Energy of the Solar System

Now that we are starting to see more darkness in the Northern skies it is time to look up in the evening toward the Aurora Borealis (the Northern Lights, although if you were able to travel to the far Southern pole you might find a mirror of what we see in the North.

A very cool 24 hour shot of the Aurora can be found on uTube and a good explanation of what the Aurora is - here is a short piece along with audio of the Northern Lights.

Doctors going Solo

Accolades to my brother Donny - who launched in his basement a private practice - with high tech tools and some smart buying he has taken the practice of being a Doctor back to the personal touch we all need and want.

Great job

Meaning of Life

This week Randy Pausch a 46 year old Carnegie Mellon CS professor gave his "Last Lecture" a powerful message about what is truly importaint in life. Randy was diagonsed with terminal cancer and was given only a few months to live.
His lecture can be found at the ABC new site --> Lecture of a Lifetime

This isn't about Self-Pity - Randy a father of three speaks to his family and friends about what is truly important.

Take a moment to listen it may impact your own prospective.

They really have it all Wrong

Verizon appeals the “Google Amendment”

by Mark Hewitt
September 17th, 2007

Verizon claiming the restriction of how to use the new 700 Mhz spectrum is a violation of “Free Speech”.

Well in my opinion – they’ve got it all wrong – the Spectrum belongs to the American Public – the FCC has been entrusted to regulate and manage its use – however Verizon nor any licensee owns the spectrum –

Spectrum like easements for Tower, Fiber, and other Utilities are part of our Infrastructure and should be managed and regulated as such. Requiring a licensee to abide by such rules is fair and prudent use of our resources.

One should also take note of the ruling against Microsoft this past week as they loose their appeal in the EU anti-trust case. Key to this ruling is how Microsoft used the Operating System sales to give preference to either Microsoft applications or those of favored partners, and while it could easily be said that the O/S wars are nearly over still this is a good example of the miss-use of power and marketing.

And you wonder why Google maintains the company motto of “Do no Evil”.

(Un)predictability and the Noah Effect

By Mark Hewitt
August 11th, 2007

The only predictable constant in the Universe is Change, hard to argue this one. The real question is what does it mean and how do we achieve stability and security amid all of this ciaos.

I believe the answer is simple – we don’t. Think about this one – Noah was presented with a vision of a great flood and had three choices.

• First - was to ignore the vision. (Since the universe works a lot like a scatter gun I believe Noah was not the only one of his time to have a vision of a great flood – he simply was the one with the resources and faith to do something about it.)
• Second - spread the word. (It is likely others had the same vision, however trying to spread the world that a great flood is coming would get you branded as a conspiracy theorist)
• Third – build an ARC. (Assuming that you can’t change the world this would be the best way to preserve the future)

We all know the story of Noah and while I believe in the story I also believe Noah represents not one man and that there was not just one ARC which is why today we have so much diversity in the human genome.

Like most of you I read many of the doom and gloom stories of just how bad things are, yet amidst all of this I see a constant glimmer of the future. This past week forecasts of our declining energy reserves and our dependence on oil to maintain our way of life has the press and political leaders in a frenzy. Yet hidden in the back pages of the news are weekly announcements of new discoveries leading to new sources of energy, materials, and medicine.

Life is quite unlike the Hollywood stories we have become familiar with today, the clarity of good and evil, right and wrong are in real life never quite black and white.

Across our culture and the world we are witnessing a modern day “Noah Effect” as we see the migration from our cities and urban environments to a new “Rural” style of living. We see many versions of Noah as both community leaders and developers have begun the task of creating a new and sustainable life style, full of hope and stability.

So I tend to agree with idealists like "Laura Sperling" in here editorial "A vortex of constant change". So I seek others who look forward to the "Noah Effect" and envision a future through change.

The “Noah Effect” was first cloned by Benoid Mandelbrot and simply states that when something changes, it can change abruptly

Irrational exuberance

by Mark Hewitt

August 7th, 2007

My friends and family will often shrug as I sometimes get quite excited about things that don’t seem to have much impact on everyday life – this is one of those times

This week marks the discovery of one of the most impactful forces of nature to our future – Two teams of Physicists have discovered how to manipulate the Casimir Force causing atoms and subatomic particles to repel each other. This is the force described in the Zero Point energy a quantum mechanical phenomenon for energy generation.

This discovery has the potential of making computers even smaller and could someday produce a truly clean energy source and improve transportation systems.

The “Internet is Dead” long live the Internet

by Mark Hewitt - July 29th, 2007

Last Wednesday Mark Cuban declared the Internet “Dead” -

"The Internet’s dead. It’s over." His basic point: The Internet has gone stagnant. The only "new application" on the World Wide Web of recent vintage was, in his view, YouTube -- which, unlike Cuban’s Broadcast.com, ripped off the creative content of intellectual-property owners to build its video-based business.

From Cuban’s perspective I guess I would agree – here in North America – actually the United States specifically we have given over the keys to the kingdom to corporate types like Joseph Nacchio, former Qwest CEO – recently sentenced to six years in prison.

Unlike the U.S. market other countries push ahead with significant pushes toward national broadband strategies – and many smaller political divisions throughout the US market move ahead such as the Ohio rural broadband plan with all 88 counties due to participate.

So Long live the Internet!