In Part 4 of 7, Gates and Jobs continue their discussion about the future of technology, covering such topics as mobile phones, flexible displays, Internet services and the nimbleness of large companies versus small start-ups.
Hope the video finds you interesting.
BEST OF FUTURE
"When Worlds Collide:Gates and Jobs on the Same Stage" , is the article heading by Newsweek's StevenLevy , that includes this video highlight reel from appearance of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates , and Apple CEO Steve Jobs ,together on stage at the fifth annual All Things Digital Conference ,to discuss their contribution to the computing industry.
See highlights of their conversation with Walt Mossberg. (May 31) :
Enjoy it live !
BEST OF FUTURE
Watch more great videos at Brightcove.com
A washingtonpost.com article by Rob Stein reports,
The Food and Drug Administration yesterday approved the first birth control pill that eliminates a woman's monthly period.
Taken daily, the contraceptive, called Lybrel, continuously administers slightly lower doses of the same hormones in many standard birth control pills to suppress menstruation. It is designed for women who find their periods too painful, unpleasant or inconvenient and want to be free of them.
"This will be the first and only oral contraceptive designed to be taken 365 days a year, allowing women to put their periods on hold," said Amy Marren of Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, which expects Lybrel to be available with a prescription by July. "There are a lot of women who think that's a great option to have."
...............Advocates of birth control welcomed Lybrel, saying it provides women with another option.
"Every woman's birth control needs are different, and the best methods are those that fit a woman's lifestyle and meet her needs," said Vanessa Cullins, vice president for medical affairs at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
But others questioned whether enough research had been done to be sure that Lybrel is safe to suppress menstruation in the long term.
"There may be important health consequences that we don't know about," said Christine L. Hitchcock, an endocrinology researcher at the University of British Columbia. "I don't think we understand everything that the menstrual cycle does well enough to say with confidence that you can abolish it and not have any consequences."
Some criticized Lybrel for fueling biases and misconceptions about menstruation.
"I think it sends the wrong message about menstruation in women's lives, especially for young women," said Ingrid Johnston-Robledo, an associate professor of psychology and women's studies at the State University of New York at Fredonia.
"It perpetuates a lot of negative attitudes and taboos about menstruation -- that it's something that's bothersome and dirty and debilitating and shameful."
Wyeth and the FDA said that there is no evidence of any long-term risks and that suppressing the menstrual cycle can have many benefits, especially for women who experience cramps, bloating and mood swings. There is no reason to think it would pose any additional health hazards, they said.
"The risks of using Lybrel are similar to other conventional oral contraceptives," said Daniel Shames, deputy director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. "We don't suspect there are going to be any surprises in terms of long-term use of this product."
Rosa Nolasco, 38, of New York said Lybrel liberated her from the monthly torment of her period when she took it as part of a clinical trial.
"I get really severe cramps, bloating, chocolate cravings, mood swings. I would literally be in bed for a few days each month," said Nolasco, a single mother of four. "It was really nice not to have to worry about any of that."
"We weren't supposed to have 13 natural periods year after year after year," said Linda Miller, an obstetrician-gynecologist at the University of Washington in Seattle. "We as a society have already changed what nature intended for us."
But she said that women can accomplish the same goal more inexpensively by using generic versions of some birth control pills that have long been available.
"You don't need a brand," said Miller, who counsels women about suppressing their periods through her Web site, NoPeriod.com.
Standard oral contraceptives consist of 21 pills containing the hormones estrogen and progestin, which prevent ovulation, followed by seven dummy pills that allow menstruation. The birth control pill was originally developed to mimic a normal cycle in the belief that women would find it more acceptable, not because it would be safer or more effective at preventing pregnancy.
The FDA approved a birth control pill formulation known as Seasonale in 2003, and a similar regimen called Seasonique in 2006, both of which reduce the number of periods to four times a year.
