"The world needs only 5 computers" comes true

 Only it will be millions of computers connected to 5 'clouds'.  Is this The Matrix in real life?

Ozzie describes five separate target customers for its web services. First are consumers, who will be offered entertainment, commerce, and communication. Second are "information workers," who will be offered collaboration tools: "Seamless Office scenarios that span the PC, the Web and even the phone. Documents that go wherever you want them, news scenarios, sharing scenarios, meeting scenarios, note-taking, presentation scenarios that use PCs for what they're really good for: for document creation and editing and review. That use the Web for what it's really good for: publishing and sharing and universal access."

Third are IT staffs, whose main benefit from the shift to utility computing will be cost savings, says Ozzie: "For enterprise IT in the short term, this is mostly going to be about moving IT infrastructure to the cloud, either in whole or in part. Things like e-mail or content management, information sharing, and so on." The fourth target customer group consists of business managers, who will gain greater speed and flexibility in deploying IT resources as applications turn into services. Finally, there are the software developers, who by drawing on the utility computing grid will be able "to run applications and store data at very, very low cost [and], for all practical purposes, with infinite capacity that's shared with other people like themselves."

Rough Type: Nicholas Carr's Blog: Microsoft's forecast: cloudy

Silverbrook Research - Technology

The fastest full colour printing I have ever seen.

Not sure how it can be environmentally sound - it will kill trees at 10x the rate of conventional printing.  It's still incredible to see 30ppm full color.

I wonder how long it would take to empty a toner.

Memjet technology, supplied by Memjet Home and Office, will reshape the office workgroup and home photo printing markets by enabling companies to design, manufacture and sell Memjet-based office printers and home photo printers that deliver high-quality, high-speed color printing at breakthrough costs. Additionally, the technology provided by Memjet Home and Office will enable brands with little or no printing technology to enter the imaging and printing market on a level playing field, while allowing established brands to leverage a compelling new printing technology.

Silverbrook Research - Technology

De Lorean on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

With new and improved Mr. Fusion

View jasonEscapist's map

Taken in (See more photos here)

Not a De Lorean. THE De Lorean.

Source: De Lorean on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Crushed glass to be spread on beaches - Yahoo! News

Why does this sound like as good an idea as dumping old tires in the ocean to make an artificial reef? 

"You talk about glass beach and people have images of sharp glass shards but it's not that way at all," he said.

Recycled glass also has been used for beaches along Lake Hood in New Zealand and on the Dutch Caribbean island of Curacao.

It's unclear how much the project would cost Broward County, or if the project is even feasible. The state and county have so far spent about $600,000 just on tests and engineering.

The county tested a small patch of glass sand on a dry patch of beach last year, using sensors to measure effects of heat and moisture. Scientists have also conducted laboratory tests that show organisms and wildlife can thrive in the material just like natural sand, they said. The county is awaiting a permit to test glass sand in the surf zone.

Some people are raising caution flags.

"There's no way that you can predict all the environmental consequences of an action like this," said Dennis Heinemann, a senior scientist with the Ocean Conservancy. "There always will be unforeseen consequences."

Source: Crushed glass to be spread on beaches - Yahoo! News

Tips for Searching Google

They missed one... want to find out things happening near an address?  Search for 000..555 anystreet ave. replacing a range near your address number.  The .. searches between numbers.

Limiting by date can be a problem. Genie Tyburski and I wrote an article about this last year. Date searching is reliable only when Google can consistently identify them as it does with Usenet message (Google Groups) and news (Google News).

A potentially useful way to limit the scope of a search is to use the syntax for file type (filetype:). For example, filetype:ppt google finds mention of Google in PowerPoint slides. Other formats include .pdf (Adobe Acrobat), .doc (Word) and .xls (Excel). Other search engines also let you query these formats.

You can use an asterisk (*) as a wildcard. Example: "George * Bush" finds George W. Bush. Example: "To * * * to be" finds "To be or not to be". I've used this strategy to find email addresses: "email * * <domain>".

Some documents are not completely indexed by Google. Indexing of the text in Web pages stops after 101kb (For PDF, it's 120kb.)

Google limits the number of search terms to ten.

Not every Google version offers all of Google's features. For example, Google via the Washington Post does not offer the cache or similar page options.

Finding out who links to a Web page is popular. You use the link (link:) syntax. However, you cannot limit the search using additional syntax. For example, you cannot discover which .edu sites link to  the home page of The Virtual Chase. The search link:www.virtualchase.com site:edu does not work. AllTheWeb, on the other hand, lets you add additional syntax to a reverse link search.

