Neurosphere

The Human-Human Interface

Self Powering


Personal Infrastructure

Powering remains a big question in the migration of personal telecom devices closer to and then within the human body. Here’s an interesting approach.

“Devices implanted in the body require power, which is normally delivered by batteries, but a number of approaches have been proposed to tap into the power or fuel sources the body already provides. Wang and Song (p. 242) have converted mechanical energy into electrical energy by deflecting anchored ZnO nanowires with a conductive atomic force microscope tip. The strain field created by bending the nanowires with the tip caused charges to separate and build up on opposite sides of this polar material. The tip and nanowire form a rectifying Schottky barrier so that built-up charge is released as electrical current when the tip crosses from one face polarity to the other.”

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol312/issue5771/twis.dtl#312/5771/155b

Wi-Fi M&A in the Making?


Network Infrastructure for the Neurosphere

Innovative wi-fi technology provider finds alliance with major supplier to cable and telephone industries. (Cable’s an investor as well.)

“Wireless mesh networking leader, BelAir Networks, today announced that the company is entering into a agreement with ARRIS TeleWire Supply for the resale of BelAir’s product portfolio throughout North America. ARRIS TeleWire Supply, a leading full-line supplier of broadband Hybrid Fiber Coaxial (HFC) products in the U.S, offers tools, hardware and infrastructure products to the cable industry.”

http://www.belairnetworks.com/about_belair/press_releases_view.cfm?p_id=86

Follow the Money


The World Right Now

Here’s an awareness of the world around us that could make a huge difference.

“’One of the next big steps in interactive television will be to let viewers find out instantly who the financial backers of public officials are, as they speak,’ C-SPAN CEO Brian Lamb said.

‘It won’t be too long where if you’re watching a network like ours or any of the news networks and you see a political official on-screen, you’re going to be able to push a button and know instantly where the money is coming from,’ Lamb said during the opening session of the National Show here Sunday.”

http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6323414.html?display=Breaking+News

Upwardly Mobile


Wholeness and Virtual Communities

Email is not immediate enough for a new generation.

“Social networking Web sites such as MySpace.com, which will soon go mobile, could become key applications driving data usage on new 3G wireless networks. Within the last year social networking and community Web sites on the fixed-line Internet have really taken off, especially among teens and twentysomethings, who spend hours online creating profiles and sharing photos, videos and blogs. MySpace, the most popular of the social networking sites, has more than 67 million members, and it adds roughly 250,000 members every day. MySpace is ranked as the second-most visited Web site on the Internet in terms of unique users, after Yahoo, according to ComScore Media Metrix. Last year Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. bought the company for $580 million…For years, mobile operators, which have spent billions of dollars to upgrade their networks to 3G wireless technologies, have tried to get customers to do more than talk on their cell phones.”

http://news.com.com/Mobile+communities+could+fill+3G+pipes/2100-1039_3-6058001.html?tag=nefd.lede

Wi-Fi, Public-Private, Half-Full?


Network Infrastructure for the Neurosphere

On the whole, I’d rather be in…Champaign-Urbana?

“Wireless Philadelphia is a project that has been in development for several years, but which will not be finished until late 2006….However, the project has stirred up a hornet’s nest, and has implications for the whole of America…”What is very different about a mesh, versus a cellular network, is that we get the radios very close to where the customer is,” said Chris Rittler of Tropos Networks. “What this does is actually pretty amazing. It enables off-the-shelf devices such as laptops, PDAs and wi-fi phones to connect easily. It also really reduces the requirements on those devices.”

When Dianah Neff announced the project she faced an immediate legal and lobbying onslaught from the giant telecommunications companies, led by Verizon. Verizon lost its fight in Philadelphia but has succeeded in getting the law changed in the rest of the state. Essentially it has become almost impossible for any other community to set up its own wi-fi system.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/4491506.stm

“Under the agreements, EarthLink will build, manage and maintain a wireless network over the City’s 135 square miles at no cost to taxpayers. EarthLink will install transmittal devices on approximately 4,000 of the City’s street lamp pole arms for which it will pay the City. In addition, EarthLink will provide City residents and visitors with free hotspots in 22 locations around Philadelphia, and provide the City with 3,000 free or discounted WiFi accounts and 700 discounted T-1 accounts to be used at the City’s option.”

http://ework.phila.gov/philagov/news/prelease.asp?id=233

Diluting Google


Network Infrastructure for the Neurosphere

More on the Google wireless infrastructure – now featuring a pay tier. It dilutes the experiment of whether network growth might be directed through more immediate, organic feedback from customer demand as measured by advertising success.

