India is actually starting to outsource some of their IT functions back the U.S. One example of this is new trend is Tata's new facility:
"Tata Consultancy Services said last week it has opened a development center in a former paper plant outside Cincinnati, with initial plans to employ 1,000 people, which would make it one of the largest U.S. development centers by an India-based IT services company. The 200,000-square-foot facility will include a lab where TCS hopes to show off its experience in such areas as industrial engineering and services. TCS plans to hire Midwest tech talent for the facility."
Tata isn't alone, the trend of IT jobs returning to US shores via foreign employers may only be beginning. We'll keep our fingers crossed.
Thanks
Monday, March 24, 2008
Web site for Dutch anti-Quran film suspended by host
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands: The Web site where Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders was promoting his not-yet-released anti-Quran film has been suspended by its U.S. hosting service, Network Solutions.
The site formerly showed the film's title, "Fitna" — "Coming Soon" — and an image of a gilded Quran. Now it shows a note that the company is investigating whether the site violates its terms of service.
"Network Solutions has received a number of complaints regarding this site that are under investigation," the note said.
While the exact contents of the 15-minute movie, due to be released by March 31, are unknown, Wilders has said it will underscore his view that Islam's holy book is "fascist."
Dutch officials fear the movie could spark violent protests in Muslim countries, similar to those two years ago after the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper.
Wilders has said he will release his movie on the Internet after television stations refused to air it.
Wilders, who lives under police protection due to death threats, could not immediately be reached for comment Easter Sunday.
"How many ways are there left for me to be worked against?" he was quoted saying Saturday night by Dutch press agency ANP.
"If necessary, I'll go hand out DVDs personally on the Dam," he said, referring to Amsterdam's central square.
Thousands demonstrated on the Dam against Wilders' film Saturday in a protest intended to show that he does not represent the whole country.
Wilders heads a reactionary party with nine seats in the 150-member Dutch parliament, elected on an anti-immigration platform.
Network Solutions could not immediately be reached for comment. Its terms of service contains a sweeping prohibition against "objectionable material of any kind or nature."
A Dutch court will hear a complaint lodged by Muslim groups seeking to bar Wilders from releasing the film March 28, but there is no legal barrier preventing Wilders from releasing his film before then.
It was not clear whether YouTube or other video sharing sites would be willing to host the movie.
Last month, YouTube was inaccessible globally for several hours after the government of Pakistan blocked it, citing what it said were offensive clips in which Wilders made denigrating remarks about Islam.
Thanks
The site formerly showed the film's title, "Fitna" — "Coming Soon" — and an image of a gilded Quran. Now it shows a note that the company is investigating whether the site violates its terms of service.
"Network Solutions has received a number of complaints regarding this site that are under investigation," the note said.
While the exact contents of the 15-minute movie, due to be released by March 31, are unknown, Wilders has said it will underscore his view that Islam's holy book is "fascist."
Dutch officials fear the movie could spark violent protests in Muslim countries, similar to those two years ago after the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper.
Wilders has said he will release his movie on the Internet after television stations refused to air it.
Wilders, who lives under police protection due to death threats, could not immediately be reached for comment Easter Sunday.
"How many ways are there left for me to be worked against?" he was quoted saying Saturday night by Dutch press agency ANP.
"If necessary, I'll go hand out DVDs personally on the Dam," he said, referring to Amsterdam's central square.
Thousands demonstrated on the Dam against Wilders' film Saturday in a protest intended to show that he does not represent the whole country.
Wilders heads a reactionary party with nine seats in the 150-member Dutch parliament, elected on an anti-immigration platform.
Network Solutions could not immediately be reached for comment. Its terms of service contains a sweeping prohibition against "objectionable material of any kind or nature."
A Dutch court will hear a complaint lodged by Muslim groups seeking to bar Wilders from releasing the film March 28, but there is no legal barrier preventing Wilders from releasing his film before then.
It was not clear whether YouTube or other video sharing sites would be willing to host the movie.
Last month, YouTube was inaccessible globally for several hours after the government of Pakistan blocked it, citing what it said were offensive clips in which Wilders made denigrating remarks about Islam.
Thanks
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
TWO HANDS!!
An old man, probably some ninety plus years, sat feebly on the park bench. He didn't move, just sat with his head down staring at his hands. When I sat down beside him he didn't acknowledge my presence and the longer I sat I wondered if he was ok.
Finally, not really wanting to disturb him but wanting to check on him at the same time, I asked him if he was ok. He raised his head and looked at me and smiled. Yes, I'm fine, thank you for asking, he said in a clear strong voice.
I didn't mean to disturb you… but you were just sitting there staring at your hands and I wanted to make sure you were ok I explained to him. Have you ever looked at your hands he asked? I mean really looked at your hands? I slowly opened my hands and stared down at them. I turned them over, palms up and then palms down. No, I guess I never really looked at my hands as I tried to figure out the point he was making.
Then he smiled and related this story: Stop and think for a moment about the hands that you have; how they have served you well throughout your years. These hands, though wrinkled, shriveled and weak have been the tools I have used all my life to reach out and grab and embrace life. They braced and caught my fall when as a toddler I crashed upon the floor. They put food in my mouth and clothes on my back. As a child my mother taught me to hold them in prayer. They tied my shoes and pulled on my boots. They dried the tears of my children and caressed the love of my life. They have been dirty, scraped and raw, swollen and bent. They were uneasy and clumsy when I tried to hold my newborn son. They wrote the letters home and trembled and shook when I buried my parents and spouse. Yet, they were strong and sure when I dug my friend out of a foxhole and lifted a plow off my best friend's foot. They have held children, consoled neighbors, and shook in fists of anger when I didn't understand. They have covered my face, combed my hair and washed and cleansed the rest of my body. They have been sticky and wet, bent and broken, dried and raw. And to this day when not much of anything else of me works real well these hands hold me up, lay me down, and again continue to open in prayer. There hands are the mark of where I've been and the ruggedness of my life.
But more importantly it will be these hands that receive, The Book of deeds. I look, ponder and pray that MY RIGHT HAND is blessed the fortune of receiving the trials of this life i.e…. MY BOOK OF DEEDS with this RIGHT HAND.
"(And Remember) the Day when We shall call together all human beings with their Imam. So Whosoever is given his records in his right hand, such will read their records, and they will not be dealt with unjustly in the least."
No doubt I will never look at my hands the same again. I never saw that old man again after I left the park that day but I will never forget him and the words he spoke. When my hands are hurt or sore or when I stroke the face of my children and wife, I think of the man in the park.
I, too, want to receive MY BOOK OF DEEDS WITH MY RIGHT HAND. I am trying to be worthy of it by preparing for it now…..
O' MY PERFECT AND GENEROUS LORD!
I make shukr for these hands.
Thank to the unknown Aughor
Finally, not really wanting to disturb him but wanting to check on him at the same time, I asked him if he was ok. He raised his head and looked at me and smiled. Yes, I'm fine, thank you for asking, he said in a clear strong voice.
I didn't mean to disturb you… but you were just sitting there staring at your hands and I wanted to make sure you were ok I explained to him. Have you ever looked at your hands he asked? I mean really looked at your hands? I slowly opened my hands and stared down at them. I turned them over, palms up and then palms down. No, I guess I never really looked at my hands as I tried to figure out the point he was making.
