Technology Futures

Project Gizmo is a new Voice over IP application that seeks to challenge Skype, one of the best known free/fee Internet telephone applications. Project Gizmo is likely to win over the long run because the software is designed on an open source model that allows users to place calls to other voice software that uses the emerging SIP standard. Skype, by comparison, uses a proprietary protocol--you can only call other Skype users for free.

Fujitsu has demonstrated its new electronic paper. It's a thin, bendable "sheet" that can display color images, and the current image is displayed even when the power is turned off.

Introduced by Senators McCain (Arizona-R) and Lautenberg (New Jersey-D), the Community Broadband Act of 2005 would give communities the right to build out telecom infrastructure and/or offer telecom services to their citizens. The bill would prevent states from pandering to the incumbent providers by prohibiting local governments from getting involved in telecom.

A private report by Informa Telecoms & Media shows that Asian countries are deploying fiber to the home faster than ever. In Japan, there are now about 2.5 million homes and businesses with fiber connections, and 10 million are expected by 2010. FTTH connections in the U.S total probably well under half a million, and that may be wildly optimistic.

The city of Wellington, New Zealand has created an MSAP service they call CityLink. It is exactly the MSAP concept, and like Blacksburg, which began offering MSAP service in 1999, ISPs have flocked to it because it lowers costs and enables them to provide better services.

BC.NET, a project of the British Columbia provincial government, is deploying what they call Transit Exchange Hubs in communities throughout the province.

An article called "The United States of Broadband" is available over at TomPaine.com [link no longer available]. It's well worth a read, as it takes the Federal government and the FCC in particular to task about the sorry state of broadband in the United States.

The LA Times reports that there are now more cellphones than landlines. We went from basically zero cellphones about ten years ago. We are at a point now where most households have at least one cellphone.

We still have a few problems with cellphones, though.

Further proof that the old, channel-based, analog TV is crumbling before our eyes: the typically staid BBC is webcasting new shows before airing them on the old medium.

One of the first really interesting uses of RFID (Radio Frequency ID) tags is described in this CNet article. A Japanese firm is looking at the possibility of using robots to guard playgrounds and other public spaces. It would be able to keep track of children by using RFID tags that would be worn by the kids, probably as a bracelet of some kind.

CNet has a great FAQ-style article on the current kerfuffle surrounding WiFi signal poaching. It's worth a read if you have a WiFi network in your home or business. There are two points worth considering. Most service contracts from DSL and cable providers prohibit sharing your bandwidth with other locations. So if you keep an open access point so the little old lady across the street can download some songs from iTunes once in a while, it's most likely a violation of your service agreement.

One of the common arguments against running fiber to every home and business goes like this: "Once we all have a cellphone with data service, we won't even need a landline."

From a certain squinty distance, it sounds very reasonable, and some invalid data to support it usually goes like this: "And I know several people that don't even have a landline phone anymore."

A Florida man has been arrested and charged with theft of a WiFi signal. Ben Smith was apparently parking outside someone's home regularly to "borrow" the broadband signal.

This may sound inoccuous, but suppose someone stopped by your flower garden every day and cut a few of your roses for their own use? Or if they walked into your yard twice a week in the winter and took wood off your woodpile?

Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn) is talking about proposing a House bill that would allow for national video franchises. This is partly in response to the somewhat justified whining by the telcos that it is too much trouble for them to go to every town in America and ask permission to deliver TV programming over phone lines.

There are so many dumbheaded things here that it is hard to know where to start.

George Mason University, in northern Virginia, has published plans for an open source robot designed for educational and research use.

Podcasts (audio files you download and play on your computer or MP3 player) have become mainstream, and it is, once again, Apple Computer that has led the way.

Although most people have not yet downloaded and listened to a podcast, the new medium has been growing rapidly, with thousands of podcasters and listeners estimated in the millions. Just as Apple, using the iPod and its iTunes software, singlehandly rewrote the rules of music publishing, Apple has once again, using the same combo of the iPod and iTunes to rewrite radio.

The province of Catalonia, in Spain, along with a consortium of 782 towns and cities located in the province, have agreed to invest $542 million in a province-wide, redundant fiber network that will connect all the partner towns and cities.

Meanwhile, in the United States, many of our elected leaders are trying to pass laws making this kind of investment illegal.

Motto for the week: Our state--not really as good as Catalonia, but we have great dial-up.

ITER is an international consortium that is planning to build a 500 megawatt fusion reactor by 2016. Fusion power is the holy grail of the energy industry because it uses relatively inexpensive fuel (hydrogen), creates little contaminated nuclear waste, and can generate large amounts of power.

Advanced engineering is underway, and one of the goals of the project is to use pre-qualified and off the shelf materials and components. The ITER fusion reactor will generate ten times more power than it needs to maintain the fusion reaction.

NRRI has a great summary of what is happening in individual states ontelecommunications deregulation, and there is a link at the top of the page to see the actual bills.

The AP reports that the just completed worldwide Live Aid concert broke all records for live streaming. An arrangement with AOL allowed the concert organizers to stream all ten concert venues live over the Internet. It smashed every existing streaming broadcast record, and AOL reported that they have more than 150,000 simultanteos viewers.