Futurist

There are 396 posts filed in Futurist (this is page 24 of 40).

Solar system

Solar panels

Solar panels


Last week we got our own solar system: a solar PV system installed by Southern Energy Management. Friday morning, I flipped the breaker that officially “tied” it to the power grid. The rooftop panels then began feeding electricity to both our home and the neighborhood.

It’s been a long journey to get here and we’re not done yet. It was two years ago that we first considered getting solar panels. We got the roof surveyed and a quote generated but didn’t feel the need to jump on it yet. Then in February, the rapid rise of stupidity in our state legislature made me wonder if the many incentives now in place to encourage solar adoption might soon vanish with the setting sun. I also knew the price of solar had dropped considerably in that time so it was wise to revisit the decision.
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Government Lab Reveals It Has Operated Quantum Internet For Over Two Years | MIT Technology Review

Astonishing.

One of the dreams for security experts is the creation of a quantum internet that allows perfectly secure communication based on the powerful laws of quantum mechanics.

Today, Richard Hughes and pals at Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico reveal an alternative quantum internet, which they say they’ve been running for two and half years. Their approach is to create a quantum network based around a hub and spoke-type network. All messages get routed from any point in the network to another via this central hub.

via Government Lab Reveals It Has Operated Quantum Internet For Over Two Years | MIT Technology Review.

Cheap Thoughts: Smartphone keys

I hate keys, as I’ve written about many times before. I also hate keycards, and thought it was ridiculous that my office suite requires two separate keycards: one for the building and one for the suite.

Yet in my pocket is a miracle of computing and communications power: a smartphone. My smartphone knows my identity when I swipe the security code to unlock it. It’s capable of very strong encryption and decryption. Why can’t I use my smartphone as a key to unlock my office doors? It sure would be more secure than relying on ancient technology like tumbler locks and keys.

Update 9 April: My friend Steve sends me links to the UniKey and the Lockitron, both of which are very, very interesting!

Google Reader and the danger of walled gardens

Sadly, I learned today that Google is pulling the plug on Google Reader, it’s RSS aggregation service. No explanation was given for the move.

Over on the Google Reader forums, I posted this question:

So, with Google’s shutdown of Google Reader, do the “walled gardens” of Facebook and Google Plus win? Is this the end of the easily-searchable, anyone-can-set-up-shop-on-the-Internet days?

Why would Google intentionally make it HARDER for its users to follow their interests online? How could Reader possibly be sapping enough resources to justify its end?

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Solar Roadways

Remember last year when I wondered when someone would start building roads made of solar panels that generated electricity? I found out today that someone actually is doing this. Pretty cool!

Years ago, when the phrase “Global Warming” began gaining popularity, we started batting around the idea of replacing asphalt and concrete surfaces with solar panels that could be driven upon. We thought of the “black box” on airplanes: We didn’t know what material that black box was made of, but it seemed to be able to protect sensitive electronics from the worst of airline crashes.

Suppose we made a section of road out of this material and housed solar cells to collect energy, which could pay for the cost of the panel, thereby creating a road that would pay for itself over time. What if we added LEDs to “paint” the road lines from beneath, lighting up the road for safer night time driving? What if we added a heating element in the surface (like the defrosting wire in the rear window of our cars) to prevent snow/ice accumulation in northern climates? The ideas and possibilities just continued to roll in and the Solar Roadway project was born.

via Solar Roadways – Introduction.

Cheap Thoughts: Telepresence

Speaking of working from home, we have an arrangement here at work that is a pretty interesting use of telepresence tools. One of our developers works remotely but needs to attend occasional meetings. Rather than fly him in and out, we’ve set him up with a Wifi-enabled camera which he can use to pan, tilt, and zoom around the room. All that’s missing is some way for him to drive the camera from room to room and he could be virtually here. The camera isn’t cheap but it easily paid for itself the very first time it kept our developer from traveling.