Then he smiled and related this story: Stop and think for a moment about the hands that you have; how they have served you well throughout your years. These hands, though wrinkled, shriveled and weak have been the tools I have used all my life to reach out and grab and embrace life. They braced and caught my fall when as a toddler I crashed upon the floor. They put food in my mouth and clothes on my back. As a child my mother taught me to hold them in prayer. They tied my shoes and pulled on my boots. They dried the tears of my children and caressed the love of my life. They have been dirty, scraped and raw, swollen and bent. They were uneasy and clumsy when I tried to hold my newborn son. They wrote the letters home and trembled and shook when I buried my parents and spouse. Yet, they were strong and sure when I dug my friend out of a foxhole and lifted a plow off my best friend's foot. They have held children, consoled neighbors, and shook in fists of anger when I didn't understand. They have covered my face, combed my hair and washed and cleansed the rest of my body. They have been sticky and wet, bent and broken, dried and raw. And to this day when not much of anything else of me works real well these hands hold me up, lay me down, and again continue to open in prayer. There hands are the mark of where I've been and the ruggedness of my life.
But more importantly it will be these hands that receive, The Book of deeds. I look, ponder and pray that MY RIGHT HAND is blessed the fortune of receiving the trials of this life i.e…. MY BOOK OF DEEDS with this RIGHT HAND.
"(And Remember) the Day when We shall call together all human beings with their Imam. So Whosoever is given his records in his right hand, such will read their records, and they will not be dealt with unjustly in the least."
No doubt I will never look at my hands the same again. I never saw that old man again after I left the park that day but I will never forget him and the words he spoke. When my hands are hurt or sore or when I stroke the face of my children and wife, I think of the man in the park.
I, too, want to receive MY BOOK OF DEEDS WITH MY RIGHT HAND. I am trying to be worthy of it by preparing for it now…..
O' MY PERFECT AND GENEROUS LORD!
I make shukr for these hands.
Thank to the unknown Aughor
Friday, March 14, 2008
New Breath-Based Diagnostic
An innovative technique for detecting different biomarkers could result in a precise, easy-to-use diagnostic tool.
Technology Review
Technology Review
32 Hacks for Sticking to Your Budget
1. Don’t spend more money than you have.
2. Stick to your grocery lists – compile them based on an itemized overview of your household needs and never stray too far from it.
3. In a similar vein, never go grocery shopping hungry!
4. Keep your receipts, or write your own – at the end of each day, list your expenditures. At the end of the month, group those expenditures to create a simple overview of where you’re spending too much or even too little.
5. Pack a brown bag lunch each day. Save hundreds, or even thousands, of dollars each year.
6. Develop a distaste for Starbucks.
7. Talk yourself out of purchases. Ask yourself, do I need this? Think of various ways you can avoid a purchase that seems necessary through innovative MacGyvering.
8. You don’t need the $100 shirt from the pricey store when there’s a $10 equivalent at the thrift store. You don’t need a room-sized plasma TV when your old CRT still works.
9. Remind yourself frequently of your financial goals, especially when you’re at the mall: paying off a big debt, retiring early, the Macbook Air. Remind yourself that by living frugally, you’re at least in some small way helping the environment.
10. Use cash. Take money out of your account and use real cash from a real wallet to pay for your daily expenses. When you run out of bills, you run out of money to spend.
11. Use credit. Run your finances on credit cards so that you don’t lose big money over the course of the year in spare change spent on coke and McDonalds. Always repay within 48 hours.
12. Never watch commercials. Get a PVR.
13. Sleep on your purchases. Give yourself a night to consider and rationalize before buying a new toy, and if you rationally decide you need it, you can go back and get it. Mac users may need to take longer – much longer.
14. Review your budget and spreadsheets regularly. Keep your financial situation constantly fresh in your mind. This helps to curb your desire to spend, spend, spend, ensures you know how much you actually have to spend if you need to, and motivates you to pay off debt and save more.
15. Use spreadsheets instead of expensive apps like Quicken – use Google Docs for spreadsheets and you can even save on overpriced office software.
16. Use every last scrap of every last thing you purchase. Don’t waste anything. Don’t leave taps running, don’t throw out the quarter of a plate of dinner you didn’t eat.
17. Become a power Nazi. Switch off lights and appliances at every opportunity, and tweak your computer’s power settings to give you the optimum balance between power savings and practicality.
18. Think about money philosophically – consider your spending behavior as a reflection of who you are. If you would not like to be defined by your purchases of cigarettes, hard liquor and pork rinds, reconsider and make better purchases that reflect the person you’d like to be.
19. Respect money like you do your family heirloom; that which you respect, can’t be hastily thrown away. It’s not about how much you make, but how much you save.
20. Exercise in the great outdoors, or use your own body weight – forget expensive gym memberships and personal trainers.
21. Diligently organize rebates and send them in on time, every time.
22. Do extensive research before all purchases, especially impulse purchases. Find the best price online or off, even if it’s “almost new” from eBay.
23. Do extensive research not only on price, but on durability and quality; buying everything from Crazy Clark’s is a bad decision as far as your long term savings go.
24. Don’t fall for the vicious technology upgrade cycle. Your laptop is still fine until there’s something actually wrong with it; performance is all in the software you run. Do you need to be running Vista or Leopard or the latest version of Photoshop? For most people, probably not. Wishing for more drains what you have.
25. If you come under your budget, save the excess. There is no legal obligation to spend it!
26. Pay yourself first. Take 10% or so off the top of your income and save it before you even start paying bills.
27. Base your meals on cheap, but nutritious, food sources instead of fresh produce that goes off quickly all the time. They might be a better food source, but if you want to pinch pennies go to grains, lentils, legumes and beans.
28. Preventing an impulse purchase with this motivation hack: simply think about how many hours it took you to earn that amount.
29. When keeping track of credit card purchases, put them into your checkbook as soon as the transaction occurs. That way the checkbook will always have as much money as you actually have, letting you freely pay off your credit card when the time comes.
30. Don’t keep credit cards in your wallet, or near any of your computers with an Internet connection.
31. Water is cheap (for the time being) and can easily replace most other beverages, such as soda – just not coffee.
32. Borrow books from your library, don’t purchase them. This puts an imperative on you to actually read your books (how often do the ones your purchase just sit on the bookshelf?) and saves huge amounts of money if you read a decent amount.
Thanks
2. Stick to your grocery lists – compile them based on an itemized overview of your household needs and never stray too far from it.
3. In a similar vein, never go grocery shopping hungry!
4. Keep your receipts, or write your own – at the end of each day, list your expenditures. At the end of the month, group those expenditures to create a simple overview of where you’re spending too much or even too little.
5. Pack a brown bag lunch each day. Save hundreds, or even thousands, of dollars each year.
6. Develop a distaste for Starbucks.
7. Talk yourself out of purchases. Ask yourself, do I need this? Think of various ways you can avoid a purchase that seems necessary through innovative MacGyvering.
8. You don’t need the $100 shirt from the pricey store when there’s a $10 equivalent at the thrift store. You don’t need a room-sized plasma TV when your old CRT still works.
