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NASA has announced opportunities to test emerging technologies during flights on an airplane that simulates the weightless conditions of space. www.nasa.gov | 3/11/10 5:00 AM

Systems integrators check in from HIMSS about emerging technologies and new competition in the health-care space. www.crn.com | 3/8/10 8:43 PM

I recently watched James Cameron's Avatar in 3D. It was an enjoyable experience in some ways, but overall I left dismayed on a number of levels. It was enjoyable to watch the lush three-dimensional animation and motion capture controlled graphics. I'm not sure that 3D will take over -- as many now expect -- until we get rid of the glasses (and there are emerging technologies to do that, albeit, the 3D effect is not yet quite as good), but it was visually pleasing. 3D information visualization displays and interactive multitouch screens as featured in this scene from "Avatar" already exist and are in use today. (20th Century Fox) While I'm being positive, I was pleased to see Cameron's positive view of science in that the scientists are "good" guys (or at least one good gal) with noble intentions on learning the wisdom of the Na'vi natives and on negotiating a diplomatic solution. The Na'vi were not completely technology-free. They basically used the type of technology that Native Americans used hundreds of years ago - same clothing, domesticated animals, natural medicine, and bows and arrows. They were in fact exactly like Native Americans. How likely is that? Life on this distant moon in another star system has evolved creatures that look essentially the same as earthly creatures, with very minor differences (dogs, horses, birds, rhinoceros-like animals, and so on), not to mention humanoids that are virtually the same as humans here on Earth. That's quite a coincidence. Cameron's conception of technology a hundred years from now was incredibly unimaginative, even by Hollywood standards. For example, the munitions that were supposed to blow up the tree of life looked like they were used in World War II (maybe even World War I). Most of the technology looked primitive, even by today's standards. The wearable exoskeleton robotic devices were supposed to be futuristic, but these already exist, and are beginning to be deployed. The one advanced technology was the avatar technology itself. But in that sense, Avatar is like the world of the movie A.I., where they had human-level cyborgs, but nothing else had changed: A.I. featured 1980's cars and coffee makers. As for Avatar, are people still going to use computer screens in a hundred years? Are they going to drive vehicles? I thought the story and script was unimaginative, one-dimensional, and derivative. The basic theme was "evil corporation rapes noble natives." And while that is a valid theme, it was done without the least bit of subtlety, complexity, or human ambiguity. From the movie "Dances with Wolves" (MGM) The basic story was taken right from Dances with Wolves. And how many (thousands of) times have we seen a final battle scene that comes down to a battle between the hero and the anti-hero that goes through various incredible stages -- fighting on a flying airplane, in the trees, on the ground, etc? And (spoiler alert) how predictable was it that the heroine would pull herself free at the last second and save the day? None of the creatures were especially creative. The flying battles were like Harry Potter's Quidditch, and the flying birds were derivative of Potter creatures, including mastering flying on the back of big bird creatures. There was some concept of networked intelligence but it was not especially coherent. The philosophy was the basic Hollywood religion about the noble cycle of life. The movie was fundamentally anti-technology. Yes, it is true, as I pointed out above, that the natives use tools, but these are not the tools we associate with modern technology. And it is true that the Sigourney Weaver character and her band of scientists intend to help the Na'vi with their human technology (much like international aid workers might do today in developing nations), but we never actually see that happen. I got the sense that Cameron was loath to show modern technology doing anything useful. So even when Weaver's scientist becomes ill, the Na'vi attempt to heal her only with the magical life force of the tree of life. Harry Potter rides Buckbeak the Hippogriff (Warner Bros.) while Jake Sully rides a Mountain Banshee / aka Ikran (20th Century Fox) In Cameron's world, Nature is always wise and noble, which indeed it can be, but he fails to show its brutal side. The only thing that was brutal, crude, and immoral in the movie was the "advanced" technology. Of course, one could say that it was the user of the technology that was immoral (the evil corporation), but that is the only role for technology in the world of Avatar. In addition to being evil, the technology of the Avatar world of over 100 years from now is also weaker than nature, so the rhinoceros-like creatures are able to defeat the tanks circa 2100. It was perhaps a satisfying spectacle to watch, but how realistic is that? The movie shows the natural creatures communicating with each other with some kind of inter-species messaging and also showed the tree of life able to remember voices. But it is actually real-world technology that can do those things right now. In the Luddite world of this movie, the natural world should and does conquer the brutish world of technology. In my view, there is indeed a crudeness to first-industrial-revolution technology. The technology that will emerge in the decades ahead will be altogether different. It will enhance the natural world while it transcends its limitations. Indeed, it is only through the powers of exponentially growing info, bio, and nano technologies that we will be able to overcome the problems created by first-industrial-revolution technologies such as fossil fuels. This idea of technology transcending natural limitations was entirely lost in Cameron's vision. Technology was just something crude and immoral, something to be overcome, something that Nature does succeed in overcoming. Unimaginative, non-futurist props in the supposed future world of the movie A.I. (Warner Bros.). Most sci-fi films depict a few truly clever technologies representing a probable human future, while leaving the rest too ordinary and undeveloped to be believable. The entire world of human technology will evolve in step, affecting all aspects of the way we work, live, play, heal, create, learn or defend. Advanced technology will be embedded everywhere, in even our most mundane objects, interconnected and always-on. In a future world capable of strong A.I. and inter-stellar travel, the landscape of technology merged with our daily activities will actually be far more advanced, and far more interesting than in the film depictions we see today. It was visually pleasing; although even here I thought it could have been better. Some of the movement of the blue natives was not quite right and looked like the unrealistic movement one sees of characters in video games, with jumps that show poor modeling of gravity. The ending (spoiler alert) was a complete throwaway. The Na'vi defeat the immoral machines and their masters in a big battle, but if this mineral the evil corporation was mining is indeed worth a fortune per ounce, they would presumably come back with a more capable commander. Yet we hear Jake's voice at the end saying that the mineral is no longer needed. If that's true, then what was the point of the entire battle? The Na'vi are presented as the ideal society, but consider how they treat their women. The men get to "pick" their women, and Jake is offered to take his choice once he earns his place in the society. Jake makes the heroine his wife, knowing full well that his life as a Na'vi could be cut off at any moment. And what kind of child would they have? Well, perhaps these complications are too subtle for the simplistic Avatar plot. See also: REUTERS | Human exoskeleton suit helps paralyzed people walk DISCOVERY NEWS | New exoskeleton gives soldiers super strength CURRENT TECHNOLOGY | Lockheed Martin's HULC: hydraulic-powered, un-tethered, anthropomorphic exoskeleton (Lockheed Martin) LOCKHEED MARTIN | The HULC: Dismounted Soldiers often carry heavy combat loads that increase the stress on the body leading to potential injuries. With a HULC exoskeleton, these loads are transferred to the ground through powered titanium legs without loss of mobility. The HULC is a completely un-tethered, hydraulic-powered anthropomorphic exoskeleton that provides users with the ability to carry loads of up to 200 lbs for extended periods of time and over all terrains. Its flexible design allows for deep squats, crawls and upper-body lifting. There is no joystick or other control mechanism. The exoskeleton senses what users want to do and where they want to go. It augments their ability, strength and endurance. An onboard micro-computer ensures the exoskeleton moves in concert with the individual. Its modularity allows for major components to be swapped out in the field. Additionally, its unique power-saving design allows the user to operate on battery power for extended missions. The HULC's load-carrying ability works even when power is not available. Lockheed Martin is a leading provider of advanced technology solutions for the Warfighter including ground Soldier systems such as wearable situational awareness equipment and mobility assistance systems. Future advancements in exoskeleton technologies will focus on specific user communities, shifting energy and performance requirements. Lockheed Martin is also exploring exoskeleton designs to support industrial and medical applications. (Source: ) www.kurzweilai.net | 3/8/10 5:34 PM

