Beck's Cafe... » Web/Tech

How the humble technology of text messaging improves drug safety in developing countries

Rebecca — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 10:55:26 +0000

You don’t normally think of it this way, but your little, non-smart, mobile phone is really a little computer that when used in ways you hadn’t considered, can be a boon to people’s lives. Such a thing is true of text messaging, technically known as SMS or “short message service“. Today, it can be used to send short messages to someone about, say, that you’ve landed at the airport or please pick up a loaf of bread at the store. Easy stuff but what if you could use that technology to prove a drug was authentic and that a patient could safely use it?

That’s what Sproxil has done. Taken little ole SMS and created a way to use it such that it helps the users and the companies. The users, in some cases, get a safer product. The producers are able to cut down on piracy of their products. In the case of medications, Sproxil did this, according to a February 2010 report in Pyramid Points:

Take Africa, where counterfeit goods are rampant, with nearly 100 Nigerians recently killed by a tainted batch of fake pharmaceuticals. In response, a startup called Sproxil created Mobile Product Authentication (MPA): Manufacturers put a unique code, hidden under a scratch-off panel, on their products. The potential buyer then sends the code via SMS to the authentication service, which sends an instant reply about whether the product is authentic or counterfeit. Sproxil sells the scratch panels and SMS bundles to manufacturers. Consumers pay nothing to use the service because the manufacturer pays for both the query and response messages.

Pretty neat way to use a simple technology for good!

AfriGadget shows that innovation can’t be stifled

Rebecca — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 00:44:07 +0000

If there is anything recent history has taught us here at Beck’s Cafe it’s that you can only keep people’s spirits and imaginations bound down for so long. In the end, they have to come out. And so the latest example is technology out of Africa.

Now we know what you are thinking, “Technology and Africa” do not seem self evident on the surface. Africa and Natural Resources or Africa and Food (when there is no hellacious drought) or Africa and Nigerian Internet Scams. But Africa and Technology? Yep. They do.

And they do because ther are smart people everywhere on our planet and there are problems everywhere and many times smart people will solve their own problems. Case in point for AfriGadget, a web site devoted to this topic:

The photo at the beginning of this post is of a student who invented an automated fishing machine
Another inventive group has come up with a way to charge mobile phones using bikes and scrap
And yet another invention harvests water from volcanic steam vents

All in all, some pretty amazing technologies using local talent and resources to solve real local problems. Smart people and smart solutions.

Wii for Web

Rebecca — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 22:33:09 +0000

At the Cafe we own a Wii. The thing really is fun, in fact, it’s so fun we’re considering keeping the patrons usage TIMED so that everyone gets a chance to use it. The free Wii Sports pack, particularly the Bowling, is the big hit here, as is YouTube on the Wii. Yes, the Wii streams video and audio.

So it was a natural to see how the Wii does with browsing the Internet. Frankly, it works just great. Nintendo has released it’s final version of it’s Internet for Wii and we like it. You can sit back with a latte, browse the net, and watch it on your TV. A few years ago this was possible of course, but, not nearly as useful, primarily due to lack of content. But now with more streaming video, audio and yes news and features, such as Beck’s Cafe, browsing and using the net from your couch isn’t such a weird idea.

We think the Wii will do a few things to change life as we know it on the planet – or at least the game console buying planet. First, the whole virtual reality part of gaming and entertainment is now very accessible to Jane Doe. It’ll take some fancy programming, good marketing, and some inexpensive hardware but, predicted here, a virtual reality setup for Wii shouldn’t be more than 12 months away. The Wii’s revolutionary motion sensing technology makes it possible. And, not too long ago, one of Beck’s Cafe’s writers helped develop micro-screens for eyeglasses (think a computer screen on the inside of your sunglasses). Put those together and you may be running from PacMan rather than just playing him on the screen!

Over at GigaOM, Wagner James Au has his own thoughts on what the Wii will do in his article, “Wii will remake the web?” here’s some of his thoughts to tease you to go read the whole article:

…according to a recent Merrill-Lynch study, by 2011, an astounding 30% of American households will own a Wii. If that estimate holds up (and given the Wiiâ€™s still-thundering sales figures, thereâ€™s no reason to doubt it), about one out of every three U.S. homes will soon have a new kind of Web browser sitting in their living room.

