techcrunth: 9월 2008

2008년 9월 25일 목요일

How to Innovate: Interview With Dean Kamen

The Telegraph has a lengthy and inspiring look at the life of Dean Kamen. It covers in depth the history and ideals of the eccentric inventor. A great read if you want to study the work habits and mindset of a great innovator (Kamen keeps distractions low - he hasn’t even watched a movie since he was a child), or if you just want an update on awesome future technology. One fantastic project he’s working on is a hybrid electric car that can run on almost any fuel - “jet fuel to cow dung”. Even more amazing - the engine design is over 200 years old.

The Telegraph reports:

Now he and his engineers have built and tested a range of Stirling engines suitable for mass production that can be run on anything from jet fuel to cow dung. The one in the boot of the small blue car is designed to extend its range and constantly recharge its batteries to make a new kind of hybrid vehicle: one fit for the roads of the 21st century. A Stirling-electric hybrid, Kamen tells me, can travel farther and more efficiently than conventional electric cars; it generates enough power to run energy-hungry devices such as heaters and defrosters that are essential for drivers who, unlike those he calls the ‘tofu heads’ of California, must cope with a cold climate; and even using petrol, the engine runs far cleaner than petrol-electric hybrids such as Toyota’s Prius.

Telegraph: “Dean Kamen: part man, part machine”

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.psfk.com/2008/10/how-to-innovate-interview-with-dean-kamen.html (Fri Oct 31 16:53:09 2008).

Information technology: Clouds and judgment

Computing is about to face a trade-off between sovereignty and efficiency

WORRYING about the next big thing in high-tech may seem otherworldly just now. The world is flirting with recession and IT is likely to suffer badly as a result (see article). Yet this will not stop a shift that promises to affect everyone (see our special report this week). Computing is fast becoming a “cloud”—a collection of disembodied services accessible from anywhere and detached from the underlying hardware. The chances are that much of business and everyday computing will one day be mediated by this ethereal cloud.

This presents a paradox. On one hand, computing will be a borderless utility. Technically, it need not matter whether your data and programs are stored down the road or on the other side of the world; everything will look as if it is happening on the screen in front of you. On the other, geography still matters. The data centres that contain the cloud, each often the size of several football pitches, cannot be built just anywhere. They need cheap power, fibre-optic cables, a chilly climate and dry air (otherwise you have to remove heat and humidity, which do horrible things to electronics). Good sites are scarce. Iceland fits the bill. Google is even thinking of building floating data centres, cooled by seawater and powered by the waves. ...

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12471098&fsrc=rss (Thu Oct 23 11:43:08 2008).

ESPN: Black Magic

Filmmaker Dan Klores links the rise of the United States civil rights movement to the history of African American basketball players and coaches at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Narrated by actor Samuel L. Jackson and musician Wynton Marsalis, this documentary explores the intersection of sports and culture through game footage and interviews with players such as Willis Reed and Dick Barnett.

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.netflix.com/Movie/ESPN_Black_Magic/70105279 (Sat Nov 1 11:38:09 2008).

2008년 9월 18일 목요일

Jonathan Carroll's The Ghost in Love: magical and wonderful fantasy novel about ghosts and love and nostalgia

Jonathan Carroll's latest novel, The Ghost in Love is the latest of thirteen genuinely magical fantasy novels in which the author makes magic the way Fred Astaire danced: effortless, simple, wondrous.

In the Ghost in Love, Ben and his girlfriend German have just broken up a long-term relationship that seems to have been as wonderful as love can be (Carroll has a special gift for bringing happy family relations to life). Now they are on the outs, and sharing custody of Pilot, their shelter-dog, and every time they meet to swap the dog, their hearts break anew.

Ben should have died the day he got the dog, when he slipped on ice and broke his head. But he didn't. So the Angel of Death sent Ben's ghost, Ling, to earth, to investigate why the universe has stopped obeying its divine destiny. Ling is hopelessly in love with German, and the ghost is also a fantastic cook (as is Ben), so whenever German is due to come over, Ling spends the whole day cooking elaborate, invisible meals for her, while chatting morosely with the dog (all ghosts speak Dog).

That's all in the first few pages. Then it gets weird.

Carroll's standard formula for his novels is to introduce us to wonderful people living magical blessed lives, lives so achingly rendered that you want to crawl into the page and snuggle under the covers with them. Then he smashes their lives like sand-castles, and his wonderful people fall apart while magic unmakes them, rewriting the rules of their world to reveal hidden truths about love, family, self-regard, self-loathing, and other emotionally charged subjects.

In Ghost in Love, Carroll does this again, but even moreso, using a kind of dreamlike fluidity to constantly rewrite the rules of his world and its magic as evil and good tear apart the lives of Ben, German, Pilot and Ling and the people around them. The story grows ever-more existential, allegorical and weird as the pages fly past.

But it's all handled so gracefully that the dream-logic never falters. Carroll is the omnipotent god of his characters and situations, and he is totally in control of every variable, so that we trust him throughout, even though he never plays fair.

And the message, the conclusion in the end? Without spoiling things, I'll say this: The Ghost in Love contains genuinely profound and illuminating truths about the way that we love others and ourselves, and about the power of owning up to your bad deeds, and about the danger and wonder of nostalgia for our simpler pasts.