Amy Alina of the National Women's Health Network, a Washington advocacy group, said Lybrel could offer an attractive alternative for some women. But she said she is concerned that the company is playing down the number of women who still experience bleeding while taking Lybrel.
"You still have bleeding, but you just don't know when it's going to happen," she said.
In the company's research, Lybrel eliminated bleeding in the 59 percent of women who took it for a full year. But many women stopped early, in part because they continued to experience bleeding and spotting.
Because women taking Lybrel may not know whether they are pregnant, the FDA said that they should undergo pregnancy tests if they suspect they could be. Ovulation can begin within days of discontinuing the pills.
Wyeth has not yet set a price for Lybrel.
An exact reproduction of a post "EU Threatens Microsoft of $4M/Day Fine" , is made here, with another 'heading', as an important link to The Prelude.
Let's not make 'hay' out of the 'plight' of this 'World's No.I Corporate' and it's father 'Bill Gates', enthroning the 'Citadel of World's Richest Person'(for 12th consecutive year by the Forbes Magazine !), especially when the same 'Business Tycoon' had opted for a 'Self-Exiled Philanthropic Hibernation'.
No one will be richer, remember, except perhaps wallets of the lawyers getting more protruded.If Microsoft is today, can the Dell and others be 'Far Behind'. Never !
Recall and take a leaf out of the lesson from "Once Bitten Twice Sigh" !!
You may be the next catch in that 'Spider Net' !!!
BEST OF FUTURE
=======================================
"The European Union's antitrust agency threatened Microsoft today with fines of up to $4 million a day and claimed that the company is overcharging for the information rivals need to make their products work smoothly with Windows", reports Computerworld , today.
..........Microsoft, however, immediately said the EU is overreaching. "It's hard to see how the Commission can argue that even patented innovation must be made available for free," Brad Smith, Microsoft's general counsel, said in a statement.
In a news conference today, EU Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd voiced the agency's impatience. "It is a very unusual situation. It is the first time we have been confronted by a company which has failed to comply with an antitrust decision. So we are in somewhat unknown territory."
"This is a company which apparently does not like to comply with antitrust decisions," Todd said.
Microsoft lost a 2004 ruling in the EU, which fined the company $613 million and said it must offer protocol documentation to other vendors so that they can make their server software interoperable with Windows clients and servers. In July 2006, the Commission slapped Microsoft with another fine -- this one totaled $357 million -- for not providing complete documentation and not making previously-set deadlines.
The latest fine, if levied, could amount to as much as $4 million and be applied retroactively to July 13, 2006. An additional daily fine of $661,000 could also be applied to the months between December 2005 and July 2006.
Microsoft objected on almost every level.
"Microsoft has spent three years and many millions of dollars to comply with the European Commission's decision," said Smith. "We submitted a pricing proposal to the Commission last August and have been asking for feedback on it since that time. We're disappointed that this feedback is coming six months later and in its present form, but we're committed to working hard to address the Commission's Statement of Objections as soon as we receive it."
Smith blasted the Commission for trying to force Microsoft to give away its intellectual property. "The proposed findings suggest that unless our intellectual property is innovative and patentable, it has to be made available royalty free. That has never been the standard for software or other intellectual property."
Not so fast, responded Todd: "The Commission does not want Microsoft to give away the fruits of its research for free." But the fees it's proposed are out of line.
"It is regrettable that the Commission has been obliged to take this step," Todd said. "But it is solely the attitude of this company that has led to this problem."
===============================================
Personal View
It seems 'the battle of wits' that started last week at the US Supreme Court, as speculated in my Feb 23rd post, "Microsoft Case May Have Global Reach", has been spreading it's spider-net to strangle Microsoft in other parts of the world too.That the world is divided on US politically, Microsoft is but a victim of vendetta and political vengeance of the bi-party political divide that is roasting with rising heat with Mitt Romney Joining 2008 US Presidential Race on the 2nd week of Feb. last.
This is more so now and shall be at it's worst ebb, I may be excused to add, but with almost dead certainty, as the fight this time there in US is not just confined between two political parties rather gone down much critical, being gender-biased.
