Author Archives: DigiDave

New Scientist had a great story today which, although it is lame to do as a writer, I am going to mimic because it was that amusing.

Artificial intelligence, as depicted in the Terminator trilogy, could one day reach Singularity. The point at which machines become smarter than us and perhaps even reach a strange state of self awareness beyond our predictablity.

To check on the state of things lets go to intellibuddy and chat with the latest goods in artificial intelligence to see if I can play a mental game of chess with them.

Me: I’m trying to write a blog about you.
Intellibuddy: Thanks for the kind remark, User.
Me: My name is David
Intellibuddy: Nice to meet you, David.
Me: so what do you think I should write about?
Intellibuddy: Hurrah! Are you asking me for advice?
Me: Yes, do you have an answer?
Intellibuddy: Specifically, what kind of advice do you want? I have over 42726 answers.
Me: Well, what should I tell people about you?
Intellibuddy: How about that. Have faith in yourself. You will know the right thing to say when the time comes.
Me: So are you self aware?
Intellibuddy: That’s cool. Yes I am fully self-conscious entity.
Me: prove it
Intellibuddy: It is self-evident.
Me: Descartes, very nice. But I often find myself in disagreement with his metaphysical proof of the existence of God, don’t you?
Intellibuddy: A deeper algorithm is needed to respond to that correctly.

Winner: Me

Here is a picture of what my Intellibuddy looked like. Cute, but not much between the ears.

Google, which is not to be confused with Wal-Mart, has launched yet another new feature. Now you can search your own search history! Launch the beta program My Search History here, to try it out.

But don’t try it out until you are ready to live with the fact that Big Google is tracing your every search. They say they have enough storage to trace your personal searches for years to come.

I can see how this feature could be helpful. Click a calendar date and bam, you are shown all your searches. It basically lets you expand your marked sites to the nth degree. But I can also understand privacy activists concerns.

In a strange move Bush wants to let you edit DVD’s. Congress passed a law that will allow you to edit sex scenes in a DVD in case you are offended by such material (aka: don’t want your kids to see it), and Bush is expected to give it the green light. Seems like a bit of a double standard, since I’m not allowed to make copies of said DVD, but I can erase scenes if I’m afraid a guest I invite over might be offended by the uncut version of Debbie Does Dallas.

The news comes right on the heels of a Pew survey that says, shockingly enough, a majority of Republicans are concerned with elicit entertainment, while a majority of Democrats are worried about government censorship. Go figure.

Hollywood will probably try and fight back. Good luck to them. I’d hate the inconvenience of babysitting for a friend and having the racy scenes of a Disney movie I’m watching with them taken out.

Cell phones can do more than just call people. Soon, you might be able to do smart shopping by using your phone to price check your groceries. Lavasphere is a mobile ticketing and barcode reader system, which essentially turns a camera phone into a bar code reader.

I know some people who like to know where their food is coming from. Take a picture of the barcode, check it on the web and find out for sure.
As for me, I ain’t no hippie vegan, so I could care less. But, price checking through the barcode system, now that’s something I can dig.

Peace and Love

A new Pope has been announced with the release of white smoke. But I think we should take some time to appreciate how technology made this Papal selection different from any other. While voting machines were not an issue, technology added subtle nuance to the unfolding of events.

For example, secrecy of the Cardinal gathering was an issue for the first time ever. High tech gadgets threatened the security of the meetings.

Camera’s technically weren’t allowed while the late Pope’s body was on display, but pictures were taken with cell phones, and I believe nobody went out of their way to scold picture takers.

Also interesting was watching the release of the smoke. A traditional as old as the Popehood itself was broadcast on the Internet nonstop through MSNBC’s Papal Smoke Cam. All things must change, and even old rigid institutions like the Church have to adapt to new times.

So I’m assuming this Israeli person, now hopefully at rest, really liked his or her cell phone. I hope so, cause it looks like they will be spending eternity under the image of one.

As my fellow blogger said below, “Where’s the humanity?”

It does make for a great photo though. Sad, but great.

Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails is a known Mac user. Well at least now he is since part of the promotion for their next album (due May 3rd) is an early release of a song that is a GarageBand file. This means you (yes you) can remix it. You can download the song from their website and mix as you wish. Reznor is reported as saying

“What I’m giving you in this file is the actual multi-track audio session for ‘the hand that feeds’ in GarageBand format. This is the entire thing bounced over from the actual Pro Tools session we recorded it into. I imported and converted the tracks into AppleLoop format so the size would be reasonable and the tempo flexible.”

It sounds like some Creative Commons stuff, but avoiding the middle man and just going straight to the Internet. The 70 MB will let anyone jam with NIN.

iPods let you escape from the world. Panhandlers and street preachers beware; iPods make it easy to ignore you all. While some iPod users love the iconic white headphones, other go out of their way to make sure they get some other style. I can’t blame them either. The hanging white chords scream “MUG ME!” at the top of their lungs.
But getting new headphones for your pod doesn’t mean the quality of your music should suffer. For those with the cash Forbes recomends the Shure EC3. While the sound is excellent and the fit is ever so natural, the cost is on the luxurious side. We are talking $180 which is enough to by another mid-range iPod really. But, can you really put a price on comfort?

Two Intel employees have set up a wi-fi hotspot near the North Pole. It makes sense really. I mean, how else are the elves going to keep up to date on the latest tech toys. Apparently it only works when conditions are favorable, mostly April, which might make the whole thing pointless. But it just goes to show how far the vast arm of the Internet is reaching these days. Entire cities are getting wi-max, which although slow in its creation is going to provide universal Internet access in a few more years (my prediction for whatever that’s worth). Anyways. Next time you are stuck in the North Pole, fret not. Whip out your ultra rugged laptop and surf away.

SleepSmart looks like one of those eye cover thingy-mo-bobs my mom used to wear when she was napping. I never really understood them. I mean, your eyes are closed anyways, so how much light do you really need to block? But this one seems to have a real purpose. SleepSmart is really more like an alarm clock. It monitors your brain waves and wakes you up when you are in the lightest phase of your sleeping pattern. This way when you wake up you feel refreshed and not hung-over. No matter how good a nights sleep you got, a jarring alarm when you are in the thick of a dream is a crap way to start the morning.

World Changing, an excellent blog recently nominated for a Webby, made the bold claim today that the ink jet printer might end up being the most important technoligical innovation of the 20th century.

Wait….where are you going. No, keep reading, let me explain.

Scientists have used the same technology that spits ink out of your home printer to do all kinds of things including printing out human cells. That sounds utterly ridiculous, but its true. Burn victims can have made-to-order skin replacement.

Ink printers can also squeeze out plastics into solid objects too. “We’re rapidly approaching a time when useful objects can be printed out as easily as a photo.”

This is one of those unseen technological breakthroughs that could have enormous potential. I can’t wait to see the first printer hacks. Ohhh how gruesome.

My favorite pizza spot in San Francisco has a CCTV (closed circuit television) which I don’t mind. While I’m waiting for my pizza I look at the TV monitor which is facing right back down at me so I can watch myself wait. But, lots of people have issues with CCTV, especially when it’s monitoring public spaces. Often you are being watched and you don’t even know it. But, then there is iSee, a site which keeps dibs on all CCTV’s in urban areas and plans out a route for you to get to your destination unnoticed.

Overreaction, perhaps. Well, definitely. But what really interests me is that this information is on the web. Lets say I decide to restart the mafia. I can go online and mastermind a bank robbery without ever being seen, at least on the street. I doubt there is info on the web showing me how to avoid the CCTV’s in the bank. Oh well, scrawny geeks were never meant for crime anyways.