Futurist

There are 396 posts filed in Futurist (this is page 25 of 40).

Another doomsday threat dies out

Looks like the killer asteroid Aphohis won’t become a killer any time soon. New data shows it passing Earth in 2036 (2068 may be another matter).

Radar observations made during this week’s close encounter with the asteroid Apophis have ruled out the risk of a catastrophic cosmic collision in 2036, NASA says. Experts say it’ll be much farther away at that time than it is right now.

The crucial readings came on Wednesday when the space rock, which is thought to measure at least 885 feet (270 meters wide), approached within 9 million miles (14.5 million kilometers) of Earth. NASA is monitoring Apophis with its 230-foot (70-meter) Goldstone radio dish in California. Optical readings also have come in from the Magdalena Ridge Observatory in New Mexico and the Pan-STARRS observatory in Hawaii.

The bottom line? "We have effectively ruled out the possibility of an Earth impact by Apophis in 2036," Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said today in the all-clear news release. “The impact odds as they stand now are less than one in a million, which makes us comfortable saying we can effectively rule out an Earth impact in 2036. Our interest in asteroid Apophis will essentially be for its scientific interest for the foreseeable future.”

via Another doomsday threat dies out: Asteroid Apophis won't hit us in 2036 – Cosmic Log.

Call Time For Congress Shows How Fundraising Dominates Bleak Work Life

I first got an inkling of just how big of a problem fundraising is for Congressional members when I went to the Veterans Campaign seminar a few years ago. A large portion of the training emphasized the need to raise funds. The underlying message was that one would never be a good politician unless one were also a good fundraiser. It was an eye-opening introduction to the real world of a Congressional representative.

The question is what to do about it? Implement four-year terms for House members? Public financing? How does America wrestle its representation back from those who have bought and paid for it?

The amount of time that members of Congress in both parties spend fundraising is widely known to take up an obscene portion of a typical day — whether it’s "call time" spent on the phone with potential donors, or in person at fundraisers in Washington or back home. Seeing it spelled out in black and white, however, can be a jarring experience for a new member, as related by some who attended the November orientation.

via Call Time For Congress Shows How Fundraising Dominates Bleak Work Life.

Google Fiber shout out in the N&O

N&O Editor John Drescher gave a little shout out to Google Fiber today in his column praising mayors. Says Drescher:

“In Kansas City, Sly James has attracted technology startups by working with Google to provide Internet service 100 times faster than typical broadband.”

I’m hopeful the Triangle area will one day be successful in luring Google’s service here. Our broadband pipes should be collectively owned like our streets and other infrastructure.

Governor, Mayor sign Dix Park lease

Raleigh Mayor Nancy McFarlane, Governor Perdue, and Secretary of State Elaine Marshall sign the lease creating Dix Park

I got to watch today as Raleigh Mayor Nancy McFarlane, Governor Perdue, and Secretary of State Elaine Marshall signed the least that created Dix Park this afternoon. It was a fantastic occasion. I look forward to helping shape this wonderful new park.

Here’s Laura Leslie of WRAL’s story on the signing:

In one of her final acts in office, outgoing Gov. Beverly Perdue formally signed an agreement Friday to lease the Dorothea Dix Hospital campus to the City of Raleigh, which plans to turn it into a “destination park.”

The Raleigh City Council and the Council of State, a panel of 10 statewide elected officials, approved the agreement earlier this month, and Friday afternoon’s signing finalized the deal on the 325-acre site that is just south of downtown.

Trading parking fees for tolls?

This week a new section of the Triangle Expressway (TriEx) opened, leading to Holly Springs and Fuquay Varina. The tolls for a ride on the TriEx are a few bucks each way.

I got to wondering today if one of the attractions for a company locating in RTP is the abundant free parking. Companies might think that amounts to a better deal but then someone has to build bigger roads to serve RTP commuters and someone has to pay for those roads. Up until the TriEx, all of us taxpayers paid for roads. Now those who use the TriEx will pay for it, and those tolls add up.

It seems to me that it’s all around cheaper to locate in an urban setting, where the infrastructure is already equipped to handle things. Sure, no one likes to pay parking fees but what about the time wasted sitting in traffic, and the tolls that accumulate? Aren’t RTP commuters trading their parking fees for tolls and wasted time?

