18 November 2002

Information Society Programme under Framework 6 SEISS Breakout Session A -- Rory Power from Enterprise Ireland outlined current thinking around FP6, the European Union's upcoming call for proposals. Projects funded under FP6 could receive funding for 50 percent of the costs of approved projects. Based on the intial concepts, it would appear the EU wants to attract larger projects focusing on 23 priority areas. Of interest: broadband for all networking business and government technology-enabled learning and access to cultural heritage Peter Johnston believes "these will be substantial projects involving substantial resources to manage and co-ordinate. The managing participants may be the larger research institutes. Around them will be others around the second tier of participants. You will be managing €15m and small businesses would not have the expertise to handle that kind of a large project."   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Irish eWork Statistics Imogen Bertin -- Speaking to an IIA/SEISS audience in Kilkenny, Bertin revealed facts about Irish e-working. Just 5% of the small Irish companies in the knowledge sector report using staff who are fully based e-workers. 2% of small Irish knowledge sector companies use staff in remote back office locations. Irish e-working is at a low base level but is likely to grow because 58% of Irish workers want to work at home.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

ICT and eWork @ work in Ireland Conference KILKENNY, Ireland -- Innovative technology and helpful technicians led 106 attendees through the opening morning of intense activities. Reading from a new page in the broadband debate, local TD John McGuinness has thought about spreading broadband Internet access to small towns in his constituency by leveraging WiFi. Until recently, only technologies like Chorus MMDS or DSL cable modem service were the only options. McGuinness could make broadband waves by introducing "Kickstart Broadband Access" with government funding to develop more powerful and cheaper long-range wireless networks. McGuinness, formerly the mayor of the city of Kilkenny, now has the unenviable position of representing interests in two counties. Both areas have well-defined needs for always-on Internet connectivity. Sent by Nokia 9210i mail2blog. This is the first time for wireless blogging at an IIA event.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Sighting: Evita 2000A OMNISERVE-INC com -- There's plenty of competition for the TC1000 tablet computer, including the Evita 2000A personal tablet companion. Like other power-conscious computers, the Evita 2000A uses the Transmeta Crusoe processor. It comes with a 20GB HDD and 256MB RAM. We worked with it while connected to a WiFi LAN during the 2002 regional SEISS conference.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Blogging Converged Clients Phil Wolff -- Information Convergence is an important subtheme in the essay "From .blog to converged client." Blogging is a form in transition. I think blogging as a form will merge with all the other forms of digital expression. With email and IM first. With voice/video conferencing, streaming videos, browsing, and PowerPointing later. Watch it change: as more people blog from their foto-mobiles as devices start to blog ("My car's day") as audiobloggers create radio shows and videobloggers create televsion programming as Sims characters start to blog. Moving forward, see a convergent software client emerge. Source: evanwolf group, 2002.... We're on our way. Blogging tools are starting to interact with email and sounds. PIMs are managing contact information across multiple applications. Community and collaboration features are as critical to games as traditional gameplay. [a klog apart and G! and The Shifted Librarian]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Bookshelf: Wireless Networking Starter Kit Cory Doctorow -- Glenn "802.11b Networking News" Fleishmann and Adam "TidBITS" Engst have written a book on setting up a home wireless network, called "The Wireless Networking Starter Kit." The book runs down the cross-platform, step-by-step instructions for setting up and running a WiFi network from scratch. Table of contents Why Wireless? Networking Basics How Wireless Works Connecting Your Computer Building Your Wireless Network Wireless Security Taking It on the Road Going the Distance Things That Go Bump in the Net The Future of Wireless [The Book and G! and Boing Boing Blog]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Audioblogging and Streaming Adam Curry -- Audiobloggers like Curry know there's something about being able to read along with an author that makes it somehow quite appealing. He wants "to deliver content on a regular basis that can actually be used royalty free, and yet not be a total waste of bandwidth." This is challenging stuff. Even major studios stumble when trying to serve up compelling content. Tim Kirby noted last week that Peercast's open source could be used for distribting audioblogs over GNUtella. [Adam Curry: Adam Curry's Weblog and Tim Kirby. G! 10 hits]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Mobile Net Data User Growing in UK Howard Rheingold -- The Mobile Data Association says British use mobile phones for data more than before. Over 11m webpages are being looked at via phones every day according to figures collated by the Mobile Data Association. The industry group says the figures are the first comprehensive study of mobile net use and it intends to repeat the research regularly to chart increases. The association puts the steady growth of use down to strategy and technology changes by operators which try to make it much easier for customers to browse pages. The most popular pages that people look at cover sport and news as well as net messaging and chat services. The MDA estimates that in September, the last month for which figures are available, 340 million webpages were viewed via mobiles phones. [Smart Mobs]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Arguments for Open WiFi Spectrum Kevin Werbach -- The whole point of open spectrum is that we can now build systems smart enough to use open space in the airwaves when it's available, and get out of the way when it isn't. Andy Seybold worries about public safety communications, but most of those are highly inefficient, proprietary systems. Open spectrum would actually be a boon to public safety and national security. For example, we could build a "priority override" capability for emergencies into software-defined radios, or could make the public safety radios much more robust to interference or system failures. [Werblog G! 508 hits]   [Comment on Shoptalk]