Japan project aims to create 3D TV by 2020 | CNET … 08/21/2005
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Japan project aims to create 3D TV by 2020 | CNET News.com: “Japan plans to make this futuristic television a commercial reality by 2020 as part of a broad national project that will bring together researchers from the government, technology companies and academia.
The targeted ‘virtual reality’ television would allow people to view high-definition images in 3D from any angle, in addition to being able to touch and smell the objects being projected upwards from a screen parallel to the floor”
Video gaming | Chasing the dream | Economist.com: … 08/04/2005
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Video gaming | Chasing the dream | Economist.com: “The move away from linear narratives to more complex games that allow players to make moral choices, argues Mr Prensky, means that games provide an opportunity to discuss moral questions. �These are wonderful examples for us to be discussing with our kids,� he says. Indeed, perhaps the best way to address concerns over the effects of video games is to emphasise their vast potential to educate.
Even games with no educational intent require players to learn a great deal. Games are complex, adaptive and force players to make a huge number of decisions. Gamers must construct hypotheses about the in-game world, learn its rules through trial and error, solve problems and puzzles, develop strategies and get help from other players via the internet when they get stuck. The problem-solving mechanic that underlies most games is like the 90% of an iceberg below the waterline�invisible to non-gamers. But look beneath the violent veneer of �Grand Theft Auto�, and it is really no different from a swords-and-sorcery game. Instead of stealing a crystal and delivering it to a wizard so that he can cure the princess, say, you may have to intercept a consignment of drugs and deliver it to a gang boss so he can ransom a hostage. It is the pleasure of this problem-solving, not the superficial violence which sometimes accompanies it, that can make gaming such a satisfying experience.”
Microsoft Forms New Connected Systems Division 08/03/2005
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Microsoft Forms New Connected Systems Division: “Microsoft Corp. quietly has formed a new Server and Tools subunit, known as the Connected Systems Division, designed to bring together a variety of Microsoft Web services, identity management and other middleware products under common management.
Microsoft officials briefed industry analysts on the creation of CSD late last week.”
Has the notebook-to-handheld conversion begun? 08/03/2005
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Has the notebook-to-handheld conversion begun? | CNET News.com: “‘I don’t carry a laptop anymore because my phone is sophisticated enough,’ said David Kelley, one of the founders of the design firm Ideo and a professor at the Stanford University Institute of Design.
Then there’s the cost side of the equation. Corporate laptops generally run about $1,000 to $1,500, that’s higher than a desktop ($700) or a handheld ($300 to $500), particularly if the carrier subsidizes the handheld. Support and management costs can be less for laptops, but ‘the notebooks get beat up a lot,’ said Roger Kay, president of Endpoint Technologies Associates, who says Wall Street traders have already begun to convert. ‘As a usage model, it makes a lot of sense. For certain kinds of users–power users–they want the best PC experience, which is a desktop. And they want mobility.’ “
Forbes.com | The Era Of The Mixmaster 08/03/2005
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The Era Of The Mixmaster | Forbes.com: “The hot air surrounding blogs and podcasts could melt steel. I’ve made a living from my own Web site since 1998. I worked on a Ziff Davis Internet radio operation two years before that. Today’s “new media” just isn’t that new.
That said, if you look carefully, the contours of 21st-century content creation are taking shape. Specifically, I see four distinct groups that will create content no matter what transpires on the business end of media:
– Editorial pros. Writers, broadcasters, actors and those who employ them.
– Commercial pros. Product placement will evolve into full-blown production of scripted programming by what we know today as advertisers.
– Independents. Today’s amateurs can expect lots of company.
– Mixmasters. Blended content from multiple sources will excite consumers and intellectual-property attorneys, alike.”
The Long Tail: The new architecture of production:… 08/02/2005
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The Long Tail: The new architecture of production: “In the comments, Ryan Shaw points to the interesting MSMDX (Media Streams Metadata Exchange) project at UC Berkeley, whose goal is ‘to create a platform for collaboratively annotating, retrieving, sharing and remixing multimedia content.’. It’s just getting underway, but it has already produced one of the more cogent graphics illustrating the new architecture of participation in a remix culture. “
