber requirement in the region [byw, the Bay area loved Ricochet]))
5)If they (Aerie) don't achieve critical mass sufficient to be able to continue to manufacture additional equipment *or* they run out of money (and I wouldn't count on them getting additional rounds if they don't meet very critical milestones), then they're toast (even if they do meet milestones, their VC(s) will be sweating). I think Aerie had about $8M left when they did the Ricochet purchase. (btw, I don't quite remember what the *exact* purchase price of the Ricochet assets was - it could have been way under $5M, the number I stated earlier...however, that doesn't change the fact that Aerie is running on borrowed time).
Aerie is - with due respect - a bottom feeder - trying to leverage a once good business idea and technology who's time has come and almost gone.
Again, what's crucial here is that for those buying into Ricochet a second time, there is no guarantee that they won't get stranded again. Frankly, I think they will get stranded.
Frankly, if I were Aerie, I would find a partner willing to aggressively do something with the patents, look for regional providers who were community based (even not-for-profits, or non-profits) and license what they've got to already enabled communities for reasonable rates. In other words, open this thing up. It won't happen though, because this is all about a limited leveraged play that is already hanging by a thread.
Aerie doesn't have the *time* to build out, because they have a venture funder breathing down their back. Good money is not chasing bad these days - it's all but over. There are many community wireless-based ways they could go with this, but it probably won't happen, as they have a very tunnel vision view of what's possible in this domain.
Bottom line: there are commercial (e.g. real estate)professionals who will re-up with Ricochet *in already enabled communities* as soon as it becomes available. Ricochet will get some subscribers; however, it won't be enough to sustain Aerie long term, and the whole thing will either get re-sold (probably just the IP), fold altogether, or get parceled out to the already enabled municipalities as a cool emergency backup wireless system.
If Aerie does manage to survive, Ricochet has little promise of long-term continuance because again, this is a highly leveraged play controlled by a company (Aerie) that is simply tryiong to re-distribute a service - that's all. Even if they succeed short term, it will take a large miracle to get the additional cash to build out new communities, improve their technology, and meet hard charging, better-funded competition.
Be careful.
There's good evidence indicating doing aerobic exercise accompanied by loud music does harm to hearing. Why? Because the large muscle demands for oxygen during aerobic exercise keeps that oxygen away from the fine attenuation muscles of the ear drums. The latter don't attenuate loud noises very efficiently under these conditions, so you put yourself at risk to hearing loss at by listening at even nominally loud levels while engaging aerobic activity.