Instant Action CEO Louis Castle and Unity Technologies CEO David Helgason are set to present keynotes at Develop in Brighton July 13-15. Castle and Helgason will be giving the opening and closing keynotes, respectively, at the one-day, three-track Evolve program set for July 13. It's focused on new and emerging technologies, markets and platforms, and this will be evolve's second year as part of the larger Develop event. Castle, also a former creative development VP ... www.gamasutra.com | 3/3/10 9:26 PM

Washington, Feb 27 (IANS) About 100 leading business and tech visionaries from around the world would discuss innovative ideas and market ready incubated technologies at the annual emerging technologies conference, EmTech 2010, in Bangalore next month. story.venezuelastar.com | 2/27/10 5:30 AM

University of Oregon labs combine emerging technologies to identify gene regions underlying adaptation VIDEO: University of Oregon biologist William Cresko, speaking from his lab, provides an overview of a paper published in PLoS Genetics in which his team discovered a specific region of genes... Twenty billion pieces of DNA in 100 small fish have ... www.topix.net | 2/26/10 10:27 PM

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Cleantech's vast ecosystem includes a dizzying array of emerging technologies, from green building materials to electric vehicles, lighting and wind power. But as Silicon Valley rei... story.venezuelastar.com | 2/24/10 10:46 PM

SAN JOSE, Calif. - Cleantech's vast ecosystem includes a dizzying array of emerging technologies, from green building materials to electric vehicles, lighting and wind power. But as Silicon Valley rei... story.haitisun.com | 2/24/10 10:46 PM

Mr. Rodney Weston, Member of Parliament for Saint John, on behalf of the Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State , today recognized Saint John-based Kinek Technologies as a Canadian Innovation Leader for their innovative approach to developing web based technologies. www.topix.net | 2/18/10 10:51 PM

Despite the game industry's recent financial hit, THQ CEO Brian Farrell believes "gaming can come roaring back" with emerging technologies like cloud computing, as well as the opportunities in downloadable games and the brand extension potential offered by social gaming. Cloud computing-based gaming, by which real-time graphics are rendered remotely and streamed to the player's screen rather than generated locally by a PC or console, has not yet reached mainstream consumers, but competing firms like ... www.gamasutra.com | 2/17/10 11:36 PM

More than half of IT software budgets in 2010 will go toward ongoing operations and maintenance of existing applications as opposed to implementing new software solutions, according to a recent survey by Forrester Research , Inc. www.topix.net | 2/17/10 5:21 PM

Exploring how emerging technologies and advanced materials will make tomorrow's cars safer. www.livescience.com | 2/9/10 4:51 PM

Recently I had the opportunity to chat with two of the more knowledgeable people in the Privileged User Management (PUM -- sometimes called Privileged Identity Management, PIM) space -- Phil Lieberman, CEO of Lieberman Software and Shlomi Dinoor, vice president of emerging technologies, Cyber-Ark Labs. www.networkworld.com | 2/9/10 4:00 PM

The drive toward cloud computing continues to be a dominant infrastructure deployment theme for organizations looking to reduce costs, increase storage and optimize mobility. What many fail to realize is the trend towards cloud computing is continually forcing IT managers to rethink fundamental security issues as a barrage of new attacks and exploits continue to assault the cloud every day. Compelling for any business model, cloud computing delivers a scalable, accessible and high-performing computing infrastructure that comes at an appealing price for organizations. Similarly, operating in the cloud allows for the convergence of new and emerging technologies. Providing appeal to both the provider and the consumer, cloud computing enables new application deployment and recovery options, as well as new application business models. However, cloud computing may not be the panacea that the press and many organizations make it out to be. We must have trust and confidence in the platform on which we are deploying our applications and data. We must be able to maintain control of the information that drives our business. Ultimately, we must be able to prove that trust to our auditors. The solution, having not yet been defined, could be deemed "auditability." read more java.sys-con.com | 2/3/10 11:30 PM

A settlement has been reached between three universities that supported Amazon.com's popular Kindle electronic book reader and the federal government. The U.S. Department of Justice settled with Case Western in Cleveland, Ohio; Pace University in New York City; and Reed College in Portland, Ore., after they agreed to no longer use or promote the Kindle DX or any other electronic reader until the devices are accessible to blind students. The universities were part of an Amazon.com pilot project to use the Kindle DX in the classroom. Six schools participated in the project. The three universities agreed that if they use e-book readers, they will be sure that students with vision disabilities can acquire the same materials, participate in the same interactions, and enjoy the same services as other students. "Advancing technology is systematically changing the way universities approach education, but we must be sure that emerging technologies offer individuals with disabilities the same opportunities as other students," said Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez. "These agreements underscore the importance of full and equal educational opportunities for everyone." The DOJ first made a case against the schools after the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) in Baltimore, Md., and the American Council of the Blind (ACB) in Arlington, Va., filed complaints about violating the Americans with Disabilities Act. Missing from Kindle Amazon's popular e-reader includes a function to convert text to speech, which could be used by someone with impaired vision. The device, however, does not have text-to-speech features in its menu bar or on its navigation controls. The Justice Department argued that without access to the menus, blind students have no way of knowing which book to select or how to use the Kindle DX browser. Others have also complained that the software used to convert text to speech is not always clear. Amazon Vice President Ian... www.cio-today.com | 1/14/10 6:58 PM

