Rusted Sky

One thing that really kind of bites as an early adopter of a technology - there's going to be something better come along. It might come along quickly, it might take a while - but come along it will, and it'll have significant improvements that throw the old way into the dust.

Take for example... cable TV. I've got a 1958 Popular Mechanics magazine that laborously goes into the complexities of the newest TV antennas, and what to expect as far as performance from each. Fast forward to 1978 - and in Cheyenne, Wyoming cable TV was very popular... no matter how good the antenna, you're not going to get decent TV signals from 75-100 miles away (Denver or Fort Collins) and if all you've got locally is ONE TV station, you're willing to look at alternatives.

Fast forward to today. Cable TV not only provides a heck of a lot of channels (far more than the 7 channel spread in Cheyenne in '78) it also provides high speed internet (with movies on demand available from NetFlix and other providers, even...) and telephone service.

Such a thing wasn't even dreamed of in 1958, outside of SF magazines.

How about cars? Reading about the vehicles in '58 don't make me long for the good old days - tires that if you're REALLY careful will last almost 40,000 miles? When a man had a bet with his wife that he could get better mileage on a long drive, and got 18 mpg to her 14? When you needed to get your plugs cleaned and gapped quarterly? The car I'm driving gets 20+ mpg in-town, better on the highway, and I expect I'll need the plugs changed at 80 to 100 thousand miles. Progress? I think so.

Computers? I've got from a 2 Mhz Z-80-based computer to the current monster - a dual-core 1.8 Ghz system, with an effective speed of about 3.8 Ghz. (Or thereabouts). I've got a terabyte of storage in it - while the first machine I bought had a whole 90kilobytes of storage on each floppy. The floppy disk is pretty well gone at this point - like the yards-long TV antennas that used to hover over the roofs of suburbia.

But yet without the first samples, and the people willing to buy them, and others willing to try them... we wouldn't have what we've got today. The PC didn't spring forth with gigahertz/terabyte capacity - cars didn't get incredible improvements on reliability and efficiency, cable systems didn't go from offering 7 channels to 200+ without a lot of engineering steps along the way. Change and improvements came incrementally.

And so it was with satellite radio.

I was one of the early adopters for Sirius - if I read my account number correctly, I was in the first 12,000. I LIKED the idea of a whole boatload of channels - and was pretty tired of what passed for entertainment on the AM band. So I picked up a Jensen receiver... and loved it! Clarity of the signal, a wide selection of stuff to listen to - I was pretty sure it was going to be a commercial success... and it's finally gotten to that point. Only took six years or so... but it's difficult to come up with something like satellite radio WITHOUT having the entire infrastructure set up before you start selling subscriptions. First you had to figure out HOW you were going to do it - what sort of signal encoding and compression you'd have, get your satellites designed and launched, your first generation receivers designed and manufactured, repeaters put into cities where signal strength from the satellites would be iffy at best... and we won't even talk about contracts for content and a ground station to control the satellites. You're talking about hundreds of millions, possibly a billion or more, before it can sign up the first subscriber.

The only way it ever came about was due to the '90s tech bubble, and venture capitalists who had a hell of a lot more money than they could figure out what to do with. But there were problems along the way - nothing insurmountable, YOU try designing and building a receiver that can take a whisper-faint 2.4 Ghz signal from a satellite 10k miles out in space, decode it, separate it into 100+ channels, expand the compressed and encrypted channel in near-real time and play it out on your car radio... and try to make it AND the antenna as small as possible, please.

The satellite antenna on my car is the size of my fist. The control unit is about 6 inches long, two inches high, and perhaps an inch deep. It's attached to a 2"x10"x10" box under the front passenger seat. It's worked pretty reliably over the years... until this last week. I've been getting more and more 'Acquiring Signal' messages as the sound cuts out - I figure possibly the micro-coax from the antenna got crimped, or the input section of the receiver's gone deaf. Either way, I'm faced with a dilemma.

Do I pay to get it fixed, or buy a new receiver? I've already had to replace the Audiovox in my wife's car - the replacement from WalMart was $38.

I broke down - and got a replacement Sirius Stratus. This is about the 4th, maybe 5th generation of Sirius hardware.

Size?

That's the Kenwood Remote for my current system on the right. That's the entire receiver on the left. The receiver is indeed smaller than the remote. Time marches on.

Yeah - being an early adopter means sometimes your equipment gets superceded. Sometimes what you adopt fails. But sometimes - you luck out. In the last 5 years I've listened to maybe two hours total of broadcast radio in the car, when I've had a choice of listening to AM/FM or satellite radio.

I don't plan on going back - and have no intention of doing so.

J.

A Blow to Bush's Tehran Policy - washingtonpost.com

President Bush got the world's attention this fall when he warned that a nuclear-armed Iran might lead to World War III. But his stark warning came at least a month or two after he had first been told about fresh indications that Iran had actually halted its nuclear weapons program.

