train nut meets sensorweb
Month: July 2007
Gatwick capsule hotel
A 4 hour stay in a premium cabin (10 square meters) costs $80. Bedside charging points, personal lighting, dimming control and bed deployment switch allows you to work or relax without moving from the comfort of your bed
a bit expensive, but yay for airports that are not hellholes. we need these around the world, imo
Storymapping
The concept of “Storymapping” – applying stories, often including photographs to something like Google Maps – is getting a lot of interest in the nonprofit community. Apparently, nonprofits aren’t the only folks to be interested, as Google just released an incredibly smooth integration of Picassa, their photo managing and editing software, and Google Maps. This integration makes adding your pictures and captions to Google Maps a matter of minutes.
someone likes the maps / picasa integration
What are you busy doing?
It’s not a trick question. Workplaces everywhere are full of people busy doing next to nothing . . . only they don’t realize it. What these people are doing is mostly shifting information around. They spend large parts of their days responding to e-mail and voice mail; they attend meeting after meeting after meeting; they watch scores of presentations and prepare still more. It all appears extremely important and productive, but when you look at it closely, what you see is an organization that spends nearly all its time swapping information from person to person, without having the time to consider fully what it contains, let alone act on it.
looking busy doing nothing: going to meetings, preparing presentations that no one reads, cc everyone. this piece has all the symptoms of a dysfunctional organization (ie, most of them).
Babies are tiny liars
Fake crying is one of the earliest forms of deception to emerge, and infants use it to get attention even though nothing is wrong. You can tell, as they will then pause while they wait to hear if their mother is responding, before crying again.
Data finds data
I like it when your data finds my data.
i’m pretty sure my data ends up, vicariously, in a lot of weird and wonderful places, so i’m always willing to nudge it into yet more directions..
Jesusphone
accurate iphone lulz
Mechanical Fingers
the device has no batteries, electronics, servos or actuators. Instead, each digit incorporates a simple mechanism which, when pushed by the surviving part of the wearer’s finger, curls a set of artificial phalanges.
All aboard
We’re pleased to announce that we have acquired GrandCentral Communications, a company that provides services for managing your voice communications. GrandCentral is an innovative service that lets users integrate all of their existing phone numbers and voice mailboxes into one account, which can be accessed from the web. We think GrandCentral’s technology fits well into Google’s efforts to provide services that enhance the collaborative exchange of information between our users.
as customer-hostile industries like telcos and music are invaded by the software industry, features go up, prices reach zero, and customer satisfaction increases.
Age of ignorance
We take our young children to science museums, then as they get older we stop. In spite of threats like global warming and avian flu, most adults have very little understanding of how the world works. So, 50 years on from CP Snow’s famous ‘2 Cultures’ essay, is the old divide between arts and sciences deeper than ever?
as long as the political elites in the west continue to be scientifically illiterate lawyers, it will keep getting its ass kicked by china.
Gregor J. Rothfuss 