Showing posts with label nanotechnology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nanotechnology. Show all posts

Sunday, November 01, 2015

Individuals Getting Paid

Wanted -- No, Needed: Digital Philosophers
"We have stronger opinions about our hand-held devices than about the moral framework we should use to guide our decisions.” As a result, we are in serious danger of having these philosophies influence our future in ways we neither intend nor desire. ......... “Advertising is a natural resource extraction industry, like a fishery. Its business is the harvest and sale of human attention. We are the fish and we are not consulted.” ...... “The reason advertising is artificially cheap is that no one has to ask our permission to advertise at us. We are involved in the transaction only as the commodity that is being bought and sold… Our right to preserve our own attention and to make our own decisions about how we spend it and with whom our personal information is shared must become part of the political agenda.” ....... One commercial at a time leaves me in control: I can change channel, look the other way, mute, close my eyes for 30 seconds. But thousands of ads, following me around on my computer, on my tablet, on my phone, in the movies, in the toilet, overwhelm me. ..... “Is advertising morally justifiable?” Thanks to the exponential growth of digital technologies, we face, or should be facing, similar philosophical questions across a whole range of activity. Is data collection morally justifiable? Does privacy have inherent value? How do we measure security?


Companies like Google should pay local, state and national governments across the world in jurisdictions where they make money. It might only be an aggregate 10% of what they make, but they should pay. Companies like Google should also pay individuals. The money should show up in your Gmail account. Data is not free. Big Data definitely is not free. It might only be 30 bucks a month, but that is a living in many countries. Heck, that is the mobile phone bill in the richest. Google's data plan is cheaper. Small internet startups should be free from this. A tech company should have to achieve a certain scale before they are asked to pay. That would work like an incentive. More paying companies would get created in the process.

Three billion people might opt to pay for their internet access this way. They might say, Google, create a section in your Chrome browser where you show me targeted ads, and let me have my internet access. For "free."

If we can create this pay structure, the impending era of abundance brought forth by huge rises in productivity might give us a billion artists who basically are jobless, who do nothing but surf the web, and who create content, who create art. Or not. They simply enrichen the internet by being there, by surfing. The internet is lifeless without people. They can always choose to get a job, or even build a company. But they are not starving in the meantime.


GOP plans for 'era of abundance' in energy
“Today’s energy policies are lagging far behind and are better suited for the gas lines in the 1970s than this new era of abundance”
JAVIER CREUS: “WE ARE ENTERING AN ERA OF ABUNDANCE!”
My co-authors and I found over 300 examples from all over the world of citizens organizing themselves to serve their own needs, which was so inspiring! This experience was what sparked my interest for the open knowledge, p2p production and collaborative economy movements........ Collaborative practices have grown massively and become mainstream in many areas such as for programmers on Github or for the European youth on ridesharing platforms. The collaborative / sharing economy has become widely known as a concept thanks to the interest of the media and the visibility of its communities. In some industries, such as lodging or city transportation, the impact on incumbent businesses has provoked many reactions and forced public administrations to rethink how to regulate these new businesses to benefit the public good. At the same time, some advanced businesses have started experimenting and getting in touch with the collaborative economy themselves. ....... basic concepts like mine & yours, customer & producer, partner & competitor, value & revenue, trust & responsibility may change dramatically when you integrate collaborative production systems. My impression is that most businesses see the efficiency generated by sharing resources, but have a hard time adapting to a new mental framework. ...... I’ve been researching the growth patterns of 50 digital powered organizations (from Wikipedia, to Spotify or AirBnb) that have grown at least 50% per year (in users, revenue and impact) since 2008. As I had predicted, platforms that have taken advantage of the socio-technological landscape as well as distributed or common resources and have integrated these new agents into their system or empowered their customers to find new roles, have grown faster than centralized service organizations. ........ Collaborative economy and open source projects have been financed by crowdfunding and P2P up to a point, but for the time being it is difficult to think of alternatives to VC in specific stages of growth. On the other hand, professional investors gain a profound insight into the businesses they invest in and can see when a long term view serves it better. Crowdfinancing, project currencies or open value chains are still experimental but promising. ........

we are going to see major changes in the next fifteen years towards a more fair and open society. Technology will make us more connected and thus aware of interdependence, ecology will make us energetically as autonomous as we can, economy will embrace the benefits of contributing to commons, and transparency will bring us trust in institutions.

