30 June 2011

Edge of Chaos ~ Niall Ferguson on Empires...

Economic historian and author Niall Ferguson speaks about Empires on the Edge of Chaos...
"Throughout history the rise and fall of empires isn't slow or cyclical, as we like to think, but arrhythmic... it mostly happens very, very suddenly. America is a superpower on the edge of chaos [...] U.S. debt levels and its unwillingness to address the problem, has put it in the same category as other great empires which have collapsed throughout the ages."

29 June 2011

Org Charts ~ Truth In Corporate Relationships;-)

Roy Rodenstein spots hilarious Org Chart comix on Bonkers World;-)

Questioning Obamacare ~ Tragically Funny...

Dr Stanley Feld writes on his Repairing the Healthcare System blog about Obamacare Unraveled, spotlighting this tragically funny poster calling bullshit on yet more Big Government promises...

Hubway ~ Metro Boston's Upcoming Bikeshare!

I just heard Boston bike czarina Nicole Freedman here at the Media Lab share the latest about Hubway, the metro-area bikeshare system slated for launch in a few weeks! Starting with 600 bikes at 61 stations, the plan is to expand to nearby cities, grow the number of bikes by 10x, and dramatically boost tourist and locals bike use. Freedman's been championing building up a far more cycle-savvy city, and indeed the Boston Bikes vision is being delivered upon, with some 50 km of bike lanes and over a thousand public bike parking spots. This is tiny stuff compared to Copenhagen and Amsterdam, but it's part of a growing movement towards more people-friendly urbanism!

Solar Sinter ~ 3D Printing Using Sunlight & Sand!

Check out Markus Kayser's Solar Sinter project using concentrated sunlight to 3D-print sand objects!

Debt Crisis Gridlock ~ US Leadership Vacuum...

America’s Debt Mountain...
Yikes, my MIT MOT/Sloan Fellows Econ Professor Shlomo Maital calls it like he sees it in his post America in Crisis: Political Gridlock, Leadership Vacuum, and an Accident Waiting to Happen...
"The Democrats and the Republicans are deadlocked. The Republicans want massive spending cuts. The Democrats want higher taxes on millionaires. Neither side will budge. [...] America’s budget deficit must be cut. According to The Economist, the deficit is 9.1 per cent of GDP. In contrast, Greece’s budget deficit is only 8.4 per cent of GDP -- and Greece is deep in crisis. America’s trade balance in April was (at annual rate) $681 Billion. (the gap between goods exports and goods imports). These two deficits are massive and endanger not only America and the world. Yet there is political gridlock. [...] This (debt crisis) is the most predictable crisis in history -- yet the politicians in Congress cannot sit down and agree on a plan of action. [...] China gets it. America’s politicians do not. And all we ordinary citizens of the world can do is sit and watch America and the world fall of the cliff..."
WTF, is this country really lead by Ponzi Politicians?!

28 June 2011

Realistic Tube Map? ~ Mapping Under London!

Going Underground's Blog guest poster Max Roberts takes a crack at creating a more Topographically Reasonable Tube Map of London's metro system! But is it possible? Or is this even worthwhile?! Yes, certainly, from a geo-informatics and urban wayfinding point of view. Anyways, here's his two top offerings, first trying to more realistically render in the classic Harry Beck Tube Map-style... And here's his spatially informative all-curves map... Lovely works!