The new intelligence report released yesterday not only undercut the administration's alarming rhetoric over Iran's nuclear ambitions but could also throttle Bush's effort to ratchet up international sanctions and take off the table the possibility of preemptive military action before the end of his presidency.

Well... how credible should I find them? And if, by chance, they'd come out and said the Iranian government was trying hard to produce nuclear weapons... would the same people touting their acumen on this subject NOW be willing to say they're correct in their call?

My thought? The CIA is tainted to the core with partisan politics. Would we be better off with them, or without them?

J.

ThinkGeek :: USB Doomsday Device Hub

Who would have thought you could blow up with world with your PC? Or... well, maybe not.

I doubt seriously the designers of the USB specs had such things in mind...

J.

The Alternative Energy crowd seem quite convinced we need to go off coal, gas and nuclear... but you ever notice just how 'eager' they are to actually APPROVE any of their 'alternatives'?

Coalition sues Land Office over wind farms

The famed King Ranch and a coalition of environmental groups sued Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson in federal court Tuesday, seeking to require extensive environmental review and public comment on two planned wind power projects along the Gulf Coast in Kenedy County.

The coalition, the Coastal Habitat Alliance, also sued over the wind project in state District Court in Travis County. That suit claims that the state's Public Utility Commission illegally denied the alliance's request to participate in permit hearings for the wind project's transmission line.

Funny, that...

J.

Having had the water line into the house replaced recently, it seemed like it might be a good idea to drain the sediment out of the water heater.

Arming myself with two buckets (one stolen from a walrus) I opened the drain tap on the water heater... and got nothin'. Literally. I ended up pushing a chunk of stiff wire through an apparent seal of sediment, and got some heavy silt - about a quart of it in a 2 gallon bucket. It seemed like there was something to this concept of draining the water heater. I buttoned things up... and found that our water was very discolored. (Think Chattahoochie River, or Mississippi. Brown. Semi-opaque. But it wasn't smelly.

A partial drain wasn't going to cut it. I did a full drain of the tank, and got three bucketsful at the last of what looked and moved like thick cocoa. Filled the tank part-way, emptied it again - and weak cocoa was coming out. Repeating the process several times got the water flowing freely out of the hose I started using when the bucket brigade stuff got a bit old. After flushing it out one more time, I relit the burner and called it good.

Well - it wasn't so good. The little guy's bath that night looked like he was soaking in murky tea. I figured things might settle down - but they didn't. I had to do a full drain and flush again - and did that today for about an hour. First it was kind of sludgy, and along with the water got out about a half-cup of what looked like sand and grit, Then I noticed a high particulate count on the fairly clear water, and on a whim put a strong magnet on the side of the plastic cup I was using to check clarity.

Big mistake.

A LOT of very small iron or steel bits collected. It's probably very fine particulate rust - but there was so much of it I'm starting to worry about the integrity of the water heater lining. The heater is 14 years old, after all... and I'm thinking it wasn't exactly a high-qual one in the first place. (It's a Sears model with a 6 year guarantee.)

Well, it's pretty clear we're not going to suffer from anemia due to a lack of iron if we use the hot water for food prep - but still...

It's looking like it's getting very close to time to replace the water heater. I'd rather replace it before it fails. So the question is - do we get another 50 gallon gas model, or a tankless model? I've been thinking about one of those for a few years - it looks like we'd make about a third to half the cost back from rebates and tax credits, and by some accounts we'll save a buck or more a day in gas costs. Seems like a no-brainer, doesn't it?

Makes me wonder what I'm missing...

Any thoughts?

J.

If atheists don't believe in God - why do they seem to spend so much time and effort trying to eradicate any mention of God from their sight?

Mike Newdow's attempt to remove "Under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance, and "In God We Trust" from US currency seems rather overblown, considering the lack of damage it does. And I know folks are found of quoting the first Amendment - but it's kind of odd that in the paragraph below...

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

That seems to me to be the intent - not a denial of religion by the government.

Is there a real and significant problem here? So much of one that the only redress an Atheist might have is to sue the government to have the hated words removed?

And if this is accomplished - does that open the door for anyone, anywhere, who is offended by something the government does, will do, might do, contemplates doing, or has done at one time whether it's stopped or not (I think that covers it all) to sue the government for redress of the perceived injury?

Welcome to the tyranny of the offended minority. When did there appear a consititutional guarantee to never be offended?

Man. The way atheists act, you'd think they were vampires.

J.

Al Gore is criticised for lining his own pockets after �3,300-per-minute green speech | the Daily Mail

Al Gore has come under fire for making personal gain from his mission to save the planet – after charging �3,300 a minute to deliver a poorly received speech.

The former American Vice-President was also accused of being "precious" at the London event, demanding his own VIP room and ejecting journalists, despite hopes the star-studded gathering would generate publicity for the fight against global warming.

Especially with southern hemisphere ice increasing, and very cold temperatures in Canada? Hard to maintain a fiction of global warming when the evidence is exactly opposite of the predictions...