A new biologically inspired "wet computer" research project uses chemical reactions to mimic neurons. Funded by an EU emerging technologies program, it will make use of stable "cells" featuring a coating that forms spontaneously, similar to the walls of our own cells, and uses chemistry to accomplish the signal processing similar to that of our own neurons. It is intended for uses such as controlling molecular robots, fine-grained control of chemical assembly, and intelligent drugs that process the chemical signals of the human body and act according to the local biochemical state of the cell. (Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8452196.stm) www.kurzweilai.net | 1/12/10 6:37 AM

By Bob Flores, E-Commerce Times [The author of this article is Bob Flores, the former Chief Technology Officer for the US Central Intelligence Agency. Currently he's a private government technology consultant with Applicology Inc., and a member of the board of directors of St. Louis-based cloud computing software maker Appistry.] Hope was a slogan and a sentiment that played a major role in the US presidential election of 2008, and hope continues to be the mindset of technology advocates pushing for cloud computing in the public sector. As a former government employee with a long history in the intelligence field, I can easily see how cloud computing can contribute to the country's security and prosperity. With the support of the current administration, cloud computing's future looks hopeful. In recent months, the Obama administration has made several decisions that indicate an aggressive move toward more effective IT enterprise management applications, including cloud computing. Some milestones: President Barack Obama made cloud computing initiatives a priority in his 2010 budget request, and the Army and Navy have already announced their own cloud initiatives. Obama chose cloud-computing proponent Vivek Kundra as the federal chief information officer in his administration. The Obama administration voiced its desire to adopt other emerging technologies, and has backed that up with budgetary information to support the concept. Obama's mandate to drive down federal IT spending and increase efficiency is made more substantial by the implementation of apps.gov, which functions as an online storefront for approved cloud computing applications. I spent 31 years at the Central Intelligence Agency. While at the CIA, I held various positions in the Directorate of Intelligence, Directorate of Support, and the National Clandestine Service. I also spent three years as the CIO's chief technology officer, overseeing the agency's technology investments. I know firsthand the difficulty of delivering mission-critical applications via legacy data center architectures while maintaining a highly secure IT enterprise environment. Since the government is dependent upon taxpayer dollars, the defense and intelligence fields must be as frugal as possible when considering infrastructure spending. Computing and organizing large amounts of data on a limited budget is a significant challenge for defense and intelligence agencies. Cloud computing offers a solution to this problem by allowing the government to cut IT expenses while increasing scalability and improving data and applications management. However, the government sales cycles are slow and are resistant to major changes in infrastructure. Cloud computing hopes to break the Federal late adoption model and appears to be making headway, driven by the economic downturn and internal pressure to innovate. As it does for private industry, cloud computing allows the government the use of massive shared storage areas and heavy duty data computing without the big price tag that accompanies traditional IT approaches and maintenance. With a cloud solution, agencies are able to transform networks of commodity-grade servers into an agile cloud environment that can be easily scaled and managed to support sophisticated Web, SOA and analytical applications. They can also use high-performance computing platforms in much more efficient ways. Cloud computing allows the government to access applications through any browser for fast and reliable data. Making sure that these various servers are coordinated is an especially crucial part of the process, and one that is led by companies like Appistry, 3Tera, and Elastra -- which provide the software to ensure that all pieces run together smoothly. To make things even more interesting, these Platform-as-a-Service providers can take a government agency's internal commodity grade computers and create a private cloud that integrates seamlessly with the current IT processes of that agency. This will help save the government time and headaches, and increase efficiency. The cloud computing initiative is an attempt to reduce the costly, out-of-date and inefficient IT services, products and policies that the government currently utilizes. Cloud computing will also help cut down on massive energy costs. According to federal CIO Vivek Kundra, the US government's many data centers have contributed to a doubling in federal energy consumption between 2000 and 2006. The Obama administration has indicated moving toward net neutrality and a wider adoption of cloud computing as ways to limit infrastructure spending. While cloud computing looks promising, it is still young. Critics have been slow to trust the government's information to the cloud. Since cloud computing currently does not have regulated security standards, many government models may stall on changing the current IT landscape. Data security is a critical issue that cloud providers must address it in their products and services. Many providers have already been able to tailor the level of security to meet federal IT enterprise management challenges. Private clouds offer a compelling alternative, because they offer more stringent security, privacy and customization. Those that have significant investments in their current IT structure can save costs by using private clouds to leverage existing structures. This story was originally published on E-Commerce Times. © 2009 ECT News Network. All rights reserved. © 2009 BetaNews.com. All rights reserved. Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009 feeds.betanews.com | 12/30/09 3:35 PM

A Singapore-based early-stage venture capital firm announced on Friday it has secured a new 20 million Singapore dollar (14 million U.S. dollars) fund. Extream Ventures, a Singapore-based early-stage venture capital firm, has secured commitments from Georgieff Capital (Germany) and ART Texas Capital (the United States) for Extream Venture Fund I. The new early-stage fund focused on supporting the next generation of emerging technologies in Singapore. Extream Ventures is funded by ... english.people.com.cn | 12/18/09 11:32 PM

By Tim Conneally, Betanews Today, Cisco announced that it has completed its acquisition of Starent Networks, a name that has been popping up in greater frequency as wireless networks evolve into their next generation. Starent deals in core multimedia technology used in all types of mobile radio networks, and has made a strong showing in emerging technologies. Just this year, the company became a partner in Verizon's LTE deployment, it has worked with 3GPP on new Femtocell standards, and launched a new method of network traffic management for 3G/4G network operators. Today's announcement completes the deal first publicized in October. Starent will become part of a new group in Cisco called the Mobile Internet Technology Group which falls under the Service Provider Group. Starent's president and CEO, Ashraf Dahod will become senior vice president and general manager of this new group. Starent's aggregate purchase price was about $2.9 billion, and Cisco expects the investment to become accretive by 2012. Copyright Betanews, Inc. 2009 feeds.betanews.com | 12/18/09 6:05 PM