Oppressing Pedestrians ~ American Urban Policy

"Across Europe, Irking Drivers Is Urban Policy" writes NYTimes columnist Elisabeth Rosenthal. She probably didn't write the headline, but it really should have read "Across Europe, Valuing Pedestrians is Urban Policy" Why assert the negative, why pander to aggressively wrong car-lovers? Consider these items: Auto owners suck disproportionate subsidies from the taxpayer tit, plus cars themselves have inherently far greater geo-physical impact per user, have countless uninternalized externalities, are an ugly aesthetic blight, have multiple environmental minuses ranging from noise pollution to noxious emissions, and their indiscriminate misuse is the single biggest source of easily avoidable deaths and dismemberments planetwide. In contrast to America's broad baseline urban policy of oppressing pedestrians, Rosenthal writes that European cities are...
"...creating environments openly hostile to cars. The methods vary, but the mission is clear -- to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation. Cities including Vienna to Munich and Copenhagen have closed vast swaths of streets to car traffic. Barcelona and Paris have had car lanes eroded by popular bike-sharing programs. Drivers in London and Stockholm pay hefty congestion charges just for entering the heart of the city. [...] Many American cities are likewise in “nonattainment” of their Clean Air Act requirements, but that fact “is just accepted here” [...] It often takes extreme measures to get people out of their cars, and providing good public transportation is a crucial first step. One novel strategy in Europe is intentionally making it harder and more costly to park. “Parking is everywhere in the United States, but it’s disappearing from the urban space in Europe,” [...] While many building codes in Europe cap the number of parking spaces in new buildings to discourage car ownership, American codes conversely tend to stipulate a minimum number. [...] While Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has generated controversy in New York by “pedestrianizing” a few areas like Times Square, many European cities have already closed vast areas to car traffic. [Says a Zurich official] “When I’m in other cities, I feel like I’m always waiting to cross a street. I can’t get used to the idea that I am worth less than a car.”
Indeed! Be sure to also check out related slideshow featuring some best-of Europe solutions.

China Rising ~ Powerful Ambitions & Anxieties...

The Economist special report on China, the Rising Power, Anxious State spotlights that...
"... the balance of global power is shifting inexorably in China’s favour. [...] China’s rapid recovery from the global financial crisis, and the West’s continuing malaise, have had a profound psychological impact on many Chinese. Emotions ranging from pride to Schadenfreude permeate official rhetoric. Diplomats treat their Western counterparts with a tinge of condescension. What is great about socialism, crowed the prime minister, Wen Jiabao, in March last year, is that it enables China “to make decisions efficiently, organise effectively and concentrate resources to accomplish large undertakings”. In the eyes of some Chinese, and even some foreigners, authoritarianism has gained a new legitimacy. [...] For all the chest-thumping, though, China’s leaders are more cautious than either their underlings or the state-controlled publishing industry. They avoid the term “China model” and do not publicly boast of a shengshi, even though they allow their media to talk of one. Indeed, they appear more nervous now than at any time for over a decade. They have massively increased spending on domestic security, which in this year’s budget has overtaken that on defence for the first time. The government has been reviving a Maoist system of neighbourhood surveillance by civilian volunteers. In the past few months the police have launched an all-out assault on civil society, arresting dozens of lawyers, NGO activists, bloggers and even artists. The Arab revolutions have spooked the leadership. From its perspective, the system looks vulnerable. Chinese leaders have other reasons to fret..."
Very interesting to consider in-depth! Check out the full report.

High Tech History ~ Key Innovation Archive!

Wow, I just properly discovered High Tech History, a blog exploring computer technology, digital history and early high-tech! Specifically their set of posts on MIT since I spotted via Google Images the nice photo of Jay Forrester's Core Memory! There are multiple compelling posts spotlighting great people, key inventions, booming as well as busted companies, and much more...

Ponzi Planning ~ Costly Suburban Sprawlcities...

Charles Marohn of Strong Towns writes in Grist that The American suburbs are a giant Ponzi scheme... "
...the underlying financing mechanisms of the suburban era -- our post-World War II pattern of development -- operates like a classic Ponzi scheme, with ever-increasing rates of growth necessary to sustain long-term liabilities. [Via the three growth] mechanisms, the local unit of government benefits from the enhanced revenues associated with new growth. But it also typically assumes the long-term liability for maintaining the new infrastructure. This exchange -- a near-term cash advantage for a long-term financial obligation -- is one element of a Ponzi scheme. The other is the realization that the revenue collected does not come near to covering the costs of maintaining the infrastructure. [...] The reason we have this gap is because the public yield from the suburban development pattern -- the amount of tax revenue obtained per increment of liability assumed -- is ridiculously low. Over a life cycle, a city frequently receives just a dime or two of revenue for each dollar of liability. [...] as with any Ponzi scheme, new growth provides the illusion of prosperity. In the near term, revenue grows, while the corresponding maintenance obligations -- which are not counted on the public balance sheet -- are a generation away."
Scandalous. Also humorous-but-dismaying is that the Project for Public Spaces wrote early about Ponzi Planning as an April Fool's Joke in 2009 -- but it's actually sadly real.