J.

Well, it's like lemmings off a cliff.

Political films still hot topic in Hollywood - Yahoo! News

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Politically themed films might be tanking at the box office, but executives are still salivating over the genre, according to a ranking of hot scripts making the rounds at Hollywood agencies.

According to the Black List, compiled annually by production executive Franklin Leonard, five of the top six scripts were political in nature.

Well, eventally they'll figure it out. They might even have money left in the bank when they do - though I think it'll be close.

J.

Down in Rusted Sky: Uh, wait a sec... I posted some thoughts on the CIA and the new NIE.

Basically, I think they've ignored the external enemy, and are trying hard to eliminate what they see as an internal threat, namely Bush. About half a year previously, Iran was seen by them as a threat. Now - they're not only not a threat, they haven't been one for years... or so the media is reporting what the NIE says.

What happened in the last 6 months... aside from the Presidential campaigns shifting into high gear, and our getting a GOOD look at the Democratic candidates? (And finding they pretty much stink on ice, but that's another topic for later.) Is what they're doing essentially hand-waving, misdirection while something ELSE is going on they don't want us to notice? A suicidal fixation on Bush? Or is Iran really not a threat, despite what the Israelies and the Brits might say?

Iran 'hoodwinked' CIA over nuclear plans - Telegraph

British spy chiefs have grave doubts that Iran has mothballed its nuclear weapons programme, as a US intelligence report claimed last week, and believe the CIA has been hoodwinked by Teheran.

Do I think the CIA would commit an ethical blunder of such a magnitude? You betcha, skippy. Bush is seen as a threat to the status quo - he's shaken up the Gentlemen's Club over at the State Department, and made it clear that business as usual won't cut it. That's not tolerable. Bush must go - or be so hamstrung that he can't do any more damage than he already has.

AJacksonian commented -

Well, coming from one of the Intel Community agencies that is not CIA, I an say that the thing is broken and has been for some time. My thoughts on the NIE run differently than most, and possibly worse than most... especially the part most people are ignoring, which seems pretty damning to me.

INTEL works well when it has a highly accountable chain of command and dedicated personnel. Civilian agencies have a hard time developing that and sustaining it... just look at the State Dept. for the CIA equivalent in a different area. It can be forced to work, but we have not had a President willing to exercise the Executive powers inside government for at least 35 years and properly going on 60 years. Part of that is an outgrowth of Congress wanting more power, more money and more control... part of that are Presidents that are unwilling to uproot the problem and start shaking it. This is no longer a 'point source' problem just in the CIA: it is government-wide and systemic outside of the armed forces. This form of government was never meant to have so much to do... and it shows.

J.

we have LOLTHULHU.

Oh, we're SO doomed...

J.

Penny Arcade! - The Tourn魯n, Part One

Heh. (To coin a phrase...)

J.

With headlines like these.

Fear of a global 'coldening' | The Daily Telegraph

Australia - Coldest June since 1950 | Clipmarks

Midwest braces for new snow blast - Weather - msnbc.com

ICECAP - Southern Hemisphere Ice Cover Remains Well Above Normal

Anyone else confused, or is it just me? How can we be having both warming AND cooling?

Never mind. I think I know the answer. (Grin)

J,

Now - the most fearsome of all.

The LOLPelosi.

Admittedly, TV is nobody's friend when you can go frame by frame. Politicians should remember that, and be aware that their appearance has a definite sell-by date.

J.

The little guy and I went with Pack 121 to Space Camp.

And my thought? Not bad. Not bad at all...

If I were 9 or 10, I'd have loved it. As it was (or is) I ... well, it was kind of boring in spots. (When an activity is oriented towards the 9 year old level, it's a trifle simplified for my taste.) One really great thing, however, was the ability to roam the museum after closing. It was nice to have the time to examine things (such as the inner cutaways of various rocket motors) instead of moving along quickly to satisfy an impatient wife or child. Or closely examine the interior of the LEM or Gemini mockups, or the interiors of various missiles.

The interior of the SpaceCamp Habitat was a trifle... industrial. Rather like the exterior -
View large image

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They're looking to replicate the appearance of a Space Station - and they succeeded well enough for my taste. The rooms aren't half-bad, but you'll be disappointed if you're expecting Tempur-Pedic mattresses. I've slept on considerably worse, and aside from getting a bit chilly last night, (solved with an extra blanket I'd had the foresight to snag) I slept remarkably well. I don't know what caused the gold tint in the shots - it was gray instead.
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All in all, a good weekend. Interesting stuff, 4 meals, museum roaming - it was a lot of fun.

Will we do any of the other father-son camps? I don't know - time will tell on that. My first impuse, if the money was there - would be to say yes quickly.

But I've finally made it to Space Camp. Whee!

J.