Semiconductor research is coming up short on new ideas to extend Moore's Law of consistently packing more transistors on a chip. Innovations in emerging technologies need to be accelerated. Presented By: NEC Ads by Pheedo Moore's law - Transistor - Semiconductors - Research - Business www.eetimes.com | 12/8/09 9:24 PM

The Emerging Technologies Conference at M.I.T. ended a few days ago with a focus on developing universal flu vaccines. www.topix.net | 11/28/09 1:56 PM

Newly released forecasts by technology and media specialist Coda Research Consultancy show that mobile phone users in Italy accessing video content via their devices will climb to 5.1m in 2015, and that revenues will reach US$685m. Coda's report into the Italian TV market shows that users accessing TV content via DVB-H alone will double from its present 1.2m users to 2.5m in 2015. In particular, the 2010 World Cup will act as a stimulus for accessing mobile TV services, as it did in 2006, and Coda estimates that regular usage will climb to 1.6m at the end of 2010. However Steve Smith, the report's author, commented that mobile TV take-up in Italy, although respectable when compared to the rest of Europe, has failed to meet expectations. "In part this is due to how Europeans fit their mobile phones into their everyday lives," he explains. "People tend to use their phones for video, games, texting, social networking and so on when they are between spaces and events, such as when commuting or meeting friends. In Japan and South Korea, where mobile TV penetration is significantly higher, people spend a lot more time commuting on public transport and so have more time available. The streaming or broadcast of live TV simply doesn't fit the European consumer. This is one example of how operators and broadcasters aren't providing the kinds of video content and services mobile users actually want." Where Coda does see the opportunity for significant growth is in users downloading video onto their phones either via 3G or from their laptops and PCs, with that caveat that content and rights owners allow them to do so. "Our research with iPhone users shows that downloading content allows people much greater control over their viewing experiences and the kinds of content they view. But content owners and service providers must provide more opportunities for users to do this," Steve explained. The report Mobile TV and Video in Italy: An Assessment forms part of Coda Research Consultancy's 'Mobilities' project. To find out more about this report and its costs, and to read further highlights, visit www.codarc.co.uk, or email steve.smith@codarc.co.uk. -----ENDS----- -----NOTES FOR EDITORS----- Coda Research Consultancy specialises in critical and strategic insight into current and emerging behaviour around technologies and media. It draws upon a range of disciplines, and works with specialist commercial and academic organisations to help them understand and take advantage of emerging technologies and media. Coda Research is directed by Dr Steven Smith, an acknowledged research specialist with more than ten years experience in successfully undertaking strategic projects for media, technology and academic institutions. To find out more about Coda Research, visit www.codarc.co.uk, or email steve.smith@codarc.co.uk. -----CONTACT----- Dr Steven Smith Senior Director Coda Research Consultancy Ltd 25 Ludlow Road Guildford Surrey England GU2 7NR read more wireless.sys-con.com | 11/26/09 12:01 PM

EE Times has compiled a list of emerging technologies that we think will be worth watching out for in 2010. Television - Travel - Specialty Travel - Recreation - Ecotourism www.eetimes.com | 11/18/09 4:40 PM

Conference on Clean Energy kicks off this week - November 12 and 13 - at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston, and will highlight a broad spectrum of emerging technologies in the clean energy sector.... story.venezuelastar.com | 11/10/09 2:40 PM

Gartner has released a few days ago the Top 10 Strategic Technologies for 2010 list. Here you can see the wordle cloud: While I don't want to spend time talking about the usual suspects (Cloud, Green, Mobile and Virtualization) I wish to share my thoughts on two topics: Advanced Analytics and Reshaping the Data Center. Advanced Analytics I'm not surprised that a branch of Business Intelligence is still in the list after years of top priority amongst CIOs. Business Intelligence is one of the fields that I love and it's promise is to transform in gold everything it touches, like King Midas. Why is this still on the list? Has something changed in these years? There are good news. Open Source Software is changing the competitive landscape allowing CIOs, BI Managers and End Users to gather deep insight into business data at a fraction of the cost. I'd like to mention some of the most interesting technologies in the Open Source ecosystem: MySQL - This is my favourite! ;) Infobright - A leading columnar storage engine for MySQL; Pentaho - End to End Business Intelligence Suite; Jaspersoft - Open Source Business Intelligence Suite; Talend - Open Source ETL/Data Integration Suite; This list is partial, but it witness the vitality of Open Source into this particular field. And with this I'll move to the next topic. Reshaping the Data Center Gartners is clearly saying: "Dear CIOs, IT Architects and CTOs: your datacenter has been designed twenty years ago... it's time to change." As MySQL we've promoted a scale-out approach and reading through the lines of Gartner's research it seems that this has proved to be a sound strategy to reduce costs in time of economical crisis. In conclusion I think that nowadays we cannot avoid to include an Open Source strategy in our plans for the future, whilst not excluding a mix of all the emerging technologies, like Cloud and Virtualization. Regards, Luca feedproxy.google.com | 10/31/09 2:30 PM

THE BARBADOS COMMUNITY COLLEGE (BCC) is concerned about the impact of emerging technologies on the English language.Speaking at the fifth disbursement of the John Wickham Scholarship yesterday at the ... feeds.barbadosnews.net | 10/29/09 7:16 AM

The Rutgers Center for Innovative Ventures of Emerging Technologies , together with RFID TagSource, announce the launch of the Rutgers University RFID Research Center located on the Busch Campus in Piscataway, New Jersey. www.topix.net | 10/26/09 2:56 PM

Hamilton (New Zealand), Oct 22 (IANS) Two India born academics have won a prestigious research grant in New Zealand to help design public policy on the use of new and emerging technologies. story.venezuelastar.com | 10/22/09 6:30 AM