For the most part, search engines display one result per domain. For example, enter "competitive intelligence" "new york". Google returns two listings from SCIP. To see additional pages from the same domain -- scip.org, you have to click the "more results" link.

Search terms are linked to dictionary definitions via Dictionary.com. Find the link near the top of the page in the blue bar. Other engines also offer this feature.

Using Google UncleSam, limits your search to material from government sites.

Findlaw also offers a focused version of Google. The filter boosts the relevancy of legal and government information. See LawCrawler.

Google is wonderful, but it is not the only Web search tool. Take a look at Teoma, AllTheWeb and Vivisimo.

Finally, learn about and bookmark specialized or, as a professor at Penn State calls them, niche databases. This can save you time and aggravation. Examples include the new keyword searchable version of The Wayback Machine or the even newer SMEALSearch, which indexes freely available, scholarly business information.

Source: Tips for Searching Google

New DeLorean company to revive car

Now if it wasn't $57,000 US and I was sure the frame wouldn't rot out and have to be  replaced every 5 years I would pick one of these up.

Then where I'm going I wouldn't need roads...

Robyn Beck / Getty Images

The DeLorean was featured in all three "Back to the Future" films starring Christopher Lloyd. See full image

Source: New DeLorean company to revive car

Too bad John De Lorean isn't around to see this.

Don't write in those books! But I wrote them!

 Stephen King defaces his own books at an Aussie bookstore.

He was lovely, very nice, charming," she said. "He introduced me to his friends and we had a talk and then I said 'Well, I'll leave you to the tomatoes.'

"I don't think he wanted people to know he was here but I told him that if I knew he was coming I would have baked him a cake."

Of the six books that King signed, five would be given to community groups for fund-raising auctions, she said.

The sixth was bought by the customer who mistook King for a vandal.

Source: Horror author Stephen King mistaken for vandal in Aussie outback - Yahoo! News

Facebook | I have 250,000 users, what now?

Try selling your app for $3 million to TripAdvisor.

Not bad for a map that you click on. 

Just for the sake of argument, what would some of you pay to acquire an app like this?
$1000?
$5000?
$10000?
Currently, the model seems to be $1000 in expenses with little revenue.

Source: Facebook | I have 250,000 users, what now?

Trends in the Living Networks

Social network motivating factors...  

The nine motivations are:
* Financial. Immediate or future financial rewards
* Contribution. Feeling of contributing to something socially worthwhile.
* Outcome. Benefiting by using or applying the outcomes created by the network.
* Learning. Learning from leading thinkers or peers or through the participation itself.
* Community. Feeling of belonging to and participating in a group with shared values or interests.
* Reputation. Enhanced reputation and esteem from others.
* Coolness. Being involved in interesting, exciting, and novel domains with broad appeal.
* Fun. Enjoying play, exploration, and social interaction.
* Fairness. Feeling there is equitable share of rewards (this is in fact most often a demotivator, if people believe that reward sharing in the network is inequitable).

Source: Trends in the Living Networks

Market share for browsers, operating systems and search engines

Are you targeting the Nintendo Wii when building your web applications?  I think no! 

Operating System 
Total Market Share 

 Windows XP 
 81.40% 

 Windows Vista 
 5.41% 

 Windows 2000 
 3.74% 

 Mac OS 
 3.36% 

 MacIntel 
 2.61% 

 Windows 98 
 1.05% 

 Linux 
 0.75% 

 Windows NT 
 0.64% 

 Windows ME 
 0.56% 

 Nintendo Wii 
 0.14% 

 Unknown 
 0.08% 

 Windows CE 
 0.06% 

 iPhone 
 0.04% 

 Pike v7.6 release 92 
 0.03% 

 Series60 
 0.03% 

Report generated Tuesday, August 14, 2007 6:41:26 PM

Source: Market share for browsers, operating systems and search engines

Poor Man's Microsoft Surface?

 

Could this be the non-touchscreen version of Microsoft Surface, created way back in 2004?

Will have to try this one out....