One in Three…think about those numbers Mr. and Mrs. Marketeer! Oh and how about this?

The obvious immediate objection, or course, is â€œwhoâ€™s going to browse the Web without a keyboard?â€ The most obvious immediate answer: the very young, who already send text messages over their cellphones

If it was as easy to use the Wii controller as it is a keyboard, why wouldn’t you just chose the easy option? From our experience at the Cafe, about 10% of the time, patrons chose to use the Wii over the computers we have installed for surfing and email. Interesting huh? We thought so.

Look out, there are changes coming in the way we reach the internet which has become highly necessary to much of the world to get information and to communicate. And it’s not all through the PC. Is it any wonder Intel, Microsoft and everyone else is vying for the living room now?

Microsoft now owns your body – pay up!

Rebecca — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 12:00:22 +0000

In one of the more bizarre things I’ve seen in technology, Microsoft has a patent on your body! See the story at TechDirt by clicking to them at the story HERE. Or read the patent at the U.S. Patent Office at this link HERE.

By the way, I’ve tried to negotiate contracts with Microsoft, I can assure you it is a one sided conversation. Get your checkbook ready!

(Foot Photo courtesy of HotShoe’s Photos, used under Creative Commons License, modified by the caffeine driven creative team at Beck’s Cafe)

Learn about Cold Fusion, Energy & Nanotech

Rebecca — Tue, 16 May 2006 15:31:02 +0000

Jonathan Chan, editor of ~~Atomic Engine~~, payed a little visit to Beck’s Cafe, lured by my article on oil investment (as seen here). I was quite honored by his visit. And then I decided to take a little read through The Atomic Engine site. All I can is, “Wow”. Here are two of his many articles I found most interesting:

“Atomic Workbench: ‘Micro-Pump’ Breakthrough at Purdue” May 2nd 2006 – A fascinating article around one possible solution to powering & cooling high performance CPU’s. As many of you may know, in general, as CPU performance increases, they tend to draw more power and get hotter. That’s not true for all (witness Freescale’s 8641D for example at this link here or Rapport’s Kilocore technology here). The big bugaboo is, “how do you power and cool the chips?” This is a classic struggle in development organizations between the EE and Power designers and the ME and Thermal team.

“The Dipstick: Driving Our Economy to Guzzle” April 20, 2006 – This was a terrific article exposing the downsides of using bio-fuel to become energy independent, or as part of the answer to that independence. Mr. Chan points out how Brazil’s success in becoming energy independent through biofuel has meant millions of acres of Brazilian old growth rainforest have been cut and burned. He also calls for a U.S. National Energy policy that relies more on renewable sources rather then non-renewable ones. It sounds like “old news” but it’s said in a fresh way and backed up with lots of good reading resources.

There’s alot more interesting reading there too. So grab your favorite java and have a look at ~~Atomic Engine~~

4/5/2007 Update: The Atomic Engine Alternative Energy Website appears to have been permanently taken down. You can learn more about alternative energy at The Alternative Energy Blog by visiting them at this link here.

Lucent & Alcatel

Rebecca — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 16:20:02 +0000

As everyone may have heard by now, Lucent Technologies and Alcatel are on the way to wedded corporate bliss. You can read about it at this link here. This is probably a good thing for them financially. Lucent’s profits were coming more from their pension plan investments than from their business, and that couldn’t have gone on much longer really. From a technology standpoint, it looks like it makes sense. Alcatel now has a wireless play when before they did not. Also, Lucent’s Professional Services organization gives Alcatel a boost up since Alcatel didn’t really have one before.

I think for me though, it’s a sad loss of the Bell Labs Research Institution. I’m all for companies being stronger and more able (though frankly the record of that happening in mega mergers like this is very low, please see stories about the lack of success of megamergers here @ C/net, and here @ HBR). But the United State’s private corporate labs (such as Bell Labs) and our public labs (such as Lawrence Livermore) are national treasures that helped keep our country a technology leader. For sure, Bell Labs won’t disappear and the defense piece will be kept in tact under U.S. influence. Still, this just feels like a sort of dismantling of some national treasures.