Vuitton-clad Venezuela minister spouts socialism | Oddly Enough | Reuters

CARACAS (Reuters) - A video of a Gucci- and Louis Vuitton-clad politician attacking capitalism then struggling to explain how his luxurious clothes square with his socialist beliefs has become an instant YouTube hit in Venezuela.
Venezuelan Interior Minister Pedro Carreno was momentarily at a loss for words when a journalist interrupted his speech and asked if it was not contradictory to criticize capitalism while wearing Gucci shoes and a tie made by Parisian luxury goods maker Louis Vuitton.

"I don't, uh ... I ... of course," stammered Carreno on Tuesday before regaining his composure. "It's not contradictory because I would like Venezuela to produce all this so I could buy stuff produced here instead of 95 percent of what we consume being imported."

The video clip (www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDsdXkY4UlE) had been viewed more than 15,000 times on Thursday, a day after it was posted on the YouTube Web site.

And under socialism, that effort doesn't get a payback. So don't worry - the luxury consumer goods will still be available to you, and you'll be able to lecture the masses on just how good they'd have if if they'd only listen to you.

After all, you deserve the good stuff because of your position, right?

J.

This last weekend was a busy one here at Rusted Sky.

No, not the chronicling of the SpaceCamp trip... but by the time I got back I had about 500 spam entries. Apparently by not immediately taking out the garbage, the spammers were able to identify vulnerable entries and delivered cratefuls of spam.

I've been in the habit of leaving comments open on my older posts. Every so often someone would read something and make a comment, but the last six months or so I've been closing the comments on articles that have gathered two or more spam entries.

This last weekend... (Shakes head.) I really don't see what they get out of it, what the purpose is. And somehow, they even manage to get in without tickling the counter. It might not be so bad if they'd bump up my visitor count!

But enough's enough. I've hired a janitor.

I've installed Blog Janitor, which should automatically close the comments on entries more than a certain number of days old. I regret having to do this - but I can't be constantly checking the blog to make sure the spam doesn't stink up the place. And literally I mean constantly - the spamposts were coming in about ten minutes apart for a while.

So we'll see if this, along with some other things I've used, will do the job. I wish I didn't have to do this, but that's the way things go.

J.

Winter storm wallops Ontario

Ottawa residents and snow removal crews continue to dig out from a record-breaking snowfall.

"You can brag to the grandchildren that you lived through the biggest snowfall ever ever in Ottawa," said Environment Canada meteorologist David Phillips.

J.

And are simultaneously appalled and thoughtful... What would be so bad about a 'Tofurkey'?

Turtle Island Foods, Tofurky Meals

The concept is, oddly enough, a reasonable one. After all, Vegans have to have SOMETHING to eat during the holidays. But a turkey made out of tofu?

The mind reels. So does the stomach.... but yet...

At Trader Joe's, they had the Tofurkey Roast with Gravy. And I thought... "Why not?" If it's sold at Trader Joe's, it has to be at least MARGINALLY edible!

Now, I just have to find the appropriate time and place to serve it...

Bwa-ha-ha-ha...

By the way, in case you're wondering about my sense of taste - I like MREs. And sushi. Live ants, however, I've tried once and don't care to nibble on again, and I draw the line at eating a live grasshopper. (What can I say? The eyes... I just couldn't bear the expression in their eyes...)

J.

A long time back (a good 25 years ago... man, how time flies) I was involved with a basically amoral woman. Her honesty was situational, in that she would do whatever she felt she could get away with... and she resented greatly any implication that she wasn't trustworthy.

The fact that she was not, that she would steal pretty much anything that wasn't nailed down if she thought it advantageous to do so and had little chance of getting caught, was irrelevant. SHE thought she was trustworthy, and therefore everyone else should.

When I saw this, I was sharply reminded of her.

New Clinton campaign out to show her likability - USATODAY.com

New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, trying to warm up an image some voters perceive as cold, starts a drive Monday to showcase her personal side with testimonials from friends, associates and constituents she has helped.

The online and in-person campaign, complete with a website called TheHillaryIKnow.com, comes a day after Clinton won a key endorsement from The Des Moines Register and her chief rival in the Democratic nomination race, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, was endorsed by The Boston Globe.

If you have to base your campaign on projecting a 'likeable' image... well... I'd say that your likeability is decidedly lacking.

Please note I don't think likeability (or the lack thereof) is a non-starter when it comes to deciding which Presidential candidate I'm thinking of supporting. What IS a non-starter for me is when a particular quality is crammed down my gullet by the organization for the candidate.

Over the last 16-17 years I've been aware of the Clintons, the likeability of Hillary has never, to my mind, been in question.... because for me that quality does not exist. One does not need to LIKE the Queen, after all - one only has to obey without question. That she's basing her campaign now on the likeability factor makes me think she's realized that not only is her unquestioned superiority within the ranks of the DNC in doubt, but the media has decided she's no longer the Anointed One and she needs to get them back on her side.

But I ain't buyin' the act.

Update: Apparently, neither are a LOT of other people.

