To answer the question that I glossed over before... We don't have the engines technology right now which could do the job. According to NASA, as of May 25 2009, there are 6185 Near Earth Asteroids, 779 of which are over 1km in diameter, (quick math: 5406 are under 1km); so, we have a few candidates to choose from.
Well, that's sort of my point. We don't (currently) have the technology available to pull that much mass back to Earth orbit. For that matter, we can't get to the Moon and back with what we've got available right now. In the next two or three decades we will have the building blocks needed for small scale operations (a pilot plant, if you will). Clearly there's the possiblity of profit, if you can make the massive initial outlay. You can then use the initial mining operations to boot-strap the 2nd generation by providing the raw materials and supporting infrastructure needed, therefore reducing cost and increasing returns.
Actually, it was all said tongue in cheek. Having gotten that out of the way... As someone else pointed out, they're only considered "rare-earths" for historical reasons. I believe some of the platinum groups are less abundant; but, equally necessary to support our technology. In either case, the relative abundance of elements on Earth should be relatively similar throughout the inner solar system, with some tendancy for sorting by mass as the original cloud condensed to form the Sun and planets.
You do understand, of course, the astronomic (pun intended) price of the resources mined in the asteroid belt?
It's very high. Most of the cost is in launching the equipment and supplies needed. Then there's manpower and support. Consider NEO 433 Eros, a relatively easy target to which we have sent a robotic probe. It has a metal content which, by one estimate, is worth $20 Trillion (US) at current market prices. The technology and marketplace might not support a mining expedition to Eros right now; but, it's conceivable that in the near future a business case could be made for such an effort. Now consider that 433 Eros is only 3% metal content. Another example with higher metal content is 4660 Nereus. There are hundreds more which have orbits that bring them near Earth.
I don't know about his specific situation; but, I can speak about mine. Homeless in the late 80's as a teenager. It's damn hard to get a job when you can't fill out the home address on the application -- they HR droids throw away "incomplete" applications. It's also hard to get called in for an interview, when you have no phone (we didn't have cell phones available in the '80s like we do now). At the time, the area I lived in had a very low homeless rate; so, if you tried to explain you were homeless some seemed to believe you were lying. I had strangers say to me, "Surely you have a place you can stay." A couple companies indicated they would not hire me because they could not believe I would be a reliable employee. It certainly didn't help that I was young. In the end, I worked day labor and temp jobs until I could get back on my feet and get in to college.
Ended up coming "home" early because of things my parents did to my credit while I was away, which prevented me from renting an apartment or obtaining student loans. That put me back into the same unstable situation I was in before. Lost at least one job to the background check. Probably others as well. Ended up taking a job at an amusement park for a summer, then a temp job at a manufacturing plant. It took a looooong time to get completely out of the hole and isolate myself from my parents, who put me there the first and second time. I essentially lost a decade to this.
Clean rooms are needed at some level. Cleanliness is the key factor. If you're doing this in a garage workshop you'll not be doing 45nm process. You'll be closer to 45um (1/20mm), along the lines of the medium scale and large scale integration done in the '60's and '70's. If you're willing to accept losses and low yield, you can accomplish this using simple bench top equipment. Having done something similar in a university lab back in the '80s, I can assure you it CAN BE DONE.
The "make your own chip" approach is usually done in FPGAs these days. You can still buy a 6502, as a verilog program for an FPGA, if you really want it. As to actually processing your own silicon wafer, that can be done in your garage workshop, but is much harder.
The user has a point. There's a massive number of companies, large and small, that have business processes dependant on VBA scripts in Microsoft Office apps. This keeps a lot of companies using Office, because they don't want to re-create those scripts -- many of which were created by people who don't know java; or, to be fair, don't know how to code in Basic either. (some of the stuff I've seen *shudder*)
If Google can offer similar scripting capability, and interpret existing VBA scripts, they might take some of Microsoft's business. Unfortunately, there are licensing fees Microsoft demands for VBA.
That's excellent! Since there are no polar bears in Switzerland, that means it must NEVER be winter! (Then I'd hate to see what a Swiss winter is really like)
While you may be right, I'm more inclined to see the near future as the INCREASE in Itanium sales, given that they finally got rid of the Itanium only chipset platforms and are moving to a single unified chipset for both Xeons and Itaniums: The benefit? Another fiasco like the SDRAM memory controller followed by RDRAM->DDR2 controllers surviving for ~5 years apiece won't happen, allowing Itanium to benefit from best of breed features and maximal memory bandwidth for that generation of parts, something that previously hadn't been happening.
But that's just my take on it, and only time will tell.
