The Future of Computing

Source: New York Times

Power in Numbers: China Aims for High-Tech Primacy
Creating Artificial Intelligence Based on the Real Thing
Vast and Fertile Ground in Africa for Science to Take Root
With a Leaner Model, Start-Ups Reach Further Afield
A High-Stakes Search Continues for Silicon’s Successor
Out of a Writer’s Imagination Came an Interactive World
Looking Backward to Put New Technologies in Focus
Interactive Map
Taking Faster and Smarter to New Physical Frontiers
Leave the Driving to the Car, and Reap Benefits in Safety and Mobility
Death Knell for the Lecture: Technology as a Passport to Personalized Education
An Evolution Toward a Programmable Universe
In an Open-Source Society, Innovating by the Seat of Our Pants
Computer Scientists May Have What It Takes to Help Cure Cancer
China Is Poised for an I.T. Golden Age
New Tools for New Computing Challenges
Full Speed Ahead, Without a Map, Into New Realms of Possibility

Blueprint For The 21st Century

Image via Wikipedia(1) Wireless, Gigabit Broadband For Seven Billion People

This needed to be the primary focus of the stimulus bill in 2009. Instead a bunch of money got poured into 20th century artifacts like roads and bridges. I don't think this will take more than 100 billion. At most. That is a small price tag if you ask me. Considering how central it is to everything else that needs to get done.

You do this and far fewer people are trying to come into America, into Europe. Educational and economic opportunities would go everywhere.

And it will pay for itself. First you build it, then you operate it, then you go ad supported, and then you sell it off, and end up making money on the whole thing. I am talking satellites, I am talking dark fiber. Do whatever it takes. The goal should be that no matter where you are on the planet, on land or water, we got you covered.

This infrastructure is key to every big problem we face today, starting with global finance. People who are trying to "fix" things are literally flying blind. They don't have the data with which to build a new global financial architecture, the only way out of the current mess.

This infrastructure is needed to fight climate change. You build this infrastructure and nothing can stop the total spread of democracy. All demon regimes wither away.

(2) Seven Billion People Checking In

All airports, all bus terminals, all train stations should have this. All public places. You announce your presence to a mega database. It could be retina stuff. Alongside build a huge database for fingerprints as well. And you do these two things to get rid of the sick immigration laws that exist in every country.

If you live in a city, you should be able to vote in that city. That should be the global law.

(3) Erosion Of The Nation State

This is inevitable.

US Ambassador To Nepal On Facebook

It started here. That took me to here. And to here.

This is the US ambassador to Nepal using Facebook to step right into a controversy. If all US ambassadors did this, Wikileaks might go irrelevant, like I said in a comment. By now I have left four comments. My latest comment is as follows.

(1) Biotechnology is like software, like nanotechnology, like green/clean energy. A country that wishes to go into the future can not be saying no to any of those. That is not me saying a big yes to Monsanto. Monsanto is just one company, although a big, influential one, and some might say a little notorious.

(2) Hybrid seeds are not news. Nepal has been using hybrid seeds for a long time now. But I must admit the kind of hybrids Monsanto seems to have in mind are leaps and bounds beyond what Nepal has been using so far.

(3) A new medicine sometimes is not what it was thought to be. But that is no argument against medical progress. Hybrid seeds can have and have had drastic eco consequences. That is an argument for a much more rigorous regimen to how the new hybrids get approved for the market in the first place.

(4) Biotech is going to play a key role in upping Nepal's agricultural production by a factor of something like 10, something dramatic. Again, that is not a vote for Monsanto. That is my positive vibe for biotech as an emerging field in applied science.

(5) Monsanto does seem to have some notoriety. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto A lot of it seems to come from its non biotech moves, in how it lobbies governments, how it influences decision making, how it enters countries. The solution to that is to have a full fledged intelligent discussion. It is for the Nepali people to decide if Monsanto is to be allowed. But at this point my stand is that a pilot project will not hurt. With a pilot project the Nepali people will have something concrete to talk about and debate.

(6) In this day and age of internet and globalization that pilot project local to Nepal can be coupled with global experiences with Monsanto. There's some good and some bad out there. Software programs have bugs. The early ones had even more of them. Windows crashed a lot in the early years. Some of what we blame Monsanto for is the fact that humanity is in its early stages of using biotechnology. And so there are "bugs." The effort has to be to fix the bugs. For that a corporation like Monsanto, a government like that in Nepal, and collectively a people all have to work hand in hand. I think cooperation is possible, and that starts with an open dialogue like this one.

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

Silicon Valley Fight Club

Uppercut from California is a place. on Vimeo.

Via Gizmodo
Paul Graham: Wrong About NYC



Fight Club: Where Is My Mind?

December Events

Image via WikipediaZaarlys Holiday Party at Fontanas
Thursday, December 8, 6:30 PM
105 Eldridge Street
B/D Grand St

Purpose Holiday Party
Friday, December 9, 2011 from 7:00 PM to 11:00 PM
224 Centre Street, 6th Floor
4/6/N/Q/Z Canal St

Young New Yorkers’ Chorus presents “NOVA! – Christmas with YNYC”
Church of Saint Mary the Virgin · Sunday, December 11, 2011, 7:30-10:30pm

Entrepreneurs Roundtable 42
Monday, December 12, 2011 from 6:15 PM to 8:30 PM
Microsoft, 1290 6th Avenue, 6th Floor
B/D/F/M Rockefeller Center

Blacks in Tech Christmas Party
Monday, December 12, 2011 from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
2296 Frederick Douglass Blvd
A/B/C/D/1/2/3 125 St

