IFTF's Future Now

Wink - Tag based social search

Wink is a new search engine that searches the "tagosphere".  It is currently in beta. 

links for 2005-04-19

• Star Hunting for the Rest of Us
  On Slooh, a service that links together amateur telescopes, and suggests ways for amateur astronomers to do new forms of research.
  (tags: science pro/am future cooperation)
• When the Blogger Blogs, Can the Employer Intervene?
  "As the practice of blogging has spread, employees... are coming to the realization that corporations... are under no particular obligation to tolerate threats, real or perceived, from the activities of people who become identified with those brands, even
  (tags: blogging business)
• The future of blogging
  "Wharton legal studies professor Dan Hunter puts blogging right up there with the printing press when it comes to sharing ideas and disseminating information."
  (tags: blogging business future media)
• Time to Buy a New Shirt, Dave
  "[C]ompanies appear to want consumers to keep RFID tags attached to their clothes and other items...."
  (tags: RFID privacy)
• It's Moore's Law, but Another Had the Idea First
  Gordon "Moore was not the only one - or even the first - to observe the so-called scaling effect that has led to the exponential acceleration of computing power that is now expected to continue at least for the next decade."
  (tags: science future)

links for 2005-04-18

• Giving computers power over RFID
  "[I[nstead of RFID tag data being in the control of the manufacturer or retailer after the tagged item is sold... why not have ownership of the RFID tag travel with the item?"
  (tags: privacy RFID security ubicomp)
• Application of a unique identification number to items in trade and attribution of the ownership of both item and number
  "Public fear about misuse of RFID... should be laid to rest if the Identity Numbers in the RFID tags, even if they could be read at long range, were unequivocally covered by the existing law and rights of Property."
  (tags: RFID security privacy)
• Work-related Blogs and Work
  On blogs and the workplace.
  (tags: blogging business)
• Bogus blogs snare fresh victims
  Fake blogs "are being used as traps that infect visitor's machines with keylogging software or viruses."
  (tags: blogging security)
• Into the Blogosphere
  "This online, edited collection explores discursive, visual, social, and other communicative features of weblogs."
  (tags: blogging)
• "A Godlike Presence": The Impace of Radio on the 1920s and 1930s
  On the cultural impact of radio, with comparisons to the Internet and other current media. "Radio... defined the twentieth century as much as the automobile."
  (tags: entertainment communication media history)

links for 2005-04-17

• Why Einstein may have got it wrong
  "A century after Albert Einstein published his most famous ideas, physicists will today commemorate the occasion by trying to demolish one of them."
  (tags: physics)

links for 2005-04-16

• Mixed Blessings of the Megacities
  "A byproduct of globalization, urban aggregates have emerged as the arena of confrontation between 21st century prosperity and enduring poverty."
  (tags: globalization place/space city)
• YaleGlobal Online Magazine-- science and technology articles
  " Some argue that an 'information revolution' has fundamentally altered the way the world works, plays, and even thinks. But the intersection of globalization and science and technology doesn't stop there"
  (tags: science future globalization)
• Commentary: What an India-China axis means for the rest of Asia
  When it comes to business there are shakes and quakes in the status quo, and then there are tectonic shifts. China and India joining hands easily tops the economic Richter scale.
  (tags: globalization)

links for 2005-04-15

• Human evolution
  "[T]rade and specialisation are the reasons Homo sapiens displaced... Neanderthal man... and emerged triumphant as the only species of humanity."
  (tags: economics cooperation)
• Human evolution
  New research "suggests that people's approaches to co-operation with their fellows are, indeed, evolutionarily stable."
  (tags: cooperation economics)
• Embedded, Everywhere: A Research Agenda for Networked Systems of Embedded Computers | Committee on Networked Systems of Embedded Computers | Computer Science and Telecommunications Board | Division on Engineering and Physical Sciences | National Research
  NRC report
  (tags: ubicomp)
• Tagvertising=Blogging 2 0
  "Here are a few ways in which tagging will create new opportunities for marketers." Evil... evilllll....
  (tags: folksonomy blogging business)
• Environmental Heresies
  "Over the next ten years, I predict, the mainstream of the environmental movement will reverse its opinion and activism in four major areas: population growth, urbani­zation, genetically engineered organisms, and nuclear power."
  (tags: environment culture future energy science)
• Prying eyes are everywhere
  (tags: privacy security)
• RFID and the Media Revolution
  "RFID has tremendous potential to transform the business world and impact our personal lives—but not as soon or in the ways that we might expect."
  (tags: RFID future)
• LED evolution could spell the end for light bulbs
  On the growth of LEDs as rivals for incandescent light bulbs.
  (tags: displays)

