Of course, some people are concerned that the Barhand could deliver beers to people already drunk, but Bowes insists that by reducing queues, people will only buy one drink at a time instead of picking several ones from a real bartender. Read more for other details and references. And send me pictures of the Barhand if you're at the Garage next Wednesday, but please don't drink too much!
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 2:26 PM | Comments (0)
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These 'rocks' which will be the size of golf balls, will be sent from an aircraft and will detect enemies by 'listening' to them from 20 to 30 meters. These sensors should be operational within 18 months and they should be cheap enough to leave them on the battlefield after they completed their tasks.
Read more for some other details and references, and post your comments if you have additional information about this project.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 2:20 PM | Comments (1)
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Monday, May 30, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 10:51 PM | Comments (1)
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"After months of work by the teams at Digital Garage and Technorati, we are happy to launch the Technorati Japan beta site. I noticed that some of the Japanese bloggers had already discovered our alpha site and some of the the feedback from the blogs have been incorporated into the new version that we launched today. Check out the Japanese news talk, book talk, Japanese top 100 and other features and let us know what you think."[Disclaimer: Joi Ito is on Mindjack's Board of Advisors]
:: posted by Melanie McBride, 12:43 PM | Comments (0)
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Saturday, May 28, 2005
In "One more way to find yourself," the Boston Globe tells us the story of a start-up company, Skyhook Wireless, which is using Wi-Fi networks to provide location-based services (LBS).
When you're walking or driving, your laptop or PDA can get the ID number of several Wi-Fi access points stored in Skyhook Wireless database, even if the signal is not strong enough to provide a connection. With these IDs, the company will plot a map of where you are.
Neat idea, but will it work if people move from an area to another one, taking away their access points with them? Anyway, this overview contains other details, references and pictures about these new location services.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:32 PM | Comments (0)
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Friday, May 27, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 7:18 PM | Comments (0)
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Morpheus' demise was not without controversy. In the days leading up to it, the developers' live team, who orchestrate the game's big monthly story-advancing moments, carried out a Wachowski-Chadwick plot that had Morpheus, in the words of some users, "turning terrorist." According to storyline, Morpheus wanted to reclaim the body of the fallen Neo, which was being held by the Matrix's machine overlords. Morpheus tried to pressure cooperation by planting bombs throughout the Matrix infrastructure. That's how the live team, including developers who controlled Morpheus himself, set things up. Players aligned with the game's three factions — the establishment Machines, the maverick Exiles, and even Morpheus' own group, the emancipating Zionists — had been assigned by their in-game leaders to defuse the bombs and stop the out-of-control digital Laurence Fishburne. But not everyone wanted to stop him.Unlike the various Star Wars games and other movie licenses, the Matrix game is in full continunity with the films, so any future Matrix movies would presumably reflect these events.
[via Slashdot Games]
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:53 PM | Comments (0)
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Spiridellis: I think advertisers will be able to create viral ads if they are willing to take the creative risks necessary to make them happen. To date, few companies have been willing to take those risks. To make something viral it can’t feel like a traditional ad. If you try to push the same message in a viral piece that you’re playing on network TV during prime time, it won’t work. If you can do something a little edgier (or self deprecating) it can work. Brand managers should look to the web as a place to experiment and have a little fun with their brand.[via Kottke.org]
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:32 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Mike Sugarbaker, 3:13 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:03 PM | Comments (0)
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Wednesday, May 25, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 4:06 PM | Comments (0)
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Tuesday, May 24, 2005
[Via Kottke.org]
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:39 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 2:29 PM | Comments (0)
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Monday, May 23, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 12:04 PM | Comments (0)
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Sunday, May 22, 2005
To begin, the trend toward larger and larger televisions will continue as screens double in size every 18 months. Televisions will eventually grow so large that families will be forced to watch TV from outside their homes, peering in through the window. Random wolf attacks will make viewing more dangerous. And, just as televisions grow larger and more complicated, so will remote controls. In fact, changing channels will soon require people to literally jump from button to button. Trying to change the channel while simultaneously lowering the volume will require two people and will frequently lead to kinky sex.Oh, and Steven Levy also has a few ideas.
