Random Thoughts: May 2009

Sunday, May 31, 2009

Google Wave A new Tool for Communication,Conversation and Collaboration

Google developers demonstrated a new tool WAVE at Google I/O. The tool is a complete rethought of what would be the design of e-mail if it is designed with today's technology. It is receiving rave reviews in the technology community.

Wave as demonstrated contains tools fro communication, group chat and sharing digital information. It also has an available API to customize and develop new extensions to the existing WAVE applications. It also has a protocol that can be used to communicate between different WAVE implementation.

Here is the video of Google I/O demo of WAVE from its creators

It shows lots of promise on how we will communicate and collaborate on the Internet in the Future.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Generation We

Gen Y is branding itself as Gen We in this video
(via facebook friend Orla Hegarty)

Generation WE: The Movement Begins... from Generation We on Vimeo.

Do we really need to segment people along generation lines?

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Profiting from Accelerated Change

The keynote presentation by Ross Dawson at MegaTrends conference in Abu Dhabi.

Ross Dawson is globally recognized as a leading futurist, entrepreneur, keynote speaker, strategy advisor, and bestselling author. He is Founding Chairman of four companies: professional services and venture firm Advanced Human Technologies, future and strategy consulting group Future Exploration Network, leading events firm The Insight Exchange, and influence ratings start-up Repyoot

Keynote: Profiting from Accelerating Change - MegaTrends Abu Dhabi Conference

View more OpenOffice presentations from rossdawson.

Please use the full screen icon at the bottom right to view the presentation in full screen mode.

A simple explanation of the Cynefin Framework for Knowledge Management

Cynefin Framework is a way to identify organizational situations that can be classified based upon the cause and effect relationship.

Image via Wikipedia

The video provides a simple explanation of the model

Source

The framework has been used successfully in Knowledge management and to analyze organization models.

Monday, May 25, 2009

Henry Jenkins on Transmedia

Henry Jenkins is the director of Comparative Media Studies Program at MIT. In this video he discusses the emergence of Transmedia a type of media that allows a new way of story telling. ( via theory.isthereason)

Henry Jenkins on Transmedia - November 2009 from niko on Vimeo.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

Space Shuttle Atlantis

The video shows landing of Space Shuttle Atlantis at Andrews Airforce base

Hedge Fund CEO to Pizza Delivery Man

Hard economic time spare no one. Here is a poignant story of a financiar, hedge fund CEO and losing it all. Finally, the courage to take up a job as a pizza delivery man to support his family.

Friday, May 22, 2009

Learning Management Systems Trends and Issues

Learning Management Systems: Trends & Issues

View more OpenOffice presentations from twerner.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

A Toolbox for Learning Professionals 2009

A Slideshare presentation by Jane Hart who manages an excellent web site about digital learning tools. She provides best learning Tools in twenty categories. Most of them are available free.

25 Tools: A Toolbox for Learning Professionals 2009

View more presentations from Jane Hart.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Hans Rosling on China

Hans Rosling is a swedish academician who is famous creator of graphic visualizations of national trends. He talks about China

Monday, May 18, 2009

Bill Gates and Steve Jobs Together with Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg at D5

Bill Gates and Steve Jobs together interviewed by Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg of "All Things Digital" at D5.

Videos showing the personal and emotional side of both Steve Jobs and Bill Gates particularly towards at the end of the Interview especially the ending of the Interview.

It is a journey through the memory lane in which two founders of PC industry discuss their relationship that was friendly and rocky at the same time. It shows some of the behind the scene activities and relationship that existed between Apple and Microsoft.

Very informative and personal.

The highlight video that provides the summary of the entire interview

This is the prologue before the interview

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

Part Seven

Sunday, May 17, 2009

New Technology Supporting Informal Learning

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

New Technology Supporting Informal Learning

View more presentations from Stephen Downes.

Steve Jobs: Good Artists Copy Great Artists Steal

The Twitter Book

Twitter is a digital communication tool. It is very simple to use but it hard to decribe its capability. A new book by Tim O'Reilly and Sarah Milstein provide details on how to use Twitter effectively. They created a slidshare presentation to provide a synopsis of the book.

The Twitter Book - A Sneak Preview

View more presentations from oreillymedia.

Use full screen mode to watch the slideshow. Also my twitter address
See You at Twitter.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Twitter on CNN

Twitter is discussed on CNN

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Recession 'Victory' Urban Gardens

Shift from Agriculture to Industry brought easy life and living with excess consumption. The Industrial production method is extremely efficient. It over produced. The entire economy reorganized itself around excessive consumption. To stimulate the demand for the Industrial output special marketing and sales techniques were invented. We are constantly bombarded with the message to buy some good or service.

All of that now is changing because we have the products but not enough money to buy all the products available on the market. The unemployment rate is going up. The benevolent corporations who offered the promise of life time employment for the workers loyalty and hard work are having financial problems. They are now constantly in the mode of restructuring and layoffs. There is a strong possibility that once we recover from the current economic stagnation we may not have enough jobs around for every body to be re-employed again in their old worker friendly corporations. This will create serious problem for the people who are dependent upon employers to provide jobs and salaries. What these people will do? The solution is to become self employed. In the beginning of twentieth century ninety five percent people were self employed and now only five percent people consider themselves self employed. This ratio will obviously change once people will realize that the old jobs are not coming back.

There are many possibility on how people can re-empower themselves through self employment rather then looking towards a corporation or government for a job. One of them is to simply cut down on the consumption and start producing themselves what ever is needed, as humans have done for million of years. This will be inefficient mode of production when compared with the industrial mode of production but we may have to sacrifice efficiency for the sake of self empowerment. In fact people have already started thinking in this direction.

