Scientists have found a 60 000-year-old neck bone that suggests Neanderthals were anatomically able to produce the speech sounds modern humans make … That implies that voice-production machinery has changed little over the past 60 000 years. – News report “You have reached the cave of Ak Ar. I’m away right now, but if you leave […]
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Posted inBusiness, Media, Tech
Web publishing goes (desk)topless
One of my friend Vinny Lingham‘s* latest projects, a revolutionary, browser-based, wysiwyg website builder, Synthasite, launched into beta this week (November 5). I had the good fortune of being able to play around with the latest incarnation just before its public release and I found it simple to use and quite addictive actually. Although all […]
Posted inLifestyle, Media, Tech
Blogging Player of the Week: Charl Norman
Meet Charl Norman. At first sight, he doesn’t look dangerous. You might even encounter him at business or social events, exchange business cards and not even think of contacting the authorities. “Hmm, nice logo, you might say,” as I did, and then carry on with the business of the evening. Mistake. Charl Norman is a […]
Posted inMedia, News/Politics, Tech
New monopoly card for bloggers: No-Libel, Pass Begin, Collect $200
An important international company in the web space recently discovered one of my blog posts and contacted me to tell me that I jeopardised the potential for future cooperation with it by being critical of it in my posts. I didn’t think I was being critical of the company, but it didn’t think so. This […]
Posted inTech
Is it the end of the line for the PC already?
An interesting article by an AP reporter talks about the decline in PC sales in Japan. It comes just a few days after a debate with some friends found us mulling over the same issue. My idea that the life of the PC was limited and that the computer as we know it was on […]
Posted inTech
Our nuclear future
Nuclear energy is the best option currently available for base load energy generation. Nuclear technology has advanced in leaps and bounds since the last disastrous meltdown in the Eighties and we are on the verge of experiencing the wonders of modular nuclear reactors, PBMR. It is small, efficient, generates little waste and above all, is […]
Posted inTech
OpenSocial gets off to a hacking great start
Google’s OpenSocial was launched amid great expectation last week, with virtual groupies waiting for the doors to open. While I wasn’t among those pitching their tents, so to speak, outside Google’s OpenSocial landing page, once I had come across the fact that it open for business, I thought I’d check it out. OpenSocial holds much […]
Posted inTech
The rise and rise of cellphone connectivity
According to Jan Chipchase, principle researcher for Nokia, there will be three billion people connected on cellphones by the end of 2007. That is a fair chunk out of the approximately 6,3-billion people inhabiting the Earth. He also anticipates that within another two years, a further billion people will be connected. Wow. That puts a […]
Posted inBusiness, Tech
The $15-billion Facebook fallacy
I’m amused by the sniggering in the blogosphere at Microsoft collecting the scraps from the Facebook table when it acquired the rights to sell the platform’s remnant advertising worldwide; ie, that inventory that Facebook doesn’t want to sell itself. Others have scowled at the other part of the transaction: the $15-billion valuation attached to Facebook […]
Posted inBusiness, Tech
Time to grow up, bloggers
Microsoft’s quarter-billion dollar investment in Facebook is a litmus test for the maturity of the social media and social networking world called Web 2.0. While it was fun for some (like Thought Leader colleague Ivo Vegter) to join a group of Facebook users who promised to quit the social network if Microsoft bought a share […]
Posted inTech
How to roll out flawless software
A somewhat radical new way of thinking about software projects and how to manage customers through them. Introduction I have been doing software-development work for my entire career. That, to my horror, is somewhere close to 12 years now, which is starting to seem like a downright respectable length of time. In this time, I […]
Posted inBusiness, Tech
Amazon patent insanity isn’t over
No sooner had a judge carved huge holes in the famous one-click-checkout patent which Amazon.com swindled out of the US Patent and Trademark Office, than the very same idiots at the very same mental institution awards it a patent on another amazing new thing.