NinetyDegrees

New RFID Standard

2004-12-20T11:32:00.000-06:00

During the past week, EPC Global Inc. announced the ratification of the royalty-free EPCglobal UHF Generation 2 candidate specification."Announcement Marks Culmination of Collaborative Process; Opens Door for Proliferation of Standards-Based Hardware to Drive EPC Implementations Worldwide"
InformationWeek headline on the topic reads :"EPCglobal's next-generation standard boosts read rate of RFID tags".
Silicon.com's article chooses to highlight the "royalties" aspect of the new Standard :"RFID standard escapes royalties".

Library Books, Searchable Online !

2004-12-14T11:10:00.000-06:00

Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) today announced that it is working with the libraries of Harvard,Stanford, the University of Michigan, and the University of Oxford as well as The New York Public Library to digitally scan books from their collections so that users worldwide can search them in Google.

"Today's announcement is an expansion of the "Google Print" program,which assists publishers in making books and other offline information searchable online. Google is now working with libraries to digitally scan books from their collections, and over time will integrate this content into the Google index, to make it searchable for users worldwide".

What this means for publishers, authors and users ? According to the Press Release :

"For publishers and authors, this expansion of the Google Print program will increase the visibility of in and out of print books, and generate book sales via "Buy this Book" links and advertising. For users,
Google's library program will make it possible to search across library collections including out of print books and titles that weren't previously available anywhere but on a library shelf".

"Users searching with Google will see links in their search results page
when there are books relevant to their query. Clicking on a title
delivers a Google Print page where users can browse the full text of
public domain works and brief excerpts and/or bibliographic data of
copyrighted material. Library content will be displayed in keeping with
copyright law."

First the "Scholar" and now the "Libraries"...Its almost too good to be true...WOW !

Panel Discussion On RFID and Data Privacy

2004-12-08T11:57:00.000-06:00

SAP is hosting a panel discussion on RFID's impact on data privacy, at Brussels today A Webcast replay will be available on December 9, 2004.

Word of the Year

2004-12-02T13:22:00.000-06:00

Merriam-Webster announced the "2004 Words of the Year".

"We've sorted through thousands of user hits from Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary, Online Thesaurus, and Merriam-Webster Collegiate.com to find the ten words that have most consistently piqued your curiosity this past year" said the editors of Merriam-Webster Online...And the #1 Word of the Year is...That's right you've guessed it, this four-letter word, meaning :

"a Web site that contains an online personal journal with reflections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided by the writer."

"Blog" is the big word. And it wasn't yet officially in the dictionary. A spokesman for the dictionary publisher says "starting in July it showed up consistently in the top 50 words every day and that translates into tens of thousands of requests,...It was by far the most looked-up word... The word "Blog", short for Weblog, had been slated for inclusion in the 2005 annual update of both the print and online versions of Merriam-Webster's 11th Collegiate Dictionary, but in face of the demand, the company quickly added an early definition to some of its online sites".

Just so that we put it all in better perspective,here is how a word gets into Merriam-Webster dictionary i.e "typically, it takes about 20 years of usage to become prominent enough to merit a place in an abridged dictionary, such as the Collegiate".
Blog is one of the few exceptions...

World Aids Day

2004-12-01T01:05:00.000-06:00

Today is the World Aids Day. Here what you can find all about it.

Form Shifter - A New Way To Recycle ?

2004-11-30T15:03:00.000-06:00

Researchers compost old mobile phones & transform them into flowers

By 2005, there will be at least 200 million cell phones in use around the US and at least 500 million older models stockpiled in drawers awaiting disposal according to study done by Inform. Study also estimates that within 3 years, Americans will discard about 130 million cell phones per year. This figure adds up to be approximately 65, 000 tons of trash, including many toxic metals and other health hazards.

Just by looking at these figures and considering the pace with which the cell phone industry is growing, finding a solution to recycling is a high priority...At least a group of researcher at the University of Warwick think so...Yesterday University announced that researchers at the Warwick Manufacturing Group " have devised a novel way to recycle discarded mobile telephones - bury them and watch them transform into the flower of your choice".

The University of Warwick team, led by Dr Kerry Kirwan, have worked with hi tech materials company PVAXX Research and Development Ltd and Motorola to create a mobile telephone case or cover that when discarded can simply be placed in compost in such a way that just weeks later the case will begin to disintegrate and turn into a flower. According to the University two researchers have made two key changes to the case or cover of the mobile to achieve this result:

"A special formulation of PVAXX Research and Development Ltd's biodegradable polymer range was developed in conjunction with materials researchers at Warwick, that produces a high quality finish but which also biodegrades easily in compost.