TEDxBoston ~ Live Delights & Insights NOW!

Here's Ramesh's TEDxBoston talk... Archive: Check out TEDxBoston live NOW!
Watch live streaming video from tedx at livestream.com

Ultra-Pano Displays ~ Future of VR Immersion!

Huge form-factor displays are the coming thing...

27 June 2011

Brazilian Talent Dynamics ~ Boomtime Demand!

Brazil's Boom Needs Talent writes Dana Mattioli in the WSJournal...
"Multinational companies are taking extra measures to secure qualified employees in Brazil's booming economy. To cope with a talent shortage, many are beefing up internship programs, spending more on training and salaries and relocating workers from flat or declining markets. Particularly in demand: English-speaking managers and engineers, as well as those with experience in business development. [...] foreign companies looking to expand in Brazil are competing with flourishing local firms for new hires. Also, local colleges and universities in Brazil were caught off guard by the economic boom. For-profit schools are attempting to fill the gap, but for now many multinational companies say they are having to educate their own employees."
Businesses are poaching talent, engaging with training programs earlier, building an intern pipeline, being more employee-friendly, and most of all, paying more money to attract and retain!

Slum Solutions ~ Mumbai's Vertical Challenges...

JDH Reddy writes in the FT of Mumbai's Vertical Challenge, making progress on rehabilitating slums...
"...in the world’s most crowded city, with an average population density of 20,038 per sq km, verticality is seen as both a necessity and a virtue. While the rich love high-rises for their glamour and views, the more than 8m people who live in Mumbai’s slums are being forced into vertical living, as powerful property developers seek profits amid the city’s desperate shortage of land. Although in principle the redevelopment of slums offers residents better living conditions, it has become intensely controversial as many are left homeless and corruption runs rampant. [...] More than half of Mumbai’s population of 12.4m are slum-dwellers. They are working poor and lower-middle class, by no means destitute, but unable to afford Mumbai’s sky-high rents. Although they are poor relative to buyers of luxury high-rises, they have something else that counts: the slums are known locally as “vote banks”, since whoever wins the slums has a hefty block of the electorate in the bank. [...] “Slum-dwellers want to move into flats, but the redevelopment needs to be done with community involvement,” says Chandrashekhar Prabhu, an architect who has been involved with several slum rehabilitation schemes."
Read the rest of the piece, plus sidebar, for rich additional details. Bottom-line: There's lots of challenges in seeking sustainable and scalable slum solutions.

Historically Illiterate ~ Generation of Ignorants...

Brian Bolduc shares his interview David McCullough in the WSJournal piece Don't Know Much About History...
"We're raising young people who are, by and large, historically illiterate," David McCullough tells me on a recent afternoon in a quiet meeting room at the Boston Public Library. [...] "History is a source of strength," he says. "It sets higher standards for all of us." But helping to ensure that the next generation measures up, he says, will be a daunting task. [Among the challenges are that] "History is often taught in categories -- women's history, African American history, environmental history -- so that many of the students have no sense of chronology. They have no idea what followed what." What's more, many textbooks have become "so politically correct as to be comic. Very minor characters that are currently fashionable are given considerable space, whereas people of major consequence farther back" -- such as, say, Thomas Edison -- "are given very little space or none at all." Mr. McCullough's eyebrows leap at his final point: "And they're so badly written. They're boring!"

Golden Chemistry ~ Great Book from my Youth!