Hillary leads in the 'anti-' vote�-�-�The Washington Times, America's Newspaper

Forty percent of Americans say they would vote to keep Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton from winning the presidency, more than twice the total for their No. 2 "anti-" pick, former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani.

In a new Fox 5-The Washington Times-Rasmussen Reports survey, 64 percent of Republicans, 42 percent of third-party or independent voters, and 17 percent of Democrats said the candidate they most want to keep from the White House is Mrs. Clinton.

J.

Why don't I find this surprising?

Local Transport Today - Carbon rationing predicted to deliver collapse in travel demand

Transport policy-makers should start preparing now for a dramatic reduction in motorised travel that will be brought about by carbon rationing, one of the country's leading environmental thinkers told LTT this week.

"Just start reading the runes because what's going to happen is the demand for road, rail and air travel is going to start falling away just as soon as we have rationing," says Mayer Hillman in an interview with the magazine.

Hillman, senior fellow emeritus at the Policy Studies Institute, says carbon rationing is the only way to ensure that the world avoids the worst effects of climate change. And he says that the problems caused by burning fossil fuels are so serious that governments might have to implement rationing against the will of the people.

"When the chips are down I think democracy is a less important goal than is the protection of the planet from the death of life, the end of life on it," he says. "This has got to be imposed on people whether they like it or not."

Have you ever noticed that those who want to impose restrictions on people ALWAYS want to do it for the 'greater good'? And for some odd reason, I'm thinking he'd find some reason why a certain class of people would be exempt from the rules the rest of the people might have to live by. After all, when you're superior, you should be allowed priveleges above those of ordinary people.

I get the feeling sometimes that the 'Climate Change' folk actually loathe the idea of all the peasants cluttering up THEIR Earth, and are looking to decrease the surplus population. Oh, there's a need for workers to support the infrastructure to provide the gentry lifestyle that they would want. But they need to know their place, and it doesn't include being able to travel.

They, of course, would be left with a mostly empty world and feel satisfaction that THEY were able to make a difference.

Of course, the 4-5 billion that would have to die to fulfill their fantasies are really irrelevant in the great scheme of things...

J.

.: U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works :: Minority Page :.

Over 400 prominent scientists from more than two dozen countries recently voiced significant objections to major aspects of the so-called "consensus" on man-made global warming. These scientists, many of whom are current and former participants in the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), criticized the climate claims made by the UN IPCC and former Vice President Al Gore.

The new report issued by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee’s office of the GOP Ranking Member details the views of the scientists, the overwhelming majority of whom spoke out in 2007.

Even some in the establishment media now appear to be taking notice of the growing number of skeptical scientists. In October, the Washington Post Staff Writer Juliet Eilperin conceded the obvious, writing that climate skeptics "appear to be expanding rather than shrinking." Many scientists from around the world have dubbed 2007 as the year man-made global warming fears “bite the dust.” (LINK) In addition, many scientists who are also progressive environmentalists believe climate fear promotion has "co-opted" the green movement. (LINK)

Look - I've got no problem with global warming. As I've posted before, I've reviewed a good bit of the evidence and find the case made for anthropological climate modifications. And I think it's a damn good thing, or we'd be waist-deep in an ice age at this point.

But if you insist on putting the supposed environmental thermostat to ONE temperature and using the technological base of the entire planet to keeping it at that one particular setting come hell or high water or global economic collapse, you need to first tell me what that setting is, how we're supposed to get it there, and how we're going to keep it there despite fluctuations in solar output.

And while you're at it, you better have a GOOD cost-benefits analysis to persuade me it would be a bright friggin' idea to do it in the first place. Because I'm thinking that man-made climate change isn't a bug, that it's more of a feature.

J.

Now this is something I'd like to see become commercially feasible.

Toshiba Builds 100x Smaller Micro Nuclear Reactor

Toshiba has developed a new class of micro size Nuclear Reactors that is designed to power individual apartment buildings or city blocks. The new reactor, which is only 20 feet by 6 feet, could change everything for small remote communities, small businesses or even a group of neighbors who are fed up with the power companies and want more control over their energy needs.

The 200 kilowatt Toshiba designed reactor is engineered to be fail-safe and totally automatic and will not overheat. Unlike traditional nuclear reactors the new micro reactor uses no control rods to initiate the reaction. The new revolutionary technology uses reservoirs of liquid lithium-6, an isotope that is effective at absorbing neutrons. The Lithium-6 reservoirs are connected to a vertical tube that fits into the reactor core. The whole whole process is self sustaining and can last for up to 40 years, producing electricity for only 5 cents per kilowatt hour, about half the cost of grid energy.

Toshiba expects to install the first reactor in Japan in 2008 and to begin marketing the new system in Europe and America in 2009.

Not that they'd accept any answers other than a sage "Yes, you're right - we should go back to the majority of people living a 18th century lifestyle and leave that wierd stuff called electricity to our betters - and only accept THAT if it comes from hideously expensive solar cells or properly sited (and non-bird lethal) windmills..."