9. Remind yourself frequently of your financial goals, especially when you’re at the mall: paying off a big debt, retiring early, the Macbook Air. Remind yourself that by living frugally, you’re at least in some small way helping the environment.
10. Use cash. Take money out of your account and use real cash from a real wallet to pay for your daily expenses. When you run out of bills, you run out of money to spend.
11. Use credit. Run your finances on credit cards so that you don’t lose big money over the course of the year in spare change spent on coke and McDonalds. Always repay within 48 hours.
12. Never watch commercials. Get a PVR.
13. Sleep on your purchases. Give yourself a night to consider and rationalize before buying a new toy, and if you rationally decide you need it, you can go back and get it. Mac users may need to take longer – much longer.
14. Review your budget and spreadsheets regularly. Keep your financial situation constantly fresh in your mind. This helps to curb your desire to spend, spend, spend, ensures you know how much you actually have to spend if you need to, and motivates you to pay off debt and save more.
15. Use spreadsheets instead of expensive apps like Quicken – use Google Docs for spreadsheets and you can even save on overpriced office software.
16. Use every last scrap of every last thing you purchase. Don’t waste anything. Don’t leave taps running, don’t throw out the quarter of a plate of dinner you didn’t eat.
17. Become a power Nazi. Switch off lights and appliances at every opportunity, and tweak your computer’s power settings to give you the optimum balance between power savings and practicality.
18. Think about money philosophically – consider your spending behavior as a reflection of who you are. If you would not like to be defined by your purchases of cigarettes, hard liquor and pork rinds, reconsider and make better purchases that reflect the person you’d like to be.
19. Respect money like you do your family heirloom; that which you respect, can’t be hastily thrown away. It’s not about how much you make, but how much you save.
20. Exercise in the great outdoors, or use your own body weight – forget expensive gym memberships and personal trainers.
21. Diligently organize rebates and send them in on time, every time.
22. Do extensive research before all purchases, especially impulse purchases. Find the best price online or off, even if it’s “almost new” from eBay.
23. Do extensive research not only on price, but on durability and quality; buying everything from Crazy Clark’s is a bad decision as far as your long term savings go.
24. Don’t fall for the vicious technology upgrade cycle. Your laptop is still fine until there’s something actually wrong with it; performance is all in the software you run. Do you need to be running Vista or Leopard or the latest version of Photoshop? For most people, probably not. Wishing for more drains what you have.
25. If you come under your budget, save the excess. There is no legal obligation to spend it!
26. Pay yourself first. Take 10% or so off the top of your income and save it before you even start paying bills.
27. Base your meals on cheap, but nutritious, food sources instead of fresh produce that goes off quickly all the time. They might be a better food source, but if you want to pinch pennies go to grains, lentils, legumes and beans.
28. Preventing an impulse purchase with this motivation hack: simply think about how many hours it took you to earn that amount.
29. When keeping track of credit card purchases, put them into your checkbook as soon as the transaction occurs. That way the checkbook will always have as much money as you actually have, letting you freely pay off your credit card when the time comes.
30. Don’t keep credit cards in your wallet, or near any of your computers with an Internet connection.
31. Water is cheap (for the time being) and can easily replace most other beverages, such as soda – just not coffee.
32. Borrow books from your library, don’t purchase them. This puts an imperative on you to actually read your books (how often do the ones your purchase just sit on the bookshelf?) and saves huge amounts of money if you read a decent amount.
Thanks
Tiny Brain-Like Computer Created
The most powerful computer known is the brain, and now scientists have designed a machine just a few molecules large that mimics how the brain works.
So far the device can simultaneously carry out 16 times more operations than a normal computer transistor. Researchers suggest the invention might eventually prove able to perform roughly 1,000 times more operations than a transistor.
Yahoo News
So far the device can simultaneously carry out 16 times more operations than a normal computer transistor. Researchers suggest the invention might eventually prove able to perform roughly 1,000 times more operations than a transistor.
Yahoo News
NASA: Data from Saturn moon 'looks great'
LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Scientists say the data download has started from the international Cassini spacecraft as it moves through geyser plumes from one of Saturn's moons.
An unmanned probe will sweep through geysers on one of Saturn's moons to measure the chemical makeup.
Todd Barber, NASA's lead propulsion engineer on the project, says the transmission signal from the unmanned probe was received at 10:01 p.m. ET Wednesday and "everything looks great."
The probe was expected to be at a height of nearly 120 miles above the surface of the moon Enceladus as it sweeps through the edge of the geysers and measures their chemical makeup.
The carefully orchestrated event will take Cassini "deeper than we've been before," mission scientist Carolyn Porco of the Space Science Institute said in an e-mail.
CNN News
An unmanned probe will sweep through geysers on one of Saturn's moons to measure the chemical makeup.
Todd Barber, NASA's lead propulsion engineer on the project, says the transmission signal from the unmanned probe was received at 10:01 p.m. ET Wednesday and "everything looks great."
The probe was expected to be at a height of nearly 120 miles above the surface of the moon Enceladus as it sweeps through the edge of the geysers and measures their chemical makeup.
The carefully orchestrated event will take Cassini "deeper than we've been before," mission scientist Carolyn Porco of the Space Science Institute said in an e-mail.
CNN News
Endeavour astronauts begin spacewalk
CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AP) -- A pair of astronauts have ventured out on the first spacewalk of Endeavour's space station mission despite a problem getting power to a giant robot that they needed to assemble.
CNN News
CNN News
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
First portable eye-controlled device launches at Rehab 2008
MyTobii, a Swedish-based world leader in eye-tracking software and hardware, has launched their Middle East division at the Dubai International Rehabilitation Forum 2008.
ITP Link
ITP Link
Chemical brain controls nanobots
A tiny chemical "brain" which could one day act as a remote control for swarms of nano-machines has been invented.
BBC Link
BBC Link
Monday, March 10, 2008
Britain makes camera that 'sees' under clothes
A British company has developed a camera that can detect weapons, drugs or explosives hidden under people's clothes from up to 25 meters away in what could be a breakthrough for the security industry.
Full Story
Full Story
Sunday, March 9, 2008
A small touching story mainly for professionals. ..
A man came home from work late, tired and irritated, to find his 5-year old son waiting for him at the door.
SON: "Daddy, may I ask you a question?"
DAD: "Yeah sure, what is it?" replied the man.
SON: "Daddy, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "That's none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing?" the man said angrily. SON: "I just want to know. Please tell me, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "If you must know, I make Rs.100 an hour."
SON: "Oh," the little boy replied, with his head down.
SON: "Daddy, may I please borrow Rs.50?"The father was furious, "If the only reason you asked that is so you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I work hard everyday for such this childish behavior."
The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door.
The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy's questions. How dare he ask such questions only to get some money?
After about an hour or so, the man had calmed down, and started to think: Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that Rs.50 and he really didn't ask for money very often. The man went to the door of the little boy's room and opened the door.
"Are you asleep, son?" He asked.
"No daddy, I'm awake," replied the boy.
"I've been thinking, maybe I was too hard on you earlier" said the man.
"It's been a long day and I took out my aggravation on you.. Here's the Rs.50 you asked for."