links for 2005-04-14

• Reinventing Physics: the Search for the Real Frontier
  "I am increasingly persuaded that all physical law we know about has collective origins, not just some of it. In other words, the distinction between fundamental laws and the laws descending from them is a myth."
  (tags: science)
• Economist.com
  If CERN finds the Higgs boson, "for the first time in several decades... fundamental physics will become a voyage into the unknown."
  (tags: science future physics)
• The future of physics
  Disentangling the nucleus "will end in the zero material theory: There is no physical material at all; there are just only organized powers thats forms physical material. "
  (tags: future physics science)
• The Future of Physics
  John Ellis' notes on David Gross' talk on the future of physics
  (tags: physics future)
• illuminating science
  (tags: physics science blogging)
• WNYC - Future Imperfect: "Fictional Futures"
  Film critic "Kent Jones... examines the phenomenon of science-fiction both as social commentary and as indicators of future events and trends.
  (tags: future science_fiction)
• WNYC - Future Imperfect: "Looking back at the Future"
  Audio of an interview with Alvin Toffler about "how our conception of the future has changed over the years."
  (tags: future)
• NRC Committee's Recommendations for the Future of Physics
  2001 recommendations regarding investment in physics education and research.
  (tags: future physics science policy)
• The future of physics in UK universities
  1997 "recommendations concerning the revision of three year BSc degrees and the introduction of four year MSci and MPhys degrees."
  (tags: UK policy physics)
• Physics: past, present, future
  1999 e-mail survey. "What happens when you ask some of the world's leading physicists seven questions about the past, present and future of physics?"
  (tags: physics future)
• International Workshop on the Future of Physics and Society, Debrecen, Hungary
  Summary from the 1999 conference on the future of physics.
  (tags: future physics science)
• Helping physics to help itself
  "With UNESCO's World Conference on Science set to debate the future of science and society later this month [in 1999], [scientists] discuss what UNESCO and physicists themselves could do to improve the standing of physics."
  (tags: future physics science)
• Kavli Operating Institute
  1994 conference on "The Future of Physics."
  (tags: science physics future)
• PISA
  "PISA, a three-yearly survey (2000, 2003, 2006...) of 15-year-olds in the principal industrialised countries... assesses how far students near the end of compulsory education have acquired some of the knowledge and skills that are essential for full parti
  (tags: education future science)
• OECD PISA Study Provides International Comparative Data on Schooling Outcomes
  2000 survey of student competency, scientific literacy, and other factors.
  (tags: science future)
• CaSE News
  Press releases and other documents from the Campaign for Science and Engineering in the UK.
  (tags: science UK policy government education)
• Ten-year science funding outlined
  BBC article on proposed increase in science funding in the UK. "Investment in science will rise from £3.9bn this year to £5bn by 2008."
  (tags: UK science government policy)
• House of Commons - Science and Technology - Minutes of Evidence
  Testimony re: 10-year plan for spending in British science. By the standards of American congressional testimony, it's a cross between Monty Python and Noel Coward.
  (tags: UK government science policy)
• Taking the spark out of science
  "Health and safety concerns are putting a dampener on school science" education, this article claims.
  (tags: education science UK)
• SocietyGuardian.co.uk | Society | Full text: Brown's spending review statement
  "The chancellor's statement to the Commons on the 2004 spending review."
  (tags: UK science policy government)
• Tax law 'killing spin-off research ventures'
  "The creation of spin-off companies by university researchers, one of the chancellor's key policies, has ground to a halt because of a catch-22 in tax legislation, say frustrated academics."
  (tags: UK science university policy government)
• UNICO - The University Companies Association
  "Unico was founded in 1994 to represent the Technology Exploitation companies of UK Universities."
  (tags: university UK science)

links for 2005-04-13

• thinking about del.icio.us: encouraging social use on del.icio.us
  "This design proposal looks at the social dilemma present in one specific instance of such systems: del.icio.us."
  (tags: collective_intelligence cooperation)
• Chip gets under CIO's skin
  "Harvard Medical School CIO John Halamka is on the cutting edge of technology...."
  (tags: RFID)
• BME: Body Modification Ezine
  "The biggest and best online bod-mod site since 1994."
  (tags: cyborg health sociology art)
• One Small Step For Hand
  Interview with someone who implanted an RFID chip in his hand
  (tags: cyborg RFID)
• MORI Social Research Institute
  (tags: future UK)
• Global Outsight
  "Global Outsight helps multinational enterprises predict how global political and economic trends will impact their business, pursue promising opportunities, and implement effective strategy by placing corporate decisions in a meaningful global context."
  (tags: future UK)
• Videos Challenge Accounts of Convention Unrest
  "A sprawling body of visual evidence, made possible by inexpensive, lightweight cameras in the hands of private citizens, volunteer observers and the police themselves, has shifted the debate over precisely what happened on the streets during the week of
  (tags: ubicomp protests)

