WINDING DOWN
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week's net and technology news
by Alan Lenton
I guess with Xmas rapidly approaching we will probably be skipping an issue or two of Winding Down. I'm not sure yet exactly when that will be, but you can take that December 26th is definitely out, and so is January 2nd. Other dates are still up in the air so to speak.
I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving, well my American friends at any rate. It isn't really celebrated over on this side of the pond, and we don't really have an equivalent, except possibly Xmas, which has long since become a secular holiday lasting from Xmas to the new year, unless you are in the retail business. Actually, most things effectively close down during the second week in December when the Xmas parties start. You can still reach people in companies until Xmas Eve, but don't expect to do any business with them.
In the meantime, on with this week's info...
Shorts:
Beneath the screaming headline 'Will Netflix Destroy the Internet?' on Slate.com, there is an interesting article about the rise of streaming movies, compared to BitTorrent type downloads. The fundamental premise is very simple. When people decide they want to watch a movie, they want to watch it now. Now! Now! Now! Not in an hour or so when it finishes downloading. And most people are prepared to pay to watch streaming movies on demand.
Hence the rise and continued success of Netflix, which, according to the latest figures accounts for something like 20 per cent of downstream net traffic during peak hours, as opposed to BitTorrent's eight per cent. The headline refers to the possibility that continuing increased usage of Netflix and similar services will overwhelm the capacity of the North American portion of the net. This is most relevant when you consider that only two per cent of Netflix customers are accounting for that 20 per cent.
The interesting thing is that the film studios are coming round to the idea of streaming as a viable business model, and in some cases launching their own streaming services. And that's not all. They are also looking at whether some of their more obnoxious practices, like the theatrical window, which is the gap between when a movie is released to show in the theatre and when it released on other media such as DVD and streaming services like Netflix, should be junked.
Could some common sense (never very common where corporations are concerned) be starting to pervade the movie space? Quite possibly...
http://www.slate.com/id/2273314
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-20022759-261.html?tag=nl.e703
Who uses smart phones for work? You think it's mainly people in their twenties? Wrong. The median age of smart phone users in this area is 46, which indicates that mobile workers are spread across the age spectrum. InfoWorld has a useful article about the issue with also covers in passing the rise of the iPad type tablet. It seems that there is already a work-place trend, more marked around the younger end of mobile workers, to using a laptop in the office and doing routine work at home on a tablet. As the article points out, "Already, 43.5 percent of mobile workers sometimes leave their laptop in the office, relying on a mobile device instead when not on-site to do work."
I don't know about you, but I hadn't realized this sort of thing was so prevalent. It will be an interesting trend to keep an eye on.
http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobilize/the-truth-about-todays-mobile-user-
499?source=IFWNLE_nlt_daily_2010-11-19
There's an fascinating buzz starting to emanate from games circles. It seems that key developers are starting to come to the conclusion that PC games are better - more creative - than their console equivalent. Why? Well, it's because the hardware is better from the point of view of gamers. Think about it. The hardware in consoles is fixed - and how long has (say) the Xbox 360 been around? It's now around six years old. The PlayStation 3, very much state of the art when it was launched, is only a year younger.
The hardware in the console boxes may have been state of the art when launched (though that is in some cases debatable), but it's certainly starting to look long in the tooth now. Microsoft are hoping to squeeze some extra mileage out of their new Kinetic technology, which tracks and interprets movement, but the technology in the 360 box is confined to what was state of the art in early 2005. And there are no new generations of the machines on the horizon yet - hardly surprising given the cost of developing and marketing such machines, which are loss leaders anyway.
Contrast that to the desktop PC with its upgradable disks, facilities to add the latest video, sound, and networking cards. Stuff in some more core memory, or video memory, and maybe an extra GPU card to handle all those flocking, physics, and Artificial Intelligence algorithms. You can see why the game designers are drooling over the possibilities, even if the publishers are worrying about how to protect their PC games from hackers.
I think we are heading for interesting times on this front!
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/11/25/crytek-say-the-pc-is-a-
generation-ahead/
I note that Microsoft Windows is 25 years old this month. Yes - it really does date back to 1985, which is when Windows 1.01 launched - it took five years, and three attempts to get it even useable - Windows 3.1. It wasn't until 1995, the launch of Windows 95, that Microsoft finally got it right. There are those who maintain that Windows 95 was the last thing Microsoft did that they got right!
Needless to say, the anniversary has generated a slew of web reviews of the life of Windows for hacks starved of material as Xmas approaches, so here are a couple of URLs to keep your going. The first is a potted history, from the windows that couldn't overlap in the first edition, through to the current day and the maximally bloated Windows 7. The second is a collection of pictures of odd Windows facts from the last 25 years. Enjoy.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/20/25_years_of_windows/
http://technologizer.com/2010/11/17/windows-anniversary/
Now, here's a tale from the UK. It seems that Hertfordshire County Council (one of our local governments) accidentally faxed details of a sex abuse case to members of the public. The case came up before the Information Commissioner this week and the offending council was fined 100,000 UK pounds (about US$150,00) for the data breach.
