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Exponential Innovations Everywhere
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Joost Bonsen's Opinions on How Money, Ideas, and Talent can
Enable Health, Wealth, and Happyness for Each plus Achieve Liberty, Prosperity, and Vitality for All and Ultimately Help Us Spread Beyond Our Cradle Planet Earth
"In the world of a not-too-distant future, everyone wears augmented reality devices as contact lenses. Everyone is constantly wired, online, connected, dependent on technology. The short film Sight is the graduation project of Eran May-raz and Daniel Lazo of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem."
"You can't pull off orange pants. I can't pull off orange pants. Only Dutch athletes can pull off orange pants."
"Pioneers of the digital revolution examine the Internet’s brief but explosive history and reveal nascent projects that will shortly reinvent how we interact with technology -- and each other. From social upheaval and ever-shifting privacy standards to self-driving cars and networked groceries..."
"...the city recognizes the importance of providing an integrated public transportation system as the backbone [so] Medellín is becoming famous for innovative sustainable transport. Recent efforts to modernize public transit, create better public spaces and improve safety are helping transform the city. These projects include the development of bus rapid transit (called MetroPlús) and the creation of a bike-share program -- new transportation elements that are integrated with existing metro and cable car systems."
"Los Angeles Times staff writer Kenneth R. Weiss and staff photographer Rick Loomis traveled across Africa and Asia to document the causes and consequences of rapid population growth. [...] the world's population has exploded over the last two centuries. The boom is not over: The biggest generation in history is just entering its childbearing years. The coming wave will reshape the planet, and the impact will be greatest in the poorest, most unstable countries."
"Norway is an important centre of marine innovation and several foreign companies have operations there, too. One such is the marine division of Rolls-Royce, a British firm, which is collaborating with Farstad, a shipping company based in Alesund, and STX OSV, a shipbuilder. The result of their efforts is Far Solitaire (pictured above), the first of a new class of vessels which bristle with novel technology that promises to make shipping safer, cleaner and cheaper."gCaptain has also been particularly good at spotting interesting new marine innovations, including this series by Rob Almeida on How to Design a More Efficient Ship...
"Wärtsilä put together a presentation recently that evaluated a number of new technologies and design concepts aimed at cutting operating costs, while at the same time reducing ship emissions."Just a few images give a taste of the techniques...
"PopFab is a multi-tool for the 21st century. At its heart is a computer-controlled motion platform and a means of attaching various toolheads. These enable PopFab to make objects from a digital plan in a variety of ways: current capabilities include 3D printing (as you are about to see), milling, vinyl cutting, and drawing -- with more on the way. PopFab has traveled the world as a carry-on item of luggage to Saudi Arabia and Germany, and within the USA to Aspen in Colorado. We hope that this is only the beginning."
"The force commander, a little-known brigadier called David Richards, had other ideas. He saw a chance, took a risk, and changed the fate of the country. [...] "I could see," he told me, "that with a little robustness, we could make a difference." [...] Richards promised the president that Britain would supply arms and ammunition to the government forces. [...] Richards was committing Britain to taking sides in Sierra Leone's civil war. However, there was one important difficulty. The general's political bosses in London had sent him to carry out a quick evacuation and then leave. "So," I asked him 10 years on, "you were promising the president all this before you had the political authority from London to do so?" "Er, yes," he said, "I'm afraid I was, yes."Wow! See more from the BBC about this remarkable story... And here's a Master's thesis by Patrick Evoe on Operation Palliser: The British Military Intervention into Sierra Leone, A Case of a Successful Use of Western Military Interdiction in a Sub-Sahara African Civil War.
"...all taken by a fleet of Earth-observing satellites that form part of the Landsat program, which celebrates its 40th anniversary tomorrow. Jointly managed by NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the initiative has been consistently gathering data about our planet since 23 July, 1972. [...] This makes it the world's longest-running satellite program for global land observations. Its archive of images forms an impartial, comprehensive, and easily accessed register of human and natural changes to the Earth."
"...the largest reciprocating engine in the world, designed for large container ships, running on heavy fuel oil. It stands at 13.5 metres (44 ft) high, is 27.3 m (90 ft) long, and weighs over 2300 tonnes in its largest 14-cylinder version -- producing 80080 kW."Finnish motive power champion Wärtsilä builds these!
"A downward lightning negative ground flash captured at 7,207 images per second. A negative stepped leader emerges from the cloud and connects with the ground forming a return stroke."
"The films focus on three treasured places in the public trust that are threatened by private mining and drilling proposals, including areas around the Grand Canyon that are still open to uranium mining, a proposal to expand coal mining near Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah and the introduction of natural gas drilling around Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming. [What is] appropriate use of the 700 million acres of public lands that belong to all Americans."See trailer...