links for 2005-04-12

• Wired News: China, India: Rule Global Tech?
  China and India should work together to dominate the world's tech industry, bringing together Chinese hardware with Indian software, China's prime minister said Sunday.
  (tags: society)
• Future of Japan Project
  Results of a GNB-NIER "scenario planning project on possible courses that Japan could take during the period up to 2010 - 2020."
  (tags: future Asia)
• The future of scientific publication
  1996 article by John McCarthy on the future of scientific publication.
  (tags: science future communication)
• The Council of Scientific Society Presidents
  "The Council of Scientific Society Presidents is an organization of presidents, presidents-elect, and recent past presidents of about sixty scientific federations and societies."
  (tags: future science)

links for 2005-04-11

• Texas bill would replace vehicle inspection stickers with RFID tags
  " A Texas legislator has filed a bill that would, in part, call for the state to replace vehicle inspection stickers with radio frequency identification (RFID) tags, otherwise known as transponders."
  (tags: RFID privacy)
• RFID policy panel raises privacy concerns
  Report on privacy session from the "RFID in 2005" conference at the Commerce Department.
  (tags: RFID business privacy)
• China Works Out RFID Standards
  "he Chinese government and industries within China are working to develop RFID standards that are in line with specifications being used elsewhere in the world."
  (tags: RFID Asia)

links for 2005-04-09

• About DTI Minister Lord Sainsbury of Turville
  (tags: science UK)
• Inside IBM's Store of the Future
  Slide show of shopping assistants, multi-surface projectors, Veggie Vision, and other technologies.
  (tags: business future)
• Redirecting Your MovableType Permalinks to TypePad (daveXtreme)
  (tags: blogging)

links for 2005-04-05

• The young and restless drive it!- The Times of India
  f you are 30 and still don't own a credit card, a mobile phone, and at least a small car, you haven't yet 'arrived'.
  (tags: society)
• The invention of the Hindu
  Hinduism is largely a fiction, formulated in the 18th and 19th centuries out of a multiplicity of sub-continental religions, and enthusiastically endorsed by Indian modernisers. Unlike Muslims, Hindus have tended to borrow more than reject, and it has now
  (tags: religion)

links for 2005-04-04

• Microchips to guard Peruvian alpacas

• "Peruvian authorities" are "inserting [microchips] into the ears of the finest alpacas to help keep track of their whereabouts."

• (tags: security RFID)

• Clickworkers

• "There are many scientific tasks that require human perception and common sense, but may not require a lot of scientific training. Identifying craters on Mars is something almost anyone can do, and classifying them by age is only a little harder."

• (tags: collaboration open_source science space collective_intelligence)

• Open Source Science

• "The open science approach is potentially invaluable -- and it's in the best traditions of science itself, which has always flourished best in a world of critical engagement, open discourse, and cooperation."

• (tags: collaboration cooperation open_source science)

• The common good

• Philip Ball's article on the opportunities for harnessing open source, cooperative volunteer labor in science. (Google cache)

• (tags: collaboration cooperation science)

• Futurology gets a little more exact

• "From the way we drive to how we vote, physicists reckon they can forecast human behaviour. Philip Ball explains the so-called 'physics of society' "

• (tags: collective_intelligence future)

• On muck, as it applies to the revival of amateur science

• "[Y]ou need three tools to do valid complex systems work yourself: One is what you are sitting in front of right now. Another is the mess of meat perched up there at the top of your neck. And the third? Access to other people working on the same thing."

• (tags: collaboration cooperation science)

links for 2005-04-02

• ACM Queue - A Passage to India - Pitfalls that the outsourcing vendor forgot to mention.
  Most American IT employees take a dim view of offshore outsourcing. It’s considered unpatriotic and it drains valuable intellectual capital and jobs from the United States to destinations such as India or China. Online discussion forums on sites such as
  (tags: outsourcing)
• The New York Times > Technology > A Blow to Computer Science Research
  The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency at the Pentagon - which has long underwritten open-ended "blue sky" research by the nation's best computer scientists - is sharply cutting such spending at universities, researchers say, in favor of financing
  (tags: future)

links for 2005-03-30

• The New York Times > Technology > Brazil: Free Software's Biggest and Best Friend
  ÃO PAULO, Brazil, March 28 - Since taking office two years ago, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has turned Brazil into a tropical outpost of the free software movement.
  (tags: social_software)

links for 2005-03-28

• India's Honey Bee Network Case Study
  Realizing the need to bridge the gap between the creation of innovations in the formal and informal sectors of Indian society, a consortium of support organizations led by the Society for Research and Initiatives for Sustainable Technologies and Instituti
  (tags: social_software)