While that is an interesting development, Itanium is falling behind technilogically. Any advantage they had will be gone, due to the raw computational horsepower available in x86, even if this is a less elegant solution.
I know there are a lot of Itanium machines out there; and, there are definite advantages to the ISA. However, Itanium has been in decline, almost from it's release. I would not be surprised if this next iteration in the pipeline is the last. I would also not be surprised, given the economy and the continuous delays, if this next iteration never sees the light of day.
Any RFID tag that can pump out a signal big enough to be seen by an overflying aircraft, is a nice beacon which can be used to radio-locate your soldier's chest. Snipers are sure to love this idea! Oh wait, this is bad.
Mod me stupid if you must. If you need an MBA, or a lawyer, get one who's worked in the field. Not one who has no experience with digital security issues, not a clue. And, seriously, I don't think a reasonable person would consider a working knowledge of DRM litigation to be "experience" in digital security.
Yes they do (Polaroid). I think you're referring to Fuji film. From the article, it sounds like Polaroid, ownership of the company and all of its assets, is in flux. Good time to try to get said patents, if they're still valid.
Yeah, but Apple computers tended to be crap at the time. It was easy to do better, which some of the clones were... Shades of Compaq vs. IBM back in the early days.
Not necessarily true. Polaroid stopped making the film because it made sense for them to stop making film. If they're trying to compete with digital cameras, Polaroid instant film will lose. If they're trying to provide supplies for a niche product, where the consumer might be willing to pay a higher price, then it might be profitable. Maybe not for Polaroid, because, again, it tried to work on large scales and compete with other formats like digital and 35mm; but, perhaps for a smaller vender working in a hobbyist market, it will work. Oh, and by the way, I can mix this kind of stuff up in my workshop... It's just chemistry.
Sir, your experience and archival methodology is to be commended. Please inform the U.S. Library of Congress as to how you have managed to maintain your library without having failures due to degradation. Our experience, unfortunately, does not match yours.
But why would you appoint a lawyer to a position that clearly needs a person with a technical skillset, a technical background, in order to even understand the security issues and assess the implications.
Slashdot Mirror
To answer the question that I glossed over before... We don't have the engines technology right now which could do the job. According to NASA, as of May 25 2009, there are 6185 Near Earth Asteroids, 779 of which are over 1km in diameter, (quick math: 5406 are under 1km); so, we have a few candidates to choose from.
Well, that's sort of my point. We don't (currently) have the technology available to pull that much mass back to Earth orbit. For that matter, we can't get to the Moon and back with what we've got available right now. In the next two or three decades we will have the building blocks needed for small scale operations (a pilot plant, if you will). Clearly there's the possiblity of profit, if you can make the massive initial outlay. You can then use the initial mining operations to boot-strap the 2nd generation by providing the raw materials and supporting infrastructure needed, therefore reducing cost and increasing returns.
Soon, soon my pretty.
oops, I only saw the beer (clearly indicates where my mind is)
are only rare on Earth. Citation, please?
Actually, it was all said tongue in cheek. Having gotten that out of the way... As someone else pointed out, they're only considered "rare-earths" for historical reasons. I believe some of the platinum groups are less abundant; but, equally necessary to support our technology. In either case, the relative abundance of elements on Earth should be relatively similar throughout the inner solar system, with some tendancy for sorting by mass as the original cloud condensed to form the Sun and planets.
You do understand, of course, the astronomic (pun intended) price of the resources mined in the asteroid belt?
It's very high. Most of the cost is in launching the equipment and supplies needed. Then there's manpower and support. Consider NEO 433 Eros, a relatively easy target to which we have sent a robotic probe. It has a metal content which, by one estimate, is worth $20 Trillion (US) at current market prices. The technology and marketplace might not support a mining expedition to Eros right now; but, it's conceivable that in the near future a business case could be made for such an effort. Now consider that 433 Eros is only 3% metal content. Another example with higher metal content is 4660 Nereus. There are hundreds more which have orbits that bring them near Earth.
are only rare on Earth. Time to start asteroid mining.
It amazes me that here on /. it took 6 hours for someone to post this idea.
I don't know about his specific situation; but, I can speak about mine. Homeless in the late 80's as a teenager. It's damn hard to get a job when you can't fill out the home address on the application -- they HR droids throw away "incomplete" applications. It's also hard to get called in for an interview, when you have no phone (we didn't have cell phones available in the '80s like we do now). At the time, the area I lived in had a very low homeless rate; so, if you tried to explain you were homeless some seemed to believe you were lying. I had strangers say to me, "Surely you have a place you can stay." A couple companies indicated they would not hire me because they could not believe I would be a reliable employee. It certainly didn't help that I was young. In the end, I worked day labor and temp jobs until I could get back on my feet and get in to college.