My first reaction was to applaud. More thought however made me wonder. There are several points. First, the fine only represents a transfer of money between government departments. Second, for all that it sounds big, for a government organization this is of the order of a 'cost of doing business' payment (think of the way plumbers in cities just factor the cost a parking fine into their prices). Third, even if the fine was bigger, the only people the fine would actually hurt are the taxpayers.
So, what's the answer? How about restoring personal responsibility? A much better solution would be to have mandatory dismissal without compensation for the person responsible and for his or her manager. This would make people much more conscious of their responsibilities and of the consequences for them personally if they screw up. The expression 'faceless bureaucrats' was invented to cover this situation. Let's put faces back on the bureaucrats and make them the ones who suffer if there is a screw up.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/24/ico_fines_hereford/
Homework:
The mathematicians amongst you will probably be aware of how difficult it is to generate true random numbers using a computer. In fact, the last time I had a computer that could generate true random numbers was in the mid-1980's when I had a Commodore 64! The CBM64 did it by measuring the voltage fluctuations across a noisy diode. No computer I've used since was as capable on this front.
Ever since then I've had an interest in how you generate random numbers on computers (answer: with great difficulty). So I was really pleased when a reader pointed me to the random.org website, which uses atmospheric noise to generate truly random numbers. Indeed since 1998, they've generated 920.4 billion random bits using this method (click on the go random button on the top page to generate yourself some random numbers...)
The Introduction page is also a useful explanation of random numbers and computers generated pseudo-random numbers. Take a look, it doesn't take long to read!
https://www.random.org/
How's your thermodynamics? Well what about demonology, then? If the answer to both questions is positive, then you will probably have heard of Maxwell's Demon. If you haven't heard of this particular thought experiment, then pay attention, because it doesn't involve anything quantum!
The laws of thermodynamics are well established, and, among other things, they state that you always get less energy out of a system than you put into it, and that you cannot create order in a system without putting energy into it.
Nineteenth century physicist James Clerk Maxwell, came up with a thought experiment that seems to defy the laws of thermodynamics. You have two rooms at the same temperature, connected by a door. A demon guards the door and only allows fast moving air particles to move from the left hand room into the right hand one, and slow moving particles to move from the right hand room into the left hand one. The result is that the right hand room gradually gets warmer as the average speed of the gas molecules increases.
But the killer point is that the demon is not adding any energy - it is just using information about the speed of the molecules. This is definitely contrary to the second law of thermodynamics which is about not being able to create order without putting energy into the system. It's an interesting paradox which has been debated by physicists for over a century.
Now, however, a team of physicists at the University of Tokyo have managed to replicate the Maxwell's Demon paradox in an experiment using a nano-scale polystyrene bead. You can read the details in the article pointed to by the URL, but the important thing is that they were able to create a situation equivalent to the paradox, using only information about the bead's state. Oh, and they managed to do it without employing a demon!
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=demonic-device-converts-
inform&WT.mc_id=SA_WR_20101117
Finally, something a little easier to comprehend: A little web app that demonstrates the scale of the universe, from the very smallest to the very largest. Teachers will love it. Try it - it's very neat.
http://primaxstudio.com/stuff/scale_of_universe/index.php
Geek Toys:
Wanna defeat the TSA perv scanners on your next trip through an airport? I have a line on just the thing - titanium lined underwear! Rocky Flats Gear is doing a great trade in its new line of lingerie for the discerning traveller - a snip for less than US$20 (unless you want a sports bra, which is somewhat more expensive).
http://www.rockyflatsgear.com/
On the other hand, if you just want to be ecologically sound, just take a look at the rather elegant wooden watches on the Wewood site. I particularly liked the DATE brown/army version, which, unfortunately is on backorder at the moment.
http://we-wood.us/collections/best-seller/products/wewood-date-brown-army
Scanner:
'Lawful Access' bills would reshape internet in Canada
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5451/135/
The Golden Gobblers: Biggest tech turkeys of 2010
http://www.infoworld.com/d/adventures-in-it/the-golden-gobblers-biggest-
tech-turkeys-2010-964?source=IFWNLE_nlt_daily_2010-11-25
What is the best approach to aviation security
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=aviation-security-ait-pat-down&WT.mc_id=SA_CAT_SP_20101122
Content 'made available' in jurisdiction where server is located
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/19/content_available_server_jurisdiction/
New Orleans still working to fix real estate computer crash
http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2010/11/new_orleans_still_working_
to_f.html
Acknowledgements
Thanks to readers Barb, Fi, and to Slashdot's daily newsletter for drawing my attention to material used in this issue.
Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Spamato spam filter...
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
28 November, 2010
Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist, the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.
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