Vision = Seeing what others cannot

What began as my Twitter rant against other Twitterers turned into a Small Times blog post. It is about the ability to see not what is in front of you, but possibilities. It's about MEMS-enabling technology, but it could also apply to nanotech. Here's an excerpt.

MEMS-enabled PUMA: Look at the possibilities

I feel like it is 1909, rather than 2009, as I hear a derisive chorus of "get a horse" from much of the media mocking the MEMS-enabled PUMA prototype electric vehicle from General Motors and Segway.

An automotive correspondent from Newsweek wrote on Twitter that he "thinks the GM Segway vehicle is a farce." And even the editor of Wired.com, who should know how to spot possibilities better than other journalists, Tweeted: "NOte to GM: car with no door = FAIL."

It is likely the PUMA uses the same MEMS gyro/accelerometer cluster as the Segway, which last I heard was supplied by the UK MEMS company Silicon Sensing Systems.

The mockery doesn't say much for the vision of many in my profession ... again. It seems like members of the news media -- the survivors who are left employed, anyway -- would have learned from the recent past to recognize the early stages of something that could potentially change everything. But, even now as newspapers close and bleed jobs, many continue to lovingly clutch onto their dinosaurs, failing to look up to see the meteor looming in the sky. More here

Backgrounder
Getting down to nanobusiness
I sing the auto body electric
The business of imagination

Do-or-die at Delphi

I profile Delphi Medical Systems in a Detroit-area tech magazine called X-Ology. The company is a subsidiary of the bankrupt auto supplier Delphi. Like most businesses ... and workers ... around my neck of the woods, it's change or die. This is how Delphi is attempting to survive. Nanotech watchers will recognize one of my sources, nano and MEMS guru Marlene Bourne.

Delphi Medical Systems: A New, Inspired Course

The ancient Greeks, it is written, would gather around the Oracle of Delphi not to see into the future but rather to soak in the intellectual atmosphere that pervaded the crowds. In the modern age, the name Delphi Corp., for some, conjures up images of a suffering automotive supplier, but take a closer look and you can see the innovators of the 21st century gathering around it, picking up the broken links and discovering new directions. More here (free registration required).

Update: Here's a PDF of the Delphi Medical article

Google kills 'NanoRobot Infection'

I just received this e-mail:

from Google Video Support
to: howardlovy@gmail.com
date: Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 9:20 AM
subject: Google Video Content Identification

Dear member,

This is to notify you that your video "Government Created Killer NanoRobot Infection" from your Google Video account has been disabled because it has been identified by our Content Identification tools as potentially lacking the necessary copyright authorization for use on the Google Video site. Content Identification is a program that analyzes similarities in audio or video between user videos and a library of reference content provided to us by copyright owners. When a video matches a reference file, that video is automatically disabled.

Darnit, and it was a great clip from "The Office." Oh well. In the end, Google will getcha. I just hope they don't kill my clip of Jim Carrey and Conan O'Brien talking quantum physics