The regulations will only apply to the US and will be in the interests of the US. When NASA de-orbits something from space they don't really care where it ends up so long as it doesn't end up falling on somebody with the means and position to sue them.
The flip side of this coin is that they don't want to chase away all the space tourist dollars to other countries. If you're going to spend $100K on a ticket then an extra $5K to fly to another country is nothing.
It would be sad if NASA has much say. They have perhaps the worst safety record of any space agency in terms of deaths/person launched.
VC mining was my immediate reaction too. With all those "reality TV" shows out there, "reality" is an instant catch-phrase too.
People have been connecting sensors to the internet etc for a long time. Most small microcontroller companies (eg. Microchip) have been promoting this kind of thing for many years.
In short there's nothing new here technically - just a marketeer with a new tie and jacket.
Last week I got an international package that got routed through the wrong country and took an extra 4 days to get here. When I queried this, I got told that this was done for "security reasons" that they were not at liberty to divulge. Security has becoome a nice smoke screen to hide service screw ups etc behind - just like people would always say "computer error" in the 90s.
What next: "No sir we didn't mess up your pizza order. We put those extra anchovies on and sent it to the wrong house and overcharged you for security reasons".
My son is a field hockey goalkeeper which, some while ago, lead me to think about things one could do to provide "optical diversions" to favour the goalkeeper. One of the things I considered was the use of camoflage techniques as done with navy ships of old, and soldiers through the ages, to break up the lines and confuse the oposition. Camoflage can be used to not only *hide* the person/object but can also be used to confuse the senses (eg. make it hard to tell which direction the objct is moving and what its features are) thus making it hard for someone aiming at a target. A delay of a second or so is often enough to give the edge. Anyway, back to the goalkeeper... if one could confuse the striker as to where the goalkeeper's arms etc are then it will take the striker a bit longer to get a shot off or cause them to miss their aim.
These optical devices could potentially be quite useful... going to have a play:-).
Even though I have approx 10 patents myself, I'm not pro patents of any form.
The "software doesn't wear out" argument is BS. When you sell software, you don't sell the software as such, but the right to use it. While the software itself does not wear out, the usefulness does. eg. Anybody still using TurboPascal V1 for MSDOS? Expanding on that, if anything software "wears out" faster than mechanical mechanisms.
When you take out a patent, you're not so much protecting your product but you're protecting your market/customer base. This doesn't change when you're making software or little mechanical gizzmos. All the examples showing that patents kill software innovation could equally be applied to mechanical gizzmos too. eg. "Method to attach spring to washer" is just as much a problem for somebody making gizzmos as "Nesting identification by colorizing". If Ford own a patent for some engine technology, they can prevent Toyota using it. So how is this different from IBM preventing Microsoft doing something?
The "software is different" proponents are just like the people who whine about their tech job going to India while wearing Nikes made in China. Patents of all kinds, including software ones, have common problems.
It's all in what you're trying to sell. Adding one factory worker job also adds 0.1 manager job + 0.02 jobs at the sandwich joint down the road + 0.1 truck driver jobs for people to bring and cart away materials and products + all the services/proiducts that the worker consumes with their paycheck. These are the upside numbers that companies like to use to show their added value.
To say that, through efficiency, each job should create -1 jobs is not likely to be true. Inefficient jobs are not sustainable and will damage the flow-on effect. In oither words artificailly keeping an inefficent job will result in many jobs being lost.
There are generally two tyes of flash: NAND and NOR.
NAND is very much like disk in that you read and write it in pages. NOR is random access. NAND writes/erases faster than NOR which makes it useful for file storage. NOR is most used for things like BIOS etc. Most Linux mobile devices use either JFFS2 or YAFFS file systems (goole will find) with flash because they are tuned for flash and are far more robust against power failure corruption etc than conventional file systems.
NAND flash isn't as fast as rotating media for desktop applications (and can't do swap very well) so does not necessarily improve boot time.
Using the rule of thumb that all technology will be exploited to the max for evil purposes, it could get even worse than this.
It is likely that the screens will eventually get used to show graphics to support the prosecution's case: "I put it to you that Joe Sixpack took a knife and stabbed Fed six times" becomes an dramatised computer generated video showing a person, recognisably Joe, taking a knife and stabbing Fred - all with nice sound effects etc.