As the entire 'Corporate World' is under the dark cloud of speculations and rumours spreading their wings, let the 'Final Verdict' on Microsoft be expedited 'expediently' with greater urgency and time-bound.
For further reference,
Microsoft issued this statement, from Brad Smith,
The commission's list of, frequently asked questions.
Love and Peace.
BEST OF FUTURE
Seth Waxman, AT& T's lawyer at far left in glasses, approaches Microsoft lawyers Bradford Smith, center, and Theodore Olson. The case addresses whether Microsoft can be held liable for violating an AT& T patent.
===============================================
"Victims in Australia, Germany, and the U.S. are being targeted by a phishing scam that reveals their location using Google Maps.", reports Darren Pauli, of Computer World Australia.
Account holders with at least two Australian banks have become victims of a phishing scam in which malicious code reveals the physical location of affected IP addresses using Google Maps. Bank account holders in Germany and the U.S. have also been targeted.
The software installs a trojan capable of key-logging user activity, hijacking infected computers.
........It installs a trojan and backdoor code to capture all user input as well as compromising a Web server to allow the hacker to hijack the victims' computer.
The hacker is then provided with details on the number of infected machines in each country, while the Google Maps server is used to translate IP information to pinpoint the machines' physical location.
Websense Australia and New Zealand country manager Joel Camissar believes hackers could potentially use Google Maps to assist in identity theft.
"The hackers could correlate user information acquired from the key-logger with knowledge of where a user is located from Google Maps to masquerade as them," Camissar said. "With this they could access bank accounts and social security numbers."
Westpac and the Commonwealth Bank were among those specifically targeted in Australia, while Bank of America and Germany's Deutsche Bank were also attacked. Westpac and the Commonwealth Bank were unavailable to comment at the time of publication.
Sophos senior technology consultant Graham Cluley said users are directed to a 404 error page which downloads the code.
"Recipients of the e-mail are encouraged to click on a link to obtain the latest information on Howard's health; however, this link takes users to a Web page which downloads malicious code to their PC, and then displays the real '404 page not found' error page," Cluely said.
"The scammers have registered several domain names that appear to be associated with a newspaper, and have gone to great effort to make people think that they really are visiting the genuine site by pointing to a real error page."
"Everyone should be on their guard against this kind of e-mail con-trick, or risk having their PC infected."
:Bullet Points:(ITBusinessEdge), says,
"As previously reported, the hackers had sent fake e-mails purporting to tell readers about Australian Prime Minister John Howard’s recent heart attack — an event that did not occur — and directed them to realistic-looking Web sites masquerading as online newspaper sites."
Last month, Google Maps was in the news after The London Telegraph reported that terrorists used the service to target UK troops.
==================================================
This vulnerability is of great concern for all of us. If not 'nipped in it's bud', millions of infections from more destructive exploits can not be in distant vision. If a single major website can be hacked by smuggling the trojan, millions also could .
More light must be thrown in details by security experts , to clear confusions created by such stray and individual incidents of unscrupulous hacking. We all expect Microsoft, Google and all concerned come with their voices out in the open.
Any one who can come in aid to this threat with any more authentic news is welcome.
BEST OF FUTURE
Please don't look back when, rather how beautifully and articulately syndicated and invaluable this blog is, today !Enjoy reading,viewing and act as desired and suggested the sooner the better !!
Thanks Google, Firefox and last but not the least, The Thinking Blog .
BEST OF FUTURE
======================================
Technically speaking, Kevin Thompson claims an all white web page uses about 74 watts to display, while an all black page uses only 59 watts on CRT monitors. The difference being 15 watts. Mark Ontkush does the math and calculates how much energy could be saved by switching Google's background to black. I use an LCD display but after looking at solid white pages for a long time, it is like you are staring into a light bulb. Google makes me dizzy!