During the past three weeks, I've given you three great reasons for going to either Search Engine Strategies Berlin or SES Chicago 2009. For those who want to catch up, they were "three key trends", "two early birds," and "a ranking in the top three." This week, I'll focus on a fourth compelling reason -- and it isn't to hear "four calling birds." You should plan to attend SES Berlin or Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2009 to hear "four keynote themes." Let's start with SES Chicago 2009, where there will be three keynote themes well worth hearing. On Day 1, the opening keynote is being given by Jeff Jarvis, author of What Would Google Do? He is associate professor and director of the interactive journalism program at the City University of New York's new Graduate School of Journalism. He is also consulting editor and a partner at Daylife, a news startup. Jarvis writes about media, technology and business on his blog, BuzzMachine. A former TV critic for TV Guide and People magazine, as well as the creator and founding editor of Entertainment Weekly, he has also been assistant city editor and reporter for the Chicago Tribune and a reporter for Chicago Today. "My keynote, like my book, isn't really about Google," says Jarvis. "It will be about the profound changes in the economy and society brought on by the Internet -- as seen through the success of the one company that has figured out and exploited them better than any other: Google." Jarvis adds, "We'll have fun discussing the impact of search and the Google economy on every sector from media to advertising to restaurants to government. On Day 2 of Search Engine Strategies Chicago 2009, the keynote speaker is Peter Morville, author of the best-sellers Ambient Findability: What We Find Changes Who We Become and Information Architecture for the World Wide Web: Designing Large-Scale Web Sites. He is also the President of Semantic Studios and blogs at findability.org. During his keynote, Morville is expected to expand on the themes found in his published works, including the idea of findability and the importance of a navigable and friendly user interface. "At SES Chicago, this will be my first opportunity to talk about ideas in my new book - about the future of search and discovery," says Morville. "In addition to exploring the relationships between information architecture, ambient findability, and search engine optimization, we'll also be covering mobile search, decision engines, augmented reality, and emerging technologies that will change the way we find everything from answers and articles to products and people." On Day 3, the keynote speaker is Dan Siroker, the web entrepreneur known for leading the analytics team for the Barack Obama presidential campaign. He also served as the Deputy Director of New Media on the presidential transition team. Siroker's team of software engineers and analysts were responsible for optimizing the effectiveness of the Obama campaign's online operations that ended up raising over half a billion dollars, registering over 2 million voters, and enabling 3 million phone calls to be made in the final four days of the campaign. Before joining the Obama campaign, Siroker was a Product Manager for Google Chrome and, before that, he worked as a Product Manager for Google AdWords. "SES Chicago is, of course, in the President's hometown, so I'm really looking forward to sharing the lessons my team and I learned during the Obama campaign and how these practices can be applied to any data-driven decision," says Siroker. "Whether you're a developer, designer or marketer, if you're building a product or selling an idea, you can use data to do it better." The fourth keynote theme will be delivered by Bill Hunt, the President of Back Azimuth Consulting and co-author of the best selling book "Search Engine Marketing, Inc.: Driving Search Traffic to Your Company's Web Site", who will be the opening keynote speaker at Search Engine Strategies Berlin. Hunt is currently on the Board of Directors of the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization and writes Bill Hunt's Rants & Raves blog, which provides digital marketing commentary from a global marketing road warrior. Hunt firmly believes that when we understand the searcher's intent, where a searcher is in the buying cycle or even understanding the type of search they are doing, advertisers can better intersect with the current demand for their type of products and services to increase sales. That's a keynote theme worth going to SES Berlin to hear. Next week, we'll look at more reasons to go to either Search Engine Strategies Berlin or SES Chicago 2009. In the meantime, keep singing "four keynote themes, three key trends, two early birds, and a ranking in the top three." blog.searchenginewatch.com | 10/5/09 9:00 AM

Decision-making on science a ' especially emerging technologies such as nanotechnology a ' must become more democratic, a new report on science policy released today argues. www.topix.net | 9/25/09 9:57 PM

First Web 2.0 conference was held October 5-7, 2004 at the Hotel Nikko in San Francisco. Lot has happened in the last five years like the theme “Web as Platform” as a terminology is dead and has been replaced by “Cloud Computing“. In this year’s hype cycle for emerging technologies, Gartner has positioned Web 2.0 under [...] read more xml.sys-con.com | 9/23/09 8:00 AM

First Web 2.0 conference was held October 5-7, 2004 at the Hotel Nikko in San Francisco. Lot has happened in the last five years like the theme “Web as Platform” as a terminology is dead and has been replaced by “Cloud Computing“. In this year’s hype cycle for emerging technologies, Gartner has positioned Web 2.0 under [...] read more linux.sys-con.com | 9/23/09 12:15 AM

The automobile, laptop computers and mobile phones were all at one point emerging technologies that progressed to provide very strong consumer and business solutions. www.topix.net | 9/9/09 9:41 AM

The recent Gartner Report on "Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies" has revealed some amazing facts about the future of emerging technologies... The Gartner report examines the maturity of 1,600+ technologies and trends in 70 technology, topic, and industry areas providing a snapshot of key technologies and trends in a specific technology, topic, geographic region, or industry domain. read more web2.sys-con.com | 9/7/09 2:22 PM

If you ask anyone today to define "cloud computing," there is slim chance you will get agreement on an exact definition. It is one of those emerging technologies that everyone knows they want to get into, but no one seems to know why or what the real benefit is. There is a lot of promise, but very few companies have realized tangible benefits from such services. www.ecommercetimes.com | 9/3/09 12:00 PM

August 28, 2009 , Ottawa, Ontario The Honourable Tony Clement, Minister of Industry, today recognized Parry Sound-based Crofters Food Ltd. www.topix.net | 8/29/09 9:50 AM

The inaugural graduates of Singularity University, a Silicon Valley school backed by NASA, Google Inc., and tech industry luminaries like Ray Kurzweil, unveiled their grand visions on Thursday for leveraging emerging technologies to solve humanity's great challenges. (Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/27/BUUQ19EJIL.DTL&type=tech) www.kurzweilai.net | 8/28/09 5:24 AM

