Future Salon

Next Future Salon: Get your hearing back!

Good futuristic practice is to shift traditions, not being bound by them. This time we break three of our traditions. First there will be no Future Salon in July. It's to bring in some European 'savoir vivre', take a break in the summer time, they all do over there. I actually will be gone most of July in Germany. Although rumor has it, that some people can't wait until the 12th of August and will do a Future Salon without me.

I would really appreciate this, because it would mean that the Salon can stand on it's own, that the concept is worth while for enough people to keep it going.

Cory Doctorow on DRM Voodoo

Weblogsky - industrial-strength weblog

I don't want to be the only blogger alive who hasn't pointed at Cory's DRM rant, delivered at Microsoft, but probably to the wrong set of heads. It's a start, though. [Link]
Pardon me, but would you like a wiki with that rant?

Well, don't want to be the only one either. Also love Jason's audio version what beautiful things are done once something is in the public space.

Reading the text of course I had to smile, because September last year the Future Salon had the pleasure to host Cory, and we got his excellent run down the copyright history road back then life and in color. (Here some more pictures from that day.) Read the MS transcript, it is worth it.

Cyborgs of New York

After an FDA Panel's surprise thumbs up to neural implants for treating depression on Tuesday, a recent NY Daily News piece, "Cyborgs of New York," sheds a welcome personal light on its significance. Choice quotes:

• "I prefer to think of myself as being bionic."
• "I can shave without decapitating myself."

While not about precisely the same device, both types of Neural Prosthesis have been undergoing trials for the same classes of disorders for quite some time—see the 2000 WABC-TV (NY) piece: "Shocking the Brain." Tuesday's approval was not without controversy, but the panel voted 5 to 2 in favor of permitting many more patients to try it, with certain conditions. It seems worth noting that "worrie[s] that the device could also be the forerunner of political behavior modification that could effect populations" (reported in the the Investors.com story) did not appear to have been among the issues the FDA addressed.

Quantum Movie

Update: Quantum Computing at Stanford is tonight Wednesday 16th and the movie is skipping the Bay Area until July/August, see showdates or my comment further down. Shouldn't post that late in the night, but I knew that there is something happening this Thursday: The AllwaysOn Salon about Social Software. Does it matter? .

There is a movie slowly making its way down the West Coast. It has been held over for 16 weeks in Portland now, runs in Eugene already and is supposed to arrive in Berkeley this weekend.

Intel's 486 CPU turns 15

This article talks about the 15 year period from April 1989 to April 2004. In April 1989, the 33MHz Intel 486 was introduced. I checked Intel's website and their current high-end offering is a 3.4 Ghz Pentium 4.

So, what's the "rate of acceleration" from 33 MHz to 3.4 GHz in 15 years? I'll do the math for you. That's a factor of 103 increase. That comes out to a factor of 1.36 per year, or 36% increase per year. That's a doubling time of 2.24 years. (Close enough to 2.25 to round, I'd say.)

Now, this calculation looks only at clock speed, and neglects the fact that the new chips are "hyperthreading", and all the other cpu pipeline improvements that have been made. So the actual difference in performance between the 33 Mhz 486 and today's Pentium 4 is much more that 103x. Exactly how much, I don't know.

Quantum Computation A Glimpse Into the Future of Computing

Quantum Computation A Glimpse Into the Future of Computing at the MIT-Stanford-Berkeley Nanotechnology Forum.

As a warm-up to this Friday's Quantum Gravity Future Salon you should check out what's the latest and greatest in the field of Quantum Computing.

Singularity Watch with Bruce

When I walked into the Fort Mason center where Bruce Sterling was about to to present his view on the Singularity, I almost took a step back, because out there on the screen was the banner from our LA brother John Smart's Singularity Watch web page. Just hanging there in the middle of the big screen. Wow. Some short notes to Bruce's talk. The Long Now Foundation taped it and you will be able to see it in a couple of weeks on their web page.

