June 2009
13 posts
2 tags
Nuclear Power From Many Small Reactors
The solutions to the world’s “clean energy” problem (or the “dirty energy” problem, depending on how you look at it) look like a combination of many distributed efforts to generate electricity and store it. One neat example is from Babcock and Wilcox which has a process to manufacture small (~150MW) nuclear reactors that can be strung together as needed to generate...
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Pirate Bay Version Of YouTube On The Way...
The Pirate Bay is working on its own version of YouTube (called TheVideoBay.org) that will likely allow its users to share any kind of video clips (not just the kind with authorized copyright permissions). This conveniently coincides with more public domain video sites so that the Pirate Bay can legitimately claim that their Youtube-like platform is not *only* used for copyrighted materials since...
3 tags
Biotech Might Create The Dreaded Nano-Goo
Biotech startups are trying to solve the world’s energy problem by making “super-biological” processes that can convert cellulose to ethanol or other fuels. But this approach strikes me as the way to create the sci-fi “nano-goo” scenario where little nano-robots consume everything in their path. Usually, this “grey goo” stuff is thought of as being...
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Rich People Pay Less Taxes As A Percentage Of...
Not too long ago, Warren Buffet issued a challenge to the other folks on the “richest persons” lists — that his wealthy colleagues (in the US) pay less taxes, as a percentage of their income, than their “secretaries” do. Buffet said he’d donate $1 million to charity if a significant number of them admitted to that assertion…. That got me to wonder: how do...
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Census Data Collecting Methods...
Next year, the US government will take another headcount to see how many people live in America. I’m somewhat intrigued by the process, and I always wonder how the government arrives at its estimate. (Actually, I don’t really know much about the process, so that’s probably why I’m intrigued…) Do they report a statistical range with confidence limits on the...
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Public Domain Video On The Way...
Wikipedia is planning to get into online videos and to allow its contributors to work on video editing and documentation. JumpCut used to offer web-tools to do video editing online, but it looks like Yahoo shut down JumpCut recently. I wonder what happens to the JumpCut technology? When Google shuts down services, it sometimes releases the code for open source projects. Wonder if Yahoo will...
3 tags
OpenIdea: Furry Cars
Cars have always been covered by shiny metal (or plastic) sheets with varying kinks or curves in them.. But why not cover a car in a “fur” of some kind? Like a carpet of fiber optic sensors that could detect when the car was touched or brushed. I think it would be pretty cool to have a furry car with the option of a “short-hair or long-hair” covering.. The fur covering...
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OpenIdea: What else to do with Netflix's movie...
Just randomly thinking that Netflix has an interesting set of data with its movie ratings (which it already has a $1 million prize for to help improve it)… But I was thinking: what else could you do with that data? Could the ratings be applied to other compatibility scores… to improve online dating matches and the like? Has anyone tried this yet? I’d be surprised if someone...
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OpenIdea: Studying mosquitoes to inject vaccines
Think of the children… who wouldn’t be crying when they need to get vaccinations. Mosquitoes can suck out a bit of blood without you really noticing too much, so a needle with similar characteristics as a mosquito sucker should able to inject medicines into people, right? Perhaps this has already been tried, and injecting enough material via a microscopic needle would just take too...
1 tag
Robot farm hands
Robotic farmers are on the way… I think there should be far more investments in robot technologies that can automate the production of all kinds of products. Robots can help harvest crops and minimize pesticide applications… all sorts of work that people shouldn’t have to do! If food production can be fully automated, world hunger could end..? hmm.
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Drill Without A Drill Bit
Potter Drilling says it has spallation drilling technology that can dig down about 9km using superhot steam. The 800C steam is created in a catalyzed reaction of peroxide and methanol, and the heat helps to break up rocks. This drilling technique could be used to access geothermal energy — which seems to only account for generating 10,000MW worldwide. The deepest drilling people have...
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OpenIdea: Lightweight engines made of plastic?
I wonder if more efficient hybrid vehicles could use engines made of plastic? hmm. If the engines are used only as generators, then they might not need to be made out of metal (which can be heavy and expensive). It might also make the engine more recyclable? I assume there must be a reason why engines aren’t made of plastic, though — perhaps no plastic is strong enough to withstand...