Secondly the engineers at the University of Warwick have created a small transparent window in the case or cover in which they can embed a seed. The seed is visible to the environmentally aware mobile phone user but will not germinate until the phone cover or case is recycled. The researchers have drawn on the specialised seed expertise of researchers in the University of Warwick's horticultural research arm - Warwick HRI - to identify which types of seeds would perform best in this situation. For the first prototype telephones they have used dwarf sunflower seeds".

Definately very interesting and important devolopment worth following up closely...

Corporate Blogging and Google

2004-11-27T15:21:00.000-06:00

Computerworld report that,"Google, which implemented an internal Web log system behind its firewall about 18 months ago, has seen tremendous benefits from it and may in the future consider providing tools and expertise for this purpose to interested clients."

".... we have seen a lot of different uses of blogs within the firewall: people keeping track of meeting notes, people sharing diagnostics information, people sharing snippets of code, as well as more personal uses, like letting co-workers know what they're thinking about and what they're up to,"Jason Goldman,Blogger Product Manager at Google, said. "It really helps grow the intranet and the internal base of documents."

Google executives have talked in the past about the company's internal Blogger implementation, called Blogger in Google (BIG), and a Google employee even posted ascreenshot of a BIG page last year.

What does a professional, say like a Gartner analyst make of all this ? Article says, Allen Weiner, an analyst at Gartner thinks that "it's unlikely that Google will develop a version of Blogger that would compete head-to-head against enterprise document management products, but it's very possible Google will give Blogger some features in the future to make it more attractive for business use...ultimately, vendors will approach the emerging enterprise blogging market from two angles, first, there will be the enterprise document management vendors and the enterprise publishing software vendors tweaking their industrial-strength products to support blogging functionality. These companies will cater to organizations that need security, rich functionality and IT control. Second, there will be more lightweight products such as Blogger, which will do just fine for organizations that approach blogging from a more casual perspective" and concludes :

"What is undeniable is that there is a growing interest among businesses towards blogs as business communication tools, particularly among IT departments. There's a huge benefit in blogging for companies implementing IT projects. It's going to be a growing trend over the next couple of years."

On Privacy and RFID

2004-11-24T10:15:00.000-06:00

Consumer concerns on privacy over the RFID technology is a hot debate among all the parties involved. Simon Garfinkel from Technology Review has almost always something interesting and thought provoking to say on the subject. In his November 3, 2004, article he brought the subject up, in the light of the recent developments, which he describes as "the rush by Wal-Mart and other companies to put radio frequency identification devices in their goods " and concluded :

"... as EPC technology starts its move from the laboratory to the marketplace, it’s becoming clear that attention to privacy niceties and even some forms of notice will increase the price of this technology. After all, it takes time to properly alert people to the presence of RFID. Wal-Mart might have had signs up at Broken Arrow, but at least some people at the stores who bought RFID-labeled products didn’t know that the products contained radio frequency tracking devices. MIT could have printed an RFID symbol on my ID card, but it didn’t; there was no requirement for it to do so. Honda doesn’t bother putting an RFID symbol on its car keys—this despite the fact that the keys can be read from 30 centimeters or more away using specialized equipment.
The problem of voluntary, industry-approved privacy standards is that they’re voluntary—companies don’t need to comply with them. And the very real danger facing the RFID industry is that a suspicious public will push for regulation of this technology. Although the industry has successfully killed legislation proposed earlier this year in California and Massachusetts, high-handed actions on the part of RFID-advocates will likely empower consumer activists and their legislative allies to pass some truly stifling legislation."

AIM, the global trade association for automatic identification, has responded to the above mentioned article in its November 23 editorial. It states that "AIM has no control over the policies and practices of retailers using the technology. It would be far more appropriate for retail associations, such as the National Retail Federation (NRF), to make responses and issue policies" and adds that " many of the concerns expressed by Mr. Garfinkle are, in fact, already addressed by the policies of the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) to which all major US retailers subscribe." However", editorial continues, "whether or not a store adheres to these policies is a management decision on the part of each store. Stores that violate these policies risk alienating customers ".

So, there you have it... the long waited response from AIM to the concerns (about consumer privacy as well as the need for a "Consumer Bill of Rights") and where the association stands on these issues.

Wind Farming

2004-11-23T16:56:00.000-06:00

Chicago based U.S. Wind Farming, Inc. announced that it" Has Entered into Several International Development Contracts to Install and Own the "Next Generation" of Integrated Renewable Energy Systems Utilizing Advanced Wind Energy Technology and Decentralized Hydrogen Technology".
According to the yesterday's press release, US Wind Farming Inc. "America's Only Publicly Traded Wind Energy company," has entered into an agreement with U.S. Global Corporation of Northbrook, Illinois and Cambridge Energy Group, Ltd. Of Northfield, Illinois to provide the development resources for several immediate projects worldwide.
USWF expects its "Next Generation" Wind Energy Electricity/Hydrogen Cooperatives will produce at least 25% more revenue than current generation Wind Energy Projects. This will provide the Company with the ability to be even more competitive within the existing wind energy industry, and allow it to compete with the fossil fuel industry in delivering cost-effective electricity and fuels without government subsidies and tax incentives.

