Monthly Archives: June 2006

More molecular assembly …

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Ok … this is my day for finding interesting articles on molecular
manufacturing.  I really like this one … a MIT team using
genetically modified viruses to manufacture.

Battery electrodes self-assembled by viruses. Genetically modified viruses that assemble into electrodes could one day revolutionize battery manufacturing.

The MIT team genetically modified viruses to create the electrodes.
They introduced snippets of single-stranded DNA that caused the
virus… [KurzweilAI.net Accelerating Intelligence News]

Writing a 10nm point size

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I caught this today … IBM going further and further with their
molecular-scale lithography.  They are now able to write compounds
onto a substrate at sizes down to 10 nanometers.  We are getting
closer and closer to molecular manufacturing at a whole new scale.

IBM uses atomic microscope for direct writing.
IBM has unveiled a new method of direct writing (like an inkjet
printer) to substrates that harnesses an atomic force microscope (AFM)
to electronically control molecular-scale lithography.

For semiconductors, IBM’s new electronically controlled … [KurzweilAI.net Accelerating Intelligence News]

Utah Bloggers Conference … the first!

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I’m at the first Utah Bloggers conference, and it’s fun to see the size of the community here. Ryan Money from HireVue kicked off the meeting, and quickly went into the panel discussion.

The group of  panelists included Cydni Tetro, Phil Burns, Phil Windley, Tim Stay, and Pete Ashdown. 
The questions varied from what blogging software is being used, to
making money with your blog.  It was good to hear them all. 
I really liked one thing that Pete Ashdown said about the record of
your history on the Internet … he referred to that as the “… price
of integrity.”  Instead of going to edit your history – such as on
the Wikipedia – you simply live honestly with the choices that you have
made.

One of the people stood up and admitted that he doesn’t yet have a blog
… he wanted to know what to do to start.  Phil Windley suggested
his essay How to Start a Blog.  Nice … it’s the first result when you search Google for that sentence.

Ryan wrapped things up talking about how we really do have a good
blogging community.  Utah is continuing to grow rapidly, and the
growth from people moving to Utah is fueling the tech industry
here.  We are slowly gaining some real momentum.  There are
going to be some future events …

That was it for now … I’m going to get some other video … another YouTube video …

A kick in the blog …

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Man … too many new things since returning form the Philippines.
I’m going to get back into the habit of regular blogging … and I’m at
the Utah Blogger event tonight which is kicking me into gear.

I got home on the 1st of June, and thought long and hard about what I
have been doing with my life. I’ve been working at Agilix Labs and
having a lot of fun, however I realized that I wanted to do more … to
further pursue some Web 2.0 projects. In addition, Agilix is
realigning its direction to more focus on the student and mobilized
learning market … and for now not as much focus on the SDK and
developer community. I made the choice … time to move on!

I’m still going to be working closely with Agilix on some specific
projects, but I am now back out in the consulting world. I’ve
already landed two consulting deals, both which are working on some
cool new technologies and human-oriented services. I’ll be
blogging more about them as I get rolling and into the groove of the
new routines. What is really fun already is working deep in the
Web again … I’m developing in both ‘realms” … AMP and .NET.

The AMP development involves a lot of Javascript and AJAX, and has been
a great learning experience. It also involves a lot of digital
video, and so I get to play back in one of my favorite hobbies …
video editing. I’m not a pro at it … I just like to play
around. I posted my first video to YouTube and am going to be
posting a number of others.

The .NET development is for a social networking site … but
more. It’s actually looking to create a new type of media …
combined media … interactive media. I guess it’s kind of like
true ‘multimedia’ … a new way to deliver a media experience ‘wrapped’
into a single download. What is really cool also is that the site
is already leveraging some of the most advanced Atlas technologies
ffrom Microsoft … so taking the site to new levels of interactivity
and customization.

On top of this … I’m working on my new Software Development
Outsourcing company. The web site is coming quickly, and after I
have now been using a half dozen developers from overseas, I am ready
to share the power of these people with anyone interested.

Anyhow … I’m going to listen and blog about the Utah Blogger conference …

Still Skypeless …

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Amazing … I have been sending support requests every single
day.  And I get no response, except for the occasional reply to
some of the messages saying “We normally will respond within 72
hours.”  Uh guys … if you are hearing this … it’s now been
almost two weeks!  Uh … they still have my $10.00 …

I wrote them the following message:

Please … oh Skype gods …
let my account go! Please unblock me …

My prayer to the Skype gods … please have mercy on my account … PLEASE
unblock my account. Why haste thou forsaken me????

