The Daily Brief

This from James Fallows at NYT:

One branch of the federal government is desperate enough for a better search tool that its efforts could be a stimulus for fundamental long-term improvements. Last week, I spent a day at a workshop near Washington for the Aquaint project, whose work is unclassified but has gone virtually unnoticed in the news media. The name stands for “advanced question answering for intelligence,” and it refers to a joint effort by the National Security Agency, the C.I.A. and other federal intelligence organizations. To computer scientists, “question answering,” or Q.A., means a form of search that does not just match keywords but also scans, parses and “understands” vast quantities of information to respond to queries. An ideal Q.A. system would let me ask, “How has California’s standing among states in per-student school funds changed since the 1960’s?” – and it would draw from all relevant sources to find the right answer.

In the real Aquaint program, the questions are more likely to be, “Did any potential terrorist just buy an airplane ticket?” or “How strong is the new evidence of nuclear programs in Country X?” The presentations I saw, by scientists at universities and private companies, reported progress on seven approaches to the problem. (The new I.B.M. search technology discussed here last year is also part of the Aquaint project.)

The world’s best search engine? Katharine Hepburn in Desk Set. 🙂

This from Marc Strassman at EtopiaMedia:

“Our co-founder Mena Trott is attending the D: All Things Digital conference, where she just sent word that Steve Jobs did a demo of iTunes 4.9. The big news is, the new version of the popular music management app beloved by iPod owners will feature integrated support for podcasting. Current plans call for podcasts to be free downloads: Users will submit their podcasts and Apple will be hand-picking the content it makes available to iTunes users.”

To see and hear Apple CEO Jobs performing a similar demonstration of iTunes 4.9 at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (Apple WWDC 2005), in a QuickTime video clip, click here.

WOW!!!! Apple is going x86:

If I were one of the people that have been defending the PowerPC’s superiority over Intel’s or AMD’s products I’d feel pretty much left out in the cold. Apparently Apple’s marketing tactics indeed were based around falsely debunking other technologies to uphold a fictional superiority. The question now is whether Apple can ever be trusted to offer trustworthy information and benchmarks? There’s light at the end of the tunnel though, as now we can finally silence those that said Apples are faster because previously we weren’t comparing Apples to Apples. Now that Apple has adopted the x86 architecture we can finally make that comparison and silence that discussion once and for all. Good thing that Apple didn’t opt to incorporate AMD’s Athlon-64 processors though as that means that PCs will be the fastest on the planet, as Intel’s x86 architecture still is no match for AMD’s.

Update: John Markoff has this in the NYT:

So what could a Macintel possibly hope to accomplish?

Potentially, quite a lot. In striking the deal, Mr. Jobs, Apple’s chief executive, has opened a range of tantalizing new options for his quirky company.

Many people in the industry believe that Mr. Jobs is racing quietly toward a direct challenge to Microsoft and Sony in the market for digital entertainment gear for the living room. Indeed, Sony’s top executives had tried to persuade Mr. Jobs to adopt a chip that I.B.M. has been developing for the next-generation Sony PlayStation.

An Intel processor inside a Macintosh could put the vast library of Windows-based games and software programs within the reach of Mac users – at least those who are willing to run a second operating system on their computers.

Moreover, having Intel Inside might solve an important perception problem that has long plagued Apple in its effort to convert consumers who are attracted to the company’s industrial design, but who have stayed away because the computers do not run Windows programs.

There is an immediate risk in the tie-up with Intel, however: Mr. Jobs could soon find himself trapped if his best customers stop buying I.B.M.-based Macintoshes while they wait for more powerful Intel-based systems, which are likely to begin arriving in January 2006.

“There is going to be a long wait,” said Mark D. Stahlman, a Wall Street analyst at Caris & Company. The power-conserving 64-bit Intel chips that Apple is counting on to rejuvenate its laptop products will not be available until early 2007, he pointed out.

In an interview, Mr. Jobs rejected the notion that Apple might suffer from what is known as the “Osborne Effect,” a term that describes the fate of the computer pioneer Adam Osborne whose firm went bankrupt when he announced a successor to his pioneering portable computer before it was available.

At Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, Mr. Jobs talked of a transition that would appear almost seamless to customers. “As we look ahead we can envision some amazing products we want to build for you and we don’t know how to build them with the future PowerPC road map,” he said.

The last time I blogged on something the boss said it generated more discussion than I’ve seen on anything else I’ve ever blogged. Our trackbacks don’t work but according to Technorati only 8 others directly linked to the orginal story but you know how that can grow and the original post gets lost in the ‘sphere as it gets told and retold and commented on. Hell, a comment on the George W. Bush Reservist (I refuse to call it Rathergate) Letters I made on Wizbang turned into a “for what it’s worth” over at Protein Wisdom and then became an “unnamed source” on some other blog I don’t remember the name of. Blogs are nothing if not weird and the story can go way beyond it’s original post. I know that now.