What were the causes of Lucent’s demise? Probably too many to list, but there’s a well done article on this by Chinese blogger Dr.Richard Zhao Liang (èµµç²®) that is well worth a read. You can see his article at this link here.

And people wonder why Google wants it’s own backbone?

Rebecca — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 00:50:07 +0000

Little snippets have been slipping out over the past 18 months that Google is buying it’s own telecommunications backbone. You can see these snippets here, here and here. While the telecommunciations backbone piece has been somewhat in the shadow of Web/Tech world, Google’s desire to push WiMAX to users has been very visible, and you can see plenty of info on that at the links here, here and here.

Why would Google do this? What do they have to gain? Because controlling the distribution network (the means of getting content to you or having you physically access the Internet) may end up being a cost game more than anything else. Surely, Google’s being able to use their almost unparalleled ability to target advertising to users will be improved by controlling the network. But, when companies like AT&T, who now own most of the on/off ramps to the network start setting up toll booths to get on or direct traffic (see article AT&T Sets up Internet Toll Booths here) then perhaps Google’s other reason is simply cost. Why pay or be beholden to a toll booth operator to run traffic on their monopoly when you can build your own road and control it and your costs yourself.

This may end up being one of the new AT&T’s biggest blunders. Certainly, they own the pipes and can do what they will with them, but, but charging rather than partnering (and with excess dark fiber still out there and enabling technologies coming online such as WiFi and WiMAX) AT&T may inadvertently be pushing greater competition against themselves, rather than drawing them to themselves. The end result? It gives users such as you and I more choice, and lower costs. It costs AT&T business, possibly subverting their network hold and causing long term losses in the long term. Is this the kind of thing we can expect from the resurgance of Ma Bell? If so, I think the Web/Tech world will be rife with innovative new approaches to getting on and off the net to skirt AT&T’s potential for too much control.

Cooking up ideas for innovation & invention

Rebecca — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 12:32:38 +0000

Need a fresh idea for an invention? Perhaps a cool user technology to get off the ground? A web site to peruse while procrastinating from that big project? Look no further than the Half-Bakery.

What is the Halfbakery?

The halfbakery is a communal database of invention and speculation. Its users can publish inventions and add links and commentary to other people’s inventions.

Robots in Tokyo – Robotic legs for soldiers

Rebecca — Sun, 04 Dec 2005 23:26:19 +0000

Tokyo robot-fest click –> here
Army Soldier Systems Center fits & trains soldiers with prosthetic legs click –> here
DARPA releases RFQ for Robotic Limbs –> here
MIT’s "Troody" helps the way toward better artificial limbs –> here

To see how the four above are connected, please read on kind reader

Seeing the above links got me thinking about
technology and how it can be used to help us, not harm us. The quote
from the movie "The Rock" came to mind too, when Dr. Stanley Goodspeed
(played by Nicholas Cage) is asked what he knows about VX gas he says
soberly "it’s one of those things we wish we could un-invent." But
does technology always result in something horrible for the human
race? That’s a rhetorical question of course, since we know it
doesn’t (anti-lock brakes, the MRI, and penicillin come to mind)

What’s really fascinating here is not some bizarre borg-like development of humans, but, the actual good use of technology to help
people who truly need it. In this case, soldiers, both men and women,
sent to war and, in the midst, facing the effects of having a limb
destroyed or blown off as a result. The trauma must be incredible,
both physically and psychologically. The co-developments in robotics
and prosthetics, looks as though it’s moving to a new phase where those
damaged could really be helped, in a big way.

Sun says it will help develop Opteron

Rebecca — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 18:44:29 +0000

Link (C/net): Sun says it will help develop Opteron

This is an interesting tidbit. Of course, AMD has had an agreement
with IBM for manufacturing and process development R&D since at
least 2003 as this link says here: Link C/net IBM to help AMD on future chips

But what does this mean for the enterprise user? The average
consumer? The telecommunications company considering AMD?

(1) For the enterprise user, it means that AMD’s CPU’s will become
better than they are already. AMD’s team is small in comparison to
Intel’s or even IBM’s PowerPC team. But, it’s smart and has excellent
technology. About the only drawback to the Opteron design is that
memory advances have to be incorporated with the spin of the CPU,
since the DDR memory controller is integrated into the chip. With Sun
giving input (and IBM already doing so) Opteron will improve in the
areas that enterprise customer’s really care about (security,
encryption, high availability, faster and cheaper deployment,
flexible system deployment). This will be a big help to AMD (and to
Sun, since Sun is now using Opteron even more so in it’s server
line).