What is flying over Denver?

What is flying over Denver?


A man approached KDVR in Denver recently with a claim that a strange aircraft was flying regularly over an area north of the city. The aircraft moves impossibly fast and appears to take off and land near a neighborhood:

DENVER – It’s a mile high mystery in the skies over Denver.

Strange objects caught on camera flying over the city and nobody can explain it.

We first learned about these sightings when a metro area man, who does not want to be identified brought us his home video. He captured the images on his digital camera from a hilltop in Federal Heights looking south toward downtown Denver.

He said, “The flying objects appear around noon or 1:00 p.m. at least a couple of times a week.” The strangest part is they are flying too fast to see with the naked eye, but when we slowed down the video, several UFOs appear.

I watched the video several times this week and get more and more curious with each viewing.
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The Daylight Saving Time Fog

I was on the agenda for yesterday’s City Council meeting. Lately I’ve been done with these in about an hour. This session had a few more detailed items for discussion, however, and I waited in the audience long enough that I began to lose focus.

It seemed like I wasn’t the only one with this affliction. Maybe I was seeing things through sleepy eyes but to me the whole room seemed remarkably devoid of energy.

An amusing parade then began at the Council table. City Attorney Tom McCormick, a man who usually stays glued to his seat lest the Councilors get themselves into legal hot water while unsupervised, quietly stepped away from the table and out of the room, returning after a few minutes. I’m not sure why Tom stepped away, obviously, but I do know that it’s very rare for him to do so.
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Cheap Thoughts: a new role for the U.S. Postal Service?

Speaking of antiquated ways of doing things, I’ve often wondered if the U.S. Postal Service might be better off transitioning to more of an IT role. Perhaps it could rebrand itself as a Information Delivery or Information Directory service and deliver both hardcopy (i.e., mail) and softcopy (i.e., email,fax,etc.) materials to Americans. I’ve often wondered if it should play the role similar to IANA in routing traffic on the Internet.

I’ve also thought before that the postal service missed an opportunity to take on the directory role by providing each American with a free .us email address.

The postal service has long been an information delivery service, it’s just that now an increasing amount of this delivery is taking place on the Internet. Could the USPS one day deliver packets the way it now delivers packages?

Phone numbers and 911 hangups

Someone in my office misdialed 911 this morning, causing the Morrisville PD to needlessly dispatch an officer. As far as I know it’s the first time this has happened at my work. The officer who responded almost certainly had better things to be doing than chasing down someone who fat-fingered a telephone number. That was one officer who wasn’t available for other, more serious calls. That’s one incoming call to 911 that tied up an emergency line and a dispatcher needlessly.

Dialing mistakes have always happened, of course, but the Triangle area has gotten hit particularly hard since the new “overlay” area code (984? I had to look it up) was introduced. The emergency call centers in Raleigh, Cary, Durham, and Orange County have taken tens of thousands of misdialed 911 calls since this change took place this year.
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Dangerous Minds | FACEBOOK: I WANT MY FRIENDS BACK

Dangerous Minds takes a closer look at Facebook’s throttling of posts. On average, posts are only seen by 15% of a user or page’s audience and posters must pay to have the post reach more of one’s audience. What used to work just a few short months ago is now purposefully broken, so Facebook can extort you into paying for the fans you already attracted.

But it wasn’t just the so-called “fan pages,” individual Facebook users were also starting to notice that they weren’t seeing much in their newsfeeds anymore from the various entities they “liked”—or even updates from their closest friends and family members. Something was amiss, but unless you had a larger “data set” to look at—or a formerly thriving online business that was now getting creamed—it probably wasn’t something that you noticed or paid that much attention to.

It’s the biggest danger of putting all of your digital eggs into one basket: Facebook’s walled garden may be one of the prettiest out there but it’s still walled. Your presence on Facebook is subject to the whim of the company’s latest profit scheme. We’re all social media serfs and Zuckerberg (or, more accurately, Wall Street) is king.

via Dangerous Minds | FACEBOOK: I WANT MY FRIENDS BACK.