...... I usually define a community as a group of people who share a common resource. Till the invention of the world wide web, communities where mostly confined to local environments as trust had to be generated face to face. The distributed structure of the Internet has allowed this traditional form of organization to scale directly to a global dimension. We are seeing new commons arising in all domains, and effectively already are in the age of communities! .......

We are entering an era of abundance, absolute abundance of knowledge and relative abundance of material goods.

We need a new version of capitalism for the jobless future
Andreessen steadfastly believes that the same exponential curve that is enabling creation of an era of abundance will create new jobs faster and more broadly than before, and calls my assertions that we are heading into a jobless future a luddite fallacy. ........ it’s a matter of public policy and preparedness. With the technology advances that are presently on the horizon, not only low-skilled jobs are at risk; so are the jobs of knowledge workers. ...... The jobs that will be created will require very specialized skills and higher levels of education — which most people don’t have. ..... millions will face permanent unemployment. I worry that if we keep brushing this issue under the rug, social upheaval will result. ......

Within 10 years, we will see Uber laying off most of its drivers as it switches to self-driving cars; manufacturers will start replacing workers with robots; fast-food restaurants will install fully automated food-preparation systems; artificial intelligence–based systems will start doing the jobs of most office workers in accounting, finance and administration. The same will go for professionals such as paralegals, pharmacists, and customer-support representatives. All of this will occur simultaneously, and the pace will accelerate in the late 2020s.

....... With less need for human labor and judgment, labor will be devalued relative to capital and even more so relative to ideas and machine learning technology. In an era of abundance and increasing income disparity, we may need a version of capitalism that is focused on more than just efficient production and also places greater prioritization on the less desirable side effects of capitalism. ........ China will be the biggest global loser because of the rapid disappearance of its manufacturing jobs. It has not created a safety net, and income disparity is already too great, so we can expect greater turmoil there. ....... Carlos Slim Domit .. He predicted the emergence of tens of millions of new service jobs in Mexico through meeting the Mexican people’s basic needs and enabling them to spend time on leisure and learning. He sees tremendous opportunities to build infrastructure where there is none, and to improve the lives of billions of people who presently spend their lives trying to earn enough on which to subsist. ........ Countries such as India and Peru and all of Africa will see the same benefits — for at least two or three decades, until the infrastructure has been built and necessities of the populations have been met. ...... Then there will not be enough work even there to employ the masses........Slim’s solution to this is to institute

a three-day workweek

so that everyone can find employment and earn the money necessary for leisure and entertainment. This is not a bad idea. In the future we are heading into, the cost of basic necessities, energy, and even luxury goods such as electronics will fall low enough to seem almost free — just as cell-phone minutes and information cost practically nothing now. It is a matter of sharing the few jobs that will exist in an equitable way......... The concept of

a universal basic income

is also gaining popularity worldwide as it becomes increasingly apparent that declining costs and the elimination of bureaucracies, make it possible for governments to provide citizens with income enough for the basic necessities. The idea is to give everyone a stipend covering living costs and to get government out of the business of selecting what social benefits people should have. The advantage of this approach is that workers gain the freedom to decide how much to work and under what conditions. Enabling individual initiative in the work that people pursue, in fields ranging from philosophy and the arts to pure science and invention, will result in their enrichment of their cultures in ways we can’t foresee. ....... With sensors, new nanomaterials and composites, and 3D-printing technologies, we could be building massive smart cities that use energy more efficiently and provide a better quality of life for their inhabitants. ....... Another potential solution, the brainchild of Internet pioneer Vint Cerf and entrepreneur David Nordfors, is to develop A.I. software that matches jobs to the skills, talent, passions, experiences, and values of each individual on the planet. They say that there is an almost infinite amount of work that needs to be done and that only a fraction of all human capacity is being used today. People hate their jobs, consequently losing tremendous amounts of productivity. With jobs tailored to a person’s passions, we could create a work environment in which people give 100 percent of their capacity to work and the economy expands because more is being done......

