(Nanowerk News) European and Indian researchers are applying principles learned from living organisms to design self-organizing networks of wireless sensors suitable for a wide range of environmental monitoring purposes.
http://www.nanowerk.com/news/newsid=6901.php
Coming to a town near you – wait, this is my town! Thirty years ago, I spent three years trying to sell energy conservation and renewables to a populace of ranchers and farmers.
“The next-generation electricity grid will allow our company to better meet growing demands, address environmental challenges, maximize available resources and optimize the entire energy system. Ultimately, a “smarter” grid helps us serve our customers by creating more options for managing personal energy use, habits and costs.”
Jacking in aims for the mass market. The headset is based on raw EEG readings, so is at a very limited level of granularity, but still.
“The exact source of the electrical activity the headset is picking up may not be important, said Dr. Jonathan Wolpaw, chief of the laboratory for nervous system disorders at the Wadsworth Center of the New York State Department of Health in Albany. He uses EEG caps as part of brain-computer interfaces for severely paralyzed people. His systems record brain activity alone, but for a consumer game device, a cap that picks up a mixture of brain and muscle activity may be acceptable.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/08/technology/08novel.html?_r=1&ref=technology&oref=slogin
“AlphaSniffer LLC has developed a highly-sensitive biosensor for detection of trace amounts (~pg/mm2) of bacteria, viruses, proteins, nucleic acids, antibodies and other biological and chemical agents in real-time and with minimal human intervention.”
http://www.alphasniffer.com/index.php
“Electromagnetic radiation of active mobile phone sets off the LEDs in relative proximity. Light shadow follows the conversation through the space.”
http://cellphonedisco.informationlab.org/media.php
There’s also old school companies surfing the neurowaves.
Increase home security and let visitors in more easily with this electric door strike designed specifically for deeper Schlage-brand locks. This 12VDC Schlage compatible door strike replaces your existing strike plate with an electro-mechanical release mechanism. Simply wire one in series with a low-voltage push-button switch an X10 Universal Module(Item#sh2010) or the relay release of an intercom system and your visitors will be able to push or pull the door open when power is applied. You can also connect them to a keypad alarm system or other entry system. 16-Volt AC Power Supply(Item#sh5191) sold separately.
http://www.securedhome.com/sh5190s.html
A home awareness system; Home Heartbeat; easy to carry “HomeKey” remote status monitor. World right now, organic metaphor, not quite jacked-in, but a nice integration of Neurospheric elements. Not quite cheap yet, but 200 bucks gets you started, and growing the system sensor by sensor is a good transition business model.
“With the Home Heartbeat system- easy-to-install wireless sensors check the pulse of your home. No technicians, no codes, no third party monitoring or complex manuals are required. Just use the included keychain-sized controller (or even your cell phone) to see the current status of your house at a glance–whether you’re at home or away from home.”
http://www.homeheartbeat.com/HomeHeartBeat/index.htm
There’s actually a method and approach for getting to this recurring dream from the way things are now, affiliated with Ken Wilber’s Integral philosophy and Don Beck’s Spiral Dynamics.
“A Declaration of the Value of Global Governance
The Declaration below is an on-line petition to the leaders of society to recognize the value of establishing a democratic world federation guided by the enlarged understanding of history and culture provided by the integral worldview.”
http://www.integralworldgovernment.org/
The Zigbee guys are part of this.
“The Grid-Interop Forum … will inform and engage public and private electric systems stakeholders in the integration issues associated with the increasingly complex, distributed automation systems that will be involved in system operations, as well as the interface standards and codes needed to enable a more efficient, reliable, and resilient electric system.
Grid-Interop is being organized by the GridWise Architecture Council, whose mission is to enable all elements of the electric system to interact.”
http://www.grid-interop.com/2007/content/overview.asp?tabvar=a
Municipal wi-fi networks seem to have run into a snag as many were based on public-private partnerships that would have made them essentially low or no cost to the taxpayers. Many of the business plans aren’t working out. But there is still work going on in bottom up, organic networks with individuals contributing their bandwidth.
“The citizens of Kuuskaista have formed a co-operative to develop and own an open public local access network to serve the community and I believe this shared ownership model could be adopted more widely. – Tuija Riukulehto : CEO of Network Co-Operative, Kuuskaista, Finland”
http://www.oplan.org/
And bigger scale public-private partnerships. Hmm.
“BT has teamed up with Spanish technology company Fon, backed by Google, to try to persuade its more than 3 million British internet users to open up part of their home wireless broadband networks so that other people can use them.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/oct/05/internet
http://www.fon.com/en/info/whatsFon