There is some understandable confusion over the changes that have taken place on the java.net site starting this past weekend... There is some understandable confusion over the changes that have taken place on the java.net site starting this past weekend. The changes consist primarily of switching significant portions of the underlying infrastructure from a platform that was custom built by O'Reilly quite a few years ago, to a much more modern, modular, widely used platform. Stage One, which got underway this past Friday, is to make the platform switch and successfully migrate more than six years of java.net content from the old O'Reilly platform to the new infrastructure. It's a big undertaking, that required lots of developer time (building migration scripts to convert data from the O'Reilly database structures into the structures in the new database, customizing the user interface in the new CMS to "be" the java.net we've had previously, etc.). If you're not noticing many differences between your java.net circa this week compared with your java.net circa last week, then the migration and transition has largely succeeded. So, then, it's proper for you to ask: "So, what's in it for me? Why are you making such a big thing out of this, when nothing's changed for me?" Well, first, I can assure you that we didn't do all this work just to entertain ourselves, and provide us with lots of overtime hours for months on end! We are doing this, indeed, for the java.net community. That's the only reason it's happening. The entire point of this infrastructure change is to facilitate changes that will make java.net more useful for the community. As we all know, a big problem with a large custom built software system is that a large developer team is needed to maintain and update it. As I said recently, O'Reilly Media is not a software engineering firm. We developed a CMS platform that met a need starting six years ago. Would any of us expect that platform, which hasn't changed all that much over the years, to be ideal for java.net's needs today? I certainly wouldn't. So, the choice was to either continue with an old platform that cannot be readily updated, or migrate to a new, modern platform. The latter option was chosen by the java.net managing team (which, by the way, does not include me -- though I completely agree with their decision). The chosen method for migrating to the new platform is exactly the one I would have chosen, had I been in charge of the effort: first, move to the new platform and migrate all the content from the old servers, keeping the site as much intact as possible. Don't lose data, don't lose functionality. In a few spots (communities, for example), some new features were put into place during the initial transition; but for the most part, the objective was: move to the new platform and migrate the old content without breaking the site. So, now we've basically accomplished that (though we're still working on multiple outstanding issues). There are new, faster servers now, with additional hardware still in the near-term pipeline. This, combined with tuning of the new infrastructure instantiation, should ultimately lead to much better site performance. Once we and the more active members of the java.net community are satisfied that the site is stable and usable, we'll be able to move ahead with enhancements. Speaking of which: now that java.net is hosted on a much more readily adaptable platform, are there specific changes/improvements that you'd like to see? Let me know. Many things that were not possible a week ago (because they would have required an inordinate, budget-breaking software engineering effort) are now possibilities that can realistically be considered for java.net's future. In Java Today, Peter Varhol announces that TheServerSide Java Symposium Call for Papers is Open: TheServerSide Java Symposium (TSSJS), a community event focusing on current and emerging technologies in the Enterprise Java space, has opened its call for presentations for TSSJS Vegas 2010. TSSJS Vegas takes place in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA on Wednesday-Friday, March 17-19, 2010. TSSJS's mission is to advance the Enterprise Java platform, propagate industry-wide best practices, and provide a forum for the Java community to engage in forward-thinking discussions... Java Champion Alan Williamson provides analysis of some significant news in "Amazon Virtual Private Cloud Is Announced": Amazon is again moving the cloud world forward a number of notches. Just as soon as the competition catches up, they hit the TurboButton and shoot forward leaving the rest of them in their dust. Today they have announced one of the biggest features to date, I believe, of their AWS offering. The ability to run a virtual private cloud within their public cloud offering... Danny Coward looks "Under the hood with Garbage First" in his latest post: There's an interesting article over at Dr Dobbs about the new Garbage First collector, scheduled for prime time in JDK 7, and currently available to try out as an optional collector in the Java SE 6 update releases. Published experiences with this new memory management technique for Java are rare, though some have had good results. In today's Weblogs, Kumar Jayanti talks about Configuring Non-JKS KeyStore with GlassFish V3: "The Java KeyStore API supports multiple keystore formats which include JKS( the default Java KeyStore), PKCS12, PKCS11 etc. By default when GlassFish V3 is installed the default Keystore Type is JKS and the server keystore (keystore.jks) is located in the domain config directory. With latest GlassFish V3 builds it should be possible to define a different KeyStore Type such as PKCS11 or..." Jean-Francois Arcand provides Tricks and Tips with Comet part 1: The Browser difference: "Writing Comet application is more and more simple, thanks to framework like LIft and Atmosphere. On the Client side, the difference between Safari, Opera, Firefox, IE and Chrome can make your application completely unresponsive or broken. Of course, there is some tricks to make it work. First, if you are new to Comet, I recommend you take a look at this introduction. For this serie, I will use my..." And Fabrizio Giudici is offering instruction on Mercurial Best Practices: "I've prepared a document that describes how to work with my projects and Mercurial. It is available here. While it is not meant as a replacement for Mercurial tutorials, it has been written also for Mercurial newbies. Comments welcome - also here (so I can see how comments work with the new Java.Net platform ;-)." In the Forums, mobility has a ComboBox Issue: "HI. am new to LWUIT. Using 1.2. My combobox doest seem to be rendering correctly. I have 2 items and is vertical. But the i can only see one item when i click on the combobox. the gap between two items seems to be more than..." m_santh has questions regarding the Network interface on OCAP: "Hi, I am new to writing OCAP applications. I am currently trying to understand the specs. Wanted to check if I have a server running on my Windows PC, can I write an Tru2way applications which can talk to server on PC. From my initial study..." And benus_ying asks how to connect to a private RDV?: "Hi all. I have come across a problem. the scenario is that there are a public rdv in internet and i want to create a private rdv in my private subnet. this private rdv is for a sub peer group and communicated with the public rdv. then. i want a..." In the current Spotlight, Danny Coward invites us to participate in a Deep Dive on JDK 7: "The Janitor joined Ed Ort for a Deep Dive on JDK 7, check it out here. Really given how much is going into JDK 7, its perhaps more of a flyover and swoop, but, if you need to catch up with the plan, take a look." The next java.net Poll will be posted soon, once the dust from the java.net infrastructure transition has settled. Our Feature Articles include Jeff Friesen's article Introducing Custom Paints to JavaFX, which shows how you can leverage undocumented JavaFX capabilities to support custom paints in JavaFX Version 1.2. We're also featuring Biswajit Sarkar's Using the Payment API for Microcredit and Other Applications, which describes how to apply the Payment API (JSR 229) in JavaME applications. The latest Java Mobility Podcast is Java Mobility Podcast 85: Migrating Your Midlets to JavaFX Mobile Technology: "Highlights from the JavaOne session TS-4506 with hints & tips on migrating your Java ME applications to JavaFX Mobile." Current and upcoming Java Events: August 28-30: 2009 Research Triangle Software Symposium August 29-30: WOWODC East 2009 September 9-11: Java Power Tools - Canberra September 11-13: 2009 New England Software Symposium: Fall Edition September 14-16: The Ajax Experience September 16-19: 2009 JVM Language Summit, Santa Clara, CA September 18-20: 2009 Pacific Northwest Software Symposium October 5-9: Java Power Tools - Brisbane October 19-23: Java Power Tools - Sydney October 23: Strange Loop Conference - St. Louis October 24: Florida Linux Show 2009 Orlando December 11-12: 4th IndicThreads.com Conference On Java Technology, Pune, India Registered users can submit event listings for the java.net Events Page using our events submission form. All submissions go through an editorial review before being posted to the site. Archives and Subscriptions: This blog is delivered weekdays as the Java Today RSS feed. Also, once this page is no longer featured as the front page of java.net it will be archived along with other past issues in the java.net Archive. www.java.net | 8/26/09 5:14 PM