(2) For the average consumer it means
that they will have a better platform – and a lower
cost point. How so? With Sun’s influence, the chip will get better
than it already is, and, with a better chip comes more adoption by
the major players (though Intel’s market dollars and influence may
still rule the day). With more adoption by the major compute
companies (HP, IBM, etc.) that puts pressure on Intel to make their
excellent products better – and cheaper. And, there will be 32-bit
systems and single core 64-bit systems unloaded onto the market -
making for great deals for Christmas (please see my note on 32-bit vs
64-bit computing here at this link: 32 or 64?

(3) For the telecommunications company
considering AMD instead of Intel, it means that the AMD CPU will
likely be a better choice for telecommunications than before. Many
telecommunications companies run Solaris on SPARC today. With
Solaris being optimized for Opteron
(see info here on Solaris Optimization for Opteron) (and
with Sun’s input and help as noted) this will be an even better
choice for telecommunications companies going forward (and more cost
effective too).

Freescale(tm) Wonder Chip

Rebecca — Sun, 24 Jul 2005 02:20:54 +0000

Freescale Semiconductor has something brewing in CPU’s that is making Intel, AMD, and many others sit up and take notice. If you develop compute systems for telecomm, computing or networking
you must have heard of the Freescale (the Motorola semiconductor unit
that got spun out) 8641D CPU. It is an incredibly innovative approach
to computing as it tries to drive overall system performance at the
chip level throughout the system – not just raw horsepower.

This balanced approach comes at an amazing power envelope (think low double digits)

See these links – this thing is very cool:
Freescale gets back in the game
Freescale 8641D datasheet

Blade Insanity

Rebecca — Sun, 24 Jul 2005 02:05:00 +0000

Sometimes there just can’t be unity…

I spend most of my time looking at technology and how it converges for computing and telecommunications applications. One long standing trend that is now very much in the public eye is: How can one compute architecture possibly be used for both communications AND computing?

While the two share a common need for computing power – the degree of that power, what supports it, what powers it and what cools it differ considerably. In a nutshell:

Computing Needs
- Ever increasing levels of High performance CPU’s
- Lots of memory (make that truck loads)
- Large amounts of 110v power delivered to run the systems
- Very large disk farms to support
- Cooling on the order of the Arctic

Telecomm Needs
- CPU power of the right amount (not too much, not too little)
- Must meet cooling requirements of NEBS (Network Equipment Building standard)
- Lots of weird I/O so that when you pick up your cell phone or home phone – you get dial tone
- Must meet power requirements as set by NEBS
- Must work with legacy stuff way back around the time of Edison

Blades *may* allow us to have one architecture for both. But the big word is may. There have been a number of compute blade appproaches. A history on that would be fun to write and I may post one here one day for fun, but briefly they include: Multi-bus, VME Bus, cPCI, MOMA (my own modular architecture), and now AdvancedTCA. These are all standards meaning that a body or organisation has received a specification from members who’ve peer reviewed it then gone ahead and voted on it. Then, they’ve gone ahead and started developing useful products around the standard so that target industries can use them, enjoy the benefits of their being a competitive ecosystem, and then drive innovation faster in the areas that the target industries specialize in.

This is great, and the way things should be (in technology, and maybe even in life). When alternatives show up to to the standard, that’s okay, they usually address the outlying pieces that are really nicheoriented, and that is a great business for cutting edge technologists (of either gender!) to go after. But proliferation of pseudo-standards to the fracturing of bona-fide standards only fractures markets and makes them less viable – and removes the customer’s confidence in new technology causing them to keep with the old. That means industries don’t grow – and jobs go overseas.
Innovation is great! And frankly we need that in this country more and more every day (especially social innovation & entrepreneurship, see the excellent book by Peter Drucker, “Managing in the Next Society” for more) – but innovation that destroys new standards geared to building and expanding markets may be more about enhancing profits for one rather than raising the tide for all.