This video shows urban gardening a new revolution where front lawns are converted into fruits and vegetable gardens.

Monday, May 11, 2009

I Am A GEEK

he word Geek is used to identify people who are involved in science, mathematics, Engineering and Technology. They are in general more interested in abstract concepts, science , mathematics and in designing, building gadgets and artifacts rather then in people.

The Dictionary.com provides the following meaning of the word GEEK

A person regarded as foolish, inept, or clumsy.
A person who is single-minded or accomplished in scientific or Technical pursuits but is felt to be socially inept.
A carnival performer whose show consists of bizarre acts, such as biting the head off a live chicken.

Wikipedia identifies Geeks as

A derogatory reference to a person obsessed with intellectual pursuits for their own sake, who is also deficient in most other human attributes so as to impair the person's operation within society.
A person who is interested in technology, especially computing and new media. Geeks are adept with computers, and use the term hacker in a positive way, though not all are hackers themselves.
A person who relates academic subjects to the real world outside of academic studies; for example, using multivariate calculus to determine how they should correctly optimize the dimensions of a pan to bake a cake.
A person who has chosen concentration rather than conformity; one who passionately pursues skill (especially technical skill) and imagination, not mainstream social acceptance.
A person with a devotion to something in a way that places him or her outside the mainstream. This could be due to the intensity, depth, or subject of their interest. This definition is very broad but because many of these interests have mainstream endorsement and acceptance, the inclusion of some genres as "geeky" is heavily debated. Persons have been labeled as or chosen to identify as physics geeks, mathematics geeks, engineering geeks, sci-fi geeks, computer geeks, various science geeks, movie and film geeks (cinephile), comic book geeks, theatre geeks, history geeks, music geeks, art geeks, philosophy geeks, literature geeks, historical reenactment geeks and roleplay geeks.
A more recent school of thought sees Nerd as being a derogatory phrase, whilst Geek is simply a description. It is taken to be someone who is an enthusiast, often in things outside of the mainstream spectrum, of note is that in this definition, there is no reference to being socially inept in the slightest.

All of these descriptions portray Geeks in a non-flattering light. Except the movies like "Revenge of Nerds" the portrayl of Geeks in the media has not been very positive. In few cases the description may fit the subjects but in majority of cases the description is way off in accurately describing the people it is trying to categorize. Now the Geeks have a "Society for Geek Advancement" who will try to advance the image of Geeks and they are using the new emerging social media to do it.

Here is the opening video from this society

Movies from High Speed Time Lapse Photography

Movies made from high speed time lapse photograps.

First SprintCam v3 showreel, made for NAB 2009 exhibition.
Mostly 1000FPS shots, made during a recent rugby competition in the Stade de France, Paris.

I-Movix SprintCam v3 NAB 2009 showreel from David Coiffier on Vimeo.

Another video

Based on a photron SA-2 camera, system is providing realtime HD-SDI output. Sensor is a 12bit CMOS of 2048 pixels wide, and speed can vary up to 2500fps.

Pixel's Revenge timelapse showreel from David Coiffier on Vimeo.

Dilbert on Capitalism

Onion News: Job Outsourcing

A hilarious look at the American workers outsourcing their jobs by TheOnion news, a humor web site.

More American Workers Outsourcing Own Jobs Overseas

Hans Rosling on Swine Flu Death versus News Ratio

Hans Rosling a Swedish specialist on epidemics shows impressive graphics of how news media creates buzz and how it blows things out of proportion.

He uses the example of Swine Flu and the Tuberculosis, a much more deadly disease and the media coverage of two diseases.

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Twiiter Parody

Twitter has a come a long way

Future of Social of Web

Jeremiah Owyang a web strategist at Forresster Research describes the future evolution of Social web and how it will become part of e-commerce.

Here is a table from the same report summarizing the development of web

Friday, May 8, 2009

Comedian Joe Wang On David Letterman Show

via GeekMBA360

Joe Wong is originally from China and came to the United Sates in 1994. He has a doctoral degree from Rice University. He works for a large pharmaceutical company in Boston. By all indication, he falls into the stereotype of "smart, hard-working, nerdy, foreign-born" scientist with a heavy accent.
But, he has been moonlighting as a comedian
in the New England area. He has become quite popular. He just made his first appearance on David Letterman show.

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Googleplex in 200 Seconds

The video shows Google complex and the work environment. It is green, entertaining and an interesting place to work.

The Google has done extremely well when it comes to generating revenues on a per employee basis. The number is approximately half a million dollar per employee.

Does this mean that the old stuffy work place as illustrated aptly in Dilbert cartoon series are their way out and the new sheik work environments as pioneered by the companies like Google are in to get maximum productivity from its employees?

or is it just an aberration due to the youthfulness of Google as a company and as it matures it will becomes same as old organizations with a rule book that institutes command and control.

Eliot Spitzer on CNBC

Former Governor of New York Eliot Spitzer on CNBC explaining how the current economic crises could have been avoided.

Useful Insights in the interview

Zombie Banks

A video parody about the state of banks

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Charlie Rose on Banking Crisis

Charlie Rose brings economists like Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz and others like editor to Finnacial Times to discuss banking crisis

Google SVP on The Ubiquity of Information

Jonathan Rosenberg, Senior Vice President of Product Management at Google, speaks to Claremont McKenna College students and faculty in Claremont, CA on March 11, 2009.

He talks about the innovation that takes place during slow economic times. The abundance of information and how it will shape the jobs of future.

He predicts a bright future for text and data miners along with statisticians who will utilize vast amount of available information and data sets to create new business value.

Innovation and Economic Crisis

omic econUmair Haque from Havas Media talks about innovation and current crisis at Columbia Business School. The change in the business models and change in value creation that is unsustainable.