TheServerSide Java Symposium (TSSJS), a community event focusing on current and emerging technologies in the Enterprise Java space, has opened its call for presentations for TSSJS Vegas 2010. TSSJS Vegas takes place in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA on Wednesday-Friday, March 17-19, 2010. www.theserverside.com | 8/25/09 9:04 PM

If you register to attend SES San Jose 2009 by Friday, July 24, you can save up to $200. But you already knew that. The bigger question that you -- and other Chief Marketing Officers -- are looking to answer is this: How do you measure the return on investment in going to a search engine marketing conference? Now, measuring marketing ROI isn't a hard science. It's more of a social science. But there some reasonable approaches that you can use to figure out the value of attending SES San Jose 2009. Ask yourself this question: Can I afford to skip this event? The answer will depend on how rapidly you think the search engine marketing industry is changing. And, unless you've been cryogenically frozen for the past year, you'll know that a lot has changed since SES San Jose 2008. That will be the theme of the Opening Keynote by Clay Shirky, the author of the new book, "Here Comes Everybody." Shirky is a writer, educator, and consultant on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies. He is an adjunct professor at New York University in the graduate interactive telecommunications program, where he teaches courses on the interrelationships of social and technological networks, particularly how they shape culture and vice versa. He consults to a variety of organizations on network technologies, and is an acknowledged expert on collaboration tools, social networks, peer-to-peer sharing, collaborative filtering, and open source development. Shirky has spoken and written extensively on the Internet since 1996, with regular columns in Business 2.0, FEED, OpenP2P.com and his own shirky.com blogsite. He has appeared in The New York Times, Time, The Wall Street Journal, the Harvard Business Review, and others. In his new book, Shirky explores how organizations and industries are being upended by open networks, collaboration, and user appropriation of content production and dissemination. Shirky's keynote will be followed by a session on Day 1 of the conference entitled, "The Adaptive CMO: A New Paradigm for Digital Marketing." This session sets the stage for the C-Suite track and provides a strategic view of how marketing is constantly evolving and will define the critical role that search must play. The rules have all changed and all bets are off. Brian Featherstonhaugh, chairman and CEO of OgilvyOne Worldwide, will present his point of view on how brands are built, why the "four Ps" are no longer valid, how corporate cultures are created, and what happens as the world goes digital. The next session in the C-Suite track is entitled, "The View From the CMO's Office." Search marketers and non-search marketers have traditionally had difficulty communicating in the language of their disciplines, often creating friction and unnecessary conflict. This session will walk you through the day-by-day challenges of the CMO from two viewpoints: the traditional CMO and the CMO who has made the move to digital. This session will explore how both disciplines can educate each other and explore such issues as the nominal percentage of marketing spend that is allocated to search. During the afternoon on Day 1, there is another session in the C-Suite track entitled, "Integration: The New CMO Imperative." With the popularity of sites like Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, and Twitter, brands increasingly need to engage with their customers outside their website. The portability of content and viral connectivity that occurs online requires a new approach to branding. If you attend this session, you will learn strategies for increasing brand awareness and protecting brand equity in today's socially connected web as well as tactics that can be implemented in today's resource and budget constrained environment. Next in the C-Suite track is a session entitled, "Budget Migration: Going Digital Without Impacting Your Brand." The move to a predominantly digital marketing strategy can be overwhelming. Migrating from staid traditional channels to the open waters of the web can be daunting -- especially for companies that are unsure of how to properly measure search, display, email and social media. This session will arm you with the information you need to know about migrating budget to digital without impacting your brand awareness or the equity you have built up in your brand. If you attend, you will learn from companies that have started moving significant resources away from TV, radio and print and into search, social, display and email. Lessons learned will be discussed as well as the metrics and tools need to gauge the success of a balanced digital marketing program. Finally, the C-Suite track wraps up on Day 1 of SES San Jose 2009 with a session entitled, "Performance Pricing Models: What Every CMO Must Know!" With many marketing organizations feeling the pain of financial pressures, pay for performance pricing models are gaining popularity in search today. At this stage of the game, chances are that you've either thought about trying this type of pricing model but held back because you were unsure of what's involved or perhaps you tried to pursue it in the past, but had trouble making it work for you and your vendor. Designed to maximize results, a performance based compensation model can truly be a win/win for you and your search engine marketing partner. Not only will it help to drive results and bring your partners' goals in alignment with your own, it will also allow you to reward your search partner for superior performance while keeping your overall ROI in mind. In this session, the panelists will cover the keys to developing a successful pay for performance pricing model including a thorough overview of the concept, how it can be applicable to both PPC and SEO, the chief benefits it offers, and why marketers should consider it. In addition the panelists will delve into what marketers need to know before adopting a pay for performance model, including how to assess if it's right for you, popular misconceptions, and the common problems that can arise along the way. If you attend, you will be provided with actionable advice on the critical success factors needed to make a pay for performance model work, including the role of goals, benchmarking, performance metrics, historical data, scenario analysis, and tracking. So, what's the marketing ROI of attending the first day of SES San Jose? Well, ask yourself this question: What's the cost of skipping this event? Now, if you've done the risk benefit analysis of attending SES San Jose for a day, what are the incremental costs and benefits of attending for two days? Take a close look at the SES San Jose agenda overview for Day 2 and you'll see lots of sessions that a CMO who is making the move to digital should attend. Here are a few that I would recommend: Igniting Viral Campaigns: Leveraging Consumer-Generated Content -- How can businesses leverage social platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and more to break through and create buzz, encourage word of mouth, and establish relationships with potential customers? This session unveils the secrets of Web 2.0 techniques and technologies that enable companies to stand out and be talked about. Facebook Ads: Reaching Prospects Earlier In The Decision Cycle -- You know how powerful search marketing ads are. They get in front of consumers who are already raising their hands