Daily Texan

When it fires, the laser will produce 1,000 times more power than the entire output of the world’s electrical grid, according to Dr. Todd Ditmire, the head of the project and professor of physics at the University. Ditmire and his colleagues will be able to test fusion power, the properties of matter at extreme temperatures and even the formation of new stars.

The laser operates on simple scientific principles. Scientists define power as energy divided by time. By reducing the amount of time the laser fires to a mere 100 femtosecond (or 10 to the -15th power of a second), Ditmire said his team can get the most power out of the laser.

Last year, I posted about using Slimserver to stream your music collection from home to work (or anywhere). Slim Devices developed the Slimserver application mainly to interact with their Squeezebox devices, but were kind enough to allow anyone to use the app to try it out without owning any products. Back then, I wasn’t too interested in owning one of their devices beyond a possible convenience factor.

But recently, Slim Devices has incorporated Pandora service into the Squeezebox. This makes it much more attractive. Pandora is a web-based music service that utilizes the Music Genome Project. Basically, you tell Pandora what kind of music you like, and based on thousands of other people’s ratings and connections, Pandora will choose and play music that you will also (probably) enjoy. Last.fm operates on the same kind of principle, with added tag support. I have used Pandora in the past and it works very well. I use Last.fm more often because I appreciate the interface and tagging more, but both are functionally very similar.

With this merging of the two technologies, the Squeezebox moves beyond a convenience choice and becomes alot more droolworthy.

Google has been tripping the light fantastic with acquisitions and features on their Web 2.0 kick. After being fairly modest in features and additions to their repertoire the first few years, the last couple years they have produced and bought out a plethora of new web-based apps. It took off with Gmail and Google maps, and hasn’t slowed down since.

One that was bought out earlier this year is a web-based word processor named Writely. After hearing about it, I wanted to try it out. But, unfortunately, soon after Google snatched it up, they stopped accepting new signups without an invitation (ala Gmail). Luckily, after a bit of searching, I was able to get an invite and try out the new app.

It is very simple, but elegant. So far it runs smooth as silk. I can see why Google wanted it, as the interface already reminds me of Gmail’s. It seems to do a great job of simple word processing. It also allows you to write and edit in HTML, which can make it a very nice tool for bloggers/web site updates. In fact, it has a tab with options such as “View as a blog” and “Publish to your blog”. Documents can also save to PDF and other popular word processing formats.

It has a collaboration feature that allows multiple people on Writely to edit or change a document. One can add or remove collaborators at will, and you can see their additions and revisions at any time.

Writely is still in beta with no real release date posted anywhere. There is also no word on when they will allow public sign-ups again (if ever, even Gmail still technically needs invites). I have several invites to dispense, and I doubt I will need them all, so if anyone is interested in one, leave a comment below (with a valid email), or reply to this post on the forum.

Some University of Michigan students built a robot that physically solves a Rubik’s Cube as a class project. In the video below it solves a particular cube pattern in 54 seconds.

I had no idea Artichokes bloomed into such a great looking flower. I have been on a gardening kick since spring, as we were finally settled in and the backyard was a jungle. I came across a blog with these photos that make me want to plant an artichoke plant immediately. I love to cook and eat these things, but had no idea of their explosion when allowed to bloom.

That reminds me, I have pictures burning in my digicam of our homegrown zucchini feast.

JJ Abrams, who is slated to be the director of the next Star Trek movie in the franchise, is reportedly eyeing Matt Damon as. the. ve-ry. essence. of Kirk.

He’s so interested that he’s apparently already sought support from the original Kirk, WILLIAM SHATNER. “Shatner gave his blessing,” my source says. “J.J. got his approval.” Damon first popped up in Trekkie circles as soon as the Abrams-’Star Trek’ deal was announced. Rumor had it that the new movie would center on Kirk and Spock’s early days at a space academy. “J.J. wants Damon as Capt. Kirk,” my source reports. “He really loves the idea.”

Fascinating.

At IREX 2005, an electronics show in Japan, they demonstrated this robot Pacman game. A physical Pacman board with a robot Pacman controlled by remote control. The ghosts are just decoration on this model, but all of them light up, and the Pacman really picks up the “pills”. How cool would it be if the ghosts really chased him and turned blue when he picked up the power pills?

The project is actually Namco and Bandai sponsored, so I’m not sure if it’s a game that will be released, or just a fun demo to promote some other product.

Here’s a video of it in action.

Links and video from Akihabara News.

Apparently, if you get stuck in a subway door in Korea, you are screwed.

This mother barely got her baby out of the stroller, and was dragged afterwards by a subway that took off while the door was jammed on her baby stroller.

Yeah, so, I stole that title from a digg.com comment… so sue me. I’m linking it at least!

IBM and Georgia Tech have coaxed a chip to run at 500GHz, a record for a silicon-based device, by dropping the temperature to minus 451 degrees Fahrenheit.

Apparently they weren’t astounded by the fact that it runs at 350GHz at room temperature? I guess because it is a very small chip consisting of just a few transistors. Gating and combinations will slow that puppy down quick. I’d like to see what a moderate processor, like a cell phone chip, can do before I start getting hopeful about PC chips being so zippy.

But, on the other hand, I would be damn happy with a 2x or 3x increase in cap speed because of this technology. I’m not holding my breath for the 100x increase. And who knows what these things will cost.

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Electronic Arts Acquires Mythic Entertainment

EA is set to acquire Mythic Entertainment and turn it into a subsection cranking out only MMORPGs.

This is near to my experience as an ex-Origin employee, which was the first MMORPG company to be bought by EA. I was there right after the acquisition. Overall the experience left a lot of people laid off, a lot of false promises, canceled projects just prior to completion (UO2), and general stagnancy of creativity.

Ah well, DAoC was fun while it lasted. It definitely had the most interesting PVP in any MMORPG to date. Their ill-fated pseudo-Rome game sounded interesting but never really picked up steam before it got shelved for the Warhammer project.

Now Mythic will be relegated to over-hyping games that are never really completed, rushed to ship, and not supported much after release. Not pretty.

Well, not exactly.

But this is a hypnotizing video montage of how they used Brando’s earlier role in the movies and updated it, complete with a speaking part.

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They declare they have “contained” music piracy.

Huzzah for them! They sure have a proper bead on all the happenings on the cybertown intarweb.

Because usenet, irc, and ftps just dried up and went away, AMIRITE? of their own accord, even!!

-ped

The race is on to keep humans one step ahead of robots: an international team of scientists and academics is to publish a code of ethics for machines as they become more and more sophisticated. “Dilemmas may arrive sooner than we think”, says Henrik Christensen. “People are going to be having sex with robots within five years.”

read more | digg story

Telltale Games is on-track to release a new Sam and Max game this fall. After much todo over at LucasArts involving the Sam and Max license and the dropping of the game Sam & Max Freelance Police.

There’s a trailer up on the main site that has the same personality and feel as the original game. It should; with the original designers behind the new title.

Here’s to reviving some old favorite characters that seemed lost in the abyss of forgotten licenses. While it won’t be as stupendous an event as when(if) Duke Nukem Forever is released, it will still be a great nostalgia trip.