The Tiger Woods Theory: When Woods plays in a tournament - win or lose - stocks tend to rise the following Monday. Conversely, the market has exhibited a tendency to drop on the Mondays following weekends when Tiger does not play. [Adam Curry: Adam Curry's Weblog]

10:51:11 PM    

A thought that is coming on almost faster than I can type. Used to indicate that this is an idea that I am thinking through as I am writing it.. Thought for the day: Nanotube (or larger) system that forms capilaries on the outside of a building.

How it works:

As the capilary heats up, it expands, the increase in diameter drawing water up into itself from a ground tank. This water is cooler, which helps shrink said capilary, and the water drops down into the tank as a result. There is a return feed at the top of the capilary system as well, so that water is the automatically returned once it has reached it's maximim temperature. All the capilaries feed one way only, so that when the constrict, the water goes out a side vent and returns to the tank.Since the tunes are flexible, freezing should not be an issue.

Since a cell can only return water if it's compromised, it becomes easy to notice problem areas.

Application: passive cooling system for the sunny side of a house in summer, to help keep the structure itself cool.

Problems:

1. How does paint adhere to a constantly expanding and contracting structure?
2. How do you attach it to a building without compromising the system?
3. What happens if the water becomes an anaerobic germ farm?
4. Durability: What happens when a large object strikes the surface?
5. How is leaking handled?

Possible solutions:

Material is grown in an overlapping series of fractals, and is set in place in sheets that automatically self align and repair (nano machines?) on installation. Applying a slight charge to system reactivates the bots and gets them to repair leaks. Solar cells (or house current) attached to the fabric then jolt them to life from time to time for periodic maintenence.

Material is applied beneath other siding materials (under aluminum, over foam board), and given it's small size the expanding/shrinkage is dealt with by having small spacers to offset the actual siding from the tubing.

10:46:36 PM    

Bluetooth Whiteboard and Palm OS Device for the Classroom. Two products for the education market, designed to enhance mobility, communication, and most of all, education without breaking the bank. [allNetDevices Wireless News]

Very cool tech, use your computer to control projectors and whiteboards, as well as to send quizzes and class notes to absent students. I imagine that videotaping a class and storing it on the schools servers can't be far behind.

2:34:00 PM    

Library Chat Greeter.

Roll Your Own IM-bot

"WiredBots: simple toolkits for making AIM and MSN Messenger IM bots." [Boing Boing]

This is too damn cool! If I was only a programmer, I would play around with it and create a library bot that patrons could query for bestseller lists, library hours, and eventually OPAC & database queries. Anybody else want to try until that day when pigs fly?

Alternatively, maybe Andy B. could provide some assistance on this one....

[The Shifted Librarian]

Given that they reccomend doing the programming in perl, it could probably also be done in python as well. I know with python it is supposed to be fairly easy to build in a GUI, which in turn would allow you to create the forms and fields to generate answers from. I know that perl has that capability as well, but I have books on python here, and it is already on my machine... Now I have a reason to start learning it.

Thought: Set the bot with security such that it will only give certain answers to people that you have on a list. For example, you would have it set to tell a close friend where you were, or give out your cell number in case they had lost it, but it would not hand this out to complete strangers. It could also pester you with reminders form your appointment book, or to do list, or even take short messages from your friends (if they knew the keywords to get it started).

Example:

Friend: hey! Where is Jane?
AIMbot: (checks name against list of trusted folks) Jane is on her way to work.
Friend: Leave Message?
AIMbot: Handjive? (checking for the password to allow this functionality)
Friend: Annabobanna
AIMbot: Go ahead.
Friend: Meet you at Phil's restaurant after work, 6ish, k?
AIMbot:...
AIMbot:...
AImbot:... Will that be all?
Friend: Yup, later!
AIMbot:Goodbye

Then, when the user goes online later, the bot lets them know that there are messages waiting. Since AIMbot only records messages from people that you allow, and if you want, only from those who know the password (as above).

8:29:11 AM    

WiFi/Hobo runes for marking wireless networks. [BoingBoing]

8:09:49 AM