...more recent posts
Interesting article by Eric Davis on wireless technology and the changing notion of space.
"Though we "know" that electromagnetic modulations of the spectrum are no less material than waves of electrons cruising along a wire, wireless nonetheless amplifies the experiential sense that we live and move in a world of invisible intelligences, a magic world verging on telepathy. Simply put, the more the physical apparatus disappears, the more we are simply listening and responding to voices in our heads."If you like this sort of thing, definitely check out his book Techgnosis. Worth a look.
In case you want another link to a good Jorn Barger explanation of why XML, and all container-based hierarchies don't really work, here it is. This is exactly what I was trying to think about this weekend. I might be getting somewhere in the sense that the question is coming into focus. Getting the question right seems like at least 85% of the battle (according to my top secret rigorous scientific testing....) Anyway, what I want is something like atomic storage of all "digital media bits" (as if they can all be classified together like that) and then a dynamic containerization (hierarchicalization? folderizing? treeifying?) of these bits depending on the context of the question I'm asking. Here's an example: I have a picture of MB I took this weekend. It is one of, say, 35,000 pictures I have on my computer. I store it in a directory structure that looks like this "/documents/travel/2001/january/montauk/pictures". This looks good. My hierarchy at least has several levels, so it's clearly a step up from having all 35,000 files in one folder called "/pictures". But now imagine that next year for MBs birthday I want to go back and pull up all the photos of her to make a little collage. In that case I'd would have wanted the picture filed in "/documents/photos/friends/MB". D'oh. And worse, for practically every situation I can think of, I would want the file hierarchy to have been different. So that is the problem, and the solution (at this point in time) seems to me to involve storing all the files (what I called "digital media bits" above) in a giant blob, or cloud, or .net, or whatever you want to call this non-hierarchical storage space. And then I want tools that dip into this storage space (I guess "cloud" is the most popular term right now) and construct container based (i.e., folders inside folders like /documents/travel/2001/january/) file hierarchies based on the context of the question I'm asking ("Select all pictures from january 2001" gets you one type of file hierarchy - namely, /pictures/2001/january - while "select all pictures of MB from the last year" gets you a different one - "/pictures/mb/2000/".) Of course, this amounts to something like teaching the computer how to think, so I'm not saying I have any insight into how to generate these on the fly hierarchies. But you have to have something to think about.
More on IT, the mystery product from Dean Kamen's DEKA research. Here's a patent (granted in 1999) that some people are saying is IT, although others are saying that this patent is for a wheelchair device which has already been released to the public. Huh? Looks like a pretty strange wheelchair if you ask me. In response to all the recent hype (which you can only suppose DEKA was somehow the instigator of,) they released this press release intended to deflate some of the more outrageous speculation. It reads, in part:
"DEKA is currently working on several exciting projects. The book proposal referred to one. However, the leaked proposal quoted several prominent technology leaders out of context, without their doubts, risks and maybes included. This, together with spirited speculation about the unknown, has lead to expectations that are beyond whimsical. We have a promising project, but nothing of the earth shattering nature that people are conjuring up."Maybe it is that weird scooter thing after all. $2000? It better be fast. Or something.
Wired had an article about this guy Dean Kamen a few months ago. I'll have to go back and take a look at it. Supposedly, he is developing a top secret technology product that is going to "change the world." Unfortunately, nobody knows what it is. MSNBC has this story about journalist Steve Kemper, who has been documenting the story from the inside, selling the rights to his book on the development of the technology for $250K - even though he wasn't allowed to reveal anything about the device to the publisher shelling out the dough. Most intriguing is reports of a meeting between Kamen and Jeff Bezos, Steve Jobs, and John Doerr (super VC.) Apparently, if we are to believe Kemper who clearly stands to gain from any amount of hype, these three techno luminaries were completely blown away by the demonstration. Dig these quotes from the article:
Bezos is quoted as saying that IT “...is a product so revolutionary,
you’ll have no problem selling it. The question is, are people going to be
allowed to use it?”
Jobs is quoted as saying: “...If enough people see the machine you
won’t have to convince them to architect cities around it. It’ll just
happen.”
Kemper says the invention will “profoundly
affect our environment and the way people live worldwide. It will be an
alternative to products that are dirty, expensive, sometimes dangerous and
often frustrating, especially for people in the cities.”
O.K., I'll bite. What is this thing? Supposedly we'll know in 2002. (When I first read that 2002 date I thought, "Oh great, another thing that won't hit the market for years..." and then I realized that 2002 is next year! Damn the future is going fast.)