Would changing Google to black really help save the environment? I'm not an expert to tell how accurate these figures are or whether it makes a difference at all (somebody please call the Mythbusters)! Still, it sounds like a good idea. At the very least, how we can conserve energy by doing little things is thought-provoking.
To change the background color of Google and Youtube, you need to download the Stylish add-on for Mozilla Firefox (don't tell me you are reading this blog with some other browser) and install your favorite userstyles to customize.
That's it!
======================================
Please Note:- This is reposted, unmoderated from my another site, especially for my adored visitor's aid .If it is no new for you please pardon.
BEST OF FUTURE
"SIX BLIND patients have had their sight partially restored by a “bionic eye” surgically implanted onto their retina. Although it restores only very rudimentary vision, the device has proved so successful that its developers are about to begin a study of a more sophisticated version on between 50 and 75 patients.
If this trial goes to plan, the device could be available to patients in two years, and one day it could be used to digitally enhance human sight."
The bionic eye works by converting images from a tiny camera mounted on a pair of glasses into a grid of 16 electrical signals that transmit directly to the nerve endings in the subject's retina.
“It’s amazing that even with 16 pixels how much our subjects have been able to do,” said Professor Mark Humayun at the Doheny Eye Institute at the University of Southern California who has pioneered the device.
“We were completely wrong...We thought from simulations that 16 would only give you distinction between light and dark and maybe some grey scale.” In fact, subjects can tell the difference between objects like a cup, a plate and a knife. They can also tell which direction objects are moving in front of them. “The brain is able to fill in a lot of the information,” he added.
One of Prof Humayun's patients is Terry Byland, 58, from Corona, near Los Angeles. He used to sell power tools before going blind from a condition called retinitis pigmentosa in 1993.
"At the beginning, it was like seeing assembled dots - now it's much more than that," he said. His field of view is about 30-cmwide, but it allows him to cross a busy street and see white lines on the road. "When I am walking along the street, I can avoid lowhanging branches, I can see the edges of the branches, so I can avoid them," he added.
And it has had a profound impact on his life. "I was with my son, walking, the first time — it was the first time I had seen him since he was five years old. I don't mind saying there were a few tears wept that day."
The camera in the glasses sends a wireless signal to a pocket device the size of a Blackberry, which processes the images in real time into a four-by-four grid of electrical signals. This grid is then transmitted wirelessly to the eye implant, which converts these into signals sent directly to nerve endings in the retina.
In the current devices, the receiver for the signal is implanted under the skin behind the ear with a wire connection to the eye implant, but the team has shrunk the electronics so the improved version fits under the skin, around the eye.
More significantly, it now has 60 pixels instead of 16 and because it is smaller, the operation to implant it is much less traumatic, taking just 90 minutes instead of eight hours. Prof Humayun predicts it will cost around $30,000 (around Rs 13.8 lakh).
All of the image processing happens instantaneously. "It has to be real time because if it isn't and you move your head and the screen is delayed... you start to feel sick and dizzy. I'm sure you've experienced that in movie theatres," said Prof Humayun.
Developing the first device took 16 years of research, but the 60-pixel version has taken just four. The implant is not suitable for every form of blindness. If the optic nerve or vision-processing centres in the brain are damaged, it cannot help; but there are many conditions in which patients lose the function of the receptor cells in the retina and go blind, even though the neural circuitry behind is intact.
Age-related macular degeneration, for example, is a common condition in which patients gradually lose sight in the centre of their field of vision. It affects 15 per cent of people aged 75 or over.
Prof Humayun believes his implants will be most successful in patients who were once fully sighted rather than people who were blind from birth. However, he wants to try the device out in those people too. "I think the jury's still out," he said, "I don't think it will be as effective as somebody who had vision into their 20s, 30s and 40s, but it is definitely a population we would like to try."
Stevie Wonder is one of his patients who has expressed an interest in the technology, but as someone who lost his sight very early in life, he will not be one of the initial trial patients. "He is very much for raising awareness of the technology, so that people can get to hear about it and really understand it."