The little boy sat straight up, smiling. "Oh, thank you daddy!" He yelled.
Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled up bills. The man saw that the boy already had money, started to get angry again. The little boy slowly counted out his money, and then looked up at his father.
"Why do you want more money if you already have some?" the father grumbled.
"Because I didn't have enough, but now I do," the little boy replied.
"Daddy, I have Rs.100 now. Can I buy an hour of your time?
Please come home early tomorrow. I would like to have dinner with you!"
The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little son, and he begged for his forgiveness.
It's just a short reminder to all of you working so hard in life. We should not let time slip through our fingers without having spent some time with those who really matter to us, those close to our hearts.
Do remember to share that Rs.100 worth of your time with someone you love.
If we die tomorrow, the company that we are working for could easily replace us in a matter of days.
But the family & friends we leave behind will feel the loss for the rest of their lives. And come to think of it, we pour ourselves more into work than to our family.
SON: "Daddy, may I ask you a question?"
DAD: "Yeah sure, what is it?" replied the man.
SON: "Daddy, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "That's none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing?" the man said angrily. SON: "I just want to know. Please tell me, how much do you make an hour?"
DAD: "If you must know, I make Rs.100 an hour."
SON: "Oh," the little boy replied, with his head down.
SON: "Daddy, may I please borrow Rs.50?"The father was furious, "If the only reason you asked that is so you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I work hard everyday for such this childish behavior."
The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door.
The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy's questions. How dare he ask such questions only to get some money?
After about an hour or so, the man had calmed down, and started to think: Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that Rs.50 and he really didn't ask for money very often. The man went to the door of the little boy's room and opened the door.
"Are you asleep, son?" He asked.
"No daddy, I'm awake," replied the boy.
"I've been thinking, maybe I was too hard on you earlier" said the man.
"It's been a long day and I took out my aggravation on you.. Here's the Rs.50 you asked for."
The little boy sat straight up, smiling. "Oh, thank you daddy!" He yelled.
Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled up bills. The man saw that the boy already had money, started to get angry again. The little boy slowly counted out his money, and then looked up at his father.
"Why do you want more money if you already have some?" the father grumbled.
"Because I didn't have enough, but now I do," the little boy replied.
"Daddy, I have Rs.100 now. Can I buy an hour of your time?
Please come home early tomorrow. I would like to have dinner with you!"
The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little son, and he begged for his forgiveness.
It's just a short reminder to all of you working so hard in life. We should not let time slip through our fingers without having spent some time with those who really matter to us, those close to our hearts.
Do remember to share that Rs.100 worth of your time with someone you love.
If we die tomorrow, the company that we are working for could easily replace us in a matter of days.
But the family & friends we leave behind will feel the loss for the rest of their lives. And come to think of it, we pour ourselves more into work than to our family.
Saturday, March 8, 2008
US schools segregate boys, girls
GREENSBORO (GEORGIA): Nearly four decades after this rural Georgia county stopped segregating its schools by race, it wants to divide students again—this time by sex. Greene County is set to become the first school district in the nation to go entirely single-sex, with boys and girls in separate classrooms—a move born of desperation over years of poor test scores, soaring dropout rates and high numbers of teenage pregnancies.
Full Story
Full Story
Friday, March 7, 2008
How to Make Tea
A well-made cup of hot tea can warm the heart and soul of any tea lover, but it can be unpleasantly bitter or disappointingly tasteless when improperly steeped. A conscientious approach to tea preparation can maximize the flavor and health benefits provided by the tea bush, Camellia sinensis. Here's how to get it just right.
Link
Link
Unleash your Inner Genius
Let’s say you are wrestling with a tough issue - maybe at work, at home, with your children or in your social life. You have been stuck for a while and you can’t seem to make a breakthrough. You want to come up with some really creative ideas. What can you do? Here are ten great practical ways to boost your inventiveness and to crack the problem:
1. Ask why, why? Ask, ‘why has this issue arisen?’ Come up with six different reasons and for each of them ask, ‘why did this happen?’ Keep asking why for each cause. This helps you to better understand the different reasons why this is a problem and so in turn you will see different possible solutions.
2. Sleep on it. Ponder the issue and all its aspects for some time and then put it out of your mind. Get a good night’s sleep. The subconscious mind goes to work and often you come up with great ideas the next day.
3. Talk it over with someone who has nothing to do with the situation. They will often ask basic questions or make seemingly silly suggestions that prompt good ideas. Two heads are better than one but people who are too close to the issue will often come up with the same ideas as you, so try an outsider.
4. Ask how some celebrity would tackle the issue - what would Steve Jobs do? Or Bob Geldof , or Richard Branson, or Salvador Dali or Margaret Thatcher or Madonna or Sherlock Holmes? Take each individual’s approach to its extremes and it will likely give you some radical solutions.
5. Pick up any object at random and say to yourself, ‘this item contains the key to solving the problem.’ Then force some ideas. Try this with several different objects and you will have a selection of radical and inventive ideas.
6. Use similes. Try to think of a different problem in another walk of life that is like your problem. Say you want your staff at work to try new ways of working. You might imagine that this is like getting your children to eat vegetables. List various methods you might use with your children to encourage or persuade them to try vegetables. Then go through the list and then see if any of the ideas can be converted into things you can try at work.
7. Imagine an ideal solution in a world where there are no constraints -e.g. you can use any resource you want. Now work back from that ideal and challenge each of the constraints that is holding you back from achieving it. Many of the obstacles can be overcome when you take this approach.
8. Open a dictionary and take any noun at random. Write down six attributes of that noun - so for tree you might write - root, branch, family, apple, trunk and tall. Then force some links between the word or its attributes and the problem in order to come up with fresh ideas. You will be surprised at how well this works - for individuals or in a group.
9. Ponder the issue and then go for a walk around an art gallery or museum. The range of external stimuli will help you conceive plenty of new ideas.
10. Draw a picture of the situation showing the people and the issues in simple cartoon style. Put it up on the wall and then imagine how the story could develop. Think of it as a cartoon strip. Many people’s brains work better in images than in words or numbers so this can lead to fantastic ideas.
These methods work for individuals and for groups. Try them and see what suits you best. Above all keep reminding yourself - there are some great solutions for my problem - I haven’t found the right one yet but I will!
Thanks
1. Ask why, why? Ask, ‘why has this issue arisen?’ Come up with six different reasons and for each of them ask, ‘why did this happen?’ Keep asking why for each cause. This helps you to better understand the different reasons why this is a problem and so in turn you will see different possible solutions.
2. Sleep on it. Ponder the issue and all its aspects for some time and then put it out of your mind. Get a good night’s sleep. The subconscious mind goes to work and often you come up with great ideas the next day.
3. Talk it over with someone who has nothing to do with the situation. They will often ask basic questions or make seemingly silly suggestions that prompt good ideas. Two heads are better than one but people who are too close to the issue will often come up with the same ideas as you, so try an outsider.
4. Ask how some celebrity would tackle the issue - what would Steve Jobs do? Or Bob Geldof , or Richard Branson, or Salvador Dali or Margaret Thatcher or Madonna or Sherlock Holmes? Take each individual’s approach to its extremes and it will likely give you some radical solutions.