Still digesting yesterdays announcements. Seems like one of the biggest things was the introduction of the "superdrive" in high end desktop Macs capable of burning DVDs (regular DVDs that is, ones that will play in home DVD players, not the older, non-compatible, DVD-RAMS which are in cartridges a la zips or 3.5" floppies.) This is very cool, and represents a massive price drop considering stand alone DVD burners were going for +$5000. Now you can get a fully loaded high end Mac with DVD burning capability for less than $4000. I wonder how the MPAA is going to feel about that. And oh yeah, the "superdrive" is also a CD/RW burner! To go along with the drive, apple has some new software. iDVD (along with the popular iMovie) will be bundled with the new PowerMacs giving you the ability to burn DVD movies right out of the box. For professional use apple is also offering DVD Studio Pro which I guess is to iDVD as Final Cut Pro is to iMovie (i.e., it costs $999 instead of $0, but if you're a pro, this is still insanely cheap for serious DVD production.) The big question, for me at least since I won't be buying one of these machines, is if Apple is going to sell this drive as an external unit. Please?
In a slightly related story (or, in what would have been considered totally cool if Apple hadn't introduced the stuff above,) Roxio has unvelied Toast 5, the newest upgrade to the popular Mac CD burning software. And this new version will support burning video CDs (VCDs) that can play in most DVD players. That's good news, but I think I'd rather just burn full on DVDs, thanks.
I guess it's still unclear whether Job's vision of the everyman as multimedia producer will ever pan out, but he is sure offering the tools. They're not cheap, per se, but compared to what you would have needed a few months ago the prices are very attractive. And compared to pre Final Cut Pro days I'd say that the new high end desktop Macs ($3500 for the 733Mhz w/ superdrive, 256K, 60gigs + $1000 Final Cut Pro + $1000 DVD Studio Pro + $1500 monitor = $7000 for what would have cost...what?...close to $200K back in Avid days? More?) actually do represent a real desktop publishing revolution. But like I said, the question remains whether the average person really needs to be making movies of their life. If you just want to play Doom, a Windows 98 system is going to rock these Macs. But if you cling to the idea that computers can be used to make something akin to art, Apple is still leading the way. Now if they can just keep from going out of business...
Jobs did announce single processor 733 mhz desktop G4s, but they won't ship until February, and even then supplies will be limited. This is total vapor meant to calm Wall St. It is well known that Motorolla cannot presently make anything over 600 mhz in quantity, so this announcement basically means nothing. Or worse. I'm prepared to eat my computer if they are shipping quantities of 733 machines before March 1, and frankly, I'll be highly surprised if they are shipping before May 1. Anyway, the big news is the powerbook. Exactly as expected. 400 and 500 mhz g4 models. 15.2 inch screen! DVD, firewire, usb, irda. 1 inch thick! (This is .15" thinner than the thinnest Sony Viao!) 5 lbs. Titanium enclosure. Jobs calls it "unreasonably thin." :-) 5 hour battery life, DVD, and that wide screen are going to be turning a lot of heads on those cross country flights. Unfortunately I coudn't get the webcast (don't ask) so I am still searching for a picture of this beauty. Regardless, my pavlovian responses are in fine working order. Now if only they've made enough of these things. If so I think this could be the best selling Apple ever. And boy do they need it.
updated: here is a small, head on shot from Apple's site.
Speaking of cool notebooks, what's the deal with this Sony PCG-GT1? I don't think it's for sale in the U.S. yet (although you can maybe get one from the ever strange chuckmeister) but it looks pretty interesting.
The wide screen powerbook rumors that I thought had been debunked have surfaced again with some vigor. 15.2 inch screen, capable of 1152x768! That would be very cool. I'm still doubtful, but we'll know a little bit past noon. You can watch Steve crank up the hype machine yourself here.
Macworld San Francisco is tomorrow (well, all this week, but Job's keynote is tomorrow, so that's when the big announcements from Apple will come.) Hopefully debuting will be the powerbook g4 with its often rumored but never seen sleek new ultrathin design. Some people claim the whole machine is the thickness of the bottom half of the present powerbook. Nice. New desktops also, but I'll be highly surprised if they announce anything over 600 mhz (or if they do announce something higher, you won't be able to get one for months.) Small chance that OS X will be officially released, but I think Macworld Tokyo is a better bet (end of February.) Also possible is the long awaited 17 inch flat panel. I'll be watching.
I'm still trying to digest this article which is subtitled "how to make the free distribution of content profitable." I think he may have something here. Sort of radical, and I think the big content publishing industries are going to have to go through with (the failure of) the "trusted client" model first, but Mr. Copley has at least hit upon a scheme that could work. I wasn't sure this much was even possible. Very intriguing.