We need something different in regards to dense, high-intensity power. You don't get a high-tech civilization without having a clean, easily portable or accessable energy souce - steampunk notwithstanding... - and there's not much out there BUT electricity that's viable in the near future.

(And please, no Tesla wireless power references. After having looked over his work, IF he did have something wreless going that wasn't the equivalent of having a neon tube near a high-voltage coil he didn't leave any workable clues to it. Besides - the electricity he was transmitting had to come from somewhere.)

So we have to look at what's going to produce that electricity. I'd have loved to see Google get into the power business with the Polywell reactor tests, but they apparently didn't see the idea as being worth investing the time or money. (Considering how much power Google must be using, you'd think they'd be eager for it.) But others are looking at it, including the Navy. We'll see.

Re nuclear - we can solving the engineering problems. The sociological problems, however... that'll take a lot longer.

J.

Hmmm.

Nano Flakes Could Transform Solar Cell Industry

A new material, nano flakes, may revolutionise the transformation of solar energy to electricity. If so, even ordinary households can benefit from solar electricity and save money in the future.

If researcher Martin Aagesen’s future solar cells meet the expectations, both your economy and the environment will benefit from the research. Less than 1 per cent of the world’s electricity comes from the sun because it is difficult to transform solar energy to electricity. But Martin Aagesen’s discovery may be a huge step towards boosting the exploitation of solar energy.

"We believe that the nano flakes have the potential to convert up to 30 per cent of the solar energy into electricity and that is twice the amount that we convert today," says Martin Aagesen who is a PhD from the Nano-Science Center and the Niels Bohr Institute at University of Copenhagen. During his work on his PhD thesis, Martin found a new and untried material.

"I discovered a perfect crystalline structure. That is a very rare sight. While being a perfect crystalline structure we could see that it also absorbed all light. It could become the perfect solar cell," says Martin Aagesen. The discovery of the new material has sparked a lot of attention internationally and has led to an article in Nature Nanotechnology.

You betcha.

I might even put a few panels in the back yard...

The company website is here...

Might be a few years away from being profitable - or it might be another BlackLight Power - an interesting idea that never makes it.
J.

As you folks know, I'm a bit of a technophile. When LED flashlights first came out, I got them. I was fiddling with computers when they were little more than glorified calculators. CF bulbs? I've got 'em, except where I've got dimmer switches installed... since CF bulbs and dimmers aren't too happy with each other. I LIKE the idea of LED lighting, but so far there's been a few, um, drawbacks. Brightness is an issue, as is cost. IKEA for a while has had under-cabinet lighting... but it's both expensive and kind of dim. There are alternatives... but I'm not ready to dump the halogen lights we've got under the kitchen cabinets for them.

Not yet, anyway.

However, a bill recently passed in Congress, mandating the phaseout of incandescent bulbs.

WorldNetDaily: Congress bans incandescent bulbs

In addition to raising auto fuel efficiency standards 40 percent, an energy bill passed by Congress yesterday bans the incandescent light bulb by 2014.

Well - there might be something out there. Have you heard of the Sulfur Plasma bulb? Apparently after getting pretty much ignored in the '90s, it's making a comeback. It's a neat idea, with no apparent long-term hazards (except from 2.45 gHz radiation - I don't know how you feel about that) and sulfur's environmentally relatively benign. It's only real drawback may be that it's too bright - better suited for industrial use than home.

But something that struck me - have you noticed what the government is doing? They're taking an inexpensive, simple, workable item who's only drawback is that it uses too much power... and forcing a change off of it to a supposedly hazardous, technically complex, more expensive item... which has as it's only real benefit the ability to provide light for the long term at a lesser cost in energy.

Well, maybe OLEDs will save us. But again - they're not commercially viable at this point for consumer lighting.

Time's getting short - and the government's clock is ticking.

J.

Nanosolar Blog � Nanosolar Ships First Panels

After five years of product development – including aggressively pipelined science, research and development, manufacturing process development, product testing, manufacturing engineering and tool development, and factory construction – we now have shipped first product and received our first check of product revenue.
We are grateful to everyone who supported us through all these years and the many occasions where there appeared to be mile-high concrete walls in our path; the unusual intensity and creativity of our team deserves all the credit for achieving this major milestone today.

Our product is defining in more ways I can enumerate here but includes:

- the world’s first printed thin-film solar cell in a commercial panel product;

- the world’s first thin-film solar cell with a low-cost back-contact capability;

- the world’s lowest-cost solar panel – which we believe will make us the first solar manufacturer capable of profitably selling solar panels at as little as $.99/Watt;

Let's see. The garage could probably support two 10x20 foot panels. The main house roof, two 15x30s. The house centerline is north-south, so past about 4 or so in the summer the eastern part of the roofline is shaded...

During the middle of the day, however.. I could have about 1300 square feet giving power.