We need to be prepared and to develop a new version of capitalism that benefits all.





The (Needed) New Economics of Abundance
Molecular manufacturing coupled with AI could bring about a “personal manufacturing” revolution and a new era of abundance. But abundance could be highly disruptive, so we need to design a new economics of abundance so society is prepared for it. .... For centuries, we have built cultures and economies around scarcity. Economics is the “study of how human beings allocate scarce resources”1 in the most efficient way and conventional wisdom agrees that regulated capitalism results in the most efficient allocation of those scarce resources. ...

But what happens if resources are not scarce?

....... Is there even a point to talking about the “economics of abundance” in a culture where economic equations are entirely oriented around scarcity? ..... “My college textbook, Gregory Mankiw’s otherwise excellent Principles of Economics, doesn’t mention the word abundance. And for good reason:

If you let the scarcity term in most economic equations go to nothing, you get all sorts of divide-by-zero problems. They basically blow up.”

......... molecular manufacturing as “the automated building of products from the bottom up, molecule by molecule, with atomic precision. This will make products that are extremely lightweight, flexible, durable, and potentially very ‘smart’.” And cheap. ........ “personal manufacturing”. Such personal nanofactories (PNs) already have been envisioned and are likely to be similar in look and ease of use as a printer or microwave oven. ..... The advent of PNs should bring the cost of most nonfood necessities to near zero.

Much of the raw material for most objects we commonly use can be found in air and dirt

...... If we build things from the molecules up (and conversely, break things down into their component molecules for reuse),

materials cost will nearly disappear.

Information would then become the most expensive resource. Meanwhile, computing power — information management — continues to expand exponentially even as its cost drops precipitously. ....... as true artificial intelligence (AI) approaches, computers will become self-programming, and information cost may drop even more dramatically. It’s already happening. .....

even food eventually could be manufactured on the kitchen countertop personal at practically no materials cost.

...... What would an economy based on abundance look like? What would we call it? Could we convince the lawmakers, the regulators, and those who currently benefit most from a system based on scarcity to relinquish what has worked so well for them? ...... we must drive toward an outcome whereby the benefits of molecular manufacturing accrue to the greatest number of people. War, poverty, and business drive my reasoning. .....

To date, all our technological and economic progress has produced a world at war and in poverty. War is largely fought over scarce resources. Widespread wealth (through universal distribution of PNs) would remove the apparent fuel for most wars.

...... 2.7 billion humans live below a level necessary to meet basic needs. The organization says that this kind of poverty includes hunger, lack of shelter, no access to medicines, and losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water ....... This discussion needs to happen now, before entrenched interests develop protections and harden regulations adapted for maximum short-term profits while stifling innovation. Market forces can be too slow. What’s needed is a means to produce broad and inexpensive licensing so that early breakthroughs in molecular manufacturing can quickly benefit a broad swath of humanity. ..... Over hundreds of years, we have developed the skills of how to allocate things in short supply. For widespread abundance, we have no experience, no projections, and no economic calculations. Abundance, paradoxically, could be highly disruptive. It is time to design a new economics of abundance, so that abundance can be enjoyed in a society that is prepared for it.

What Esther @kcolbin and Thomas Wells talk about here is part of why I care about web science. Must-read. And I think I'...

Posted by JP Rangaswami on Sunday, November 1, 2015


Thursday, May 28, 2015

Technology Problems, Policy Problems

English: ANgel_F, the child artificial intelli...
English: ANgel_F, the child artificial intelligence son of Derrick re Kerckhove and the Biodoll (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
It is not the job of technology to make sure everyone is fed. It is the job of technology to produce abundant food. It is the job of public policy to make sure everyone is fed.