5. Pick up any object at random and say to yourself, ‘this item contains the key to solving the problem.’ Then force some ideas. Try this with several different objects and you will have a selection of radical and inventive ideas.
6. Use similes. Try to think of a different problem in another walk of life that is like your problem. Say you want your staff at work to try new ways of working. You might imagine that this is like getting your children to eat vegetables. List various methods you might use with your children to encourage or persuade them to try vegetables. Then go through the list and then see if any of the ideas can be converted into things you can try at work.
7. Imagine an ideal solution in a world where there are no constraints -e.g. you can use any resource you want. Now work back from that ideal and challenge each of the constraints that is holding you back from achieving it. Many of the obstacles can be overcome when you take this approach.
8. Open a dictionary and take any noun at random. Write down six attributes of that noun - so for tree you might write - root, branch, family, apple, trunk and tall. Then force some links between the word or its attributes and the problem in order to come up with fresh ideas. You will be surprised at how well this works - for individuals or in a group.
9. Ponder the issue and then go for a walk around an art gallery or museum. The range of external stimuli will help you conceive plenty of new ideas.
10. Draw a picture of the situation showing the people and the issues in simple cartoon style. Put it up on the wall and then imagine how the story could develop. Think of it as a cartoon strip. Many people’s brains work better in images than in words or numbers so this can lead to fantastic ideas.
These methods work for individuals and for groups. Try them and see what suits you best. Above all keep reminding yourself - there are some great solutions for my problem - I haven’t found the right one yet but I will!
Thanks
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Brain Scanner To Visualize Dreams
"Scientists have developed a computerised mind-reading technique which lets them accurately predict the images that people are looking at by using scanners to study brain activity.
The breakthrough by American scientists took MRI scanning equipment normally used in hospital diagnosis to observe patterns of brain activity when a subject examined a range of black and white photographs. Then a computer was able to correctly predict in nine out of 10 cases which image people were focused on. Guesswork would have been accurate only eight times in every 1,000 attempts.
The study raises the possibility in the future of the technology being harnessed to visualise scenes from a person's dreams or memory."
Thanks
The breakthrough by American scientists took MRI scanning equipment normally used in hospital diagnosis to observe patterns of brain activity when a subject examined a range of black and white photographs. Then a computer was able to correctly predict in nine out of 10 cases which image people were focused on. Guesswork would have been accurate only eight times in every 1,000 attempts.
The study raises the possibility in the future of the technology being harnessed to visualise scenes from a person's dreams or memory."
Thanks
"The technology of teaching" BBC
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Learning looks set to undergo a big change as novel technologies make it into the classroom, says Bill Thompson.Once you start looking at the way schools operate then you start to question teaching methods, assessment, exams and even the very existence of "schools" and "classrooms" Bill Thompson
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
How to Save Money
Saving money is one of those tasks that's so much easier said than done. There's more to it than spending less money (although that part alone can be challenging). How much money will you save, where will you put it, and how can you make sure it stays there? Here's how to set realistic goals, keep your spending in check, and pay yourself first.Nationwide fails to debit thousands of withdrawals in ATM blunder
The Nationwide Building Society has admitted an ATM blunder which has seen thousands of customers not charged for machine cash withdrawals.
The building society has been forced to apologise to thousands of customers after a technical glitch in Northern Ireland led to accounts not being debited at the time of withdrawals.
The problem reportedly affects about 7,500 customers who took money from their accounts using cash machines at Northern Bank between last November and this February.
The total amount in question is said to be about £400,000. An IT fault in the building society's connection to the national Link processing system is believed to be the cause of the problem.
Jay Colville, area director of Nationwide in Northern Ireland, told the BBC that Link upgraded the ATM network at the end of last year, but that the building society did not handle the upgrade correctly.
ADVERTISEMENT
Nationwide has told affected customers it will now debit the cash from their accounts on 10 March.
Link
The building society has been forced to apologise to thousands of customers after a technical glitch in Northern Ireland led to accounts not being debited at the time of withdrawals.
The problem reportedly affects about 7,500 customers who took money from their accounts using cash machines at Northern Bank between last November and this February.
The total amount in question is said to be about £400,000. An IT fault in the building society's connection to the national Link processing system is believed to be the cause of the problem.
Jay Colville, area director of Nationwide in Northern Ireland, told the BBC that Link upgraded the ATM network at the end of last year, but that the building society did not handle the upgrade correctly.
ADVERTISEMENT
Nationwide has told affected customers it will now debit the cash from their accounts on 10 March.
Link
Monday, March 3, 2008
UAE bank card details stolen from hacked ATM
Thieves operating in the UAE have compromised an ATM machine and stolen bank card details over a seven day period, according to a statement from the Central Bank of the UAE.
The gang is understood to have installed a card reader inside the ATM to read card data, along with a video camera to record PIN numbers. The Central Bank statement warns that the thieves were able to "copy data of all the cards used in the said ATM during the period 19-25 February 2008".
The location and owner bank of the ATM was not disclosed.
The Central Bank has contacted the banks of card users who were affected, with instructions to block usage of affected cards and to replace them or PINs, as well as to check ATM machines for sign of tampering.
Skimming attacks normally involve the placement of a fake card reader over or inside the regular card reader in an ATM, which reads and records the data from the card's magnetic strip, while either a hidden camera or a nearby observer (a so-called ‘shoulder surfer') steals the PIN. The stolen details can then be used to create fake cards or make purchases online, or the data may be sold on to other gangs of fraudsters.Story continues below ↓ advertisement
Skimming fraud has been seen in most regions of the world, and banks usually take measures to protect machines, such as installing plastic guards to prevent the installation of illicit card readers, camera monitoring of ATMs and regular inspections of machines.
Jonathan Campbell-James, head of Regional Security and Fraud Risk, HSBC Bank Middle East, said that HSBC ATM machines were not been affected by this latest spate of skimming incidents, as the bank has taken steps to protect its machines.
"HSBC Group has invested heavily by installing devices in its ATMs that prevent this type of activity. All of our ATMs in the UAE are covered by these devices, meaning that ‘card skimming' on our machines is highly unlikely," Campbell-James said.
"Nevertheless, if customers notice anything unusual about a machine which might represent a card reader added to the card slot or a micro camera, we ask that they contact the bank immediately so that appropriate action can be taken," he added.
Most skimming attempts now either target high usage ATMs for a very short period of time, to steal the maximum number of card details in a short time, or machines in out-of-the-way locations where the reader will not be detected as quickly.
It is unknown if the thieves have been caught or what they have done with the stolen card data.
Thanks
The gang is understood to have installed a card reader inside the ATM to read card data, along with a video camera to record PIN numbers. The Central Bank statement warns that the thieves were able to "copy data of all the cards used in the said ATM during the period 19-25 February 2008".
The location and owner bank of the ATM was not disclosed.
The Central Bank has contacted the banks of card users who were affected, with instructions to block usage of affected cards and to replace them or PINs, as well as to check ATM machines for sign of tampering.
