December 2007
121 posts
Google is God - For something I'm working on, I... →
Google is God — For something I’m working on, I compiled a bunch of stats on Google (sorry, I didn’t intend to blog it and so I didn’t capture all the links, but I found the collection so compelling I thought I’d share it): — • Google is the “fastest growing company in the history of the world.”
Source: BuzzMachine
Author: Jeff Jarvis
Link: ...
Graphene could be used in creating solar cells,... →
Filed under: Displays, Misc. Gadgets
Not to sound alarming or anything, but apparently, we’ve only got a decade or so before our planet runs clean out of indium. Thankfully for us, a team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Germany are purportedly onto a replacement. For those in the dark, indium is a critical resource in “creating solar cells, LCD and...
RIAA's Target In 2008: You - The RIAA has lodged... →
RIAA’s Target In 2008: You — The RIAA has lodged documents in the ongoing case of the Record Industry vs Jeffrey Howell that argues that ripping music from legally purchased CD’s is illegal. — If the Judge rules that the RIAA is right, any person in United States who has ever ripped …
Source: TechCrunch
Author: Duncan Riley
Link: ...
Pat Boone, Futurist, 2008 AD →
Link: WorldNetDaily: A New Year’s vision and prophecy.
“Well, only a fool would venture specific predictions right on the brink of all the traffic jam of caucuses and primaries, with so many candidates still jostling and jockeying for position. But I’ll rush in anyway, perhaps solidifying my credentials as a fool. I predict: The Democrats will finally realize they’re not...
BlogFuse: serious bloggers only. →
BlogFuse launched yesterday with an appropriately Web 2.0 PR blitz, including giveaways on TechCrunch. BlogFuse is a tool that lets you create a Facebook application from an existing blog. Compatible with any blog that has an RSS feed, it’s targeted at the “pro” blogger looking to generate more viral traffic.
Setting it up is easy. You simply sign up for a $5/month account,...
NASA's James Hansen Says Atmospheric CO2 is... →
The Washington Post ran a column today on famous NASA climatologist James Hansen’s speech at the American Geophysical Union’s December meeting stating that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are already too high.
It happened at an academic conclave in San Francisco. A NASA scientist
named James Hansen offered a simple, straightforward and mind-blowing
bottom line for the planet:...
Need a Baby Name? Nymbler Has A Hunch About What... →
Any parent knows how hard picking a name for a baby can be. The Web makes it easier to research names, but the majority of baby-naming sites simply overwhelm you with too many choices. You can check out the most popular baby names in the U.S., map those names around the world, look to celebrity baby names for inspiration, or even graph a given name’s popularity over time. My wife and I have gone...
Hybrid Cars →
I’m in Chile for the year-end holidays and I’ve been driven around in a Hybrid Honda Civic. This is the first time I’m actually on a Hybrid so I thought I’d dedicate a post to it, and hopefully convince some out there to buy one. The first thing you notice is the discreet, yet very satisfying “Hybrid” Logo on the right side of the back of the car. In Santiago Chile (a City of over five million...
EU: Microsoft’s Last Stand Against Google’s... →
As we reported December 20, the last hurdle to Google’s acquisition of Doubleclick now rests with the European Union after obtaining approval for the merger in the United States.
One company petitioning against the acquisition is Microsoft. The NY Times has a copy of a leaked Microsoft document here (.doc) that details in dot points the case against the acquisition. One choice quote:
By...
DaVinci Inspires Bike Transmission →
At first glance, The Ride looks like just another high-end beach cruiser. But take a look at the crank and wheel, and you’ll find a an innovative transmission that adjusts for an infinite number of gear ratios. The NuVinci system is based on a mechanism sketched by Leonardo da Vinci. Fallbrook Technologies hope to utilize it in cars, wind turbines and more. But for now, it’s benefits...
Garage Door Opener with Fingerprint Reader →
Biometric security meets the wonderful world of garage-door openers with te smartTOUCH Master Lock. It can store up to twenty authorized users and includes time-limited or scheduled access for visitors. Essentially, it replaces a $3 button with a $130 contraption: it’s obvious from the pictures that it uses the same generic print-reading hardware that’s found on laptops and the like....
“Eres como Santa, viajaste a traves del mundo la noche de Navidad con una maleta...”
– My brother Sander this morning as I arrived to Santiago, Chile from the trip I started yesterday afternoon in Philadelphia.
Aptera's Typ-1 gets a video test drive →
Filed under: Transportation
After getting a good look at this thing, all we can say is that it better not take as long as the Tesla to get to market. Aptera’s ultra-aerodynamic Typ-1 most certainly has some outrageous claims behind it — most notably that 300 MPG rating — and some people are doubting how real or drivable this thing could be. Popular Mechanics got a chance take...