“The Google-Earthlink proposal endorsed by the city on Wednesday would see the companies offering a tiered payment system, including an Earthlink service that allows paying users to connect at significantly higher speeds than those who connect to a free service supplied by Google, which will be paid for by online advertising….Experts have warned, however, that the free wireless model remains unproven, and may not offer the best solution for smaller cities and towns addressing the “digital divide” to promote economic development.”

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12178170/

Wayne’s Wireless World


Network Infrastructure for the Neurosphere

Community owned wireless has the organic potential I look for in technology development. I’m not sure wireless community networks are different in kind from community networks like the moribund Boulder Community Network tried to be for internet access or community access television tried to be on cable.

“The Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network (CUWiN) has built a communications network using wireless networking equipment. This is essentially the same “WiFi” equipment used in homes and offices, but we put it on rooftops to connect neighbors and form a high-speed community network.”

http://www.cuwireless.net/

But maybe they are different. Check out this sister network, the Tribal Digital Village.

http://www.sctdv.net/

Global Lip Service


The World Right Now

Here’s an international effort that the Bush Administration supports. “More study” of course is also the Administration’s response to global warming, hence their lack of support for Kyoto Protocols that might actually do something about what is observed. So far, in the U.S. part of GEOSS, they’ve completed a strategic plan, and have scheduled a workshop – breathtaking progress in only 14 months.

“On February 16, 2005, 61 countries agreed to a plan that, over the next 10 years, will revolutionize the understanding of Earth and how it works. Agreement for a 10-year implementation plan for a Global Earth Observation System of Systems, known as GEOSS, was reached by member countries of the Group on Earth Observations at the Third Observation Summit held in Brussels. Nearly 40 international organizations also support the emerging global network. The GEOSS project will help all nations involved produce and manage their information in a way that benefits the environment as well as humanity by taking a pulse of the planet.”

http://www.epa.gov/geoss/

Cyworld


Wholeness and Virtual Communities

Remember how Americans used to be afraid of falling behind the Japanese?

“South Korea, perhaps more than any other country, is transforming itself through technology. About 17 million of the 48 million South Koreans belong to Cyworld, a Web-based service that is a sort of parallel universe where everyone is interconnected through home pages. The interconnectivity has changed the way and speed with which opinions are formed, about everything from fashion to politics, technology and social science experts said…Two years ago, after the opposition-led National Assembly impeached President Roh Moo Hyun, a consensus began forming on the Internet that the move was politically motivated — two hours after the vote took place, Mr. Chang said. “That quickly led to mass demonstrations,” he said. “That kind of thing had never happened in Korea before. Everyone is connected to everyone else, so issues spread very fast and kind of unpredictably.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/02/world/asia/02robot.html?ex=1301630400&en=d2a418720b473359&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Tip of the NeuroHat to Steve Solomon for the pointer.

Wireless Sensory Apparatus


The World Right Now

In my day job, I have been working to develop a standard application platform for interactive television, the absence of which I think is responsible for the failure so far of ITV. (www.opencable.com/ocap) Not so coincidentally, it’s based on Sun’s Java technology, which has been very successful as a cell phone application platform.

“Sun SPOT (Small Programmable Object Technology) is a new research project at Sun Labs…to make wireless sensors ready for mass commercial deployment by simplifying application development for them. Wireless sensors are inexpensive battery-powered, low-power communication devices composed of radios and exceptionally small mechanical structures that sense fields and forces in the physical world. These […] devices can be deployed throughout a physical space, providing dense sensing close to physical phenomena, processing and communicating this information, and coordinating actions with other nodes. Combining these capabilities with the system software technology that forms the Internet makes it possible to instrument the world with increasing fidelity.”

http://sig9.com/node/244