Exploring the impact of broadband and technology on our lives, our businesses, and our communities.
Gamers make better surgeons
Someone has finally found something good about playing video games for hours on end. Engadget reports that surgeons who relax by playing video games are better at what they do in the operating room. The improvement, unsurprisingly, is most noticeable when performong laproscopic surgery, where they manipulate tiny tools while watching a video screen. It is hardly worth getting excited about it though. Other recent studies of kids addicted to video games show that they perform less well in school, among other problems, meaning that video-addled kids won't have the grades to get into medical school in the first place, so they will never be able to put the great eye-hand coordination to good use.
Technology News:
Seventy five cent gasoline
How about gasoline for seventy-five cents a gallon? Sound far-fetched? Not according to this article on plug in electric cars. The article states that the cost of recharging the battery of an electric vehicle using the electricity coming from the socket in the wall of your garage would be economical--equating to buying gas for seventy-five cents a gallon.
And that's the appeal of rechargeable electric cars. It is far more efficient, even with transmission costs, to make electricity at a central location than to burn gasoline on the hoof, so to speak, just to go to the grocery store or to work in the morning. An there are huge added benefits in terms of less pollution, cleaner air, and less groundwater contamination from gas spills and leaking gas tanks.
Affordable broadband, reliable electric power, and great quality of life: those are the three cornerstones of modern economic development. Is your community making those a priority?
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Open access satellite radio
The impending merger of XM and Sirius satellite radio providers is a good example of why open access networks make sense. Sirius and XM have not grown as expected, largely because the two companies provide redundant and duplicative systems. Nobody cares about which satellite a radio station comes from, and people particularly do not care to spend hundreds of dollars on special radios that only work with one provider. If we were doing this with TV, we'd all have to buy one TV to watch NBC, and another TV to watch CBS.
That's the current satellite radio model. It is also the current broadband model. Want to use Verizon's VoIP telephone service on your Comcast cable modem? Good luck. You have to switch to Verizon broadband, install different equipment, and pay different rates before you can even talk about getting what you want, which is dial tone.
The correct business model for XM and Sirius is to merge, and then sell channel access to the highest bidder, on a level playing field. In other words, the merged Sirius/XM becomes a neutral carrier for hundreds of channels of music, news, and entertainment, and the business model is to make a small amount of revenue share on each channel. With a little tweak to the radios we buy to get this entertainment, we could buy on a per channel basis instead of getting 150 channels when we really only listen to 4 or 5 on a regular basis. Bundling content (the radio channels) with the infrastructure (the satellites) is a Manufacturing Economy business model. There are better ways to make money while simultaneously giving buyers of content (us) more choice.
The same is true of broadband. Communities should build a single integrated digital road system that any service provider can use to deliver goods and services. Done right, telecom costs will go down while everyone selling services will make more money. And the community will also share in the revenue for providing the transport system, just like Sirius/XM should do.
Technology News:
VoIP pays big benefits
This short article from DefenseTech [link no longer available] indicates that the Navy expects to save 24% per year on it's $4 billion dollar telephone bill by switching to Voice over IP phone systems. In round numbers, that's about $1 billion a year, or enough to buy an entire aircraft carrier in five years. Businesses are consistently seeing that much savings or more, and reports of 40% savings are common. Of course, you have to have a reliable broadband connection to switch your business to VoIP.
Technology News:
Grappling with technology
An Illinois legislator has introduced a bill to outlaw "social networking" sites in Illinois libraries and schools. The bill is extremely broad, and probably will never be passed, but it is an interesting exercise in lawmaking.
The problem is real. Sites like MySpace and FaceBook have user profiles that promote pornography directly and indirectly, and is that something we really want our kids to be looking at on school computers or in public library computers funded with taxpayer dollars? I have been dealing with this issue since the early days of the Blacksburg Electronic Village, and I think what is needed is more adult supervision of children--hands on adults--parents and teachers who pay attention to what is going on in the classroom or in the library and dealing with it appropriately and promptly. This law would make police responsible, and worse, it is not the kids who get punished for accessing inappropriate material, but teachers and librarians. This is just kooky. We are going to arrest a teacher because they failed to notice that a hormonally challenged fourteen year old boy was caught looking at something inappropriate? It is the kid who should be punished, not the teacher or the librarian.