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 10:13 PM | Comments (0)
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Here is how it works, according to "Cellphedia Melds Facts with Mobile Smart Mobs" from E-Commerce Times. First, you register for free on the site and you indicate what are your subjects of interest. If you want to ask a question, it is sent to all the members who expressed interest in this particular subject. Finally, the first answer received by Cellphedia is sent back to you.
This means that later answers, which could have been more accurate, are discarded. But this service is still very young and its creator is working hard to improve it. Read more for some examples of questions and answers stored on the Cellphedia central server.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:10 AM | Comments (0)
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With this system, inmates carry a wrist bracelet which issues a signal every two seconds and is caught by RFID readers installed everywhere in the prison. Officers and staff also carry a RFID device attached to their belts. And a central server keeps track in real time of the position of all prisoners and guardians. Besides tracking locations, the system also intends to reduce violence within the jail and to avoid escapes.
If this system works as its promoters think, the potential market to equip all federal, state and county jails in the U.S. exceeds $1 billion. This overview contains other details and references, including a picture of a wristwatch transmitter worn by inmates.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:07 AM | Comments (0)
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Enter MatchingDonors.com, a non-profit corporation run by volunteers who take no salaries. If you're a potential donor, you tell them that you're ready to give an organ (not sell, it's illegal!). If you're a patient, you register for $295 per month -- 100% of the money paid for patient memberships is applied to running the site.
Then you have access to the full list of potential donors -- more than 2,000 today -- and you look for what you need. Read more for other details and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:03 AM | Comments (0)
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Saturday, May 21, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 9:48 PM | Comments (1)
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Friday, May 20, 2005
:: posted by Mike Sugarbaker, 6:24 PM | Comments (0)
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Thursday, May 19, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 9:24 PM | Comments (1)
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Wednesday, May 18, 2005
Peter Moore, the Microsoft vice president in charge of advertising for the Xbox business, described a scenario where a virtual race hosted by a corporate sponsor, with thousands of gamers competing for a grand prize while their buddies and competitors watch online.For more on advertising in video games check out Tony Walsh's Mindjack article, Banner Ads Invade Gamespace.
"If you are the sponsor, you've captured the attention of hundreds of thousands of people who've spent the last six months living and breathing your tournament and your brand," Moore said at a Xbox 360 launch event.
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:24 PM | Comments (0)
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Then I found Boodler. Its author, noted interactive-fiction scion and game designer Andrew Plotkin, describes it as "a programmable soundscape tool" and mainly uses it for ambiences that are not musical, strictly speaking. However, with the instructions here, some short WAV files, a touch of music theory and a little Python code (not exactly an easy interface, but at least it's straightforward to learn - and you can reuse it to make desktop apps! Try that with MIDI!), you could be rollin' with heat. And did I mention it's free? Give it a try - if you have trouble with the Windows version, it's worth grabbing a Linux live CD of some sort to fool with it. (And Mac OS X users should do well, naturally.)
:: posted by Mike Sugarbaker, 1:37 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 12:24 PM | Comments (0)
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Tuesday, May 17, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 6:17 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 2:25 PM | Comments (0)
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Monday, May 16, 2005
Sony unveiled the PlayStation 3 today at E3 today, Engadget has live coverage of the launch and details on all the specs. At first glance it looks like it beats the Xbox 360 in the performance department, and it will be backwards compatible with both the PS1 and PS2. Also confirmed for the console are Metal Gear Solid 4, Devil May Cry 4, Tekken 6, Gran Turismo 5, and a next-gen Grand Theft Auto game. Look for it to hit stores in Spring 2006 -- no price announced yet though.
[Disclaimer: I'm a contributor to Engadget]
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 9:35 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 3:38 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Donald Melanson, 2:53 PM | Comments (0)
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Saturday, May 14, 2005
Clearly, this leaves a lot of bloggers faced with a tough decision, so B.C. blogger Darren Barefoot decided to call up Elections B.C. to get more details about their position. He found that even a single web page with text expressing support for a candidate, party or referendum issue must be registered. He also notes that newspapers, including editorials and letters to the editor, get an exemption -- in fact, the exact words used by Elections B.C. were “bona fide news organizations”. Where exactly does someone register as a bona fide news organization?
