Archive for the 'Future' Category

Competition

Published
by
David
on November 23, 2007
in China and Future
. Comments

And you thought careers fairs were bad where you are. Spare a thought for our contemporaries in China:

Chinese Job Fair
[via]

Now that’s competition! In a country which churns out graduates by the millions every year it’s no wonder there’s a shortage of jobs. Sustainable growth? I think not. Still, I’d give anything to be back there - the feeling of excitement and energy is incredible - these kids know the future is theirs and you can be sure they’re not going to let it pass by.

Have a great weekend :)

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Analogue People

Published
by
David
on August 19, 2007
in Cool, Future, Japan and Tech
. Comments

The Japanese apparently have a saying for people who aren’t much good with technology - “Analogue Person“, literally translated. Futurologists have long predicted that eventually an underclass of people who do not have access to/do not want to use/don’t know how to use technology would evolve and some even go as far as to say that this would cause the human species to split into two sub-species of the elite and the digital underclass. Whilst this isn’t predicted to happen for thousands of years if this isn’t an early sign I don’t know what is!

Of course there is another line of thought which says this has already happened in Japan. You don’t have to look far for the evidence:

This twelfth generation android from Sony Robotics dubbed “Sony-san” is a particularly disturbing example of the future anthropomorphisation of humanity! Sony-san has appeared in music videos, variety shows, the occasional advert, and reportedly “lives” in a Buddhist temple (so much for secularity of science!).

1984 was a turning point in many ways (think Apple Computer, George Orwell, Linux, the Space Programme, Terminator, my birth…) and a mere 23 years later the world has been revolutionised by technology. But this revolution is not like it’s predecessors; it has no end. Like it or not things are not going to move at an ever accelerating pace. Don’t look back in 50 years and say I didn’t warn you!

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British Ingenuity (or lack of)

Published
by
David
on August 8, 2007
in Cool, Future, Rant and Tech
. Comments

Shinkansen

Why is it that the Japanese have had bullet trains (Shinkansen) for decades which can travel at over 300 km/h (186 mph) and experimental Maglev trains which have set a world record of 581 km/h (361 mph) while here in Britain our ageing trains rarely reach 130 km/h (80 mph)… are overpriced… unreliable… and overcrowded… you get my point!

Considering we invented the railways it’s a pretty depressing situation. Sometimes I wonder if we just gave up after the Industrial Revolution and decided to leave it to the rest of the world to invent the future!


This is how it should be done!

Interestingly a group called UK Ultraspeed are proposing a network of high speed Maglev trains based on the German Transrapid technology, first used in Shanghai, which would link the major cities of Britain at speeds up to 500 km/h (311mph). Sadly their website is a rather amateur affair which doesn’t add much credibility to their cause, but all the same we painfully need some like this to bring our rail infrastructure into the 21st century.

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E-Brain Construct

Published
by
David
on July 31, 2007
in Cool, Design, Future and Tech
. Comments

Back in November 05 I posted about the concept of “Web 2.0” which was (and still is to an extent) the latest buzzword for something which is still pretty fuzzy and difficult to define. However, in my mind the underlying notion here of moving to a user centric model of content distribution, a shift in the way we navigate through information, and changes in the underlying program style (amongst other things) is merely another step to something much bigger…

The way I see it, a big part of the idea here is about collectively converting data into information which can be used to form knowledge about anything and everything (which is eventually perceived as wisdom). If we divorce the idea from the technological implementation then data conversion happens through the aggregation and integration of disparate, loosely-coupled, systems based on globally consistent standards. From this interconnected knowledge communities form.

To an extent we can already see this with services like Gmail, Flickr, YouTube, Digg, Wikipedia, Del.icio.us and many more all leading the way with their own web-based applications which deliver/organise content based roughly around this concept; be it knowingly or not. Here content is no longer just sitting in a forgotten folder somewhere but becomes part of something more valuable and accessible.

This is all very good but as of yet there is no truly joined up experience which pulls all the elements together. Google is taking small steps towards this (e.g. email & IM integration, universal search…) but it’s still a long way from comprehensive. To try and get a better picture of it I’ve put together a fairly simplistic visualisation (GITS style!) of all the different components I envisage if we take things a step further:

E-Brain
This Work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 License. Click image for larger version.

At the core lies an individuals “Personal Profile” - this is the hub of their digital self (an e-brain if you like) which contains all the connections to everything outside it. Along with connections it also provides an artificial intelligence (AI) to manage and archive everything past and present into a logically accessible format. It will also present information which may be of future relevance based on what it has learnt through the individuals usage history (EA). The individual chooses to select what content is private to them and what is publicly available to others (a multi-tiered system of filters).

Outside of the immediate profile are a number of [meta-] services which concern communication, rich media, organisation (I’m naming this ’symatise’) and most importantly search (maybe others which I’ve not though of). These tie together digital assets both personal and public across the internet to form a coherent platform. Content is moderated (and optionally censored) based on your profile or collective/combined profiles. Content ownership would be based around a standard licence model (e.g. Creative Commons).

Just imagine a platform where you could search, cross-reference, publish, view… anything regardless of format or location. This is the epitome of everything, everywhere: On your computer, on your phone, on your iPod; in your brain? The way you interface is arbitrary and would constantly evolve… I could elaborate further but I think you get the point… the iPhone is a perfect example of how this is already becoming a reality, albeit a baby step towards it.

You might question Why would want all this? I see it as a way to cope with the increasing information overload we face every day in such an efficient way it takes most of the effort out of everyday information conversion/transfer. It makes finding, learning and understanding almost trivial and frees our minds to deal with other tasks.

Wont this make everyone dumb? Possibly if used in the wrong way. As with students copying & pasting content found through Google it all depends on how you use it. No doubt the system is open to abuse and complacency but such is the price of freedom. It is up to the end-user to govern themselves and those they are responsible for.

So there you have it - Good idea? Bad idea? Already here? SOA on steroids? …or have I just watched The Matrix one to many times? I’d be fascinated to hear what people think!

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Noosphere

Published
by
David
on October 2, 2006
in Future and General
. Comments

I kicked off a new project at work today which is exciting but is also probably going to mean my posting frequency might take a bit of a hit over the next couple of months. October is shaping up to be fairly busy what with one thing and another but it’s not necessarily a bad thing! What is causing me much annoyance is the throat infection I seem to have picked up making eating/drinking/talking extremely painful - just what you need when doing client presentations! Thank goodness for non-prescriptions drugs!*

Outside this particular sphere of influence into another noosphere:

Man-Machine Interface

Omega point is a term invented by French Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin to describe the ultimate maximum level of complexity-consciousness, considered by him the aim towards which consciousness evolves. Rather than divinity being found “in the heavens” he held that evolution was a process converging toward a “final unity”, identical with the Eschaton and with God.

It’s an interesting idea for sure. If our consciousness evolves towards ever greater integration and a social structure of such complexity that no one person can understand more than a tiny fraction of the whole where does this leave the individual? Is it possible that human tools could eventually completely surpass human capacities? Some people just have to take these things one step further…

Assuming that achieving the Omega Point is physically possible, Tipler hypothesizes this would be accomplished by “downloaded” human consciousness in tiny quantum computers that could exponentially explore space, many times faster than biological human beings. The incredible expense of keeping humans alive in space implies that humans will never personally travel to other stars. Instead, highly efficient artificial intelligences (”Mind Children” as Tipler calls them), will spread civilization throughout space.

Slightly freaky idea I’d say but nevertheless food for thought!

(*taken in moderation!)

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