Before you can do it in RL, it must work in World of Warcraft (Week 7)

Welcome to the world of the future where you simply wear a headset and think what you want objects to do..... and they do it. This can be on a screen or three dimensional objects. Sounds cool, but how can you get companies to buy into the technology? The answer is to make it work in a video game first. Let's face it all the great technologies start in either video games or porn.

Just think Brian, no more being just a second too slow taking down the Lich King with your sword because your fingers just can't move fast enough on the keyboard. No more letting that pesky Gnome Warlock beat you in PvP (player vs. player). No more videos on Youtube of how bad you are at Call of Duty. Your in-game lightning reflexes will be as quick as your mind...now if we can just keep these gizmos out of the hands of kids, us old-timers can rule the World (of Warcraft) as we were meant to....

Oh, and think of all the possibilities in manufacturing....the potential is almost endless (that part is serious).

The strange thing is that this article is over 3 years old and we haven't seen the first one of these helmets (unless the technology is in the 3D games and I just don' t know). However, the idea that you can just think while wearing a helmet and actually move things on a screen based solely on your thought patterns is amazing.

Look for yourself:

http://technutnews.com/2008/10/17/new-video-game-literally-a-mind-game/

RL = real life

All the cool geeks will be wearing one! (Week 6)

Ever since Brian retired his trusty pocket protector to the junk drawer, he has been looking for just the right fashion accessory to replace it. He's tried lots of things over the years - propeller hats (part of the hazing for his fraternity at college), E=mc² tee shirts, laptop computer carrying cases, smartphones. However, nothing seemed to really set him apart from all the wannabe Geeks out there these days. (You know who you are......)

Well, Brian, Caveman Enterprises has just the thing for you! Imagine a bracelet or watch that morphs into a super smartphone or computer complete with screen and keyboard. You'll be the envy of everyone at Comicon this year. They'll put you on the cover of Computerworld. Good Grief, Man! You'll have more "friends" on Facebook than Jim Parsons! .

The technology behind the morphing fashion piece is "millions of microscopic robots that are to 3D objects what pixels are to a screen." This is actually being developed by Intel (shockingly not Caveman Enterprises) and while originally thought to be 50 years from being a reality is now just a "couple more years" away according to a comment from Jason Campbell, one of the research team members, in 2009.

Note that this comment was made just over two years ago......so let's get you the first one....think of it Brian, you can be a trendsetter - a computer that morphs right back on to your wrists and can be worn like a set of bracers. So, Brian,...... "do you like gladiator movies?"

If you want to read the entire article, here you go.... http://technutnews.com/2009/05/07/morphing-programmable-matter-gadgets-could-soon-be-a-reality/

The actor chosen to play Brian Spangler in the upcoming movie release "AMS: The Early Years"

I hope you all realize that the jabs at Brian are purely in jest and meant as entertainment.

Hope for Mom (Week 5)

I know many of you were looking forward to my retaliation for being called a "caveman" by Brian last week, but that will just have to wait (if for no other reason than I kind of agree with him and I am awaiting my sponsorship from GEICO). Anyway, a few of you may be aware from talking with me outside of class that my mother has serious "memory issues" (officially not Alzheimer's). This is a source of great frustration for both of us as well as many of the other people around her and, frankly, scares me when I think about my possible future.

Well, I found some hope this week while looking for something for this blog. It is s seemingly straight-forward concept - you simply take blood from an infant's umbilical cord and inject it into the older patient. This has shown success in a study done by researchers in Florida on rats and is elaborated on by researchers from the VA and several other sources. Basically, the process helps grow new neurons and seems to reverse some of the effects of brain aging. This would enable our aging population to live fuller and more productive lives well beyond the current retirement age.

Essentially, the injections seem to reduce swelling in the brain which allows the stem cell pool already there to produce new cells and neurons which ultimately helps people to "regain the plasticity of their youthful minds." Now if I could only remember how to publish this thing....

For more info, check out the article here:

http://io9.com/366156/rejuivenate-your-brain-with-umbilical-cord-blood

P.S. On a ironic humorous note, the io9 website states "we come from your future" and this was brought to you by someone that still lives in a cave........

Genome data out of hand (also Week 4)

There are several companies calling for industry standards in recording deciphered DNA. Apparently, the number of genomes that are sequenced each year is increasing at a staggering rate. While there were only a few dozen in 2009, there were 1700 in 2010, and an estimated 30,000 will be done in 2011. The issue is that each of the companies doing this research keep the data in a different format (sound like the issues we have heard about with medical records?).

The potential for big discoveries is increased dramatically when one can combine the results from several of the companies, but as yet there is no standardization and, therefore, no ability to perform the analytics necessary.