Thanks to Gregg Favalora for spotting the Golden Book of Chemistry Experiments, one of the key influences on me as a kid! This is partial inspiration for Howtoons and at least a couple Moments of Science at the IgNobels! The book is full of fantastically hazardous stuff you could probably never get away with publishing today, including no gloves or eye-protection for starters, but more importantly DIY lessons on "chemical warfare" like this page on Chlorine gas!

Climate Change Recalc ~ Griffith @ Long Now

Saul Griffith speaks at Long Now Foundation in 2009 on Climate Change Recalculated... He shows lots of personal, national, and global data and makes strong assertions about what humanity ought to do. One little delighter comes at the tail end of questions when Saul puts up two equation slides and points out how the vast majority of human power consumption flows through one or the other of these two, from an engineering point of view! Note how he gives each of the key colored variables a normative prescription for how to make things more efficient...

The Measured Life ~ TR on Quantified Self'ers...

Nice piece by Emily Singer in TR on The Measured Life about self-monitoring devices and systems and the...
"...rapidly growing movement of fitness buffs, techno-geeks, and patients with chronic conditions who obsessively monitor various personal metrics. At the center of the movement is a loosely organized group known as the Quantified Self, whose members are driven by the idea that collecting detailed data can help them make better choices about their health and behavior. In meetings held all over the world, self-trackers discuss how they use a combination of traditional spreadsheets, an expanding selection of smart-phone apps, and various consumer and custom-built devices to monitor patterns of food intake, sleep, fatigue, mood, and heart rate. [...] even as startups plot how to profit from the trend, the people behind the self-tracking movement have a very different mind-set -- and very different goals. "I find that the most interesting tools are those that give us the chance to reflect on who we are," says Wolf, the Quantified Self founder. The problems self-tracking tries to solve, he says, are important to everyone's life: "How to eat, how to sleep, how to learn, how to work, how to be happy."
P.S. Nice photo above by Winnie Wintermeyer of MIT Media Lab's Ian Eslick using his Zeo!

26 June 2011

Visualizing Density ~ Urban Life & Sustainability

Great resource on Visualizing Density from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy here in Cambridge, MA which articulates its mission as...
"...a resource for key issues concerning the use, regulation, and taxation of land. Providing high-quality education and research, the Institute strives to improve public dialogue and decisions about land policy."
And on Density specifically...
"The American Dream of a single-family home on its own expanse of yard still captures the imagination. But with 100 million more people expected in the United States by 2050, rising energy and transportation costs, disappearing farmland and open space, and the clear need for greater energy efficiency and reduced global warming emissions, the future built environment must include more density."
I especially like their Visualizing Density learning-visuals, as represented by this example from Boston's own Back Bay neighborhood and how you get different densities depending on what you include and measure...

Stress and the City ~ Urbanity's Mental Toll...

Globe columnist Gareth Cook opines about Cities on the brain: Urban life takes mental toll; green space may cure it. While "engines of civilization" nevertheless...
"Cities, recent research shows, can make us crazy [they] exact a mental toll. People living in an urban setting are 21 percent more likely to experience an anxiety disorder, and 39 percent more likely to experience mood disorders. [...] Last week, German scientists announced that they had found, for the first time, the specific structures in the brain affected by city life. Using brain scanners, they demonstrated that people who lived in cities showed a greater stress response in the amygdala, a brain area that processes emotions. And a second structure, which helps regulate the amygdala, showed a heightened stress response in people who were raised in cities, according to a report in the journal Nature. The discovery suggests a specific mechanism by which cities, with their steady stress, might unbalance parts of the mind. Scientists can now look at particular aspects of urban design -- a particular layout of streets, say, or the preponderance of straight lines -- to see which ones cause the signature brain changes. Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg, one of the German scientists who led the research, says he has already begun to look into just these sorts of questions. One of the answers, it is already clear, will be to better integrate nature into our urban landscapes."
Fantastic possibilities are emerging here, including finally data-driven urban planning and design based on randomized controled trials and neuropsychological evidence! In addition to the visual dimension of seeing greenery, I'm especially curious about the senses of smell and hearing -- i.e. stench and noise -- the olfactory and auditory dimensions!