And they don't give any idea of output per square foot. Dang!

J.

xkcd - Why Windows ME? The Ballmer Peak...

I always figured there was a cause...

J.

xkcd - Be Warned.

It's so true! LOL...

J.

Aphelion Webzine: Shorts

A little light reading for you. Hope you enjoy it!

J.

Denver Breaks Record For Snowfall On Christmas Day - Denver News Story - KMGH Denver

Global warming may soon see Santa don shorts

Antarctica's penguins threatened by global warming - Yahoo! India News

'Polars bears on the brink? Don't you believe it' | the Daily Mail

Trekker calls off Antarctic adventure | Philadelphia Inquirer | 12/27/2007

Carmichael had set out on Nov. 28 with a partner to raise awareness of global warming and break the 45-day record for trekking without outside assistance set by a five-man Korean team in 2004. Two years later, Hannah McKeand of the United Kingdom made a solo, unassisted trek in 40 days.

Crews at the Antarctic trekker's outpost of Patriot Hills had been urging Carmichael to call it quits for days - well after a calf injury had ended the journey for his friend, trekking partner and professional tour operator Jason De Carteret of the United Kingdom.
"Everyone had decided the window had closed except me," Carmichael said yesterday from his coffee business in Philadelphia. "I had to learn to accept that over a period of 10 days."
What helped persuade him was the unrelenting snowfall, which he had not encountered on a 100-mile test trek he made during his first trip to Antarctica in 2004. Skiing through as much as two feet of snow - when he had expected to be crossing a slick ice-packed landscape - was far more physically punishing and calorie-consuming than planned.

My prediction? 5 years, and we'll be facing an ice age again. And good ol' AlGore will be leading the charge towards making a buck off scaremongering.

J.

the depths and scope of a hatred which would do something like this.

Pakistan: Explosion At Benazir Bhutto Rally |Sky News

Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has been shot dead at a political rally.

The gunman then detonated a bomb, killing at least 15 of her supporters. Many more were injured in the suicide blast.

But I cannot understand why someone would see assassinating a popular figure as something good, something likely to bring to fruition what they desire for the future.

Don't they see what such stupidity has gotten the Palestinians? Or do they think that THIS time it'll get them what they want?

Benazir Bhutto is dead. Pakistan is in turmoil. What will the body count be? And how could the hardline Islamist factions think this would HELP them?

J.

sQuba, the driving, diving concept car from Rinspeed - Engadget

But it'll do until one comes along...

J.

Haven't been to a theater in a while - there's some movies I'd find interesting, but the spouse and little guy wouldn't, so this afternoon I took off to see "I Am Legend" with Will Smith.

I read the book long ago, and picked up a copy of "The Last Man On Earth" which was made in the '50s with Vincent Price. It's a loose adaptation, as was "The Omega Man" in 1971. This was actually pretty close to the original book, if I remember right - and a lot more, um, powerful than the other two. Will Smith's one hell of an actor, and his performance was gut-wrenching at times. (The last scene in the video store was masterful - a man who knows what's real, but desperately needs the fantasy to keep going, and is trying desperately to hold on to his sanity.)

I don't often recommend movies, but I'll recommend this one. Go. See it in the big screen. Take someone you can clutch - you don't want to see it alone.

Trust me.

J.

Wow.

It's funny looking at the evolution of video games. From Pong to the current gaming consoles... well, in retrospect it sure doesn't seem like it's been 25+ years. But each generation has improved graphics, each generation has improved games... we went from 2D side-scrollers to 3D graphics, from simple joystick controls on the first Atari systems to multifunction controllers...

And things kept getting better and better.

Of course, games like Doom and Quake and the like didn't hurt - video cards for PCs advanced in capability almost as fast as Intel churned out faster processors. And you needed the advanced graphics capabilities - game manufacturers kept trying to outdo each other with better features, better graphics... it became a race.

And what a race. We started with monochrome. IBM came out with CGA 4 color, then EGA 16-color... then they came out with the 256 color VGA adapter, open-sourced the pinouts, and we were off to the races, dozens of vendors vying to see who could make a sucessful knockoff first. PC-based games advanced in leaps and bounds. But there were still limitations on sheer computing power.

Now the market and the technology's advanced to the point where you can get a game console capable of doing teraflops. I've put off buying a console - for one thing, I didn't want the little guy parking himself in front of the TV permanently. For another, I've got enough demands on my time as is - I don't want to park MYSELF in front of the TV!

But it was inevitable, I guess.

I've been reading an article on Halo 3 in WIRED. It's kept in the bathroom, so I won't go into details. Suffice it to say that it was the cover article, and with a bright orange cover it was hard to hide. It runs on the XBox 360, and I didn't have any plans to get something like that, but it was interesting to read about the development process for the game. Then last summer Microsoft had a Halo themed XBox on their main page when I was doing some work requiring frequent visits to their site.