"The Boardwalk extends along the coast of the Monterey Bay, from just east of the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf to the mouth of the San Lorenzo River. [...] The Boardwalk was founded by Santa Cruz businessman Fred Swanton (1862–1940), who aimed to create a resort on the West Coast similar to Coney Island or Atlantic City, New Jersey [...] The West Coast once hosted many more beach parks, including the Pike in Long Beach, California, Neptune Beach in Alameda and Playland at San Francisco's Ocean Beach. Those all have long since closed, but the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk survives as a reminder of a bygone era."
"Through a combination of consumption and investment in physical capital, growing cities could inject up to $30 trillion a year into the world economy by 2025. Understanding cities and their shifting demographics is critical to reaching urban consumers and to preparing for the challenges that will arise [...] The 600 cities making the largest contribution to a higher global GDP -- the City 600 -- will generate nearly 65 percent of world economic growth by 2025. However, the most dramatic story within the City 600 involves just over 440 cities in emerging economies; by 2025, the Emerging 440 will account for close to half of overall growth. One billion people will enter the global consuming class by 2025. [...] To capture the opportunities that arise from urbanization, businesses will need extensive market intelligence. [...] Companies that understand and respond to shifting urban marketplaces are likely to experience tremendous benefits. Yet a new McKinsey survey finds that less than 20 percent of executives are making location decisions at the city level."Read the full report!
"Munyai found basic necessities like food and clothing difficult to come by. But although his circumstances didn't make it easy, he was determined to get an education. "I spent a lot of time without a school uniform," he said, recalling the embarrassment he felt being different from classmates from middle-class neighborhoods. "Going to school with a hungry stomach... it was very tough." Munyai worked hard, however, and in high school, he heard about the Kliptown Youth Program. The after-school program, commonly known as KYP, provided him with intensive tutoring that helped him pass his senior exams and find funding to attend the University of Johannesburg. He recently earned a national diploma in banking. "This program actually changed my future," Munyai said. "(Without it), right now, I would not be standing here and saying that I went to university."
"...a six-month long fundraising campaign to raise a minimum of $10,000. Volunteer 10 minutes of your day, give $10 out of your pocket, or just tell 10 more people about us!"
"A new understanding of marine geology has led to the discovery of hundreds of these unexpected ore bodies, known as massive sulfides because of their sulfurous nature. These finds are fueling a gold rush as nations, companies and entrepreneurs race to stake claims to the sulfide-rich areas, which dot the volcanic springs of the frigid seabed. The prospectors -- motivated by dwindling resources on land as well as record prices for gold and other metals -- are busy hauling up samples and assessing deposits valued at trillions of dollars. [...] Skeptics once likened mining the deep to looking for riches on the moon. No more. Progress in marine geology, predictions of metal shortages in the decades ahead and improving access to the abyss are combining to make it real. Environmentalists have expressed growing alarm..."
"Colonial-era social freedoms still apply in Hong Kong, and pro-democracy groups in the territory have staged protests on July 1st ever since the first anniversary of the reversion to Chinese sovereignty 15 years ago. [...] Hong Kong officials were at pains to prevent Mr Hu from encountering any disaffected citizens, whose complaints range from Hong Kong’s growing wealth gap to the mistreatment of dissidents in mainland China to [...] the crushing of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. [...] Mainland Chinese media imposed a virtual news blackout on the demonstration."
"The bridges are for the animals; the animals walk over the road, and the vehicles go through the structure. Most of the structures are between 10m and 60m wide. They typically have soil, litter, and vegetation on top to provide suitable habitat for a range of different species and species groups"
"Founded in 1976, surgeons working for Aravind are among the most productive in the world, with fewer complications than British doctors. But what is truly astonishing about Aravind is that nearly half of the 300,000 procedures it conducts every year are free. Aravind treats everyone from presidents to paupers, regardless of what they can pay."
"The oval-shaped "Orsos Island" has been designed to combine the mobility of a yacht with the comfort of a house. It offers six bedrooms spread over three floors and 1,000 square meters -- nearly four tennis courts -- worth of luxury living space. [...] The island is the passion project of Hungarian-born entrepreneur Gabor Orsos, a former hotelier who wanted to combine the best features of luxury hotels with the flexibility that a superyacht provides. Measuring 37 meters long, the island can be anchored anywhere in the world its owner fancies."
"The adult industry is notoriously innovative, and it’s going through the same technological disruption as other entertainment industries in the Internet age. [...] When I looked for research on the subject, I couldn’t find very much, so I decided to do it myself. [...] Adult entertainment has always been in tremendous demand. Also, many new media formats have increased privacy and convenience, which is something that consumers value highly. Another reason may be that the adult industry has never really had the option of fighting technological change. [...] As with previous technological disruptions, the companies that figure out ways to use this new architecture to their advantage rather than spend all of their resources trying to stop it are more likely to win in the end. [...] once the current dust settles, I think we will be left with some highly professional, smart, competitive players, and I think that they have a good shot at surviving, and even thriving."Finally, Darling answers the obligatory question about sexbots...
"I’m fascinated with all of the directions that social robotics is taking and truly hope we manage to develop sophisticated sex robots"Be sure to read the full, uncut interview;-)