I suggest that the noble citizens that fill jury benches will be heavily swayed by images like these and will really struggle to tell the difference between something like this and true video evidence.
In the old days you could fix cars with a wrench and a screwdriver etc. Now you need a logic analyser! This means that cars are becoming more and more unrepairable items (like TVs etc have become).
As for all this fancy stuff that will improve safety, well I doubt it will really have a huge benefit. People tend to drive to a certain risk level. If it feels dangerous, then they drive slower and more carefully; if it feels safe they drive faster and more carelessly. If you pack the car with "feel safe" stuff then all you nend up with is people driving faster in more extreme conditions.
Safe driving, at the end of the day, comes down to the nut that holds the wheel. Expecting electronics etc to significantly improve safety is asking a bit much.
The press does get controlled by governments. In the US, journalists that don't "play ball" get bumped down. Instead of getting immediate responses they will get put on hold and generally shunted around. This does not make for free press.
The journalists that go into war zones will get left in the cold if they don't say the right things. This makes them part of the political system. In theory, the journalists are independent observers, but they are not. No wonder the Iraqi forces etc treat them as "enemy".
The difference between open and closed source is that people can't extend closed source. Open source, on the other hand, can be extended and used in new ways. The control over who can touch the code is removed.
Example 1:For my sins, I am the maintainer of the YAFFS file system which is used extensively in Linux-based mobile and embedded devices. People have often take YAFFS and add stuff or use it in ways that would not happen if YAFFS was closed. Having people play with and extend YAFFS in ways that I would not have done myself has improved it. YAFFS is designed for NAND flash, when somebody said they want to use it for NOR flash I said "Dumb idea", but the person went ahead anyway and achieved great results. Now a few products are shipping using YAFFS on NOR. In a closed source model that could not have happened.
Example 2: The RML preemptable kernel stuff. RML went and played with preemptable kernel stuff that many people said waas a waste of time (including, if I recall, Linus). When he was done, and could show that it worked, it got included back into the mainstream and the Linux kernel is vastly improved because of this. In a closed source model Linus would have said "Dumb idea, fsck off" and RML would have not been able to "scratch thaat itch" and would not have been able to get past having a cool idea.
Code improves by having different people try out different things. Some are dumb ideas and go nowhere and some are good. Until tried, it is difficult to tell the good from the bad ideas. In closed source, a pre-selection filter prevents people trying ideas. In open source anyone can scratch an itch and try things out, hence open source is more likely to experience breakthroughs than closed source.
Popular Mechanics in the 1960s etc was very much an interesting HOW-TO type mag, unlike the glossy car-wax-commercial thing it is now. Many people browse these mags on an infomercial basis, just interested in how stuff works and what they can do with things without actually ever getting around to do stuff oneself.
Actually, the ozone hole is caused in spring when the stratospheric clouds form. That's one time when it probably makes very little sense to use a telescope.
Contrary to popular opinion, x86 only make up less than half of Linux machines. Most Linux devices are embedded systems running on ARM, MIPS, PowerPC etc which, I'm sure, the Intel compiler does not support.
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The flip side of this coin is that they don't want to chase away all the space tourist dollars to other countries. If you're going to spend $100K on a ticket then an extra $5K to fly to another country is nothing.
It would be sad if NASA has much say. They have perhaps the worst safety record of any space agency in terms of deaths/person launched.
People have been connecting sensors to the internet etc for a long time. Most small microcontroller companies (eg. Microchip) have been promoting this kind of thing for many years.
In short there's nothing new here technically - just a marketeer with a new tie and jacket.
What next: "No sir we didn't mess up your pizza order. We put those extra anchovies on and sent it to the wrong house and overcharged you for security reasons".
These optical devices could potentially be quite useful... going to have a play :-).
Rhinos though are also notoriously blind so probably won't get their kicks from visual images.
The "software doesn't wear out" argument is BS. When you sell software, you don't sell the software as such, but the right to use it. While the software itself does not wear out, the usefulness does. eg. Anybody still using TurboPascal V1 for MSDOS? Expanding on that, if anything software "wears out" faster than mechanical mechanisms.