Future Salon: Hard Science Details

Guess I did the cardinal error of web publishing/editing, using the back button going from preview to edit. Consequence was, that the Hard Science details were missing in my previous post (I have added them today). Just in case someone has missed that. Here they are again this time even with some links.

Hard Science part or Extreme Physics as Mike calls them, which with the current fascination of everything extreme should really peak your interest.

Here are some suggested readings if you want to prepare for next Fridays talk:

“Three Roads To Quantum Gravity” by Lee Smolin
“The Search for Superstrings, Symmetry, and the Theory of Everything”, by John Gibbon
“The Odd Quantum”, by Sam Trieman
“Loop Quantum Gravity”, in Scientific American Jan 2004 (I don't have the link to the article, but one by Lee Smolin at the edge with the same title) The Wikipedia entry is very interesting too.
“The Myth of the Beginning of Time”, in Scientific American May 2004
“Parallel Universes”, in Scientific American May 2003

24HOURDOTCOM

24HOURDOTBOMB is a great Art/Prank with a dose of seriousness, cramming the dot com experience into 24 hours.

Right now we are at the Wizards of OS conference in Berlin to make a performance art/business project. The mission is to create a dotcom business from scratch in 24 hours. That means designing and programming a complete and useful web application, recruiting people, doing marketing, creating investment programs and much more. After 24 hours, the complete business will be sold on an eBay auction, and everyone involved will be rich!

You can't be part of the fun anymore, but can buy the business for currently $780 on Ebay. So hurry up. [via Steve at O'Reilly Blogs]

The man can't bust our biometrics... no wait, he can

Future Now: The man can't bust our biometrics... no wait, he can

Will the RIAA ever stop? Andrew Orlowski from The Register puts it very nicely:

Not content with asking for an arm and a leg from consumers and artists, the music industry now wants your fingerprints, too.

And it is easly fooled. [via Future Now]

Singularity Worship Tonight

Come on out and eat Future "Manna" directly from the mouth of Mr. Future Rant himself Bruce Sterling will be in da Long Now House, or should we say in the Church of the Long Now?

As if he would have been invited by us Future Saloners he is going to preach about: "The Singularity: Your Future as a Black Hole" (Background on The Singularity by Stewart Brand)

If you don't know what's in store, check Cory's transcription of Bruce Sterling's talk from SXSW.

Therefore fellow Future Congregation, come out early and in mass (or should we say to mass?) to worship at the feet of the master :-)

Friday, June 11th, 7pm, Fort Mason Conference Center, San Francisco. Can't wait.

Future Salon: Hard Science and Smart Art Details

As Futurists, once in a while we should check what are the boundaries, what are the real limiting factors to our life besides our imagination? Mike Korns a Computer Scientist and long time Future Salon participant took the time to look into the latest research regarding Quantum Physics. And the boundaries are quite different than they used to be last time I checked, which is very fascinating. (Details further down)

At the Planetwork conference last weekend Spot Draves showed his Electric Sheep and also offered, unfortunately too late, to talk about the interesting background to his art. It was the highest rated suggestion of the conference, but because he offered it too late, not enough people voted for him, so other sessions were selected. But next Friday the 18th at 7pm, SAP Labs in Palo Alto 3410 Hillview Avenue [map] you will get all the background and some more great Electric Sheep graphics. Here is his Abstract:

Highest Form of Flattery ...

Tony Perkins and his AlwaysOn gang is having a "Salon"
Update: It's not tomorrow. It's Thursday June 17th a day before the Future Salon.

I was about to blow up my cheeks (which probably has a negative connotation in the English language, but I pull out my "I'm an innocent, stupid foreigner" card here), on how copying highest form of flattery ...

But then I remembered, that the Berkeley Cybersalon is around for ages. "Her Honor, I swear I didn't know when I created the Future Salon."