And I mentioned it to She Who Buys Christmas Presents once. Said I thought it looked neat - but it was too expensive. She did say we'd end up having to buy some sort of video game console soon - the little guy ain't getting any younger!

So Christmas morning rolls around - we pass out presents and She Who Pulls Tricks says... "Wait a minute..." and pulls out a large red bag.

With the Halo console in it. And Halo 3, and "Stunt Driver - Ignition".

So that kind of explains why I haven't been blogging much the last few days... I got a new toy for Christmas!

J.

Psycmeister's Ice Palace!: What would it take for me to vote for a democrat?

There's 4 criteria here that would fit his bill, and they're real close to mine. I especially like #4 -"Don't tell us what our problems are. We know what they are."
But I'd add something to it. "Give us some REALISTIC expectation you'd FIX the problems."

Sadly, after watching the Democratic party since the Nixon era, I've come to the conclusion that the Democrats are NOT concerned with fixing the problems they identify. They do identify them, they do use them as election fodder - but they will NOT, under pretty much any circumstances, actually FIX them.

There's two main reasons for that, from my point of view.

First - a problem solved is only good for momentary credit. The media is NOT concerned at all with SOLVED problems. A solved problem is good news, and will get at most a vague mention on CNN. "There have been no bombings in Iraq for a month. And may I remind you, please tune in for our one hour prime time special on a new scourge sweeping preschools and grade schools - the Perils of the Infected Hangnail, and what YOU have to get our lawmakers to do about it! It's VERY important you watch this special if you've got children!" I exaggerate, but only slightly.

Second - a problem that's difficult to solve can be used for a LONG time to shill for votes. All you've got to do is take a look at how the campaigns are shifting on the Democratic side - they first started off with Iraq as an insoluble problem that HAD to be abandoned, and it seemed like whoever managed to toss Iraq under the bus first, fasted, and hardest would be the Chosen One.

Then the Surge took effect. You aren't hearing much at all about Iraq from the candidates now. It is, for the time being, a 'solved problem', therefore it's pretty much useless when it comes to exciting the base for donations and activism. Instead, you see other issues come to the fore like health care, which stir as they might a lot of folks won't get terribly worked up about. Energy might be a topic - but again, it's one folks are used to. Yes, oil's high. You don't see Congress getting off it's collective hindquarters and doing much about it, however - since it's private industry that will need to come up with workable, affordable solutions.

(Like the Polywell reactor. Government's been focusing on tokamacs for fusion for a long time. 50 years ago, workable fusion was maybe 50 years out. Workable fusion is still 50 years out. In the meantime, a lot of people have had permanent, well-paid jobs on the government dime. Where's the incentive to actually SOLVE the problem and implement a workable solution, if it means your job goes away? The Manhattan Project, for example, needed results FAST for obvious reasons. Commercially viable fusion does not.)

There's one other criteria that I'd put in - that the politician in question actually be able to LEAD once elected. Sadly, I think most of our political class have learned how to get elected - which is nowhere near the same thing as learning how to lead once elected. The two mindsets are pretty much completely different - when working on getting elected you're going to tell your supporters what they want to hear in order to get elected. The problem is - once you get elected you've got to shift off that mode and move forward. If you're trying to govern by polls, the direction you're going on various issues will be about as constant as a weathervane on a blustery day. This is one advantage a dictator has over an elected government - no matter what the dictator does (within reasonable limits that don't provoke violent rebellion from the people) he doesn't have to worry about polls or accountability once 'elected', so he can embark on what he thinks are necessary plans over, say, a 20-year time frame with a good possibility of completing them. The primary job of an elected official in the US is to get re-elected, and for that he's got to listen to as many people as possible, which introduces severe variability to goals and the methods of accomplishment.

So, what would it take for me to consider voting for a Democrat for President? Simply put - not much... but what I'd need is very unlikely to happen.

J.

Why? Or Why Not?

Frankly, this post is to see if there are indeed legions of Ron Paul supporters just googling on an hourly basis looking for new places to post spam. We were discussing this last night, and I'd like to see if it's true.

And what the hell - I can use the hits.

So - if you're a Ron Paul supporter, tell me why - and why I should vote for Ron Paul. Because, honestly, I tend to vote Republican, but if it came down to Ron Paul vs. say, Joe Lieberman (heh, like THAT'S a possibility) I'd vote for Joe a hell of a lot faster than I'd vote for Ron Paul.

But you might be able to change my mind - if you've got a reasoned, well thought out block of solid, verifiable information about the worthy qualities of Ron Paul.

I await your reply.

PS - I WILL be googling whatever Ron Paul screeds are left here - so if you think you can do a quickie Cut&Paste flyby you're going to find your remark creatively replaced with verses from The Famous Pig Song. Just wanna warn you on that - I want something original, not something you've already attempted to googlebomb elsewhere.

J.

The Royal Navy had a sense of humor?

Get The Message

(Maybe that should be 'humour"...)

Anyway - have fun!

J.