Robert Williams's new web site →
The incredible artist Robert Williams — outlaw hot rodder, underground comix pioneer, and father of “Lowbrow Art” — has a shiny new Web site. It’s Flash, but it’s gorgeous. Seen here, “In the Pavillion of the Red Clown.” Link
Nanotech Squeezes Bible onto a Pinhead →
In a move that would have made Gutenberg’s head explode, Israeli scientists have printed the entire Old Testament onto a silicon chip that is only 1/1000th of an inch square—tinier than a pinhead. This “nano-Bible project,” developed at the Technion-Israel…
The Year's 10 Craziest Ways to Hack the Earth →
(((AIEEEEE!!))) http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/multimedia/2007/12/YE_10_geoengineering Link: The Year’s 10 Craziest Ways to Hack the Earth .
The Year’s 10 Craziest Ways to Hack the Earth
By Brandon Keim (((who else?)))
12.20.07 | 12:00 AM
“Scientists have come up with extreme — some might say crazy — schemes to counteract global warming. This year...
National Geographic on giant human hoax →
Five years ago, “IronKite” submitted this wonderful photo illustration to a Worth1000.com Photoshop contest on the theme of “Archaeological Anomalies.” The powerful picture was transformed into an Internet urban legend about the National Geographic Society’s discovery of the remains of giant humans in India. Several media outlets reported the story as fact. To this...
News.com Extra: Six steps to clean lunar living →
Also: What your phone knows about you. See what people are saying on News.com Extra.
Sweden's Ice Hotel Open For Business →
While some of us would probably prefer a holiday getaway some place warm and tropical, for those who feel like embracing the cold weather, try Sweden’s ICEHOTEL. The world famous hotel, now in its eighteenth season, opened its first ten rooms this year on December 7. Currently, 80 more rooms are being built for completion by the first week of January. Around mid-November each year,...
I hear voices: Could in-skull advertising be the... →
New technologies deliver highly focused sound.
How about a social directory? →
The last posting I wrote about Spock has touched a nerve among more than a few people in the blogging world. Both Irwin and Andy have responded saying “enough is enough! who needs another social network”. Andy writes:
Do we really need more networks, or do we need to get more from the ones we already have? As Plaxo looks more like LinkedIn, and as LinkedIn tries to keep up with the...
“That is ridiculously possible”
– Don’t remember but I’m still laughing
Inverted Clock Always Points To The Right Time →
Jason Linde’s inverted clock operates on a simple principle: the hand stays still while the face rotates. While the artsy original implementation is cool, I’d like to see a huge, wrought-iron Victorian-style monster, which nested clockfaces for seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years, powered by steam, its single obelisk-finger serving as a monument to the inescapable...
Sensors of the Future Will Create The Matrix →
The Matrix trilogy was one long paean to data visualization. As we all know, it began with the premise that life was a sophisticated simulation, virtual reality taken to the civilizational level. Except for a few Matrix die-hards that I’m sure exist, people don’t actually believe this is what the physical/geographical world actually is. But with new sensor technology, we could create...
Santi - 12/19/2007 - Suzhou →
My emotional state (previously expressed through the beats of DJ Shadow) is currently best embodied by the song posted below(it might or might not have been otherwise a little harder to find, depending on who has influenced your music collection). If you are as mesmerized as I am by the funkalicious beat of this song, and the merry children singing in the background, fail not to discern the...
Solar Table Charges All Your Gadgets, Gets Hosed... →
When it comes to the emerging market of green gadgets, we like to
think that it’s about more than the thought that counts. So when we
heard there was a solar table out there doing some conservin’ and some
nonpollutin’, we immediately wanted to know more. The Sun Table from
Devang A. Shah and Michael Low is made out of renewable materials (all
aluminum), goes to...
The Story of 2007 →
The economic story of 2007 isn’t Facebook being worth
$15bn, its not the subprime mess and the resulting credit crunch, its not the
fact that the US economy seems eerily similar to where we were in 1975. The economic story of 2007 is where the money is coming
from. The capital that is propping up our companies and economy is coming from
China, The Middle East, and Russia. On Monday we...
Intel foresees less controllers, more flailing... →
Filed under: Gaming
It looks like Intel has some fairly big ideas of its own about the future of video games, at least if some comments Intel Chief Technology Officer Justin Rattner recently made to BusinessWeek are any indication. As the magazine reports, he said that Intel imagines that “some future generation of [Nintendo’s] Wii won’t have hand controllers,” adding that,...
VC Survey Predicts More Web Investments in 2008 →
The National Venture Capitalists Association has released its survey forecasting next year’s trends in the VC world. The good news? According to respondents, investment in internet specific companies, clean tech, and the IPO market should improve in 2008. The bad news is that the U.S. economy at large will most likely continue to take it on the chin. Below is the highlight reel. Of the...
On-demand personal transport system could shuttle... →
Filed under: Transportation
Britain’s Heathrow airport has already made plans to step its game up once this year with a swank new parking garage, but the latest development most certainly outshines the prior. Reportedly, a network of 18 four-seater pods will be unveiled within two years after Terminal 5 opens next March in order to shuttle passengers “to and from a business car park to...