So, down with the adrenalin level and a big welcome to the new kid on the blog. (Pun intended.) Details:

AlwaysOn/Churchill Club Salon: Who Cares about Blogging & Social Networking?
Quite an interesting roster of people (See further down)
June 17, 2004, 6pm to 9pm, Crowne Plaza Hotel, Palo Alto, California

With dinner $40-$60. Let me just check the average cost of the Future Salon, usually without dinner: $0. I just couldn't resist.

Description:

Road Trip with Party to the Space Launch

Historic Space Launch

Cool, Adam London is organizing a trip to the scheduled space launch of Space Ship One on June 21st.

There will be one RV from San Francisco too. Not sure yet if I can make it.

Planetwork: Disruptive Media Technologies

Blogging from the Planetwork conference.

Brad de GrafDisruptive Media Technologies

Definition: Disruptive is a technology that is changing society. Examples: Cars, Napster. Disruptive usually to barrier to entry.

Media is one of the biggest leverage point for the things that we want to do.
The current setup of the media is inhibiting the social change that we want to occur.

Hugs per Conference Day

I have a new personal measurement for to judge how good a conference is: Hugs per Conference Day :-)

May be it's because the Planetwork one is happening in the beautiful Presidio that brings out the best in people. There were for sure a lot of smiling faces and hugs galore. Of course I may just have noticed it, because I didn't get enough hugs lately, but who has?

So on the Hug-O-Meter scale this conference is a ten. Here some more random notes:

Future Salon with Hard Science and Smart Art

We haven't done hard science in a long while. It is something that you have a tough time to get anywhere else than at the Future Salon.

Michael Korns has looked deeply into the current status of the Science of, as he calls it Extreme Physics: The Theory of Everything. Can we finally unify the large and the small? Unify the behavior of
planetary bodies under gravity with the behavior of subatomic
particles under quantum theory?

He will introduce us to the current state of the knowledge regarding: String Theory, M Theory and Loop Quantum Gravity. All that in layman's terms using no mathematics. He has done his presentation already at the Las Vegas Futurist meeting last month and people were raving about it. More details soon.

The second part of the evening will be more lighthearted. Spot Draves will let his Electric Sheep run free. I love the premise: If machines will get conscious, what will they dream about?

He is using the sleep cycles of computers all over the world to create magic, very beautiful eliminated clouds and structures. It is not only great art, but there is also a very strong concept and technical realization behind it, which he will introduce. He just came out with a DVD which in part you can experience here.

Pre-Planetwork Happy Hour

Our WorldChanging friends are having a Happy Hour

Planning to come early for the Planetwork conference? Come on by and join the Worldchanging gang for cocktails and friendly conspiracy Friday night June 4th!

Who: If you're reading this, you're invited. RSVP in comments below appreciated.
When: Friday, June 4th, 5:00 - 8:00 (perhaps even later)
Where: 540 Club 540 Clement St San Francisco, CA 94118 Cross Street: Sixth Avenue Phone: (415) 752-7276

Let's be happy.

Dorkbot 2nd Year Anniversary Party

As the Future Salon dorkbot-sf is around 2 years already. Congratulations. They celebrate with a party.

For the people that have never been. It's similar to the Future Salon, that they look into cool future developments, they just lean more towards the artsy/robotic stuff. Check it out. My sister is in town and we may swing by for a while tomorrow.

time: 7:30pm Wednesday 2 June 2004
place: rxGallery 132 Eddy St (between Mason & Taylor) San Francisco map

The Doc was in

Had a bit of a lousy day, nothing major, just a couple of smaller things not going my way and so I was frustrated clicking around on the Internet. Reading here and there, checking what Doc is writing. - And there it was a link to my post from yesterday. Wow, instant cure to the blues. Thanks. Didn't know how much uplifting power a simple link can have. A link from Doc for a fellow Blogger is like a blessing from the Pope for a devote Catholic. Well, may be like a blessing from an Archbishop :-)