Ended up coming "home" early because of things my parents did to my credit while I was away, which prevented me from renting an apartment or obtaining student loans. That put me back into the same unstable situation I was in before. Lost at least one job to the background check. Probably others as well. Ended up taking a job at an amusement park for a summer, then a temp job at a manufacturing plant. It took a looooong time to get completely out of the hole and isolate myself from my parents, who put me there the first and second time. I essentially lost a decade to this.
While, you think you're being cute... 127.0.0.1 doesn't keep you fed, warm, and dry.
Clean rooms are needed at some level. Cleanliness is the key factor. If you're doing this in a garage workshop you'll not be doing 45nm process. You'll be closer to 45um (1/20mm), along the lines of the medium scale and large scale integration done in the '60's and '70's. If you're willing to accept losses and low yield, you can accomplish this using simple bench top equipment. Having done something similar in a university lab back in the '80s, I can assure you it CAN BE DONE.
The "make your own chip" approach is usually done in FPGAs these days. You can still buy a 6502, as a verilog program for an FPGA, if you really want it. As to actually processing your own silicon wafer, that can be done in your garage workshop, but is much harder.
The user has a point. There's a massive number of companies, large and small, that have business processes dependant on VBA scripts in Microsoft Office apps. This keeps a lot of companies using Office, because they don't want to re-create those scripts -- many of which were created by people who don't know java; or, to be fair, don't know how to code in Basic either. (some of the stuff I've seen *shudder*)
If Google can offer similar scripting capability, and interpret existing VBA scripts, they might take some of Microsoft's business. Unfortunately, there are licensing fees Microsoft demands for VBA.
Sadly this is essentially true. Any time a sub fires a torpedo or a missle, it makes its location known to damn near half the world.
That's excellent! Since there are no polar bears in Switzerland, that means it must NEVER be winter! (Then I'd hate to see what a Swiss winter is really like)
While you may be right, I'm more inclined to see the near future as the INCREASE in Itanium sales, given that they finally got rid of the Itanium only chipset platforms and are moving to a single unified chipset for both Xeons and Itaniums: The benefit? Another fiasco like the SDRAM memory controller followed by RDRAM->DDR2 controllers surviving for ~5 years apiece won't happen, allowing Itanium to benefit from best of breed features and maximal memory bandwidth for that generation of parts, something that previously hadn't been happening. But that's just my take on it, and only time will tell.
While that is an interesting development, Itanium is falling behind technilogically. Any advantage they had will be gone, due to the raw computational horsepower available in x86, even if this is a less elegant solution.
*sniff* x86 is getting to be so grown up *sniff* I remember when it was just a little 16 bit chip.
I know there are a lot of Itanium machines out there; and, there are definite advantages to the ISA. However, Itanium has been in decline, almost from it's release. I would not be surprised if this next iteration in the pipeline is the last. I would also not be surprised, given the economy and the continuous delays, if this next iteration never sees the light of day.
Tritium. There, solved the energy source problem for you.
Any RFID tag that can pump out a signal big enough to be seen by an overflying aircraft, is a nice beacon which can be used to radio-locate your soldier's chest. Snipers are sure to love this idea! Oh wait, this is bad.
Mod me stupid if you must. If you need an MBA, or a lawyer, get one who's worked in the field. Not one who has no experience with digital security issues, not a clue. And, seriously, I don't think a reasonable person would consider a working knowledge of DRM litigation to be "experience" in digital security.
Yes they do (Polaroid). I think you're referring to Fuji film. From the article, it sounds like Polaroid, ownership of the company and all of its assets, is in flux. Good time to try to get said patents, if they're still valid.
Yeah, but Apple computers tended to be crap at the time. It was easy to do better, which some of the clones were... Shades of Compaq vs. IBM back in the early days.
Not necessarily true. Polaroid stopped making the film because it made sense for them to stop making film. If they're trying to compete with digital cameras, Polaroid instant film will lose. If they're trying to provide supplies for a niche product, where the consumer might be willing to pay a higher price, then it might be profitable. Maybe not for Polaroid, because, again, it tried to work on large scales and compete with other formats like digital and 35mm; but, perhaps for a smaller vender working in a hobbyist market, it will work. Oh, and by the way, I can mix this kind of stuff up in my workshop... It's just chemistry.
Sir, your experience and archival methodology is to be commended. Please inform the U.S. Library of Congress as to how you have managed to maintain your library without having failures due to degradation. Our experience, unfortunately, does not match yours.
But why would you appoint a lawyer to a position that clearly needs a person with a technical skillset, a technical background, in order to even understand the security issues and assess the implications.
How many cats rescue injured people?