Skimming attacks normally involve the placement of a fake card reader over or inside the regular card reader in an ATM, which reads and records the data from the card's magnetic strip, while either a hidden camera or a nearby observer (a so-called ‘shoulder surfer') steals the PIN. The stolen details can then be used to create fake cards or make purchases online, or the data may be sold on to other gangs of fraudsters.Story continues below ↓ advertisement
Skimming fraud has been seen in most regions of the world, and banks usually take measures to protect machines, such as installing plastic guards to prevent the installation of illicit card readers, camera monitoring of ATMs and regular inspections of machines.
Jonathan Campbell-James, head of Regional Security and Fraud Risk, HSBC Bank Middle East, said that HSBC ATM machines were not been affected by this latest spate of skimming incidents, as the bank has taken steps to protect its machines.
"HSBC Group has invested heavily by installing devices in its ATMs that prevent this type of activity. All of our ATMs in the UAE are covered by these devices, meaning that ‘card skimming' on our machines is highly unlikely," Campbell-James said.
"Nevertheless, if customers notice anything unusual about a machine which might represent a card reader added to the card slot or a micro camera, we ask that they contact the bank immediately so that appropriate action can be taken," he added.
Most skimming attempts now either target high usage ATMs for a very short period of time, to steal the maximum number of card details in a short time, or machines in out-of-the-way locations where the reader will not be detected as quickly.
It is unknown if the thieves have been caught or what they have done with the stolen card data.
Thanks
Bloodless Diabetes Monitoring
To track their blood sugar levels, patients with diabetes typically prick their fingers at least three times a day and feed blood samples into glucometers. It's a tedious and sometimes painful process, and a patient will often need to run a second test due to "insufficient blood" in the first sample. Now, researchers at Baylor University, in Waco, TX, have engineered a thumb-pad sensor that measures glucose levels via electromagnetic waves--no finger pricking required.
"There are many patients that don't monitor because of the pain of monitoring," says John Buse, president of the American Diabetes Association. "So there's certainly the potential to improve the lives of people with diabetes."
According to Randall Jean, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Baylor, the prototype of the new device matches the performance of conventional glucometers.
"It is accurate enough for people to make decisions about whether or not to inject insulin," says Jean. "That's really the target. It's not to measure glucose within one ppb [part per billion] but to produce an instrument that patients can use to make decisions about externally controlling blood sugar."
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved only one noninvasive glucose monitor, called the GlucoWatch Biographer. Designed by Cygnus, of Redwood City, CA, the device is a wristwatch that uses an electric current to pull small amounts of fluid through the skin without pricking it. A sensor analyzes the fluid for glucose. However, 50 percent of patients who used the watch experienced skin irritation and sores, and the product was discontinued in 2007.
Jean says that the sensor he and his colleagues are developing will be "truly noninvasive" and will not require that any fluid--blood or otherwise--pass through the skin. The sensor itself is a small, spiral-shaped microwave circuit, which acts as a transmission line and emits electromagnetic waves. When a person places her thumb on the spiral, the electrical properties of her thumb change how energy passes through the circuit. Jean and his colleagues measure this change, and in early trials, they seem to have found patterns that correspond to variations in glucose levels.
"The energy does not specifically respond to glucose; it responds to the aggregate effect of blood, muscle, fat, skin, and glucose," says Jean. "What we're hoping is that over a broad enough frequency range, the individual components have unique signatures that allow us to extract the glucose."
The sensor is still in the early stages of development, and Jean has so far tested the prototype on five volunteers in 15 separate trials. The researchers made plastic molds of each subject's thumb, and they fabricated plastic guides to ensure that the subjects placed their thumbs on the sensors in exactly the right position. Jean also added a pressure gauge to tell the subjects how hard to press down in order to get a successful read. In each trial, volunteers placed their thumbs on the sensors, and researchers took 10 separate readings. Subjects also performed finger-prick tests, drawing blood and using traditional glucometers.
Researchers entered data from both methods into a computer program and looked for patterns within the electromagnetic data that corresponded to the glucose readings from the blood samples.
Although the early results are promising, it remains to be seen how broadly they can be generalized. "We're still working on verifying that the calibrations are truly robust," says Jean. "In other words, the data looks good for the people we've had a lot of experience with, but now we have to make sure that if a new thumb comes along, it works on that one."
What's more, Jean's sample pool tended to exhibit glucose levels within the normal range. To verify the sensor's accuracy, the team needs to test it on volunteers with varying glucose levels. In the next few months, Jean plans to test the sensor on patients at Scott and White Hospital, in Temple, TX, whose glucose readings may be "all over the map."
"If [a monitor] could be developed, it would be enormously promising because it's not just noninvasive but could give continuous data," says Howard Wolpert, director of the Insulin Pump Program at the Joslin Diabetes Center, which is based in Boston. "That's what people are interested in, because with devices today, you're only looking at intermittent time points, and glucose fluctuations can be quite dramatic."
Jean says that while his ultimate goal is to design an accurate sensor cheap enough for patients to carry around with them, he expects that one of the first early uses of the technology will be as screening devices at local drugstores, much like the large commercial monitors that take blood-pressure and heart-rate readings.
"It could provide a useful service for someone who didn't know they're diabetic, and you could say, 'Your blood sugar is kind of high. You should go to the doctor,'" says Jean.
Thanks
"There are many patients that don't monitor because of the pain of monitoring," says John Buse, president of the American Diabetes Association. "So there's certainly the potential to improve the lives of people with diabetes."
According to Randall Jean, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Baylor, the prototype of the new device matches the performance of conventional glucometers.
"It is accurate enough for people to make decisions about whether or not to inject insulin," says Jean. "That's really the target. It's not to measure glucose within one ppb [part per billion] but to produce an instrument that patients can use to make decisions about externally controlling blood sugar."
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved only one noninvasive glucose monitor, called the GlucoWatch Biographer. Designed by Cygnus, of Redwood City, CA, the device is a wristwatch that uses an electric current to pull small amounts of fluid through the skin without pricking it. A sensor analyzes the fluid for glucose. However, 50 percent of patients who used the watch experienced skin irritation and sores, and the product was discontinued in 2007.
Jean says that the sensor he and his colleagues are developing will be "truly noninvasive" and will not require that any fluid--blood or otherwise--pass through the skin. The sensor itself is a small, spiral-shaped microwave circuit, which acts as a transmission line and emits electromagnetic waves. When a person places her thumb on the spiral, the electrical properties of her thumb change how energy passes through the circuit. Jean and his colleagues measure this change, and in early trials, they seem to have found patterns that correspond to variations in glucose levels.
"The energy does not specifically respond to glucose; it responds to the aggregate effect of blood, muscle, fat, skin, and glucose," says Jean. "What we're hoping is that over a broad enough frequency range, the individual components have unique signatures that allow us to extract the glucose."
The sensor is still in the early stages of development, and Jean has so far tested the prototype on five volunteers in 15 separate trials. The researchers made plastic molds of each subject's thumb, and they fabricated plastic guides to ensure that the subjects placed their thumbs on the sensors in exactly the right position. Jean also added a pressure gauge to tell the subjects how hard to press down in order to get a successful read. In each trial, volunteers placed their thumbs on the sensors, and researchers took 10 separate readings. Subjects also performed finger-prick tests, drawing blood and using traditional glucometers.
Researchers entered data from both methods into a computer program and looked for patterns within the electromagnetic data that corresponded to the glucose readings from the blood samples.