CPNMouse : Multiple Mice in Windows

Windows XP SP2

This is a temporary workaround:

1. All your input devices must be working under Windows (i.e. the device should not be disabled and a driver should be installed etc. -- basically you should be able to controll the mouse cursor by moving all your input devices).)
2. You must be Administrator.
3. Copy cpnmouse.inf to c:\windows\inf
4. Copy cpnmouse.sys to c:\windows\system32
5. Select "System" from the control panel. If "System" is not visible, click "Select classic view" at the left of the window.
6. Select the "Hardware" tab.
7. Click "Device Manager".
8. Expand the "Mice and other pointing devices"-tree.
9. Double-click on the desired input device.
10. Select the "Driver" tab.
11. Click "Update Driver".
12. Select "No, not at this time"
13. Make sure "Install from a list or specific location" is checked.
14. Click "Next"
15. Make sure "Don't search. I will choose the driver to install" is checked.
16. Click "Next".
17. "CPN Tools mouse filter driver" should be available. Select it.
18. Click "Next".
19. Click "Yes".
20. Click "Continue Anyway".
21. Windows will ask for a CD. Simply point it to the location of cpnmouse.sys.

Source: CPNMouse : Multiple Mice in Windows

Or this one is a bit newer and direct from Microsoft...

The Microsoft Windows MultiPoint Software Development Kit (SDK) helps developers create programs that enable the use of multiple mice on a single computer.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=a137998b-e8d6-4fff-b805-2798d2c6e41d&DisplayLang=en

http://www.ardentdev.com/blog/index.php/2007/06/04/multiple-mouse-pointers-in-windows/

Management Methods | Management Models | Management Theories

MBA on a page, the largest list of management theories ever published on the Internet? 

Link to Management Methods | Management Models | Management Theories

Library cuts in Toronto

Toronto libraries get piledrived.

A sign of the times.  I went to BMV books next to the World's Biggest Bookstore last Sunday and they were very busy, with a huge backlog of boxes of books, magazines, and movies they were purchasing & pricing, and lots of browsers.

They have compressed their Sundays into shorter hours to save costs too.

I can see that stores like Chapters & BMV will see some increases in sales after library cuts, though the people who will suffer most are the fixed income, new immigrants, and students who can't afford the $20-$40 average price for a book.

What leaves are being torn from the Toronto Public Library? To start with, the Toronto Reference Library, the Lillian H. Smith Library (affecting both the Osborne Collection of Early Children's Books and the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculative and Fantasy literature), and fourteen other branches (including North York Central, Albert Campbell, Bloor/Gladstone, Brentwood, Don Mills, Downsview, Eatonville, Fairview, Goldhawk Park, New Toronto, Northern District, Pape/Danforth, Parkdale, and Parliament) will be closed on Sundays beginning in September. Furthermore, a seventeenth branch (Jane/Dundas, currently undergoing renovations) will be mothballed until further notice. On top of this, the TPL has reportedly cancelled the purchase of 14,000 items, mostly books and periodicals. These are cuts that library users will see.

Source: Imagining Toronto

Over 14,000 items.  My collection has only 500-600 books and still fills over 7 bookshelves and a bunch of boxes. 

Why didn't they close libraries on Wednesdays or Thursdays, or open to private events on Fridays? 

Sunday is considered a day of rest and relaxation, so wouldn't it make sense to close then?

Hopefully the $100 laptop will be released soon, as impoverished Toronto councillors and residents may need them to read books on.  Mayor Miller only makes $144K/year, compared to his Vaugan counterpart Mayor Di Biase at $164K.

$20k can buy a lot of books.  Perhaps Mr. Miller could convince Mr. Di Biase to give him a loan.  Just one weekend of yard saling collecting $1 books for our libraries could get us 20,000 books.

Perhaps this kind of money would be better spent and more appreciated overseas.  A library in Cambodia costs $5-$15k. 

Volunteers needed!

The guys who didn't redesign Facebook

 But they're still cool designers.

The market value for any digitally reproducible product that is not specific to anyone’s needs is close to zero, as there is always another similar thing around that goes out for free. Why free? Because the free product gets a lot of high value attention and makes up for its actual sales loss with Google ad words or some nice contract…

Source: Information Architects Japan » iA Notebook » Realitycheck: What Works on the Web

Finding my hobby

DISCOVERY
Life is a journey, and you take the time to smell every single rose along the way. Your brain is a sponge, soaking up every detail of life around you, and you constantly look inward to figure out the ties that bind you to the universe. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it's what makes you tick. You might like hobbies like participating in archaeological digs, botany, assembling models, playing the stock market, meditation or even parapsychology.

They're right on the stock market... but I was never into models and parapsychology sounds too much like Bill Murray zapping somebody in Ghostbusters. 

 

Discover your hobby: http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2007/leisure/quiz/index.html