Who are the relevant friends on Facebook? →
Mark Cuban hitting the 5,000 club on Facebook is all over Techmeme this morning. His solution — dividing Facebook friends into real friends, acquaintances, and power friends — is an extreme case of a much more general need, which is to be able to categorize friends. We already see this in the remarkable number of applications on Facebook that let you choose to designate some of your friends as...
Kite-assisted ship to set sail in January →
Filed under: Transportation
If you thought a solar-powered ferry was far out, get a load of this. Reportedly, a 132-meter long vessel will be making its maiden voyage next month, but rather than chugging copious quantities of diesel while traversing the Atlantic, it’ll be sipping down fuel and receiving a good bit of help from the computer guided kite attached to its bow. The $725,000 device...
Amazon Helping To Change The Business Of Music →
The signs are everywhere that a revolution is taking place in music. DRM is history, the price of music is falling towards zero (and sometimes even free isn’t enough to slow piracy), and even big music sites like Yahoo are beginning to break ranks with the RIAA and labels.
But Amazon may be doing more than anyone else to change the way music is discovered, promoted and sold. Not only do they have...
Google may have finally figured out what to do... →
Google may have finally figured out what to do with Google Apps — Om writes that Google has inked a deal with satellite ISP, WildBlue, that puts Google’s “Office Suite” in the hands of average users — the right place for it. There are many reasons Google Apps works much better for personal use …
Source: Googling Google
Author: Garett Rogers
Link: ...
What Do Venture Capitalists Know? →
The National Venture Capital Association surveyed 170 of its members, and this is their collective wisdom for 2008:
The sectors VCs are most bullish about are Clean Tech, Media, Biotech, and the Internet, in that order:
Those also happen to be the sectors they think will become the most overvalued:
Will that stop them from investing? Nah. VCs are particularly optimistic about their own...
Dinosaur theme park coming to Dubai →
Filed under: Robots
In the 90’s, you might have been convinced by certain bestsellers and major motion pictures that if someone created a theme park full of man-made dinosaurs, you’d probably get eaten. What no one could have predicted back then was that you wouldn’t be getting eaten by a dinosaur… you’d be getting eaten by a robot dinosaur. At least that’s...
TRANSPORTATION TUESDAY: Tindo, the solar powered... →
Solar powered mass transportation? it’s no longer a dream! The Tindo, a solar powered electric bus, was introduced just last week in the city of Adelaide in Australia. The best part? It’s free to ride the super-cute, super-solar Tindo.
(more…)
Lunar Real Estate Boom →
Real estate prices may be dropping domestically, but on the Moon they’re still climbing. The investment bank UBS released a report concluding that lunar land prices have risen 40 percent since the start of 2007. The costs vary, with some…
Nanosolar Ships First Panels (Martin... →
Nanosolar Ships First Panels — After five years of product development - including aggressively pipelined science, research and development, manufacturing process development, product testing, manufacturing engineering and tool development, and factory construction - we now have shipped …
Source: Nanosolar Blog
Author: Martin Roscheisen
Link: ...
America's new jobs: We don't need no education,... →
The United States doesn’t have much in the way of productivity in its future, according to BLS projections.
Anti-Aging Drugs Could Change the Nature of Death →
A new class of drugs aimed at age-related physical and mental deterioration could change not only the nature of life, but of death. The drugs target mitochondria, the cellular power generators that provide our bodies with chemical energy. Over time, mitochondria accumulate damage, causing cells and eventually tissues to malfunction and break down. Some scientists believe that such seemingly...
Virtual Cable nav system superimposes route... →
Filed under: Displays, GPS, Transportation
We’ve seen quite a few next-gen nav device concepts, but none with as much potential as the Virtual Cable, from a New Jersey company called Making Virtual Solid. The system uses a laser, a set of lenses, and a moving mirror mounted in the dashboard to project a 3D route-guidance line above the road ahead, as though it’s actually out in front...
You Get What You Give →
My brother in law has a saying, “you get what you give.” Every time he says it, I just nod my head. In the late 90s, after I started my first venture capital firm, I was working like a dog and had a young family, a wife and three kids. At an offsite that I attended, there was a psychologist who talked about work life balance. He said, “you’d better pay attention to your kids when they are young,...
Founders Fund Closes $220 Million Second Fund →
San Francisco based Founders Fund launched in 2005 with a $50 million venture fund. They’ve had two liquidity events since then, and a handful of other very high profile investments (Facebook, Powerset, Ooma, Quantcast, Slide, Geni, Causes, etc.).
Today they will announce a second fund, Founders Fund II. It’s much larger - $220 million. And unlike the first fund, the money comes mostly from...
Ribbit Pulls Back the Covers On Its Voice 2.0... →
In case it isn’t abundantly clear by now, voice is just another application—bits that can be co-mingled with other data in unexpected ways. Ribbit, a startup that officially launches today and calls itself “Silicon Valley’s first phone company,” takes that concept as its basic premise. It wants to be the platform company for Voice 2.0 applications. If its plans succeed, there will be thousands of...