Annual NYC UX Community Holiday Party
FORUM LOUNGE · Tuesday, December 13, 2011, 6:00pm

Holiday Party
Max Fish · Tuesday, December 13, 2011, 7:00pm

Women in Wirelesss Holiday Party
Roger Smith Hotel · Wednesday, December 14, 2011, 6:00pm
501 Lexington Avenue , Starlight Room

NYU ITP Winter Show!
Sunday, Dec 18 2:00 PM
NYU ITP, 721 Broadway 4th Floor, New York

TechDrinks XXIII: Happy Christmahanukwanzivus!
Lunasa Bar · Monday, December 19, 2011, 6:00pm
New Venue: Startup Xmas & TechDrinks
Monday, December 19 at 6:00pm
The Bloomberg Building, 731 Lexington Ave, 28th Floor

Digital Media MBA December '11 Holiday Party
GSTAAD · Monday, December 19, 2011, 6:30-10:00pm

Prof. SD Muni - South Asian Perceptions of Rising China
December 20, 5:30-7:30 PM on Tuesday, December 20, 2011 at 72 Fifth Ave, 7th Floor
(northwest corner of 13th and 5th Ave.)

Ignite NYC Holiday Party
8-11pm, Hotel Chantelle, 92 Ludlow Street (btw Broome and Delancey)

(FREE) Live Jazz at Bar Basque with Mike Cottone
Bar Basque · Wednesday, December 28, 2011, 6:30-9:30pm

DUMBO Startup Lab: Open House + New Year Party Mixer
Thursday, December 29, 2011 at 7:30 PM (ET)
DUMBO Startup Lab
68 Jay st. #415

Naked Holidays!!
Thursday at 8:00pm until Friday, December 30, 2011 at 11:30pm

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When Sean Parker Took A Break From Tweeting

Image by Getty Images via @daylifeWhen Vinod Khosla Took A Break From Tweeting

Sean Parker used to tweet near daily after he finally, finally got on the service. Well, that has not been true for weeks now. And I have no idea why. But there is a strange coincidence to my tweeting him around the same time.

My Take On AirTime (3): November 13

Sunday Tickles

@BestAt
BestAt: The Best @'s RT @buck4itt: Wait. This is just sinking in. Herman Cain was running for president of THE COUNTRY?
Dec 04 via twitterfeedFavoriteRetweetReply

@BestAt
BestAt: The Best @'s RT @ineedaballrub: Name your iPod 'Titanic', plug it into the computer, "Titanic is syncing", press cancel, feel like a hero.
Dec 03 via twitterfeedFavoriteRetweetReply

@BestAt
BestAt: The Best @'s RT @emirkr: There's a Polar bear in my niece's coloring book; in case you're wondering why Earth is doomed.
Dec 02 via twitterfeedFavoriteRetweetReply

@BestAt
BestAt: The Best @'s RT @robdelaney: Kill them with kindness! Or a hammer.
Dec 02 via twitterfeedFavoriteRetweetReply

@BestAt
BestAt: The Best @'s RT @FilthyRichmond: Marriage is about the little things, like playfully slapping my husband's elbow when he's using a Q-Tip.
Dec 02 via twitterfeedFavoriteRetweetReply

Rachel Sterne: NYC CDO: Five Months Into The Job

City Hall Newsmakers with Rachel Sterne from City Hall on Vimeo.

Happy Holidays
Tim Berners-Lee: The Internet Is Not A Country
Rachel Sterne: CDO
To: CDO Sterne
GroundReport Needs To Get GroupOnized To Take Off
A Mind Blowing Party
GroupOnizing GroundReport Might Be Specific To GroundReport

Why This Kolaveri Di (4)

Via Bhupendra Khanal in Bangalore

Why This Kolaveri Di (3)
Why This Kolaveri Di Dance By The Japanese
Why This Kolaveri Di

Shakira Or Hydroelectricity?

Cover of ShakiraSeveral months back I mentioned at this blog that I had been approached by a group in Kathmandu who wanted Shakira perform there. But they never really followed through. I think they considered her too big a ticket item and perhaps not affordable, or whatever.

Doubling Down On Tech Consulting
US Royalty: Staying Together

But recently I have been approached by another group that wants to build a six plus megawatt hydroelectric dam in Nepal north of Kathmandu pretty close to the Chinese border. This is a bigger, better deal than the Shakira deal might have been. And done right this could be the first of many deals. If you know investors who might be interested in hydroelectric dams in Nepal, let me know. This also allows me to be part of Nepal's economic revolution, its next challenge after the political revolution of a few years back.

Why do I mention this?

I blog profusely. But I don't want the label of a blogger, a writer. I am a consultant with a few different hats who happens to blog. Blogging is working out for the mind and I recommend it to everyone. I exercise regularly, but I don't want to be called a bodybuilder. I think everyone but everyone needs to exercise. The networking I have done so far in the NY tech ecosystem I could not have done if it were not for this blog.

March 8, 2012: Next Immigration Court Date

I am going to be a tech entrepreneur once the immigration gestapo in this fucking country finally lets me, but until then I consult. And it has been interesting. Primarily I do tech consulting. But I stay open to business opportunities otherwise. An entrepreneur is a jack of all trades who assembles masters in their specific fields. I be Jack.
Image via Wikipedia
Cruise Ship Coding
Looking For Holiday Parties To Go To

Nepal is second only to Brazil in terms of hydropotential. And it is a country mired in massive power cuts. And neighboring India growing at China like rates has a massive thirst for electricity.

Why This Kolaveri Di (3)

Why This Kolaveri Di Dance By The Japanese
Why This Kolaveri Di