More Thoughts on Technology and the Division of Labor. Andrew Tobias drinks his coffee, and ponders both the incredible sophistication of our division of labor and the incredible depth of our technological knowledge and collective capital stock. Andrew Tobias - Money and Other Subjects: ...I would like to see someone write book called, quite simply, A Cup of Coffee. It would have a chapter on each element that[base ']s involved [^] or at least as many as could fit (decaffeination? color printing on the sides of coffee cans?). And it... [Semi-Daily Journal]

What a neat idea. So many things are taken for granted because we have no experience of anything else. But so many things are interconnected. Starbucks exists and is successful because of a million little things that make it so. Being able to see the interconnections, to focus on something as simple as getting a cup of coffee, is a fascinating proposition.  10:22:50 PM    

Ease into the Switch. When new users come to the Mac platform, they bring fresh eyes and sometimes keen observations, which are useful for all of us. Here, recent switcher Michael Brewer offers a bucket-full of useful Mac OS X tips that he put together the old-fashioned way. [O'Reilly Network ONLamp.com]

An excellent tutorial for anyone who makes the switch. It has several nice cheat sheets.  10:06:54 PM    

Rad50 and the maintenance of genome stability. Dr. John Petrini and colleagues have succeeded in creating the first mouse model of Rad50 deficiency, lending unprecedented insight into the in vivo function of this protein in maintaining genome stability and preventing cancer in mammals. The report is published in Genes & Development. [EurekAlert - Medicine & Health]

Okay, you have a viable mouse. This means that instead of dying as an embryo, you can get live births. But it sounds like these mice still have huge problems. A single amino acid change in such an important gene, greatly reducing its activity, demonstrates that you can explore the effects of Rad50 deficiency, but just what will it be a model for. The problem with so many whole animal genetics experiments like this is that an organism is very adaptable, finding ways to create viability even in the absence of important proteins. What other systems are affected and will it have any relevance to humans. Very hard to tell but that is why you do basic research. By examining these complex systems, you may glimpse a small part of the important processes that could not be seen in any other fashion.  9:45:54 PM    

Research reveals myth of a nation united in grief after Diana[base ']s death. Research at Cardiff University, UK reveals that the image of a British nation united in hysterical grief after the death of Princess Diana was a media myth. [EurekAlert - Medicine & Health]

Well, statistics can show anything and it is 5 years on, but I am not surprised to learn that the media made a big deal out of something that did not touch most people. I bet it sold a LOT of papers, though.  9:39:38 PM    

For Youth in Japan, Love Is a Many Segmented Thing. New York Times Aug 31 2002 8:14PM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

I wonder if this would work in the US. Of course, finding a 30 foot tapeworm might be difficult.  9:36:37 PM    

Remarkable twins give clue to cleft palates. New Scientist Sep 1 2002 1:46PM ET [Moreover - moreover...]

While this is really interesting, I am very intrigued by the identical twins that are not identical. They found this gene because in a set of identical twins, one had a cleft palate and the other did not. I wonder how many other identical twins are not identical. What is the process for these genetic changes? When did they occur in development? Lots of interesting paths of inquiry.  9:09:00 PM    

HAMR, A New Hard-Drive Technology, Overcomes Magnetic Memory Problems.

Every single day brings us new technology advances. This one is about disk storage. Seagate, the hard-drive vendor, just said that storage densities a thousand times higher than densities available today would be available in the next five to ten years.

Hard-drive maker Seagate said it has overcome a significant challenge in magnetic memory with a new technology capable of achieving far beyond today's storage densities -- up to as great as 50 terabits per square inch. Currently, the highest storage densities hover around 50 gigabits per square inch, but Seagate said its heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) could break through the so-called superparamagnetic limit -- a memory boundary based on data bits so small they become magnetically unstable.

By heating the memory medium with a laser-generated beam at the precise spot where data bits are being recorded, HAMR dramatically increases density -- and substantially improves the outlook for magnetic recording, according to Seagate.

Now, let's come to one of my all-time favorite comparisons.

While the technology was originally expected to accommodate one terabit of data per square inch -- which Paulsen called "extremely high compared to today's standards," Seagate researchers now believe they can store as much as 50 terabits per square inch -- equivalent to the entire printed contents of the Library of Congress -- on a single disk drive for a notebook computer.

If I got one dollar -- or one euro -- for every article or press release mentioning the Library of Congress, I certainly would not be rich, but I'm sure I could travel around the world for free.

I don't know if Seagate's claims are real. You can also check their press release here.

Anyway, having 20 terabytes of disk space on my laptop sure sounds like a good idea. But what about bandwidth or data access time? Imagine a backup of such a humongous disk at today's speeds? It would take months.

Source: Jay Lyman, NewsFactor Network, August 28, 2002

[Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends]

I just had to include the entire segment. The idea that you could have such huge amounts of disk space is mind boggling. I would assume you could have some really high-definition videos. This is really disruptive technology and will probably find a use that we can not imagine yet.  9:04:20 PM    

Dive into Accessibility

9:01:16 PM    

Fair-use rights took a hard hit in a copyright cas .... Fair-use rights took a hard hit in a copyright case decided on August 20. In Bowers v. Baystate Technologies the First Circuit Court of Appeals held that when a shrink-wrap license and the federal copyright statute conflict, then the licence takes precedence. Moreover, the shrink-wrap licence is valid even in the absence of UCITA. (PS. Librarians know well that licensing terms often negate fair-use and other rights granted by the copyright statute. There have been two windows of hope for challenging such licensing terms: federal preemption of state contract law, and the general invalidation of shrink-wrap licenses as contracts of adhesion imposed on parties with essentially no bargaining. This case closes both windows, though only the first of the two issues seems to have been fully litigated here. Now the only windows of hope are that the First Circuit is merely one of eleven, and that the Supreme Court has yet to weigh in.) [FOS News]

How did this escape everyone? First, that the shrink-wrap license can take precedence over federal copyright!! So no fair use! I'm going to have to check this out. The other thing is shrink-wrap licenses to begin with.I am not a lawyer but many legal authorities have doubted the usefulness of shrink wrap licenses because they are essentially a one-sided contract. You have no ability to negotiate. Without the ability to negotiate, there can be no meaningful contract. Shrink wrap licensing means that by opening the box, you accept the contract. In this case, the license said that you could not do any reverse engineering. This is when you use totally different techniques to accomplish the same end, getting around any patents by using novel approaches. Now, reverse engineering is what created the PC business. IBM came out with their computer. Others (I think Compaq) reverse engineered much of the system, making sure they violated no IBM patents. This made the PC configuration open to anyone who wanted to make one. MS rules the world because of this. Just think. If IBM had simply had a license that said no reverse engineering, where would we be. I may not like MS but I think IBM would have been worse. If this case holds up, then I am really afraid of what may happen with shrink wrap licensing. Could music companies put a shrink wrap license saying that you are not allowed to record the CD in any form? Could they say that the CD is licensed to play on 1 device and that if you want to hear it at home and in your car you have to have 2 copies? This could be really troublesome. I hope I misread the court's finding.  8:47:42 PM