Technology produces guns. And citizenship requires that we agree to the lawful use of the gun by the police and the military, both of whom have to work within the parameters of the law. Public policy does, or should, determine the use of the gun.

Artificial intelligence is the same way. The public policy domain needs to stay vigilant. There is good use to which artificial intelligence can be put. We are nowhere close to having too much artificial intelligence right now.

Monday, February 02, 2015

The Most Powerful Scene In Interstellar




You always thought Matt Damon was Da Bomb (I have watched the Bourne movies more times than I can remember, they are better than all the Bond movies, I used to watch Heat the same way) and Matthew McConaughey was the sidekick, the also star. That changed for me after Interstellar. McConaughey emerged clear. Late blooming is in.

I am really into movies. I love watching them. My favorite celebrity is a movie star, not a politician or a tech entrepreneur. I don't think that means I ought be in the movies (although I do want a small role here and there, get me in as an extra, maybe I will sip coffee in some scene, I don't have time for a full role, and maybe talent is also required, although I did win a best actor award in middle school, just like my favorite movie star). I think that means I think overwhelmingly visually. Words come to me later. First I think through abstract images. And once the thought is formed, I look for words. 

My favorite scene in Interstellar is when the McConaughey character falls into what is a black hole, but instead he finds himself on the other side of the cosmic window, right outside where his daughter is. He just does not seem to be able to reach out or communicate. 

There is this concept of worm holes. You can travel vast seemingly untravelable distances through worm holes. They are warps in space and time.

For me coming to America has been McConaughey going into deep space. You think you are doing it for people on earth, people you care most about. 

For me it is about the dollar a day people. I feel like if I do well enough as a tech entrepreneur - a SuperEntrepreneur - I will be able to reach out to the dollar a day people in some of the most effective ways possible so as to have a positive impact on their situation, to help them spiral up into higher income brackets. That there is a worm hole. And it is at the cutting edges of innovation. 

From the entrepreneur angle, years have been lost to trucking (I packed a decade and a half worth of vacations into two plus years), years have been lost to politics (I was born where I was born, what can I do, what can I say, and if I have a gift, which I think I do, it is that both sides of my family were political), years have been lost to American immigration (the revenge would be to effect an IPO for every such lost year), but I will make up for it all. Software is the center of it all, but I have already made some early moves in biotech, nanotech and clean energy. 


Saturday, January 31, 2015

SuperEntrepreneur Options

Boldness 2009 logo.
Boldness 2009 logo. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I think the SuperEntrepreneur concept has to start with the boldness of vision, it is about realizing the next big things are (1) Software (still) (2) Biotechnology (3) Nanotechnology and (4) Clean Energy. I am tempted to put Microfinance on par with the Big Four, and I admit to my Third World (Global South) bias.

You start with that boldness of vision. And you cultivate an eye for spotting for the companies of tomorrow. And you build and scale business processes, and fundraising, and you build your network, and you weave together Founder CEOs doing exciting things in their domains, the earlier you grab them the better.

If you are too much in tune with what is most talked about today (mobile?), you might be missing out on the biggest trends of tomorrow. Although I do think mobile has at least until the end of this decade to run strong.

The Founder CEO concept is key. The Founder CEO is the central hub in the SuperEntrepreneur concept. If you don't have the Founder CEO personality, you are too "clingy."

Friday, September 12, 2014

Nanostructured Ceramics

Just like biotech has a huge appetite for Big Data, I keep wondering how you plug in software into these nano scale equations. You know how they say for sensory perception the software-only approach is a dead end. You need to innovate at the hardware level. So you design neuro inspired chips. I think nano could see software use in that direction. Smarter hardware? In built smartness?