Can the companies agree to a standard or will there be a need for government intervention (regulation)?

These companies are also under increasing pressure to "pay off' on the promises made that attracted the large amounts of investment money that they have gathered over the years. Is cooperation in their best interest or should each company hold out hoping they get the whole pie?

Not really a new technology....just an example of some things we have been talking about in class...

Link: http://www.fiercebiotechresearch.com/story/sequencing-leaders-want-industry-standards-govern-decoded-dna/2011-09-27?utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss

Siri + Yelp = Useless Google (Week 4)

As I was searching through various places for a target for my weekly bashing, I came across a headline entitled "Siri + Yelp = Useless Google." OK, there is more to it, but that was the point at which it had my attention.

When I actually read through the article, I found that it was highlighting how poorly the results were when someone used Siri (a voice recognition software) in combination with Yelp (a restaurant rating service) on an Apple 4S phone (woohoo - a bonus bash for me). At this point, dashed were my hopes that two software midgets had teamed up to slay the evil monolith Google. Siri is actually the "assistant" on an Apple 4S phone (Am I the only one that I didn't know this? Probably.)

I won't get into the details (follow the link below if you are interested), but what happened was the user got a Google map that gave them an address and a phone number. The user had expected to get more information about the restaurant selected. Furthermore, the user was trapped because Siri has no ability to go back. In order to try to search again the user had to start over. Clearly, this wasn't working as the user had wanted.

The difficulty arose from the fact that the user had spoken "places to eat" into the phone when searching rather than "restaurants." Part of the issue is in how Google handled the "natural language" search compared to if the user had typed in "restaurants" and part of the issue is in how the user spoke in his search request.

There are two things I want to discuss:

First, while voice recognition is an emerging technology, is it ready for prime time? I have seen it work quite well in other situations, so I will say "yes." However, when we see these technologies merged with other apps (as in this case), do they work well? I'll back down to "sometimes." So how can a developer be expected to make this voice recognition software work as expected when combined with so many other possible apps? Is it unreasonable to expect things made by different developers (and by different companies) to work together flawlessly? And is the goal to make everything work together easily or should a company "capture" a customer by saying "if you want to be able to use my Feature A, you'll have to buy my set of X, Y, and Z (often the more profitable model to the company)?

Secondly, when building a service like Google Search, is it more important to be able to search in "natural language" (as is most convenient for the user) or should users adapt to the style that allows the machine to work most efficiently? Which is more important, the man or the machine?

NOTE: before we go any further, I want to state that I think Google makes a very good search engine. I'm not trying to bash them here.

and now for the ENTERTAINMENT:

A mother and her ten year old daughter are driving to the daughter's dance lesson when the daughter figures out how to use the voice recognition software on her phone to "type in" her text messages without having to actually do any typing. She then just says "send" and off goes the text to her bff Abby. Her mother says "won't it be cool when Abby gets a phone smart enough to do that too and you don't even have to say 'send.' Before you know it you'll be able to just talk back and forth." The daughter then replies "you're so silly mommy, that technology is probably years away."

Anyway, here is the link: http://searchengineland.com/why-siri-yelp-google-maps-iphone-4s-96976

Steve Jobs and the Innovative Environment (not for credit)

I submit for your perusal a fictious introduction to Steve Jobs in the early years:

"Hi - my name is Steve Jobs and I want to welcome you to my company.I consider myself to be a great thinker and an innovator and want to encourage you to join me on my journey. However, there are a few rules. You are welcome to call yourself an innovator and join my movement so long as your opinions and innovations are not in conflict with my ideas (my ideology is supreme). All those who question my supreme authority or have ideas contrary to mine will be terminated. For those that follow me I promise great riches at the expense of those that do not......"

My question to you is why is this considered a good example of an innovative company? A man with innovative ideas - yes, but an innovative company? From the standpoint that Jobs runs the company and everyone else follows his ideas and innovations, sure, but is that a truly innovative company or just a company buit around an innovative man? Where is the collaborative effort to come up with new ideas? Where is the freedom to question the norm and the system that leads to new ideas. I submit it is not at Apple.

Yeast - its not just for beer and baking anymore! (Week 3)

In keeping with our recent discussions and readings regarding merging two seemingly different technologies, I found information about research that uses yeast to build a biological computer.

Apparently, researchers in Sweden have developed a process in which genetically altered yeast can be used to manufacture anything from "gas to expensive perfumes." The basic idea is that genetically altered yeast cells can be used to create circuits (or as the acrticle says the "building blocks of a computer") including multiplexers. However, it does not work with standard electrical impulses, but rather uses some other type of stimuli such as light.