Well, we had another Commander’s Call this week, and the boss acknowledged some of the blogosphere’s “more colorful” commentary on my post with a dry chuckle and a grin that told me I wasn’t being hunted like a dog for talking out of school. Good to know. The last thing on this earth I want is a Marine mad at me, and a 4-star to boot.

Boss, if you’re reading this one, I’m very sorry for any grief that last post may have caused you. I honestly thought it was a very amazing quote and too good to keep in-house.

Just like when you said:

“If you can’t live there, how do you expect to lead the folks that live there?”

“You” being military leaders. “There” being the netcentric work environment. “The folks” being those of us who have become very used to being able to find/move information as fast as we need to and get a little snippy when we can’t.

And he re-iterated, “When I ask a question on my blog I want answers. Let me decide the validity of those giving me answers. I have X amount of time to make a decision, I’d rather have a big hot and sweaty mess of answers to base my decision on than one cold answer that’s had all the life sucked out of it.”

He said a lot of other cool things but if I told you any of that he might have to shoot me.

This from Thomas Mennecke at Slyck:

Today, in what many consider to be an unfortunate announcement, the developer of DVD Decrypter, “LIGHTNING UK!”, has announced he too will cease the future distribution and development of his software.

“Ok so it has taken a while (almost 2 years), but eventually “a certain company” has decided they don’t like what I’m doing (circumventing their protection) and have come at me like a pack of wolves. I’ve no choice but to cease everything to do with DVD Decrypter. I realise this is going to be one of those “that sucks – fight them!” kinda things, but at the end of the day, it’s my life and I’m not about to throw it all away (before it has even really started) attempting to fight a battle I can’t possibly win.”

In order to survive this ordeal with his finances intact, the developer of DVD Decrypter must transfer the domain “www.dvddecrypter.com” over to “a certain company” by the end of this week. Currently, the site is no longer available. The developer of DVD Decrypter was instead forced to announce this event on AfterDawn.com.

And this from Sander Sassen at Hardware Analysis:

If you’ve been reading my columns for a while you must’ve noticed that I’m not too keen on how the movie and music industry chooses to fight piracy, or rather, as many people view it, uphold their inflated profit margins. In an attempt to put a stop to DVD copying they’ve now targeted individuals that develop software tools that allow you to circumvent the copy protection as found on DVDs and make successful backups. I’m actually specifically using the word backups here as despite the grim scenario the industry’s watchdog, the RIAA, paints most people do not supply copies to the whole neighborhood but rather make backups of their own, expensive, DVDs for home use.

Again I’m stumped as to why they’re resorting to such tactics and honestly they could be in for a surprise. In most countries you’re allowed to make a backup for home use or archiving, which sounds like fair play to me, but also have a law which prohibits you from breaking the copy protection. So you’re basically caught between two fires, you’re legally allowed to make a backup but breaking the copy protection in order to do so is prohibited. In order to fix this juxtaposition we’ll need to have a judge decide which law has precedence over the other. If it is the latter then indeed corporate gain and profit margins are paramount and the rights of the individual end user further limited.

But there’s a catch, many publishers have now put into place a EULA which states that the content stored on a DVD is supplied on a loan basis, you don’t actually own it. Hence you buy the right to use, cq. watch the movie or listen to the audio tracks, but are not the rightful owner of the content. This creates a whole new discussion as when that’s the case, and for some reason the carrier of that content gets damaged, it doesn’t void your right to use the content. Hence the carrier, CD or DVD, should be replaced at no cost by the publisher, they cannot charge you again for something to which you already own the right to use. This would also soften the backup argument used by many somewhat as now the publisher will need to replace your faulty discs, regardless whether you used them as coasters or they suffer from a manufacturing defect.

…Get ready for the Conceptual Age:

Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions – the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times.

Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they’re no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere – artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent.

Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we’ve often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind.

To some of you, this shift – from an economy built on the logical, sequential abilities of the Information Age to an economy built on the inventive, empathic abilities of the Conceptual Age – sounds delightful. “You had me at hello!” I can hear the painters and nurses exulting. But to others, this sounds like a crock. “Prove it!” I hear the programmers and lawyers demanding.

From BBC News.

Apple says the next version of its iTunes music management program will give people a way to find and subscribe to podcasts, MP3 audio files online.

The following conversation took place recently between myself (Me:) and a high ranking person (HRP:) in my organization. Two things to keep in mind: My workspace is at least 30 feet below ground in a hardened, shielded, and secure facility. The HRP has worked in Communications and Computers for over 30 years.