Although the early results are promising, it remains to be seen how broadly they can be generalized. "We're still working on verifying that the calibrations are truly robust," says Jean. "In other words, the data looks good for the people we've had a lot of experience with, but now we have to make sure that if a new thumb comes along, it works on that one."
What's more, Jean's sample pool tended to exhibit glucose levels within the normal range. To verify the sensor's accuracy, the team needs to test it on volunteers with varying glucose levels. In the next few months, Jean plans to test the sensor on patients at Scott and White Hospital, in Temple, TX, whose glucose readings may be "all over the map."
"If [a monitor] could be developed, it would be enormously promising because it's not just noninvasive but could give continuous data," says Howard Wolpert, director of the Insulin Pump Program at the Joslin Diabetes Center, which is based in Boston. "That's what people are interested in, because with devices today, you're only looking at intermittent time points, and glucose fluctuations can be quite dramatic."
Jean says that while his ultimate goal is to design an accurate sensor cheap enough for patients to carry around with them, he expects that one of the first early uses of the technology will be as screening devices at local drugstores, much like the large commercial monitors that take blood-pressure and heart-rate readings.
"It could provide a useful service for someone who didn't know they're diabetic, and you could say, 'Your blood sugar is kind of high. You should go to the doctor,'" says Jean.
Thanks
How to Think
When I applied for my faculty job at the MIT Media Lab, I had to write a teaching statement. One of the things I proposed was to teach a class called "How to Think," which would focus on how to be creative, thoughtful, and powerful in a world where problems are extremely complex, targets are continuously moving, and our brains often seem like nodes of enormous networks that constantly reconfigure. In the process of thinking about this, I composed 10 rules, which I sometimes share with students. I've listed them here, followed by some practical advice on implementation.
1. Synthesize new ideas constantly. Never read passively. Annotate, model, think, and synthesize while you read, even when you're reading what you conceive to be introductory stuff. That way, you will always aim towards understanding things at a resolution fine enough for you to be creative.
2. Learn how to learn (rapidly). One of the most important talents for the 21st century is the ability to learn almost anything instantly, so cultivate this talent. Be able to rapidly prototype ideas. Know how your brain works. (I often need a 20-minute power nap after loading a lot into my brain, followed by half a cup of coffee. Knowing how my brain operates enables me to use it well.)
3. Work backward from your goal. Or else you may never get there. If you work forward, you may invent something profound--or you might not. If you work backward, then you have at least directed your efforts at something important to you.
4. Always have a long-term plan. Even if you change it every day. The act of making the plan alone is worth it. And even if you revise it often, you're guaranteed to be learning something.
5. Make contingency maps. Draw all the things you need to do on a big piece of paper, and find out which things depend on other things. Then, find the things that are not dependent on anything but have the most dependents, and finish them first.
6. Collaborate.
7. Make your mistakes quickly. You may mess things up on the first try, but do it fast, and then move on. Document what led to the error so that you learn what to recognize, and then move on. Get the mistakes out of the way. As Shakespeare put it, "Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt."
8. As you develop skills, write up best-practices protocols. That way, when you return to something you've done, you can make it routine. Instinctualize conscious control.
9. Document everything obsessively. If you don't record it, it may never have an impact on the world. Much of creativity is learning how to see things properly. Most profound scientific discoveries are surprises. But if you don't document and digest every observation and learn to trust your eyes, then you will not know when you have seen a surprise.
10. Keep it simple. If it looks like something hard to engineer, it probably is. If you can spend two days thinking of ways to make it 10 times simpler, do it. It will work better, be more reliable, and have a bigger impact on the world. And learn, if only to know what has failed before. Remember the old saying, "Six months in the lab can save an afternoon in the library."
Two practical notes. The first is in the arena of time management. I really like what I call logarithmic time planning, in which events that are close at hand are scheduled with finer resolution than events that are far off. For example, things that happen tomorrow should be scheduled down to the minute, things that happen next week should be scheduled down to the hour, and things that happen next year should be scheduled down to the day. Why do all calendar programs force you to pick the exact minute something happens when you are trying to schedule it a year out? I just use a word processor to schedule all my events, tasks, and commitments, with resolution fading away the farther I look into the future. (It would be nice, though, to have a software tool that would gently help you make the schedule higher-resolution as time passes...)
The second practical note: I find it really useful to write and draw while talking with someone, composing conversation summaries on pieces of paper or pages of notepads. I often use plenty of color annotation to highlight salient points. At the end of the conversation, I digitally photograph the piece of paper so that I capture the entire flow of the conversation and the thoughts that emerged. The person I've conversed with usually gets to keep the original piece of paper, and the digital photograph is uploaded to my computer for keyword tagging and archiving. This way I can call up all the images, sketches, ideas, references, and action items from a brief note that I took during a five-minute meeting at a coffee shop years ago--at a touch, on my laptop. With 10-megapixel cameras costing just over $100, you can easily capture a dozen full pages in a single shot, in just a second.
Boyden, E. S. "How to Think." Ed Boyden's Blog. Technology Review
Thanks
1. Synthesize new ideas constantly. Never read passively. Annotate, model, think, and synthesize while you read, even when you're reading what you conceive to be introductory stuff. That way, you will always aim towards understanding things at a resolution fine enough for you to be creative.
2. Learn how to learn (rapidly). One of the most important talents for the 21st century is the ability to learn almost anything instantly, so cultivate this talent. Be able to rapidly prototype ideas. Know how your brain works. (I often need a 20-minute power nap after loading a lot into my brain, followed by half a cup of coffee. Knowing how my brain operates enables me to use it well.)
3. Work backward from your goal. Or else you may never get there. If you work forward, you may invent something profound--or you might not. If you work backward, then you have at least directed your efforts at something important to you.
4. Always have a long-term plan. Even if you change it every day. The act of making the plan alone is worth it. And even if you revise it often, you're guaranteed to be learning something.
5. Make contingency maps. Draw all the things you need to do on a big piece of paper, and find out which things depend on other things. Then, find the things that are not dependent on anything but have the most dependents, and finish them first.
6. Collaborate.
7. Make your mistakes quickly. You may mess things up on the first try, but do it fast, and then move on. Document what led to the error so that you learn what to recognize, and then move on. Get the mistakes out of the way. As Shakespeare put it, "Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt."
8. As you develop skills, write up best-practices protocols. That way, when you return to something you've done, you can make it routine. Instinctualize conscious control.
9. Document everything obsessively. If you don't record it, it may never have an impact on the world. Much of creativity is learning how to see things properly. Most profound scientific discoveries are surprises. But if you don't document and digest every observation and learn to trust your eyes, then you will not know when you have seen a surprise.
10. Keep it simple. If it looks like something hard to engineer, it probably is. If you can spend two days thinking of ways to make it 10 times simpler, do it. It will work better, be more reliable, and have a bigger impact on the world. And learn, if only to know what has failed before. Remember the old saying, "Six months in the lab can save an afternoon in the library."
