From what I heard today Samsung with its Flexible AMOLD OLED displays will soon outdate gorilla glass and be wearable 2013. We got a taste of Samsung’s amazing flexible OLED displays at CES in 2011. According to some Samsung peeps the flexible OLED will be going commercial in 2013 (dates are unknown as of now). They also say screens can be bent so a user can wear them on their arm or rest them on their shirt. No immediate details but who needs gorilla glass anymore… Yes its unbreakable to a hammer! Check the videos below:

Samsung’s Flexible AMOD OLED screens in 2011 – Going Commercial 2013 according to talk:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Could this be the killer app for ultra-spec tablets? Microsoft Surface researcher David Brown is working on a marvelous space app that shows off not only the multi-touch power of Microsoft Surface, but also the computational grunt of the Samsung SUR40 on which it runs – not to mention the majesty of the solar system we live in and the Universe beyond.

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Of course, we’re all well-acquainted with multi-touch demos by now, but the nuanced gestures in Brown’s app, NUIverse, are something else. The name NUIverse is of course an anagram and play on the word universe, with the acronym for natural user interface incorporated. Clever: but nowhere near as clever as the app itself, which does indeed use the sort of familiar NUI gestures smartphone owners everywhere will be used to: grabs, twists, swipes and prods all work much as you’d expect.

But in fact not all the gestures could be considered natural – with some requiring the summoning of elaborate on-screen dials that can be used to control effects ranging from the very subtle – including the field of view of the camera, to the more fundamental – such as the passage of time. But writing about NUIs is like angling about acupuncture (if that’s the expression). Probably the thing to do at this point is take a look at Brown demonstrating the app himself:

Click here to view the embedded video.

But we hope the app will see some sort of educational application. The power of the SUR40 is put to great use, rendering thousands of on-screen objects (all the data in the app is supplied by NASA) at a time – and turning on labels for them doesn’t appear to appreciably slow it down. And the ability to set the solar system into motion with the speeding slowing and reversing of time means NUIverse is a wonderfully detailed and dynamic clockwork model of our corner of the cosmos. Observing an Earth-rise from the moon’s dark side or watching from geosynchronous orbit the ballet of light and shadow play out on the Earth’s surface (or at least digital recreations of these things) is compelling enough without need of spaceships.

Another video showing only the on-screen action of the app in use, can be seen below. There. Something the iPad doesn’t do. Yet.

Click here to view the embedded video.

They call it the “Hackerspace Global Grid” and organizers say it would be made up of a network of low-orbiting satellites, all relatively small in size, which would be used to allow internet access that could not be controlled or blocked by any government censors.

The Hackerspace Global Grid, or HGG for short, would also integrate an array of base stations which would be located around the world.

The HGG is aimed at providing a way for activists and journalists to obtain access to the internet, even when a repressive government has cut off access or censored the internet in one way or another.

While most people would think this is aimed at combating the authoritarian regimes in the Middle East being challenged by the so-called Arab Spring, this indeed could be quite useful in what some might consider the “free” nations like the United States and other Western nations.

With legislation similar to SOPA/PIPA being pushed around the world in the form of the Anti-Counterfeit Trade Agreement (ACTA), the danger of governments controlling the internet is growing.

The anti-censorship network would rely on low orbiting “cube” satellites which would be interconnected in a manner similar to the traditional internet.

This distributed network architecture allows for one satellite to be disabled without the entire network going down because the functions of the downed satellite would simply be re-routed to other units in the network.

While the developers of the project are excited for obvious reasons, critics and doubters believe that it will never happen.

However, some amateur HAM radio operators and others have already discovered methods to launch their cube satellites into orbit.

According to Nick Farr, a hacker and accountant working on the project, they will be using these methods along with new methods to get their satellites into low orbit.

Farr says this is a growing trend, telling TechNewsWorld, “What we’re seeing right now is a big explosion in people launching cube sats.”

While there is a lot of promise for the HGG, it is still in its infancy at this point.

The organizers of the project still have to iron out how they will track the satellites in near-earth orbit from the ground because high orbiting satellites have a fixed position, making them much easier to track from the ground.

The problem with these low orbiting satellites is that they have variable positions and are fast moving, meaning that the window for locating one and then connecting is quite small indeed.

Currently they are focusing on establishing a network of base stations around the globe which will be used “to track various things, for example airplanes, satellites, weather information,” Armin Bauer, a lead hacker for the project said.

The organizers say that once enough stations are integrated into the network grid, it will be possible for the low-orbiting satellites to operate in a way similar to cellular networks.

As the satellite moves, the link would be passed from base station to base station, much like a cellular connection is passed from tower to tower.