Prof Humayun predicts that future versions of the bionic eye will need at least 1,000 pixels for patients to recognise faces. And even further off is the possibility of manipulating the images the patients sees; for example, allowing them to pause or enhance it by zooming in. ‘I see faces as shadows’ "The last thing you want to hear is that you are going blind and that there's nothing they can do." That was the nightmare that faced Terry Byland in 1985.
By 1993, a rare condition called retinitis pimentosa, that affects around one in 3,500 people, had robbed him of his sight. But 13 years later, Prof Humayun accepted him as the sixth patient to trial his experimental bionic eye.
After the eight-hour operation to put it in place, the first he saw was a sequence of specks of light as the experimenters tested the device. "It was amazing to see something. We were told before it would be a very slow and tedious process. Well, we've gone far beyond that.” The device has helped Byland regain his independence. "My visual cortex, which was dormant, is learning to work again. When I'm at home, I can go into any room and switch the light on, or see the light coming in through the window," he said. "It is going from a good guess to knowing what I see. I can't recognise faces but I can see them like a dark shadow. I can cross a busy street.”=The Gaurdian=
Retinal prosthesis:
A tiny electrical implant that attaches itself to the retina may some day restore partial sight to millions of patients blinded by age related macular degeneration, US researchers said on Thursday.
1. A video processor, mounted in eyeglasses, converts images captured on a camera into electronic signals and sends it to the transmitter.
2. An implant wirelessly receives this data and sends the signals through a tiny cable to an electrode array.
3. The electrode array is stimulated to emit electrical pulses which induce responses in the retina that travel through the optic nerve to the brain How electrodes signal the brain When the ganglion cells at the surface of the retina are stimulated by the implant’s electrodes, they send a signal to the brain which perceives patterns of light and dark spots corresponding to the electrodes stimulated A pager-sized wireless microprocessor and battery pack worn on the belt powers the entire device.
Source: Second Sight Medical Products REUTERS.
========================================================
"First results encouraging, US experts are working on improving device.", reports Hindustan Times in it's Delhi edition today titled, Robotic retina offers hope for sight .
Enjoy reading this inventional article.
BEST OF FUTURE
Novell today unveiled an end-to-end automated system management “blueprint” marrying guidance for heterogeneous infrastructures and Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) methods.
The Desktop-to-Data-Center Management Blueprint is centered, of course, on Novell ZENworks, but company spokespersons say they’ve made a concerted effort to design a methodology that allows for cross-vendor use (if other vendors get involved), according to an eWEEK overview piece.
The company also highlights the fact that the blueprint covers all resources, including PCs and handheld devices, not just the content of the data center.
The creators of the ITIL told IT Business Edge in a recent interview that the methodology, which hasn’t been updated since 2000, will “better reflect how service management is applied in everyday practice” when v3 is released later this year.
IT departments reported at a recent conference that changing goals and service complexity stand in the way of full implementation of ITIL — in other words, it’s just too hard to keep up.
Case studies from large organizations that have prioritized ITIL implementation show that investments were indeed maximized through the effort. And the ITIL creators promise that v3 will include guidance for smaller organizations so that they, too, can reap the same benefits.
(Courtesy, Bullet Points )
Hope this article finds you with some intersest.
BEST OF FUTURE
A spokesman for ICANN says that a massive attack yesterday on Internet root servers — basically the Web’s traffic routers — had little impact on typical users.
The attack, which The Guardian reports seemingly focused on ICANN and U.S. defense department servers, amounted to a massive DoS attack using botnets. The coordinated effort emanated from Asia, experts agree.
The Associated Press reports that UltraDNS, a company that manages Web traffic, appears to have been the target, but the ICANN rep says details are still far too sketchy to draw definitive conclusions. The attack is said to be the largest of its kind since 2002, but distribution of load between the root servers muted the impact of this DoS effort.
(courtesy, Bullet Points )
BEST OF FUTURE
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