[Via Mikel.org]
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 7:56 PM | Comments (0)
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Now, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture is celebrating the first hydrogen fuel cell powered by cow manure. The Haubenschild farm already was producing electricity from its cows, by using methane gas as the vehicle. But now, the farmers wanted to know if hydrogen fuel cells could produce enough electricity to power a farm and dubbed their effort the 'cow power.'
This overview contains other details and references about this innovative way of using cow manure.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:36 PM | Comments (0)
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The new 'BetaBattery' is more efficient than conventional chemical batteries and potentially cheap to manufacture. It uses a radioactive source as its fuel, the tritium, an hydrogen isotope. When the tritium releases electrons in a process called beta decay, the 'BetaBattery' generates electricity by absorbing these electrons.
So far, the 'BetaBattery' doesn't deliver as much power as chemical batteries, but it could be extremely useful to power devices which have a long life and are difficult to service, such as structural sensors in bridges and satellites. This overview contains other details and references and includes a picture of the special wafer used to design the 'BetaBattery.'
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:33 PM | Comments (0)
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Right now, these chips are at the prototype stage, but navigation products able to track an individual within a city should be available next year. And Rosum even thinks to integrate these radio chips in future cell phones. Meanwhile, the military envision to use the technology as a full GPS backup system or to track soldiers in dangerous environments.
Obviously, privacy advocates warn that the technology could be used to locate and track people without their consent. Considering that one of Rosum's investors is In-Q-Tel, the investment arm of the CIA, we should look at this technology with caution. Read this summary to know how the technology works and look at a diagram showing the TV-GPS system components.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:28 PM | Comments (0)
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Its creator, Blair Lazar, from Extreme Food, describes his experience when he tried it: "It was like having your tongue hit with a hammer. Man, it hurt. My tongue swelled up and it hurt like hell for days." Another "chilli head" -- as are named the lovers of these extra hot sauces -- put a single grain into a pan of tomato soup and reported his wife's words after she tried the soup: "She threatened divorce once she could speak again."
If you're interested, there will be only 999 bottles for sale, with prices ranging between $159 and $199. Read this summary to discover where to buy a bottle of this very hot stuff.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:24 PM | Comments (0)
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Thinking that his article was unfairly rejected before peer review, he decided to publish a two-page ad with the contents of his paper in the same journal. He even asked readers if they thought the contents interesting and received 33 positive replies. Read this summary before telling me what you think and if you've heard about a similar story.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:21 PM | Comments (0)
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Friday, May 13, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 7:20 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Mike Sugarbaker, 1:37 PM | Comments (0)
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Sunday, May 08, 2005
In a lab located at Fort Huachuca, AZ, BUFF analyses 170,000 hourly intelligence reports or about 3 terabytes of data each day. The goal of the BUFF program is to reach the Level II of the data fusion hierarchy -- Level I occurs when a sensor is able to detect the movement of an object in a battle space while Level II blends data from multiple sensors.
Many scientists believe that reaching Level II will take two decades, but promoters of the BUFF program think they can do better. This overview contains other details and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:23 PM | Comments (0)
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The image acquisition will be done throughout 2005 and use the Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) instrument of the Envisat environmental satellite. To create this sharp map, the GLOBCOVER project will analyze about 20 terabytes of data gathered by the European satellite.
When it's completed, the GLOBCOVER map will have numerous uses, "including plotting worldwide land use trends, studying natural and managed ecosystems and modelling climate change extent and impacts." Read more for additional links.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:21 PM | Comments (0)
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Using a concept dubbed "virtualized reality," which mixes inputs from lasers to measure distances and digital cameras to scan a city, they can now build a 3D model of a whole city in about an hour. Obviously, the first applications will be military, but sooner or later, you'll be able to drive your car in an unknown city using this 3D technology.
This overview contains more details, pictures and references about this new way to build a model of a city in 3D.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:16 PM | Comments (0)
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You want to rescue these 'endangered' recordings. In order to give visitors some insights about over 6,000 artifacts of its permanent Pacific collection, the museum needed to read audio tapes named 'sonobands.' Now, these voices which have been recorded on a state-of-the-art Walkie RecordAll system -- in 1958 -- have been saved to digital format with some creative engineering help.