I think this program has a lot of promise and I will be keeping tabs on it and hopefully we will see it go operational, in which case I would love to be a part of it as I’m sure many others worried about the viability of the future of the internet would be.

You can now make a 3-D projection of yourself anywhere in the world. The first product for real teleimmersion has been released, the Telebeamer.
It consists of four 2-meter pillars, to set up so they form a square of about 4 square meters. Anything within the box (preferably you) is scanned in three dimensions, and can easily be projected in another box with the same setup. The great thing is that you can have someone else projected in the same box where you are, at the same time as you are projected in that person’s box. In that way you can truly communicate with each other from different parts of the world.

In the pillars there are 3-D scanners as well as 3-D projectors. They are wireless connected to your computer where you have specific software that connects with the person that you would like, that have the same software and 3-D box as you. With the microphone and speakers that goes with the installation you can easily talk to the other person when he or she is projected in front of you.

In the future the manufacturer intends to provide a three-party connection, so people from three Telebeamers can meet. They are also developing game versions where you for instance can play table tennis together with a projected ping-pong ball. Even though an installation is a bit bulky they hope that a shuttle can bring a Telebeamer to Starbright Hotel on the moon, so the guests there can get a visit from home.

Even if it sounds cool, don’t expect that this will be the Christmas present of the year. First you need two of them to have someone to communicate with, and secondly, they cost US$ 12,900 each, so they are mainly for businesses.

Argument: Even though videophone has not been interesting enough for the mass market so far, there is a great interest in interacting in people elsewhere. The developing in 3-D scanning and 3-D projection makes the Telebeamer possible, and by year 2035 Internet will be so fast that it can handle a well projected, well updated, 3-D experience.

Questions: Will a product like the Telebeamer be interesting for the home market? Will there be other ways to interact with each other from distant locations in the future?

February 14, 2025 – Today is the release of the first home computer with the new 4 THz microprocessor, currently the highest performing processor available. Several analysts have doubted of the need of the 4THz processor for the home market, but the pre-sale for the last couple of weeks look positive according to the manufacturer.
The computer has the 100TB memory drive that became standard about 5 years ago, basically because the lack of interest in more storage for home computers due to cloud hosting. It’s nice that they have included 1,000 movies in the package but as you can guess they are not the latest releases.

It has 512 GB RAM memory, the size of the box is 10.3″ x 7.9″ x 1.2″ (WxDxH) and it is of course compatible with all the wireless screens that you have at home. The introduction price is set to US$ 399.

Argument: According to Moore’s Law the number of transistors that could be placed on a computer chip would double every 18 months which has been the case since the 1970s. Gordon Moore has though revised his law since then which could give us a microprocessor of 4 THz by 2025.

Questions: Will there be need for more than 100 TB storage memory for the home market? How far will it go with cloud hosting? What else can drive the development of home computers than moving images, as in movies and games?

When it comes to rumours about the next Xbox, there’s some wild speculation to get your teeth into.

But on the PlayStation 4 rumour mill, things were, until recently, turning much slower. As Kaz Hirai said earlier in the year: “we’re not deliberating on a PS4 or a next generation machine, whatever you call it.”
But on 26 May 2011, that stance appeared to change when Sony’s executive vice president and chief financial officer Masaru Kato seemingly confirmed that Sony is working on the PS4. The revelation took place during a conference call to investors where he was asked about increased R&D costs.

“This is a platform business, so for the future platform – when we’ll be introducing what product I cannot discuss that – but our development work is already under way, so the costs are incurred there,” Eurogamer reported him as saying.

However, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal on 31 May 2011, Kato denied that he was specifically referring to the PS4, saying “Some people misread what I said.”

In November 2011, PlayStation Europe boss Jim Ryan said it would be “undesirable” for PS4 to launch a while after the next-gen Microsoft Xbox console.

So what can we expect from the PlayStation 4?

The PS4 specs could abandon the Cell processor and return to x86…

In February, there were rumours of a failed Sony/IBM research project to develop a PowerPC chip for future PlayStations. Going forward, Sony will surely stick with the advanced, multi-core, bitch-to-develop-for Cell processor that it dropped $3 billion on. Here are three reasons why:

1. Easy backwards compatibility with the PlayStation 3

2. A familiar development environment. By 2015 (or whenever a PS4 comes out), games developers will have had much more experience working with Cell and its software tools

3. Toshiba recently sold its Cell factory in Nagasaki back to Sony for £400 million. Sony is hardly going to abandon the chip now it owns the means to manufacture it in bulk

…or it could move across to ARM

There are some rumours that PS4 could use Nvidia’s ARM-based Project Denver.