25 June 2011

Interoceanic Highway ~ Linking Peru and Brazil...

Quite interesting to read Steven Bodzin's piece in the CSMonitor on Peru's new highway to the future...
"After decades of delay, Peru is on the verge of completing the $2.75 billion Interoceanic Highway connecting [...] Brazil to the west coast. [Millions of] Brazilians and Peruvians will see their lives change radically once they live along the continent’s first true transcontinental highway. [...] The last major link in the Interoceanic Highway, a bridge over the Madre de Dios river 143 miles away, is set to open this month. The last rivet in the bridge will be like the golden spike which, in 1869, completed North America’s first transcontinental railroad. There is a road connecting Argentina to Chile, and a roundabout route through Bolivia. But this is the first two-lane, year-round highway across the continent's waist, from the Amazon directly to the Pacific. From Sao Paulo, near the Atlantic, the highway traverses 2,439 miles of Brazil, crossing coastal hills, soy-farming plains, and the cattle pastures where Amazon rain forest once stood. At last [...] it crosses the Acre River into Peru."
This is as big a deal as the Trans-Siberian Railway or the US Interstate Highways. I hope it's followed with railway infrastructure investments too. And by a renewed emphasis on other links, including finishing the Darién Gap in the Pan-American Highway.

Aero-Feather ~ Personally-Powered Airship!

Star Simpson spots the Aero-Feather!

24 June 2011

Honest Venn ~ Logically Slicing & Dicing Life;-)

More Honest Venn!-) (Adding to past examples) Thanks to Rob Lemos for spotting this... And, of course...

Urbanization in China ~ Recent Spotlights...

The latest Economist spotlights Urbanization in China... And Bloomberg reports on China's Ghost Cities...

Urbanizing Us ~ Visualizing Population Intensities

Humanity is urbanizing, with over half of us now in cities, including increasingly megacities. Here are three maps as windows on the current state of things, first the big cities... Population density (people per km2)... And the percentage of all peoples in each country living in cities...

Stark HUD 2020 ~ Wearable PC Future-Promo

Thanks to VC technophile Brad Feld for spotting this Stark HUD 2020 dream-future-promo about wearable heads-up display and PC system. Feld's interested in investing in this arena, so those who are actually making it happen, drop a line... What's especially amazing to me is that it's taken so long for this PC infoglasses realm to blossom. Yours truly was working on wearables as an MIT undergrad using Private Eyes (this was even before the Media Lab folks turned this into a research theme). Anyways, since smartphones have boomed and ARE the consumer wearable PC, the time to add heads-up and build apps for this ecosystem is NOW.
P.S. Also important here are key enablers, including ring-mounted tracking devices for "hands-free" interactive control... And current generation best-of suppliers of infoglasses, e.g. Vuzix...

Fab Lib ~ Maker Libraries, 3DP, Hackerspaces++

Thanks to Shapeways via Timbuktu Chronicles for spotting this survey of future fab labs, public libraries, 3D printers, hackerspaces and more...
"This video was made in support of Lauren Britton-Smedley's proposal to create a pilot FabLab at the Fayetteville Free Library. This is Lauren's final project for the "Innovation in Public Libraries" class taught by Meg Backus and Thomas Gokey at Syracuse University's iSchool. In this class we look at avant-garde art from the past 60 years (social sculpture, relational aesthetics, institutional critique, interventionist practice, hacker/maker/DIY culture) and use it as a way to rethink what the library of the 21st century could be."

23 June 2011

Inventing Apple ~ Wozniak Recollects DIY PCs!

FORA.tv spots Wozniak on How I Invented the Personal Computer...

Chemical Reactions ~ Patten Exhibit Wins MUSE!