A second problem with the law is that "social networking" is inescapably vague. This site has most of the same "social networking" features as MySpace; users can register and post comments and "talk" to each other. Millions of sites could be defined as "social networking" sites, so who decides what is acceptable and what is not? We need more reason and less grandstanding as we grapple with these new systems.
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Knowledge Democracy:
LEDs changing projection technology
Boxlight has released a new, battery-powered LCD projector that uses LEDs instead of hot, expensive incandescent bulbs. A cluster of 10 bright white LEDs projects an image of 150 lumens, compared to 800-1000 for an entry level old style projector. The unit is not suitable for large groups or rooms, but its quiet operation (no fan needed) and small size (1 lb.) could make it a popular choice as a home or office projector, or impromptu small group business meetings. How many times have you been in a work situation where two or three people are clustered around a monitor, trying to look over someone's shoulder at too small print on the screen? This little device would be perfect for projecting a 40" image onto an office wall for small group meetings and collaboration. As these new designs are refined, light output should increase and prices will drop. And as a bonus, these things are very green, using a fraction of the electricity that other projectors do.
LED lighting options are proliferating rapidly, and we are going to see more and more applications for them in the home and office. The initial cost will be offset by the extraordinary long life of the bulbs and the energy savings.
Technology News:
Microsoft taxes Mac users
Most businesses, if they had the opportunity to attract several million new customers with almost no effort, would do so willingly. Not Microsoft. In an almost incomprehensible move, Microsoft wants Mac users who want to buy a copy of Windows to pay $100 more than other Windows users. All new Macs can now easily run Windows alongside the Mac operating system, and many Mac owners are looking forward to being able to run a Windows application occasionally. You would think Microsoft would welcome these folks with open arms, but apparently not.
Technology News:
Apple calls for DRM-free music
In an interesting essay covered in a Wired article, Steve Jobs of Apple has called for an end to DRM (Digital Rights Management) for music. Apple has found that, on average, only 3% of music on a typical iPod uses the Apple FairPlay DRM; the rest is music that has no DRM at all. Typically, this means most people are simply ripping music from CDs and putting it on their iPod.
Apple has been heavily criticized for kowtowing to the record companies, but Jobs makes it clear Apple has always done so reluctantly, and would happily abandon DRM on the iPod and for the iTunes software. DRM's main accomplishment has been to annoy music lovers, who chafe under the restrictions that limit what devices can play a song, how many times it can be shared, and how it can be shared. Apple's proposal to end DRM puts the target squarely on the record companies, who continue to whine about piracy while suing grandmothers without computers and fourteen year old girls. As I have said in the past, it is mystifying to me that a business would go to such great lengths to alienate its customers, and would state in public that it thinks its customers are all crooks.
Knowledge Democracy:
iPods banned in crosswalks
There are stories and links all over to the news that state legislators in New York may ban iPods in crosswalks. The problem is that people are "...walking into buses. They're walking into one another and it's creating a number of fatalities..." The bill will not specifically target iPods, but will be aimed at any portable device that has users with earphones on that are blocking street sounds.
Technology News:
Combo DV movie and still camera
DXG has a new combo movie/still camera (DXG-506V) with a 5 megapixel image sensor. It also plays MP3s and can take voice memos. The company says it will sell for $149. If the picture quality is good, that's a real bargain. Note that the company's Web site is not well designed. Click on the center area on the bottom (the DXG-505V) to get to a menu. I have yet to find a multi-function device that does everything well, but this product is probably a good hint at the future of cameras. Older, tape-based video cameras are on their way out, and the newer writable DVD video cameras also seem clunky. My Canon A85 takes very nice video, even if it is low resolution, and being able to squirt the video clips right into the computer for storage is much easier than labeling, storing, and sorting media of any kind, whether it is DV tapes or DVD discs. The problem with removable storage is that the extra effort of transferring the movies to the computer is a disincentive, especially tapes. I have found that taking more, short, 30 second to 1 minute video clips with the Canon beats 30 minutes of "just let the camera run" old style video, where you have lots of dead space--the longstanding "home movie" problem that dates back to 8 mm film-based movie cameras.
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