Click here to view the embedded video.

By now, people who use the Internet seriously, and even plenty who don’t, are aware of the arrest of six-foot-seven, 300-pound Kim Dotcom, an outsize figure in the business of facilitating Internet downloads.

The problem with his company, Megauploads, according to the US Justice Department and the FBI that carried out the arrest, is that his brainchild allowed users to traffic in “stolen” – copyrighted – entertainment on which no royalties had been paid.

In this article, I’ll comment on the arrest of Kim Dotcom and try to show how this one action is actually the beginning of an entirely new phase of what we may call the Internet Wars.

I’m not the first to notice this. As Kurt Nimmo and Alex Jones, of Infowars fame, pointed out in an article posted today entitled “The Great Internet Wars Have Begun,” we wake up to an entirely new Internet era this weekend.

Yes, a war has been joined and human history shall never be the same. For one thing, the outcome is NOT certain – and the power elite that seeks to control and constrain the Internet may yet end up taking a step back – at least in these early rounds, anyway.

For another, the directed history that the Anglosphere power elite has been so clever at inculcating over the past century is gradually fading away. That’s perhaps an even more important point. The Dotcom arrest actually reinforces this observation, as I’ll try to show in a moment.

There is no doubt, in my view, that the elites practiced directed history in the 20th century, setting up wars and economic catastrophes designed to consolidate world government. But in the 21st century, with so many understanding and evaluating the mechanisms of the elites, this is a considerably harder trick to pull off.

The elites actually have a limited playbook when it comes to influencing the larger society, though that is not intended to downplay its power. The elites use what we call dominant social themes – fear-based promotions – that are designed to frighten middle classes into giving up wealth and power to specially prepared globalist institutions like the UN, IMF, etc.

The other “tools” in the toolkit include war and a pervasive societal matrix of sociopolitical, economic, religious and military elements. The matrix itself was seamless in the late 20th century – for most Western citizens anyway – and allowed the power elite to advance its fear-based promotions without fear of contradiction.

What if Neanderthals, who bit the dust just 28,000 years ago, had instead wised up and were now living next door? Or what if, during all these millennia that humans have been evolving, some unrelated creature had evolved cognitive and technological prowess in keeping with our own?

Another scenario: what if humans had split into two separate species — the original gangsters, and a successful evolutionary offshoot?

These are all perfectly reasonable histories of the world that would have resulted in two advanced species of Earthlings living side-by-side today. They’re just not the histories that happen to have happened.
But what if they had? Would we break bread with our brainy cohabitants or be locked in a constant battle for supremacy?

Oh, them – just ignore them
In this hypothetical world, there would be three possible relationships between humans and “others,” said William Harcourt-Smith, a paleoanthropologist at the American Museum of Natural History. The most likely one is that competition for resources would cause us to fight, constantly.

“Given knowledge of how humans behave within their species — the endless intertribal conflicts and wars that have sadly gone on for many thousands of years — I think that whenever resources become an issue, or competing ideologies become an issue, you get conflict,” Harcourt-Smith said. If one of the species was slightly cleverer or stronger or developed better technology than the other, the former would eventually decimate the latter, reminiscent of Humans vs. Neanderthals.

Alternatively: If, after tens of thousands of years of clashes between Humans and Others, no one had come out on top, the two species might have gradually drifted toward equilibrium, either by populating geographically separate regions of the globe or by adapting to require different resources, Harcourt-Smith said. Others might have developed an appetite solely for fish, for instance, while Humans might have specialized in animal husbandry, and come to find fish disgusting.

In either of those cases — if we lived in different regions or utilized different resources — Humans and Others would have developed cultural systems in which we were taught to avoid one another. That’s what other species do under the same circumstances. “As long as there isn’t competition, species just ignore each other,” he said. “Two monkeys living in the same tree, for example — if they’re not going after the same resources, they don’t interact.”

The brain-computer interface will be a critical component for extreme human life extension.
Such connections will allow the human brain and mind to expand beyond its current limits and could potentially allow one’s consciousness to long outlive outlive one’s body.
We are at the first steps of this inevitable journey, and the work of researchers at the University of Wisconsin appears to be laying the groundwork.
Scientists there have first created silicon-geranium nanotubes. Then they placed them into a culture of mouse neurons.
There they found the dendrites from the nerve cells were drawn to explore and grow into and through the tubes and even follow their structural architecture.
In the next stage of research the tubes will be made into functional silicon transistor chips that will be capable both of reading electric signals from the dendrites as well as stimulating them. This would then form the basis of future brain-machine interfaces.
“There’s a lot of nontrivial engineering that has to happen, that’s the real challenge,” said one expert. “It’s really cool engineering, but what it means for neuroscience remains to be seen.”