HRP pointing at my iPod plugged into my OnStage Speakers: Is that one of those satelite radios?

Me: (Blink-blink.) Ummmm, no sir, that’s an iPod.

HRP: A what?

Me:

Me: An iPod? An MP3 player?

HRP: (Blink-blink.)

Me: (Picking up my iPod and showing it to him a little more closely.) It’s basically a 20 gig hard drive that holds anywhere from 3000 to 5500 songs depending on the quality of your sound files. I’ve got almost my entire library on here.

HRP: (Blink-blink. Looking at iPod, looking at the OnStage Speakers.) And ya gotta plug it in there to play it?

Me: That’s one way, or headphones, or any other speakers with a quarter inch jack.

HRP: Hunh… What did you call it?

Me: An iPod.

HRP: (Holding it for a moment) Are they new?

Me: Not really sir…they’ve been out for a couple years now.

HRP: A hard drive…wait…is that supposed to be down here?

Me: Sir? Security disabled every USB and Firewire port in this section 6 months ago. I couldn’t link it up with anything in here if I wanted to.

HRP: Hunh… Why’d they do that?

Me: Dunno sir…maybe it’s because of all the keychain drives the contractors carry.

HRP: The what?

Me: (Blink-blink)

HRP: Oh, damn, look at the time, got a meeting. (Giving it back.) Neat gadget. Might have to get me one.

You know when you know that someone should retire but you simply can’t tell them? I hate that.

…Who needs a laptop and WiFi hotspot? You can now blog from your cell phone with Rabble:

So in addition to creating original content, Rabble subscribers will be able to use their phones to find and read mobile blog posts from magazines like “Spin.” They can follow the exploits of budding celebrities like singer-songwriter Aslyn or the social commentary of Stowe Boyd. And, as with traditional blogs, mobile users can subscribe to the content to receive the latest posts automatically.

The Rabble software works with other popular blogging applications, such as Blogger and Live Journal. That means a photo taken with a camera phone can be published to an Internet blog. Or text written on the computer can be published for the phone reader.

So, would a phone-based blog be called a PHLOG? 🙂

This from Forbes:

Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky, creators of the Palm and Handspring personal digital assistants and the Treo smartphone, have formed a software company built around a powerful and unorthodox vision of how the human brain works. In its early stages, they hope to create predictive machines useful for things like weather forecasting and oil exploration. Further out–much further, says Hawkins–they plan to lay the basis for cosmologically attuned robots that conceive and reflect on the universe itself.

Okay, it is a big idea. And so far the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company, called Numenta, has built what the creators say is a set of tools for creating pattern-recognition software capable of “learning” shapes and events, with a goal of foreseeing what the pattern will next create. Yet these tools draw on decades of work that Hawkins has done on how the brain works. If it pans out–and there is an attractive logic to much of his thinking–Numenta may certainly oversee the creation of embedded software that adapts and improves its own performance.

[…]

Hawkins believes that the several levels of the neocortex are an organizational hierarchy of sensory inputs. This hierarchy has multiple interconnections among levels that enable us to sort things in space and time and associate them with previously encountered things, be they faces, phone numbers or typing skills–whatever our memory holds. Traveling down from the top of the hierarchy to the base sensations, he figures, the neocortex functions as a prediction machine, anticipating what we will see next, where the ball is headed or how an experiment might turn out. In effect, prediction is akin to “remembering” the future.

Pretty heady stuff, if you ask me. 🙂

It seems my Emprex Combo drive has turned “moody”; sometimes it opens, sometimes it doesn’t. I was playing around with Registry Mechanic/Regedit yesterday, so there might be a problem there. But it’s also behaving badly when just running off the boot floppy. So it might be in the drive itself.

I almost feel guilty for using the blog this way, but then again, I’m not the only one who benefits when I ask these questions so…

What program do you use to rip soundtracks from DVDs?

I’ve got a few concert DVDs that I would LOVE to get the music off of.

Had an email in my box from Stryker this morning.

If you want to know more about last night’s episode, download the “podcast” of the episode. There’s no way I’d play it while I was watching the show, but it’s extremely interesting this morning. Some very real insight into what the guys making this show are thinking. Well done.

The producer talks a bit about the “riffs” we’ve noticed. Last night was going to be a riff on Crimson Tide but it evolved into what we got. We also find out WHY it was the funniest show they’ve had yet. Come on…Starbuck walking in on Baltar and 6? The dinner party? The final scene in the lab? That was funny stuff.

I can’t wait for the DVDs to be released…the commentary talks about a LOT of footage left on the floor.