Our Skype who art in
Luxemburg,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy phone call come, thy will be done,
on
the Internet as it is on POTS lines.
Give us this day our daily
SkypeOut,
and forgive us our use of mobiles,
as we forgive our non-Skype
friends.
And deliver us from expensive calls,
for thine is the
$.02/minute, the p2p calling,
and the VoIP solution
forever.
SkypeMe.

Oh please Skype gods … please unblock my account
…

Will it work?  Hmmmm … we’ll see …

Skype … where the whole world CAN NOT talk for free. Not even for PAY!

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Ok … I had to take a moment to vent about Skype.  What a great
product … what lousy execution.  Their support?  It sucks
beyond almost any vendor I have ever dealt with.

On my recent Philippines trip, I started to use SkypeOut … or tried
to.  First, I was unable to get them to accept any of my credit
cards … business or personal.  Now these are the same credit
cards that I use for all other on-line purchases … but not with
Skype.  Nope.  They wouldn’t take them.  So no SkypeOut
credit.

Well, then I noticed that they accept PayPal … hmmm … wonder if
that will work.  Yeah!  It worked!  A week ago I was
able to pay Skype $10 for SkypeOut credit.  They even gave me an
extra $1.60 of credit for paying!  I called lots of people … for
one day.  Then … back to ground zero.

Six days ago … the morning after my success paying via PayPal … and
after using Skype to make calls for over an hour … I wen to dail a
number only to see a red bar appear that said:

Skype Account Blocked – Your Skype account has been blocked!  Click here for details

Yeah … right.  Try clicking … it takes you to their home
page.  Uh guys … how about if I log into my account?  I
simply get another message:

You are currently restricted from purchasing services or redeeming vouchers.
Please contact
Customer Support to review your account status.

Ok … great.  No details … I click the link … get taken to a
crappy tech support form.  Fine … I filled it in, posted it, and
was sent to a page with a bunch of unrelated “knowledgebase” articles
… with another button to *really* post my support request.

So six days ago … I sent my support request.  And I have done so
for each and every day since.  No response.  Oh … well this
monring I finally got back a message saying that they have received my
first support request … sent seven days ago!

So Skype has my money … and has blocked my account.  As for the
“free in the US” they claim to be offering?  I can’t call those
numbers either now … my account is blocked.  I can call PC to PC
… I think … but no SkypeOut at all … nada.

So they lie … the whole world CAN NOT talk for free.  And in my
case, I have even paid my $10 and I can not talk … at least not via
Skype.  What a bummer … some people are screwing up a perfectly
good idea.

The Trip to Baguio

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After spending one day and night in Manila, we headed up to Baguio City
… north of Manila in the Mountains.  We left early and flew
Asian Spirit … in a YS-11
… an old turboprop airliner.  After taking off, we quickly
climbed to ~10,000 feet.  The grey color of Manila slowly began to
be sprinkled with green, and the quantity of green again continued to
grow as we flew north away from Metro manila.

As we continued our flight, the spots of green continued to grow until
we were over a large flat valley with some large winding rivers. 
Various roads – paved and otherwise – cut convoluted paths between
farms, towns, and open ground.  All of these roads seemed to wind
in strange directions with no rhyme or reason.  Below, one large
river wound below us, leaving groups of buildings, and maybe whole
towns, stranded on empty oxbows.  And then the foothills appeared.

It was impressive to see the mountains rise from the valley as a series
of large sharp ridges.  The river winding below us came from a
valley in between some of these ridges, and a large reservior with a
dam had been built to hold back its waters.  The mountains
continued to rise.  And rise!  All of the sudden the
stewardess announced that we were approaching Baguio … and the
mountains continued to climb up towards our altitude.  Below us
there were now a few roads winding up the jagged mountain sides … all
looking like dirt roads.  And then the first towns appeared up in
the mountains.  As we passed over one of the larger ones … now
looking only a few thousand feet below us … I caught site of a runway
cut into the mountains … one end spilling out over a shear mountain
face.  Baguio Airport?

As we now passed that runway the plane began to turn … yep … that’s
Baguio!  I actually shot some pretty good footage of the landing
… amazing mountain with a mix of small homes and big mansions. 
The vacation homes of the upper-class, mixed with the homes of the
average people.  We continued to bank hard left … circling
around to the other end of the runway that I saw … to land in the
direction of the shear mountain face.  As we got lower and lower
there were all sorts of streams and rivers flowing down the mountain,
with waterfalls all over the place.  We continued to decend, and
finally touched down.  We’re in Baguio!

As we exited the aircraft, it was immediately cooler than Manila … by
far!  Nice.  We wandered the parking lot … found a cab …
and headed to Session Road … one of the main roads in Baguio. 
I’ll write more later.