A Super-Strong and Lightweight New Material
they could make ceramics, metals, and other materials that can recover after being crushed, like a sponge. The materials are very strong and light enough to float through the air like a feather. ..... In conventional materials, strength, weight, and density are correlated. ..... nanoscale trusses made from ceramic materials can be both very light—unsurprising, since they are mostly air—and extremely strong. ..... To make the ceramic nano-trusses, Greer’s lab uses a technique called two-photon interference lithography. It’s akin to a very low-yield 3-D laser printer. ..... Nanostructures have a very high surface area and are lightweight, a combination that could make for a fast-charging battery that stores a lot of energy in a convenient package.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

My Third World Advantage

Image representing Google as depicted in Crunc...Image via CrunchBaseThere are five broad categories in tech: web tech, clean tech, bio tech, nano tech, fin tech. Each of those five categories are broad. Each has sub categories, and sub sub categories.

There is no next Google in web tech, there is no next Facebook in web tech. Google is the next Google. Facebook is the next Facebook. But the Googles and Facebooks of clean tech, bio tech and nano tech are still out there. They are still small. If you can locate them and put some money into them, you are going to end up uber rich. But it is not easy to locate them, not easy at all. Even the Google of today was not easy to locate when it was small. Yahoo could have had the Google search engine for a few tens of millions, but they passed up on the offer.

Wednesday, January 05, 2011

Fred, How About Some Money?

Fred Wilson - The Naked TruthImage by Randy Stewart via FlickrCharlie O'Donnell At His Inspiring Best

Hi Fred. Looks like you are back from your Middle East Peace Tour, aka vacation. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26) And so this might be a great time to bother you. Chances are you are not cranky.

I am writing this at three in the afternoon but shall schedule post it for four in the morning when people are asleep, and no one quite sees it. That is how JFK first wanted to announce that it was Bobby for Attorney General: around midnight. He feared accusations of nepotism. If you do give me money, people might think it is because I am a member of the AVC community. Accusations of nepotism might fly.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

An IP Address For Your Heart

New Scientist: Body organs can send status updates to your cellphone: wireless body area network (BAN). Dubbed the Human++ BAN platform ..... The next step will be to use an ultra-low-power radio transmitter, still in development at IMEC, to improve the stamina and portability of the sensors. .... "telehealth" monitoring like this

This totally chimes in with my thought expressed at this blog a few times that most tweets in the future will not emanate from human fingers. Looks like some of them will emanate from the heart.

New Scientist

Evidence of water in megacanyon on Mars
Water cycle goes bust as the world gets warmer
Quantum thermometers usher in the big chill
Evidence of water in megacanyon on Mars
Deep space drama: Top 10 views of the southern skies
Tune in to the live whale song network
Sweaty palms and puppy love: The physiology of voting
Chemistry Nobel winner: My work is not done
Stuxnet: the online front line
Ancient tattoos linked to healing ritual
Black widow pulsar is fattest collapsed star yet
Exoskeleton helps the paralysed walk again
Extreme PowerPoint: a 3D slide show
Innovation: Online army turns the tide on automation
Audio zoom picks out lone voice in the crowd
Andre Geim: Why graphene is the stuff of the future
Breaking the noise barrier: Enter the phonon computer
Scratched glasses give perfect vision
Ditch the glasses for lifelike 3D
White House turns green with solar panels
Physicists win Nobel using sticky tape and pencil
First frictionless superfluid molecules created
Wind farms make like a fish and shoal



New Scientist: Nanotechnology

Introduction: Nanotechnology
Nanotech: The shape of things to come
Work light twice as hard to make cheap solar cells
Electron vortex could trap atoms
Nano-engineered cotton promises to wipe out water bugs
Medical nanotech could find unconventional oil
Real invisibility threads would be fit for an emperor
Antibacterial socks may boost greenhouse emissions
Quantum electron 'submarines' help push atoms around
Graphene bubbles mimic explosive magnetic field
Say Cheese (Monstera Deliciosa)Image by grytr via FlickrGrow-your-own approach to wiring 3D chips
Casimir effect put to work as a nano-switch

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