Today, the Center for American Progress hosted a panel titled “Mind Wars: Brain Research and National Defense.” CAP Senior Fellow Jonathan Moreno, Ph.D. gave a run down on his book and fellow panelist Jennifer Bard, a law professor at Texas Tech University, gave a legal analysis of advances in neuroscience research as applied to real life situations.

The most shocking comment came from panelist Paul Root Wolpe, Ph.D. when he said that it “is realistic that in ten to fifteen years, it could be possible to directly connect the human brain to the internet.” He cited current research where neuroscientists are able to bypass lesions in the brain by connecting two sections of the brain by man made circuitry.

Despite such an earth shaking advancement being possibly a decade away, there exists no body of ethical oversight OR laws governing such research. The biggest sponsor of this type of research is the Federal Government, often funding scientific studies through the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, DARPA.

Techniques currently in development include functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, or fMRI. It takes pictures of brain activity in real time and is being used to learn reactions of the brain to figure out if someone is lying, their sexual orientation, if they have racist tendencies, if they are extroverted, and countless other things. It is the closest that we have come to “mind reading.”

DARPA is funding an “Enhanced Human Performance” project. Augmenting cognition, or increasing brain function, is one of the goals of this project. This can be accomplished by inserting a chip in a soldier’s brain and increasing the bandwidth of brain activity.

The drug Modanafil has also been developed and can keep people awake for days at a time without the need for sleep or calories. This has already been made available in the private sector under the name Provigil.

This barely scratches the surface of an emerging issue about which the Center for American Progress hopes to begin a public discussion. The potential implications of this issue on civil liberties is enormous. It warrants much scrutiny until acceptable legal and ethical standards are created. There should also be a balance between using these new advances for national defense and using it in the private sector where it can be used to improve the lives of everyday Americans.

‘The Matrix’ is a step closer to reality; Neuroscientists break code on sight
From: physorg.com

In the sci-fi movie “The Matrix,” a cable running from a computer into Neo’s brain writes in visual perceptions, and Neo’s brain can manipulate the computer-created world. In reality, scientists cannot interact directly with the brain because they do not understand enough about how it codes and decodes information.

Image: Neurons in a purely visual brain region called the inferotemporal (IT) cortex respond selectively to different images. As pictures were randomly presented to the monkey during specific intervals (top), neurons at different sites in IT produce distinct patterns of activity to each picture (bottom). For example, neurons at site 1 favor the toy and the yam, while neurons at site 3 prefer the monkey face and the cat. Image courtesy / Poggio/DiCarlo labs

Now, neuroscientists in the McGovern Institute at MIT have been able to decipher a part of the code involved in recognizing visual objects. Practically speaking, computer algorithms used in artificial vision systems might benefit from mimicking these newly uncovered codes.

The study, a collaboration between James DiCarlo’s and Tomaso Poggio’s labs, appears in the Nov. 4 issue of Science.

“We want to know how the brain works to create intelligence,” said Poggio, the Eugene McDermott Professor in Brain Sciences and Human Behavior. “Our ability to recognize objects in the visual world is among the most complex problems the brain must solve. Computationally, it is much harder than reasoning.” Yet we take it for granted because it appears to happen automatically and almost unconsciously.

“This work enhances our understanding of how the brain encodes visual information in a useful format for brain regions involved in action, planning and memory,” said DiCarlo, an assistant professor of neuroscience.

In a fraction of a second, visual input about an object runs from the retina through increasingly higher levels of the visual stream, continuously reformatting the information until it reaches the highest purely visual level, the inferotemporal (IT) cortex. The IT cortex identifies and categorizes the object and sends that information to other brain regions.

To explore how the IT cortex formats that output, the researchers trained monkeys to recognize different objects grouped into categories, such as faces, toys and vehicles. The images appeared in different sizes and positions in the visual field. Recording the activity of hundreds of IT neurons produced a large database of IT neural patterns generated in response to each object under many different conditions.

Then, the researchers used a computer algorithm, called a classifier, to decipher the code. The classifier was used to associate each object — say, a monkey’s face — with a particular pattern of neural signals, effectively decoding neural activity. Remarkably, the classifier found that just a split second’s worth of the neural signal contained specific enough information to identity and categorize the object, even at positions and sizes the classifier had not previously “seen.”

It was quite surprising that so few IT neurons (several hundred out of millions) for such a short period of time contained so much precise information. “If we could record a larger population of neurons simultaneously, we might find even more robust codes hidden in the neural patterns and extract even fuller information,” Poggio said.

Article from: http://www.physorg.com/news7879.html