Kenaruro Furukawa states that the "results show that it is possible to build complex systems of the genetically modified yeast cells." Much of this research was done as a collaboration between Swedish universities and researchers in Spain and Germany. It is interesting to note that one of the issues slowing the research is the general lack of interdisciplinary understanding between engineers and biologists or others with an understanding of how the human body works.

Listed potential uses of this technolgy in the future include "biomaterials, information technology in home care, artificial organs and tissue, sensors and smart clothes."

However, I see this as the next step (bionics being the first) in the realization of what has previously only existed in science fiction, the  Cyborg (a part biological, part artifical being).

Warning: the writing in this article is horrendous
Link: http://www.bgdna.com/biotechnology/biological-computer-can-be-built-by-the-yeast.html

Windows 8 and HTML5 (Week 2)

It looks like we'll all be dragging our feet once again as Windows 8 gets released in an as much "all HTML5-only as possible" approach. The interesting thing is that the new browser will not support any plug-ins. Therefore, no PDF, no Quicktime, no Flash, and no Silverlight (an MS product). The defense for this decision is that the new Metro browser is supposed to work better with "touch style browsing."

Ok, who is using "touch style browsing?" I've used it it in the store (about a year ago when I got a new computer) and it looks really cool, but my first thought after playing with it for about a minute was that my shoulder is going to get tired after about 2-3 minutes. It would be fine for things that don't require much input such as reading articles or books (you're only turning pages), but if I to tried to write a paper for one of my classes, it would be a nightmare.

The issue here is that Microsoft is trying to guess on the direction of technology (in this case thinking that most people will be moving to touch screen interfaces and away from the keyboard and mouse).

At this point, I'll let you know that Microsoft is hedging a litttle. They intend to allow you to use a desktop option of the browser that will still work with the plug-ins. If you'd like to read more, visit http://www.linkedin.com/news?actionBar=&articleID=773716949&ids=0Vd3AScjsPdPsIdP4Mcj8PcPsTb38TdPoQcPcTdOMQdP8SdP4OdPsIdP4Me34PczsT&aag=true&freq=weekly&trk=eml-tod-b-ttle-4&ut=3BatDJpKSROAU1

The point is that a large company (such as MS) can afford to take some risks and still try to be cutting edge. In this case, they are anticipating that people will move toward the touch screen interfaces and are positioning themselves to be market ready with a competitive browser when/if this occurs. When I first read the articles, I thought they had made a huge mistake and were creating a browser that few people would use. Then, after reading it a second time, I realized they had left them selves an out by keeping the desktop version available. My opinion was they could have just saved the money, but at least they had an out. Then, on the third try, it hit me.....I had failed to think it out far enough. I was stuck with my vision of what the touch screen interface looked like a year ago. Has it changed already or would it change in the near future to become more user friendly? Almost certainly! Therefore, what initially looked like a waste of money to me, now appears to give Microsoft a jump to regain some of its market share in the "browser wars" if people do move toward touch screen interfaces and if not, their browser still works with the "old technology" mouse and keyboard. In this manner, they are in a position to strike if  the expected change in interface technology takes place, but without fully committing itself in that direction.

Well played, Mauer....

Emerging Technology 6290 (Week 1)

Week 1:

This week we began discussing and reading about how current large companies are at a seeming disadvantage when it comes to handling emerging technologies in general and disruptive technologies specifically. While, I agree with the statement, I feel that they have no choice when it comes to many threats. First, they cannot necessarily see what the potential competitors are doing and, short of industrial espionage, really don't know which competitors to take seriously and which to dismiss. They don't know who is developing something until that information is released to the public and unless that company is run by morons that shouldn't happen until they are about to release the product or service for consumption. The trick is to keep up to date as best as possible and be open to discussing these potential threats as early as possible. Then, serious contemplation needs to be done before jumping to react or choosing to "wait and see" whether the threat is any real danger.  My personal opinion, is that the "wait and see" approach has been too quickly dismissed by the authors of our reading assignments.

Company culture plays a huge role here. There are several success stories where so called innovative companies have been very profitable and the "person at the top" encourages such behavior. However, there are also many seemingly innovative companies that simply could not succeed because they do not know how to focus on one idea long enough to get it to market (everyone wants to plan the menu and no wants to do the cooking). Furthermore, when we are talking about more established companies, this is often simply not considered acceptable behavior. Telling the boss that you have an idea about a product or service that will shorten the life of a company's cash cow is not usually going to be well received. In many cases, this behavior will only lead to your dismissal.

So, before you set out to change the world, have your resume updated.......

Lee