Smart Yarns

2004-11-22T14:18:00.000-06:00

On November 19, Commenwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) issued a Media Release announcing that "In a collaborative effort, scientists at CSIRO Textile and Fibre Technology (CTFT) have achieved a major technological breakthrough that should soon lead to the production of futuristic strong, light and flexible 'smart' clothing materials. "
In partnership with NanoTech Institute at the University of Texas at Dallas, CTFT has adapted textile technologies used to spin wool and other fibres to produce yarns made solely from carbon nanotubes (CNTs).

Initial research into the potential uses of the new material is focussed on the production of vests and 'soft' body armour to provide protection from bullets and other small ballistic missiles. This application exploits the excellent mechanical properties of the CNTs.

SurgiChip, A New Surgical Marker

2004-11-19T17:29:00.000-06:00

America's Surgeons, "Help" Is On The Way!
In an effort to offer additional protection for patients who are undergoing surgery, The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it has approved "the marketing of an external surgical marker tag intended to minimize the likelihood of wrong-site, wrong-procedure and wrong-patient surgeries. The device is the first such surgical marker to utilize radio frequency identification (RFID) technology to mark an anatomical site for surgery".
The product is the SurgiChip Tag Surgical Marker system, manufactured by SurgiChip Inc., of Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. It consists of the tag, which is a "smart" label with an integrated passive transponder, along with a printer, an encoder and a RFID reader.
Here is how it all works:
The patient's name and surgical site are printed on the SurgiChip tag. The inside of the tag is encoded with the date of surgery, type of procedure and name of surgeon. The tag is scanned with a desktop RFID reader for confirmation by the patient and is then placed in the patient's hospital file.
On the day of surgery, the tag is removed from the file and scanned again, and the encoded information is verified by the patient. The tag, which has an adhesive backing, is then placed on the patient's body near the surgical site.
In the operating room, the tag is again scanned and the encoded information is verified with the patient's chart. The tag is removed just before surgery and returned to the patient's hospital file.
FDA cleared the device for marketing based on a review of safety, effectiveness and software validation information submitted by the manufacturer.

Scholar.google.com

2004-11-18T10:47:00.000-06:00

Google Scholar Beta is here...
Google Scholar, is a result of the company's collaboration with a number of scientific and academic publishers and is intended as a first stop for researchers looking for scholarly literature like peer-reviewed papers, books, abstracts and technical reports. The New York Times reported that it was scheduled to go online on Wednesday evening. So checked it out first thing this morning...It is another useful tool from the Company, which has a promise to make life easier for all the researchers...

Changemakers Innovation Award

2004-11-17T16:41:00.000-06:00

Contest has started already, have you submit your strategy yet...Changemakers and Ashoka's Citizen Base Initiative (CBI) announced the beginning of Changemakers Innovation Award on November 15. "The prizes will given to the five best ideas for creatively generating resources from a diversified citizen base, comprising individual citizens and citizen organizations, businesses, and the media." Winners and will be announced on January 21, 2005.

Tis The Season - On Line Sales in Europe

2004-11-16T14:16:00.000-06:00

According to the just released Forrester Research forecast, this year Europe will pass US in On Line Sales during the coming holiday season. Figure is expected to reach 13 billion (Euro), about 3 billion more than the forecasted US sales. Last year Europe caught up with US and the main concern at the time was the reliability of the Order Fulfillment. Looks like European e-business managed to improve on that, just fine...

Feeling Like A New Man

2004-11-16T11:17:00.000-06:00

Spam ! Is it getting better ? Or it just keeps finding new ways and means each and every day to show the world that its here to stay no matter what. Blogs present another area to exploit for the spammers. While trying to fight with it effectively, on personal level, some bloggers start making the capability of their blogging software to ease their pain in this fight, a priority. Honestly, for many, this is worth the extra effort needed to move their years of work to a new tool, especially from the very popular MovableType. Dylan Tweney seems to be one of them. He recently joined the ranks of the ones moving away from MT and his new choice is WordPress. His advice to all of us who needs to "feel like a new man" : " switch to WordPress"

FDA and RFID

2004-11-15T16:25:00.000-06:00

Today's FDA announcement about its new initiative to protect the US drug supply, demonstrates just another venue for RFID technology. Although, it looks like we are a year or two away from seeing the first applications actually making their way into the market, Compliance Policy Guide, aims to help impliment RFID feasibility studies and pilot programs related to US drug supply chain.