Very cool to see Media Lab Tangible alumnus interaction designer James Patten's museum exhibit Create a Chemical Reaction win MUSE Gold award for Interactive Kiosk design!
"Create a Chemical Reaction allows visitors to use the Periodic Table to initiate their own chemical reactions and virtually create a variety of chemical compounds. The experience integrates a physical and digital interface, employing an object-sensing reaction table with three overhead projectors. Visitors use small pucks to select virtual atoms of specific elements from the Periodic Table, then drag the pucks to the Reaction Lab. As they touch the pucks together, the “reaction” takes place and visitors see the results of the reactions they created via images and video of real life phenomena, objects or materials."
Lovely work! I personally believe we've only seen the very tip of the iceberg of this kind of interactive projection interface and the glorious applications it enables!

Official Corruption ~ West African IRTG Report...

Thanks to A Bombastic Element for originally noting back in 2009 the West Africa: The 9th IRTG Report -- Monitoring Police Harassment about the West African Trade Hub's Improved Road Transport Governance and for spotlighting the conclusion...
"Generally speaking, the Police (greatest bribe takers) have the most negative impact on the corridors as far as extorting bribes from drivers is concerned."
Here's the latest maps and stats from the 15th IRTG Report featuring location, number of controls, amount of bribes, and total delays. Clearly there's room for exorcising more corrupt cops and related cronies from the region...

Robomutt ~ Naki'o's Orthopet Canine Prosthetics

The DailyMail says Meet Robomutt... The world's first bionic dog...
"Naki'o, a Red Heeler cattle dog, was abandoned in a frozen puddle and suffered such severe frostbite that he was left with just stumps to move about on. His future was looking grim until veterinary surgeon Christie Tomlinson, who was looking for a playmate for her golden retriever, saw him at a Colorado rescue centre. [...] as he grew and gained weight it became painful for him to walk, especially on hard surfaces. Eventually Naki'o had to crawl along on his tummy at home and at the clinic's daycare centre. Then Christie heard about a company called Orthopets in Denver, Colorado. Founded by husband and wife team Martin and Amy Kaufmann, Orthopets began when Martin saw that his experience in creating human orthotic devices could be adapted for animals. [...] 'I thought we should be using the technology used for humans on our pets. 'An animal is a much better patient than a human. They have drive, determination and they just won't quit. 'They don't feel sorry for themselves.' Since undergoing the pioneering surgery Naki'o can leap and bound with the best of them."

Inside 747 ~ WSJ on Boeing's Latest Designs...

Azamat Abdymomunov spots this WSJournal sneak-peak inside Boeing's latest 747. Cool snippets of timelapse assembly as well as pre-certification testing arcania!

22 June 2011

Daniel Rosenberg ~ InDemoVeritas on MP.tv...

Fantastic to have Harvard science lecture demoguru Daniel Rosenberg of InDemoVeritas fame -- and my colleague in performing Moments of Science at the IgNobel Prize Ceremony -- join me on MaximizingProgress.tv! The essence of our conversation was the power of learning-by-doing and the iterative experimentation and observation that's the core of the scientific method! Every kid can embrace this and have a major advantage in life -- being reality-grounded! Also, Daniel pointed out the gold at Harvard Natural Sciences Lecture Demonstrations website where the many demo videos include Exploding Garbage Can, Coanda Beach Ball, and Mousetrap Fission!

Good Vibrations ~ Cool FLUKE Slo-Mo Promo!

UniqueDaily spots FLUKE slo-mo promo on Vibrations!

Greentown Labs ~ Boston Boomzone Incubator!

Excellent to see the kickoff-opening tonight of Greentown Labs, the cleantech incubator and startup hostel in the Fort Point Channel / Boston Innovation District! Sorin Grama of Promethean Power and a key Greentown protagonist represents here in these pix...

21 June 2011

World Hydrography Day ~ NOAA's Glackin...

gCaptain points out it's World Hydrography Day and spotlights this salute by NOAA's Deputy Under Secretary for Oceans and Atmosphere Mary Glackin on how...
"...hydrography supports the U.S. economy, keeps mariners safe, and protects our coastal communities and ecosystems."

Shuttle Action ~ APOD Spotlights Endeavour...

NASA's APOD Astronomy Picture of the Day spotlights Space Shuttle Endeavour on its final flight...