When you take out a patent, you're not so much protecting your product but you're protecting your market/customer base. This doesn't change when you're making software or little mechanical gizzmos. All the examples showing that patents kill software innovation could equally be applied to mechanical gizzmos too. eg. "Method to attach spring to washer" is just as much a problem for somebody making gizzmos as "Nesting identification by colorizing". If Ford own a patent for some engine technology, they can prevent Toyota using it. So how is this different from IBM preventing Microsoft doing something?
The "software is different" proponents are just like the people who whine about their tech job going to India while wearing Nikes made in China. Patents of all kinds, including software ones, have common problems.
How is that possible?
To say that, through efficiency, each job should create -1 jobs is not likely to be true. Inefficient jobs are not sustainable and will damage the flow-on effect. In oither words artificailly keeping an inefficent job will result in many jobs being lost.
There are a few ways to achieve this with from digital sources including:
NC milling of shapes into plastic, wook etc.
PCB etching techniques.
The use of piezo electric material which changes size/shape when a voltage is applied.
For the EE, wearing a static wristband...
NAND is very much like disk in that you read and write it in pages. NOR is random access. NAND writes/erases faster than NOR which makes it useful for file storage. NOR is most used for things like BIOS etc. Most Linux mobile devices use either JFFS2 or YAFFS file systems (goole will find) with flash because they are tuned for flash and are far more robust against power failure corruption etc than conventional file systems.
NAND flash isn't as fast as rotating media for desktop applications (and can't do swap very well) so does not necessarily improve boot time.
It is likely that the screens will eventually get used to show graphics to support the prosecution's case: "I put it to you that Joe Sixpack took a knife and stabbed Fed six times" becomes an dramatised computer generated video showing a person, recognisably Joe, taking a knife and stabbing Fred - all with nice sound effects etc.
I suggest that the noble citizens that fill jury benches will be heavily swayed by images like these and will really struggle to tell the difference between something like this and true video evidence.
Whetstones, Dhystones, now stoning to death.
It is more like the defendent showing up in a suit, but then getting roughed up by the cops to look more ugly when he stands there.
That was when using a 2GHz CPU. Now if we used a dual 3GHz CPU with a better graphics card, the whole trial could be over in 15 seconds.
As for all this fancy stuff that will improve safety, well I doubt it will really have a huge benefit. People tend to drive to a certain risk level. If it feels dangerous, then they drive slower and more carefully; if it feels safe they drive faster and more carelessly. If you pack the car with "feel safe" stuff then all you nend up with is people driving faster in more extreme conditions.
Safe driving, at the end of the day, comes down to the nut that holds the wheel. Expecting electronics etc to significantly improve safety is asking a bit much.
Perhaps you can't enter a URL and just get google on the browser.
The journalists that go into war zones will get left in the cold if they don't say the right things. This makes them part of the political system. In theory, the journalists are independent observers, but they are not. No wonder the Iraqi forces etc treat them as "enemy".
Example 1:For my sins, I am the maintainer of the YAFFS file system which is used extensively in Linux-based mobile and embedded devices. People have often take YAFFS and add stuff or use it in ways that would not happen if YAFFS was closed. Having people play with and extend YAFFS in ways that I would not have done myself has improved it. YAFFS is designed for NAND flash, when somebody said they want to use it for NOR flash I said "Dumb idea", but the person went ahead anyway and achieved great results. Now a few products are shipping using YAFFS on NOR. In a closed source model that could not have happened.
Example 2: The RML preemptable kernel stuff. RML went and played with preemptable kernel stuff that many people said waas a waste of time (including, if I recall, Linus). When he was done, and could show that it worked, it got included back into the mainstream and the Linux kernel is vastly improved because of this. In a closed source model Linus would have said "Dumb idea, fsck off" and RML would have not been able to "scratch thaat itch" and would not have been able to get past having a cool idea.
Code improves by having different people try out different things. Some are dumb ideas and go nowhere and some are good. Until tried, it is difficult to tell the good from the bad ideas. In closed source, a pre-selection filter prevents people trying ideas. In open source anyone can scratch an itch and try things out, hence open source is more likely to experience breakthroughs than closed source.
Sign me up!
Actually, the ozone hole is caused in spring when the stratospheric clouds form. That's one time when it probably makes very little sense to use a telescope.
More like fscking cold stuff!
Contrary to popular opinion, x86 only make up less than half of Linux machines. Most Linux devices are embedded systems running on ARM, MIPS, PowerPC etc which, I'm sure, the Intel compiler does not support.