Neurosphere

Grid computing available at retail!

“The Sun Grid can accept any self-contained, 32-bit application that is pre-compiled for Solaris 10 OS on the x86 architecture. (Java binaries will work as well.) Upload your apps for deployment on the Sun Grid and for execution. Input files may be cataloged and stored for repeat usage.”

http://www.sun.com/service/sungrid/overview.jsp

Grid computing like other innovations starts to see business model enablers come along. To the extent free markets are the perfect vehicle for expression of human needs, this growing grid entity will have the necessary circulatory systems to keep it going. Here’s one enabler from H-P, and a fully formed market mechanism for buying “computons” from Sun.

“Tycoon is a market-based system for managing compute resources in distributed clusters like PlanetLab, the Grid, or a Utility Data Center (UDC). The basic idea is that users have a limited supply of credits. Consuming users pay providing users to use computer resource. Users who provide resources can, in turn, spend their earnings to use resources later.”

http://tycoon.hpl.hp.com/

Whenever someone uses the term “solution”, I reach for my wallet. But I suppose this is the way the grid infrastructure is adapted to specific uses.

“Kontiki offers the industry’s most secure and scalable digital media delivery solution, enabling enterprises and content providers to securely publish, deliver and track digital media to employees, partners and customers.”

http://www.kontiki.com/

Pir Vilayet Inayat Khan died this year. Pir Vilayet brought the teachings of Sufism, the contemplative, mystical branch of Islam, to the West. He founded the Omega Institute, a “holistic” learning center whose name comes from Teilhard’s concept of the Omega Point. He talked about the institute resurrecting the aims of the ancient library of Alexandria, the compendium of all known knowledge at the time. Years ago, Internet pioneers had the idea that the Interent had the potential to be a mechanism for such an ambitious project of wholeness. Today advocates of online encyclodpedia Wikipedia harbor similar ambitions.

“Omega will be a global center for the development of human potential.”

http://www.eomega.org/

www.alexandria.ucsb.edu

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

Here’s a critique of theories of Intelligent Design by reference to Teilhard de Chardin’s more inclusive synthesis of science and religion.

“And this is the first thing to notice; unlike ID, Teilhard’s cosmology is not a shortcut to anywhere. Teilhard’s cosmology does not close off questions; it opens them up. And, if it is right, it really does help us make metaphysical sense of everything about the universe without having to abandon real science at any point in the process. That is, for Teilhard, as much as for any naturalist, we understand the universe by looking at the universe; not outside of it. In Teilhard’s universe there are no dei ex machina; things happen in the universe because that’s the way they happen in this universe. The difference is that this universe is not quite as straightforwardly self-subsistent as the naturalists would have it be.”

http://www.techcentralstation.com/111705B.html

The HomePlug Powerline Alliance is a group of companies seeking to spin gold by characterizing the electrical line to your home as a provider of broadband Internet and video access. I think this is a long way from competitive with the incumbents, but the interesting thing is the natural synchonization of such data intensive uses with the primary use, electric power. This recent announcement is another step toward an electrical grid with distributed intelligence, that is to say, a network that operates itself in an efficient manner commensurate with the global nature of its environmental impact.

“The alliance’s command and control specification will offer whole-house control of lighting and appliances, allowing them to respond to simple commands such as “turn on” and “turn off” and to report their status to a controller. Recent advances in powerline signaling technology enable interference free connectivity throughout the home while greatly reducing the need for additional aids such as phase couplers and repeaters.”

http://www.homeplug.org/en/news/press030905.asp