Future Salon

Congratulations: Technorati tracks over Two Million Blogs

Wow, didn't think it would go so fast: Sifry's Alerts: Technorati Tracks Two Million Blogs Current Number: 2,007,819 weblogs watched.

The blogosphere continues to expand at an amazing pace, with about 12,000 new weblogs being created every day. We're tracking over 150,000 weblog updates every day, and growing.

As David told us at the Future Salon 30% of these will be abandoned within the first 3 months, but the other 70% wil be alive and kicking.

r vs K strategy

For those of you who were following our conversation at the last Future Salon on r vs K strategy, I got the r and K backwards. r strategists are the ones with the high reproductive and mortality rate, K strategists are the ones with the low reproductive and mortality rate. For an explanation, see Checks on Population Growth.

Basically, the context of the conversation goes like this: Michael was discussing terrorism, and saying that eventually a terrorist group will get their hands on nuclear weapons. I asked if he thought this was a situation of r-strategy vs K-strategy. The link here is that terrorists depend on a continuous supply of 'expendable' people for suicide attacks. Large supply of 'expendable' people suggests tendency towards r-strategy (to use the correct term this time.)

DARPA Road Trip album; SRL turns 25

So, two weeks later, I've finally put up a small Trip Album from the DARPA Grand Challenge Race. Better late than never.

If you missed it, the perfect chance to make up for it is coming April 9: the Survival Research Labs 25th Anniversary bash. If you don't know who SRL is, think MythBusters without the boring educational lectures. With robots. On steroids. And acid. Obviously, an event you don't want to miss.

Advanced Materials for Low Tech Uses

I'm fascinated by various new high tech materials, and how they might transform the world by replacing low tech materials. For instance, aerogel, made of silica and 99% air, has been around for a while, but is finally becoming more stable and useful.

The alchemy of the 20th century

Stumbled over this interesting question and viewpoint on the PC Forum Eventspace - Great Weird Ideas section:

The alchemy of the 20th century
Neal Stephenson was asked: "What's the alchemy of the 21st century."

The context of this question was a discussion of Newton and his fascination with and attempt to "rescue" alchemy. Stephenson explained this fascination as part of Newton's attempt to reconcile his belief in God with his attempt to explain the physical world in mechanistic terms.

Jaron Lanier Update to his One Half of a Manifesto

Next Future Salon: Friday April 23rd (7-9pm, dinner afterwards)
Jaron Lanier (The Edge intro by Paul Saffo; listed as one of the 10 smartest people in the Bay Area) will present an update to his One Half of a Manifesto written in 2000 where he tackles the "cybernetic totalists" the ones that fetishize Moore's Law.

At the Future Salon and the Institute for Accelerating Change we may be some of the culprits. His half manifesto is definitely worth a read and I am looking forward to an update on the 23rd of April. (Date not 100% confirmed yet.)

He is also an excellent musician and composer and if we are lucky he will bring some of his exotic flutes and play too.

Social Network Hunt is On

Danah Boyd got robbed at a SXSW party. Now we have a picture of the robber (to the right)[more pictures].

It is quite weird to see this cristal clear picture of him half smiling. My prediction is that it is only a matter of time until someone recognizes him and brings him to justice. (Or so I hope)

We talked about that at the dinner after the last Future Salon: Privacy is gone, but if the robber is coughed it would clearly show a positive side of it.

The Social Network hunt is on. Tell all your friends in Austin. Craigslist post here. Developing.

Technorati's New Look and Logo

Technorati: Searching the World Live Web we got a taste of it already last Friday at the Future Salon (See the projections on the monitors). Now it's open for the public to enjoy too. Much nicer and cleaner interface. Take a look at the developer corner too.

Feels like it is faster as well, but that may be because it is early morning and I need to go to bed.

With that slick look Technorati will be a winner this week at the PC Forum.

Update: Here David lists the improvements details , and yes the performance is better.

Technorati: Be of Service

Set strong guiding principles at the beginning when creating an organization, live by them and the organization is going to be strong.

Similar to Google's "do no evil" David Sifry at the Future Salon on Friday said, that "be of service" is probably going to be the main principle for Technorati.

Travels with Technomads: Wanderers of the Wifi Age

Today Berkeley Cybersalon: Travels with Technomads: Wanderers of the Wifi Age

Adrian Scott, founder of Ryze, a business networking service on the Net, who lives in the Bahamas, Tampa, and San Francisco; Jonathan Chester, a leading polar photographer and explorer, who will talk about Everest and extreme blogging; and Gregory Brown, founder of ACTEL, an $800 million satellite telecom system that provides connectivity across the entire continent of Africa, and also cofounder of the Music Channel on TV and former executive for Adnan Khashoggi at the Pan Am Pacific Satellite Corporation.

I have been to a couple of these Cybersalons and Sylvia is an excellent host, keeps the dialog flowing and always has some surprises in her sleeve. Not sure yet, if I can make it this afternoon though.

5:30-7:30 p.m.
Sunday, March 21
The Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St.
Berkeley, CA
$10 donation at door