I was thinking of bringing in my now-unused Roomba vacuum and using that to move the camera around. I could slap a small UPS battery on top to power the camera and interface it with the camera software to let it be controlled remotely.

Another thing that would be useful to telepresence tools would be an additional fisheye-lens camera. This should show the whole room in a separate window while the main camera is pointed somewhere else. When the viewer needs to focus on something or someone in the room, the viewer will know where the main camera needs to be pointed. Better yet, the viewer could simply click on a point on the room image and the main camera would point there. That might make it painless enough that attending a meeting virtually wouldn’t be so much about fiddling with the tools but being able to focus on the meeting itself.

Interesting stuff. I’ll have to see what I can put together to make this work.

Marissa Mayer doesn’t get it

Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer recently nixed the company’s work-from-home policy in an effort to build camaraderie:

“Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home,” read the memo to employees. “We need to be one Yahoo!, and that starts with physically being together.”

The goal of Mayer to cure what ails Yahoo: Reviving a moribund and enervated workforce that has struggled to innovate and excel over many years. One of the many problems has been the liberal use of work-from-home policies that have been woefully mismanaged to create a culture that is simply not energized.

Mayer is supposedly some kind of whiz kid, and I’d be more open-minded about this move if it weren’t for one thing: this is an asinine way to lead if I ever heard of it. There’s no shared sacrifice. Mayer doesn’t have to worry about balancing her work and home lives because she brings her home with her to work:

Many others at Yahoo’s Sunnyvale, Calif., HQ pointed to the nursery Mayer had built — for which she paid personally — next to her office as a perk others at Yahoo do not get.

“I wonder what would happen if my wife brought our kids and nanny to work and set em up in the cube next door?” joked a husband of another employee who will be losing her work-from-home privileges.

The story quoted an anonymous Twitter user agreeing with this tactic …

“Marissa is doing what good leaders do,” wrote one person on Twitter. “Making sure her Yahoo team is communicating & working TOGETHER.”

… but the likely reason this user was not named is because this person doesn’t have a fucking clue what leadership is.

Leadership is not a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do thing. If you ask your team to sacrifice and yet your Little Dumpling gets a playpen palace in your office your team will be stampeding for the exits in a New York second. If Queen Yahoo isn’t willing to set the example for her team then she’s not a good leader.

I don’t know what work-from-home policy is best. Each company and each situation is different. I do know that if you make a drastic change to your employee’s arrangements and continue feathering your own nest then soon you won’t have a team left to lead.

via Despite Yahoo Ban, Most Tech Companies Support Work-From-Home Policies – Kara Swisher – News – AllThingsD.

LED bulbs: a bright idea

The three or four regular MT.Net readers know of my long history of griping about CFL bulbs. I’m a greenie, don’t get me wrong, but aside from the handful of CFL bulbs I bought when they were first introduced in the market the CFLs I’ve had have fizzled depressingly quickly. The culprit? Cheap electronics.

Imagine my surprise today when I was wandering through Costco and saw an end-cap stacked with LED bulbs on sale. These bulbs are normally $15 apiece but a manufacturer’s instant rebate knocks them down to under $5! What’s more, this rebate runs through the rest of 2013!
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BREAKING: Huge Meteor Explodes Over Russia.

Meteor explodes over Russia


Yesterday, a huge meteor exploded 12 miles over the heads of the Russians citizens of Chelyabinsk.
Watching all the videos on Slate’s Bad Astronomy page, I was struck by how frightening it must’ve been to witness this event. It’s pretty sobering to see this rock hurtling towards you, knowing there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

It made me wonder how close this was to what the dinosaurs saw right before their world ended. I also wondered if this was a preview of how our world might end.

Apparently, at about 09:30 local time, a very big meteor burned up over Chelyabinsk, a city in Russia just east of the Ural mountains, and about 1500 kilometers east of Moscow. The fireball was incredibly bright, rivaling the Sun! There was a pretty big sonic boom from the fireball, which set off car alarms and shattered windows.

via BREAKING: Huge Meteor Explodes Over Russia..