Two practical notes. The first is in the arena of time management. I really like what I call logarithmic time planning, in which events that are close at hand are scheduled with finer resolution than events that are far off. For example, things that happen tomorrow should be scheduled down to the minute, things that happen next week should be scheduled down to the hour, and things that happen next year should be scheduled down to the day. Why do all calendar programs force you to pick the exact minute something happens when you are trying to schedule it a year out? I just use a word processor to schedule all my events, tasks, and commitments, with resolution fading away the farther I look into the future. (It would be nice, though, to have a software tool that would gently help you make the schedule higher-resolution as time passes...)
The second practical note: I find it really useful to write and draw while talking with someone, composing conversation summaries on pieces of paper or pages of notepads. I often use plenty of color annotation to highlight salient points. At the end of the conversation, I digitally photograph the piece of paper so that I capture the entire flow of the conversation and the thoughts that emerged. The person I've conversed with usually gets to keep the original piece of paper, and the digital photograph is uploaded to my computer for keyword tagging and archiving. This way I can call up all the images, sketches, ideas, references, and action items from a brief note that I took during a five-minute meeting at a coffee shop years ago--at a touch, on my laptop. With 10-megapixel cameras costing just over $100, you can easily capture a dozen full pages in a single shot, in just a second.
Boyden, E. S. "How to Think." Ed Boyden's Blog. Technology Review
Thanks
Global Classroom to link students in Doha and Washington
The Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar has rolled out a Polycom video conferencing suite that will enable the school to link to its US campus to share lectures and seminars.The Global Classroom initiative will be used to deliver lectures between the two campuses, to ensure a consistent learning experience for undergraduate students.Polycom's RealPresence Experience High Definition (RPXTMHD) technology includes high-definition displays, low profile microphones, controls and cameras, and special dual lens camera technology that enables speakers in different locations to make realistic eye contact during sessions, to improve communications.James Reardon-Anderson, dean of the School of Foreign Service in Qatar commented: "The point of the global classroom is to enable students and teachers in separate locations to experience learning as if they were in the same room. This gives students from different countries and cultures an opportunity to talk directly to one another, and it weaves together the two Georgetown campuses in ways that have not been possible in the past."The Global Classroom was rolled out by Polycom partner Techno Q, who will also provide service for the video suite.
Youssef Saleh, vice president and general manager of telepresence and vertical solutions at Polycom said: "Georgetown University's Global Classroom is a great example of how Polycom telepresence solutions can erase the collaboration barriers caused by distance and create wonderful new opportunities. The flexible nature of this technology makes it ideal for a broad range of industries and interactive applications. We look forward to seeing how the progressive educators at Georgetown will use this system to continue to enhance their curriculum for students of international affairs."
Thanks
Youssef Saleh, vice president and general manager of telepresence and vertical solutions at Polycom said: "Georgetown University's Global Classroom is a great example of how Polycom telepresence solutions can erase the collaboration barriers caused by distance and create wonderful new opportunities. The flexible nature of this technology makes it ideal for a broad range of industries and interactive applications. We look forward to seeing how the progressive educators at Georgetown will use this system to continue to enhance their curriculum for students of international affairs."
Thanks
One free dialysis a day for underprivileged patients
The TANKER (an acronym for Tamilnad Kidney Research)Foundation is a registered, non - profit charitable trust, founded on 30th June 1993. TANKER aims to provide health care and financial assistance to those who have kidney problems and do not have the wherewithal to seek medical attention.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
How to Work Less and Get More Accomplished
Working less while accomplishing more isn’t easy. It requires creative thinking creatively and a willingness to open yourself to the possibility that your methods aren’t as efficient as they could be. Once you do that, though, there are some ways that you can do it, including:
The 80/20 Rule
Only 20 percent of your work contributes to a large output. Be ruthless in cutting time in the less important 80 percent.
Parkinson’s Law
Parkinson’s Law states that “work will fill the time available for its completion.” Give yourself strict deadlines and cultivate a desire to finish projects.
Energy Management
Think of results as a function of energy, not time invested. Working intensely for a short period of time can accomplish more than working for days, tired and distracted.
Only Use Sharp Tools
Skill saves time. Don’t waste your time doing things you don’t intend to be excellent at. Delegate them to someone else.
Rule With Numbers
Assumptions are the biggest waste of your time. When your intuitions don’t match the way the world works, you can never be efficient. Combat false assumptions by testing them and paying attention to the numbers.
The Marginal Rule of Quality
Whenever extra input you invest perfecting something exceeds the output gained, stop working on that task.
Thanks
The 80/20 Rule
Only 20 percent of your work contributes to a large output. Be ruthless in cutting time in the less important 80 percent.
Parkinson’s Law
Parkinson’s Law states that “work will fill the time available for its completion.” Give yourself strict deadlines and cultivate a desire to finish projects.
Energy Management
Think of results as a function of energy, not time invested. Working intensely for a short period of time can accomplish more than working for days, tired and distracted.
Only Use Sharp Tools
Skill saves time. Don’t waste your time doing things you don’t intend to be excellent at. Delegate them to someone else.
Rule With Numbers
Assumptions are the biggest waste of your time. When your intuitions don’t match the way the world works, you can never be efficient. Combat false assumptions by testing them and paying attention to the numbers.
The Marginal Rule of Quality
Whenever extra input you invest perfecting something exceeds the output gained, stop working on that task.
Thanks
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Filter Out Unwanted Noise to Get Some Sleep
Does that slow drip in the sink keep you awake at night? Do you ever find yourself hearing a sound outside of your home and while getting used to it, staying up anticipating the next moment you will hear it again? Would you like to filter out annoying and disturbing sounds and get a good sound rest?
The Sound Screen by Marpac aims to mute out undesired noises and give you a calm tone, so you can rest and sleep as you deserve. You filter out the amount of “white noise” by simply rotating the top cap of the device and relax while focusing on the silence.
Can you think of someone this gadget is good for? Anyone you know that would love some external tech product to give them some peace and quiet?
Whether you work late, crazy shifts, have a hard time getting used to all the noise at different times of the day, or simply looking for an easy remedy to help you sleep…Marpac aims to grant that
Thanks
The Sound Screen by Marpac aims to mute out undesired noises and give you a calm tone, so you can rest and sleep as you deserve. You filter out the amount of “white noise” by simply rotating the top cap of the device and relax while focusing on the silence.
Can you think of someone this gadget is good for? Anyone you know that would love some external tech product to give them some peace and quiet?
Whether you work late, crazy shifts, have a hard time getting used to all the noise at different times of the day, or simply looking for an easy remedy to help you sleep…Marpac aims to grant that
Thanks
Dollar Collapse Imminent
The US Dollar Collapse is Imminent and there will be global economic catastrohpe when it is rejected as the currency for trade, former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Tuesday. The US dollar was retaining some value because of fears of a global economic catastrophe if it was rejected, he told a conference of some 650 chief executives from 30 countries at a conference in Kota Kinabalu on Borneo."But the catastrophe will come one day because even the most powerful country in the world cannot repay loans amounting to seven trillion dollars," Mahathir said.He said, Central banks worldwide were reducing their US dollar reserves and he suspected that Malaysia was also switching to other currencies.The huge deficit meant that the US dollar had no backing but it continued to be used internationally because some people still accepted payments in US dollars, he said."But there will come a time when we will switch away from the US dollar and we have suggested the use of gold for international trade," he said.
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