Future Salon

The Google Browser

Jason is speculating apparently not for the first time about The Google Browser. I am intrigued. Now that the quiet period is over, hope they rev up their innovation machine again:

A Google Browser is a no-brainer for them and they have to be thinking about it. It's been obvious for awhile now that Google isn't a search company, nor are they an advertising company, despite what the experts have to say. Sorry to sound like a broken record, but I'm convinced they're building an operating system (of sorts) from which they will dispense all sorts of applications and data (as well as allow other people/companies to do the same in this fashion). What we could see is the next generation of office suite. Not Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and Outlook of Microsoft's Office or iPhoto, iDVD, iMovie, iTunes, and Garageband of Apple's iLife suite, but Google search, Gmail, Google Browser, Blogger, and perhaps even GIM. It'll be interesting to watch whether this happens or not.

Google Instant Messenger using Jabber as the underlying technology would be really cool.

Falls into the category of what the Web 2.0 Conference is all about: The Web as platform to build solutions on top of. Great line up of speakers and topics. Bummer that it is at the same time as the SAP TechEd in San Diego.

Transparent Society Update

In July 2002 one of the earliest books we covert at a Future Salon was David Brin's Transparent Society He has just written the cover story for Salon Magazine [free day-pass] in August of this year: Three cheers for the Surveillance Society!

He makes the case that the surveillance technologies are so plentiful, that it is no use fighting it. It is a tide, that you may slow down, but not stop. What we should focus on is to make sure it goes both ways:

Each time the lesson is the same one: that professionals should attend to their professionalism, or else the citizens and consumers who pay their wages will find out and -- eventually -- hold them accountable.

I am not so sure about this. Take for example Prison Rape. It is a long known fact that these horrors are going on in the prisons on a daily basis. So we have found out about it, but we are not really holding anyone accountable do we?

Xed out

You may remember that the word Hack and Hacking are banned from the Yahoo group descriptions.

Today they took it one step further, double XX is not allowed [see the picture]. I guess they are fighting the naughty side of the business. But fans of the Vauxhall Trixx will have to find another place to gather.

The funny thing is, that they cut into their own business, because the 'xx' in my group description is in the link from a Yahoo Map that points to the SAP Palo Alto location. Thankfully there is also MapQuest without X.

Sometimes I really wonder, why I still use Yahoo Groups.

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.

PlaNetwork Conference

The upcoming PlaNetwork Conference on June 5 & 6th at the Presidio's Golden Gate Club in San Francisco, is going to attempt a fairly radical new way of running the conference:

This year we are exploring a new form of conferencing wherein we are blurring, if not erasing, the distinct lines usually drawn between presenters and audience. As anyone who has attended conferences, and especially Planetwork, knows the real action is in the hallway, as so many in our network have great contributions to make and it is really our interaction that facilitates the emergence of a self-organizing community.

The InterActive component of this event is an experiment designed to provide participants with conditions to discover fresh ideas and tools to facilitate new ways of working together; to strengthen shared interests while helping to realize the larger goals of an emergent truly democratic global society.

The last time I can recall this radical of a conference design was the Foresight Senior Associates Gathering in 1999, which was quite interesting but had mixed results. We've learned a lot since then, in particular how to leverage wifi (802.11), wiki, irc, subthaedit and other technologies with meetings. I'm pleased that they are experimenting with new ideas, because we need to find new ways for groups to collaborate together.

Torture, and Democracy, the American Way

As Mark reported, a fair amount of the discussion Friday night centered around interrogation technology. Unfortunately, it's been made clear the last few days, U.S. Military Intelligence has been utilizing far more primitive techniques in Iraq. (Thank God for "veteran investigative journalist[s]" (old-timers) like Seymour Hersh!) For a particularly damaging indictment, see today's editorial in the Army Times.

The Kerry Campaign has responded with an online petition for Rumsfeld's resignation which has already garnered over 250,000 signatures. If this works, will it mark a new milestone for digital democracy?

Eric Drexler's personal technical website is now online

Eric Drexler's personal technical website which focuses on the science behind emerging technologies is out.

He presented last year at our Accelerating Change Conference and you can see him again at the Foresight Senior Gathering in two weeks. [Via email from Mark Miller]

An Overview of RFID (SF Bay Area)

SDForum's Emerging Technology SIG (disclaimer: which I chair) is having yet another great meeting this Tuesday, on April 13.

The speaker will be Ricardo Labiaga, of Sun Microsystems, and he'll be talking about RFID, the EPC Network architecture, and the hardware and software that makes it all possible. What's more, this won't be an entirely theoretical talk; he'll be demoing a Java based RFID system.

For more details, see the complete event description.

Technorati: Mavens and Connectors

In his book The Tipping Point Malcolm Gladwell analyzes how ideas spread in the society. He writes that mavens (experts who love to teach) and connectors (people who know a lot of other people) are especially important for how fast an idea gets propagated through society. Examples in the blog world would be Matt Haughey with his PVRblog is a Tivo maven and Glen Reynolds is clearly a connector as noted in the Tipping Blog. There John Heiler also concludes and I agree, that online the lines between connectors and mavens are blurring.

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.