This overview contains more details and references about this old recording device.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:13 PM | Comments (0)
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ReturnKey Systems Inc. has a solution. The company has deployed Automated Mailing Kiosks (AMKs) in several airports. These AMKs look like ATM machines. Using a touch screen, you enter your personal information and a description of the object. If your address is valid and if the object is not included in the list of prohibited items by the US Postal Service, you pay and you send the item.
And international shipping is also available since mid-April. This overview contains more details and references. It also includes a picture of a happy traveler.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:11 PM | Comments (0)
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According to this article from Nature, researchers from Toshiba have developed a system which can generate 100 quantum 'keys' every second, fast enough to protect every frame in a video exchange.
This technology, which today is working over a distance of about 120 kilometers, could become commercially available within two years at an initial cost of $20,000. This overview contains more details and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 4:08 PM | Comments (0)
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Its small radio antennae will detect radio wavelengths up to 30 meters, and because the ionosphere can bend some of these radio waves, the Lofar images might be somewhat blurry. So all the information captured by these antennae will be digitized and sent to a computing facility at a rate of 22 terabits/second today, and almost 50 terabits/second in 2010.
This is the reason why Lofar needs Stella, an IBM supercomputer installed recently in Groningen, also in the Netherlands, to process signals from up to 13 billion light years from Earth.
Stella consists of 12,000 PowerPC microprocessors and has a computing power of 27.4 teraflops. This overview contains more details and a picture about the Lofar-Stella interaction.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 3:32 PM | Comments (0)
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Friday, May 06, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 9:47 PM | Comments (0)
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:: posted by Mike Sugarbaker, 5:56 PM | Comments (0)
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Thursday, May 05, 2005
:: posted by Donald Melanson, 4:20 PM | Comments (0)
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Sunday, May 01, 2005
It uses "a new image acquisition technique known as Bidirectional Texture Function (BTF) that captures the look and feel of different materials." The system handles both lighting and viewing direction and can acquire and render very subtle textures in VR environments. With previous VR modeling applications, you could see the results as believable. But, according to the researchers, with RealReflect, you think the model is real.
The system has been targeted for the automotive industry, but could be used for other applications, such as architecture design or computer games. This overview contains other details, pictures and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:26 AM | Comments (0)
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And I'm amazed by the beauty and the simplicity of their idea. They're using white lasers which produce all colors simultaneously -- but with a twist. The white laser light goes through a 20-kilometers long optical fiber before reaching its target. And because different colors 'travel' at different speeds, this produces independent results for the different wavelengths. The researchers are using spectral resolutions smaller than a thousandth of a nanometer and they are able to get all the results within a millionth of a second.
This method could be used to design cleaner engines or data storage applications in a few years. Read more for other details, pictures and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:24 AM | Comments (1)
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Their core-shell nanoparticles are both sensitive to temperature -- which has been done before -- and to acidic levels. When these nanocarriers encounter acidic environments such as tumor tissues, they break apart and release the molecules they contain. So far, this technology has only been tested on mice, but the researchers have filed an application patent in the U.S., so expect to see practical applications in a few years. Read more for other details and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:22 AM | Comments (0)
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But it needs to be mounted on an atomic force microscope (AFM) to be useful, so it probably is something you'll not find at your local drugstore for a while. However, this nanofountain probe could have applications for nanosensors, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. Read more for other details, pictures and references.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:20 AM | Comments (0)
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Of course, another mystery needs to be solved. You might not know that a local story says that if the monkeys disappear from Gibraltar, so will the British. So when the population of these Barbary Apes was almost reduced to zero sixty years ago, did British Prime Minister Winston Churchill order to capture some of them in nearby Africa? Read more for other details and references, plus a great photo of one of these monkeys which doesn't seem to suffer from vertigo.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:17 AM | Comments (0)
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This new molecule has aptly been named UCB, or University of California Bone. This new protein for growing bones is more precise and has less side effects than the ones currently used by orthopedic surgeons to aid in bone repair.
But if you suffer from a bone deficit today, you'll have to wait almost ten years before an FDA approval and a commercial introduction of products based on this discovery. Read more for other details and references, plus a picture of a bone defect corrected by the UCB.
:: posted by Roland Piquepaille, 8:14 AM | Comments (0)
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