The Offshore Gate

2004-08-10T15:36:00.000-05:00

"Within the next few years, about three million jobs in the services sector will be outsourced abroad from the United States, according to estimates of Forrester Research. Up-and-coming offshore service providers in India, China, and Belarus continue to offer more and more comprehensive IT services at competitive prices. And companies in the United States are handling their internal business processes, such as posting or complaint processing, overseas more and more frequently"

John McCarthy leads Forrester’s research efforts as a vice president in the use of offshore providers and business process outsourcing.In his 09.08.2004 article published in SAP INFO ,he goes on to say that "China, Vietnam, and North Africa appear as possible target regions for offshoring in the future"and concludes :

"Offshoring will revolutionize the service sector, which has been the number one creator of jobs and the engine of growth in the United States for some 30 years"

Computerworld | RFID falls prey to patent trouble

2004-07-13T09:08:00.000-05:00

Computerworld RFID falls prey to patent trouble

Patent issues latest for the RFID. Intermec has sued Matrics, basing its claim on four patents....

E-mail Wars, new frontier !

2004-07-11T17:26:00.000-05:00

Oddpost and Yahoo!

Oddpost announces its aquzition by Yahoo, on july 9th,20004

SAP INFO

2004-07-10T10:33:00.000-05:00

SAP INFO

On the role of new media. Check out the

Spam (2)

2004-07-06T01:22:00.000-05:00

US, UK and Australia Join to fight Spam.

http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;710630776;relcomp;1

Mobile Parenting

2004-07-05T04:02:00.000-05:00

Evan Williams (evhead) calls it "Wacky".
Strange it may sound, but the basic reason behind this growing trend is quite obvious, "safety". "Parents who bought phones for their children or handed down their own felt children were safer if they could stay in touch". Makes sense... and yes you can only "remind your kid of the nap time " remotely, if they have a phone; Mobile Parenting 101....

On the other hand, Australian Youth is leading the way,in 13- 15 year old age group. Again, according to Mobile Youth, 45% of Australian teens between the ages of 13-15 are regular mobile phone users.

Spam "Capital" (1)

2004-07-02T18:41:00.000-05:00

Spam !, everyone has been talking about it, we all (almost) complain about it. Even better, everyone involved seem to be "battling" against it. We should be pretty in good shape by now, one would think... Well, not so fast, says the recently published report...
Thanks to the "Spam Trends For The First Half of 2004" (by Commtouch)we know now the "King", (Quin) of Spam. For most of us this might seem like a pretty obvious result( Viagra is the King). How about the Spam "Capital" ?...
Yes, we are talking about US here, keeping her lead in this area too... US earns the title by being the "proud" origin of 55.69% of global spam..
Are we fighting the wrong fight ? Why, US is the number 1 origin of global spam?

Let The E-Mail Wars Begin !

2004-06-25T15:30:00.000-05:00

First it was Yahoo!.
Now it is Microsoft...
MSN and Hotmail customers begin receiving e-mail notices about the coming "service upgrade".
Microsoft is boosting its free web-based e-mail service capacity and adding anti-virus protection to all Hotmail customers worldwide.
As a reaction to Gmail, first Yahoo! increased its e-mail service capacity to 100MB/account, now its Microsoft's turn... It decided to offer 250MB to free Hotmail accounts and, listen to this, 2GB to MSN Hotmail Plus accounts. Both with anti-virus protection...
Who wants to talk about "competition" !

"Got Gmail ! ", Great Idea...

2004-06-25T12:40:00.000-05:00

Have you request an "Gmail Invite" yet ? What a great initiative. I am talking about the blog started by Mel... (www.gmail4u.blogspot.com). Thousands lined up for an early account invitation, already...All, started on June 14 th. And I posted my comment requesting an invite on the very next day, June 15th at 4.21 pm. So, it has been ten days. Well, if you are wondering whether I got the "Gmail" or not; Not Yet ... But I made to the "Canditates" list two days ago. This is progress, people...I am trying to predict as to when my "invite" will actually arrive, and its fun(kind of...) For those of you who are in line and/or considering getting in line and want to have some idea as to how long the wait time is, I was about the 200 th candidate. Therefore, it is safe to say, in about 11 days, less than 200 invites have been distributed. This gives about 15 people a chance, each day, to get an invite to a "Gmail account" ! How about that.... There is no clear telling though, in what order or based on what criteria the invites are distributed... That's ok... I just hope that a fair and balanced soul, will decide to extend one to me, sooner than later...And keeping my fingers crossed...