links for 2005-03-27

• Folksonomy, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Mess
  Discussion with Clay Shirky, Stewart Butterfield, Joshua Schachter, Jimmy Wales.
  (tags: collective_intelligence folksonomy)

links for 2005-03-26

• Tsunami created gender imbalance
  Four times more women than men were killed in some areas hit by the Indian Ocean tsunami, creating long-term social problems for devastated communities as they try to rebuild, a leading charity has warned.
  (categories: society)
• CorporateBlogging.Info: European Corporate Blogs
  "Corporate Blogging is still a very US-focused phenomenon. But it would be interesting to see examples from Europe."
  (categories: blogging business)
• Euromail - What Germans can teach us about e-mail
  "For Europeans, e-mail has replaced the business letter. For Americans, it has replaced the telephone."
  (categories: Europe culture business)
• It's Not Graffiti, It's Grafedia
  "What if the internet extended beyond computers and high-speed connections, with web pages expanding down city streets and onto the sides of buildings?"
  (categories: art digital/physical place/space city)
• Large-Scale Social Cooperation in the East African Plains Ape
  "Of all the puzzles in xenobiology, perhaps the most remarkable is the existence of large-scale (but very imperfect) social cooperation among the East African Plains Ape of Sol III."
  (categories: biology cooperation)

links for 2005-03-25

• E-Governance - making some headway to help common man
  epartment of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances, all the central ministries and departments have a website of their own. Of the ministries & departments with key G2C (government-to-Citizen) processes, about 69% are using Website to directly conn
  (categories: social_software)
• The New York Times > International > Asia Pacific > India Alters Law on Drug Patents
  ndia, a major source of inexpensive AIDS drugs, passed a new patent law yesterday that groups providing drugs to the world's poorest patients fear will choke off their supply of new treatments.
  (categories: health)
• science made easy
  airing cutting-edge scientific research with Laurel and Hardy? Or Sherlock Holmes? Surely not. But like a good scientist, Sudhir Thattey brings together the unlikeliest ingredients to create a concoction of full-throttle mystery, surprise and scientific d
  (categories: science)
• Companies in Radio Tag Business Broaden Legal Dispute
  "A skirmish over patents between suppliers of gear that uses radio signals instead of bar codes to identify commercial goods expanded yesterday into a much broader legal battle."
  (categories: RFID)
• The Pro-Am Revolution
  "From astronomy to activism, from surfing to saving lives, Pro-Ams - people pursuing amateur activities to professional standards - are an increasingly important part of our society and economy."
  (categories: culture Internet science cooperation)
• Always connect
  Open source "has worked in the hi-tech sector - could it be the key to creating the perfect soft drink, the ultimate wine guide or even a cure for malaria?"
  (categories: open_source cooperation)
• Always connect - part 2
  "[O]ne thing is known: open-source software was only the beginning."
  (categories: open_source cooperation)
• Spark Issue 1
  "Spark is a new magazine about the good things that are going on all over the world, and the people working to create a brighter future for us all."
  (categories: future)
• Forward thinking
  " Pervasive computing will be introduced under the banner of efficiency, and will probably turn into a battle between our sometimes - conflicting desires for privacy and for security. Expect security to win every time."
  (categories: RFID ubicomp future privacy security)
• Change is in the Air
  "New technologies promise to make air travel smoother for passengers and cut costs for beleaguered airlines."
  (categories: RFID travel)
• IATA - Simplifying the Business
  "IATA has been tasked to lead the industry's agenda to Simplify the Business by moving forward with five key projects: e-ticketing, common use self-service kiosks for check-in, bar-coded boarding passes, radio frequency identification (RFID) for baggage h
  (categories: travel RFID future business)
• IATA - Radio Frequency ID
  "ATA is leading an initiative to introduce radio frequency (RFID) technology in baggage handling industry-wide by conducting a pilot project with key airlines and airports worldwide."
  (categories: RFID travel)

links for 2005-03-24

• Andrés Guadamuz
  "E-commerce lecturer, University of Edinburgh"
  (categories: economics law Internet people)
• AHRB Research Centre for Studies in IP and IT Law
  "The research programme reflects the unique nature of the Centre in combining research on IP and IT law together with work on bio-medical technologies, and in developing inter-disciplinary perspectives..."
  (categories: law Internet Europe biology)
• Honey, I Geotagged the Kids
  (I hate when that happens.) "How collaborative cartography could enable us to map our shared worlds -- and why the wireless industry probably won't go for it."
  (categories: geoweb Internet place/space)

links for 2005-03-23

• Outsourcing in China
  f Henry Luce were alive, he would undoubtedly label this the Asian Century, just as he deemed the 20th century the American Century. The big driver is China, enticing because of its low-cost labor, which is poised to burst into a consuming middle class to
  (categories: software)