I've read and enjoyed all thirteen of Carroll's novels, and this one is going right on the shelf with the others, and will occupy the same oft-visited part of my mental landscape wherein dwell his other magical books.

The Ghost in Love on Amazon,

The Ghost in Love, author's site with free first chapter

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.boingboing.net/2008/10/31/jonathan-carrolls-th.html (Fri Oct 31 14:19:27 2008).

Sprint changes mind, decides to hold onto Nextel iDEN

I’d imagine things are a bit awkward at the Sprint/Nextel camp today. After spending the last few months fielding offers for Nextel, Sprint has announced that they’ve decided to hang on to it.

Not only are they no longer planning on offloading it, but they’re also reupping their commitment to the iDEN network by promising all around improvements. Beyond expanding the iDEN network by way of more towers, they’ll be tag-teaming with Motorola over the next year, with plans to bring at least 8 handsets to market by the end of 2009.

[Via MobileBurn]

Crunch Network: TechCrunch obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2008/10/31/sprint-changes-mind-decides-to-hold-onto-nextel-iden/ (Fri Oct 31 19:08:04 2008).

2008년 9월 10일 수요일

Migration: Coming or going?

Immigration will probably fall in an iffy economy. But emigration might too

FAILURES in asylum policy have spread “untold human misery”; immigration authorities did not know what they were doing; it has been “too easy” to get into Britain. Phil Woolas, the new immigration minister, has not been shy of stirring things up since he started the job earlier this month. Along with much bluster he appeared to announce two new policies: that the government would not allow the population to rise above 70m (it is now 61m) and, more obliquely, that immigration might be subjected to annual quotas.

There has since been some back-pedalling, and many think that the minister went further than he intended, citing another unguarded remark about the disestablishment of the Church of England (imminent, Mr Woolas said; unthinkable, the Ministry of Justice promptly corrected). But his immigration proposal was probably no gaffe. Mr Woolas made the remarks twice, to the Sunday Times and, a week later, to the Times. His Labour colleagues are in no doubt. “He was sent over the top with approval,” one MP says. ...

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12480460&fsrc=rss (Thu Oct 23 11:43:08 2008).

where do I get inspiration - library books!

From some of my latest stack. These are on Swedish artist Carl Larsson.

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://weewonderfuls.typepad.com/wee_wonderfuls/2008/10/where-do-i-get.html (Fri Oct 3 20:02:12 2008).

2008년 9월 3일 수요일

Robert Schumann: Genoveva

Juliane Banse, Cornelia Kallisch, Shawn Mathey, Martin Gantner, Ruben Drole and Alfred Muff star in this acclaimed adaptation of German composer Robert Schumann's opera "Genoveva," produced by Nikolaus Harnoncourt. Inspired by the works of Johann Ludwig Tieck and Christian Friedrich Hebbel, Schumann's tale centers on an ill-fated countess who finds her life turned upside down when she's falsely accused of adultery.

It's for a test: This post is crawled from http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Robert_Schumann_Genoveva/70108241 (Sat Nov 1 11:38:09 2008).

BlogBits Podcast #9: Ressurgindo das cinzas

Publicamos ontem o BlogBits podcast #9, depois de quase dois anos de inatividade.

Pra quem não se lembra, o BlogBits era um podcast sobre tecnologia feito por Diego Eis, Rigonatti, Danilo Medeiros, Gui Leite, Leo Faoro e, ocasionalmente, o Élcio. Além de mim, claro. Por motivos diversos acabamos abandonando o projeto, mas agora estamos bem afim de voltar à ativa (mas, claro, você não precisa acreditar).

Pegamos o gancho de uma discussão que rolou no twitter sobre uma ação da LG que convidou uns 20 blogueiros para fazer um “safari urbano”, que consistiu de um passeio de helicóptero; um jogo do São Paulo no morumbi, na sala VIP; comida, chopp e outras bebidas pagas pela LG; e, pra finalizar, um celular último modelo da LG, iPhone-like, cheio de frescuras, de graça pra cada um dos participantes.

A discussão foi sobre como a opinião dos blogueiros e, mais importante, dos leitores desses blogueiros, poderia ser influenciada pelos “mimos” dados pela empresa. Claro que esse não era o tema perfeito para a volta do BlogBits, mas como nos juntamos e estávamos na onda de fazer, fizemos e, acho eu, valeu muito a pena.

Nessa edição participaram, além dos sócio-fundadores Diego, Rigonatti e este que vos fala, o Marco Gomes, magnata do marketing contextual no mundo e, quissá, no universo, e o Garradini, que eu não conhecia, mas que tem uma empresa de informática e que parece ser muito gente fina, pois prometeu pagar uma rodada de cerveja belga pros participantes do podcast :).

A discussão foi boa, a bagunça foi a mesma de sempre — e, claro, não poderia faltar, pois BlogBits sem bagunça é igual namorar sem beijar. Portanto, se você é um dos milhares de fãs saudosos do BlogBits, vá lá conferir essa nova edição que você vai gostar. E se você não conhecia o BlogBits, está na hora de conhecer, pra não ficar aí, excluído.

O programa foi gravado usando o TeamSpeak que provou não ser a melhor ferramenta pro trabalho. Nós sempre o usamos pois, na época de ouro do BlogBits, o Skype não gravava as conversas. Como hoje a coisa mudou, prometemos que a próxima edição será gravada no Skype e terá uma qualidade de áudio menos ruim.