for more information about your business. But wouldn't it be great to influence that decision earlier to a much larger target audience? With over 200 million active users sharing authentic information, you can precisely reach the right people before they start searching. Learn how to target your exact audience, create compelling ads, optimize for the greatest ROI and generate demand for your business on Facebook. Afternoon Keynote -- Nicholas Fox, a business product management director on Google's AdWords team, is giving the afternoon keynote. Fox leads product management for Google's ads quality efforts, focused on optimizing the end user experience with ads displayed through Google's AdWords program. He is responsible for the development and improvement of the algorithms that determine the display, ranking, and pricing of AdWords ads on Google and its partners. Fox also leads product management for AdWords bidding features, which enable advertisers to maximize their ad performance and simplify their bid management. Prior to joining Google in 2003, Fox was a consultant with McKinsey & Company in Palo Alto, Calif., focusing on corporate finance and strategy for technology companies. He studied economics at Harvard College, from which he graduated magna cum laude. Four Paths to Success in a Tough Travel Economy -- Travel marketers discuss the challenges of smart search marketing in tough economic times, when leisure travelers are hard to come by and businesses slash budgets. Experts in four key areas of travel search marketing - Organic, Paid, Social and Local/Mobile - share successful strategies and creative campaign ideas to attract and increase traffic, proving that it is possible to generate positive ROI with limited resources. The BuyerSphere Project: Understanding B2B Buyer Patterns -- A major B2B research initiative, conducted by Enquiro with input from Google, Business.com, Covario, Marketo and DemandBase, showed that most marketers aren't effectively leveraging online assets to their best potential. Among other things, the notion of a strictly followed, traditional buying funnel is simply not accurate in many instances, risk dictates buying behavior, search is incredibly important as an integrator across online and offline channels and face-to-face persuasion is still necessary in many high risk, complex purchases. The BuyerSphere project looks at how online strategies became artificially separated from traditional best practices, how they can be more effectively integrated and the part search plays as a major influencer. This panel will review the research from over 100 face-to-face interviews, hundreds of eye tracking sessions and over 3,000 survey responses in total. The project represents a major step forward in understanding B2B buyer patterns and the part online marketing can play in influencing them. Okay, if you are in for a penny, are you in for a pound? What is the marketing ROI of attending SES San Jose for a third day? Again, take a close look at the conference agenda and decide for yourself. Nevertheless, here are some sessions that you might want to consider attending: How to Prepare for the Future of Search -- The morning keynote will be given by Charlene Li, an influential thought leader on emerging technologies, with a specific focus on social technologies, interactive media, and marketing. She is the co-author of the business best-seller, Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies, published by Harvard Business Press in May 2008. Named "one of the most influential women in technology" by Fast Company, Li is the founder of Altimeter Group, which provides speaking and consulting services to organizations looking to understand and thrive in a new economy driven by social media tools and techniques. She is one of the most frequently-quoted industry analysts and has appeared on 60 Minutes, The McNeil NewsHour, ABC News, CNN, and CNBC. She is also frequently quoted by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, USA Today, Reuters, and The Associated Press. A sought-after public speaker, she has presented frequently at top technology conferences such as Web 2.0 Expo, SXSW, and ad:Tech. Most recently, Li was a VP and principal analyst at Forrester Research. She joined Forrester in 1999, after spending five years in online and newspaper publishing with the San Jose Mercury Newsand Community Newspaper Company. She is a graduate of Harvard Business School and received a magna cum laude degree from Harvard College. SEO Through Blogs & Feeds -- Not yet running a blog? Not syndicating your content through web feeds? Then you're missing out on an important area that can help your overall SEO efforts. Learn more about the unique advantages blogs and feeds offer to search engine optimization. The New Search ROI: Measuring More than Conversion -- Search marketing has a great advantage over other forms of marketing: It is extremely measurable and actionable. Advertisers have access to detailed click and conversion data about their campaigns, so they know which keywords are leading to the most sales. But smart search marketers today realize it's not enough to simply measure conversion to get an accurate picture of the overall ROI of their paid search programs. Internet sales typically account for 5 to 20 percent of a company's revenue (depending on the industry), but influence as much as 40 percent of sales. Therefore, measuring paid search ROI in relation to only online transactions significantly underreports SEM's overall contribution to company revenue. Also, remember that paid search conversions are influenced by more than just the last click; many times a conversion happens a few hours, days, or weeks after a series of clicks and searches. This practical and informative session will focus on best practices and practical techniques that marketers can use to get started with "multi-conversion" measurement. If you attend, you will walk away with actionable strategies for using industry-tested approaches that can help you effectively analyze key performance metrics of their campaigns -- whether a click results in a purchase online, a purchase offline, a call to a call center, or another conversion metric. You'll learn how to use freely available techniques to make sure you're measuring the real effectiveness of every click, to make better, more accurate keyword buying decisions, and more accurately gauge the real ROI of search programs. Advanced Keyword Research -- Mark Twain famously said that the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. When it comes to effective keyword research, nothing could be more true. Carefully tailored keyword research not only helps determine the success or failure of your entire search marketing campaign, but it can also provide a way of better understanding your visitors and their intentions. This in-depth discussion will move beyond the basic keyword research tools to zero in on advanced tips and techniques for taking your SEO or PPC campaign to the next stage. Extreme Makeover Live! Why Am I Not Making Enough Sales? -- There are many companies out there for which traffic is not a problem. Are you one of those companies that gets plenty of visitors but only about 2% of those that visit convert into a sale or a lead? This session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live to show you why you aren't making enough sales. Do you know the main issues holding your website from converting visitors? The panel of experts will make sure you walk away from this session with a great deal more insight about the factors that cause your website to act like a leaky bucket and what to do about them. Okay, spending three days at a search engine marketing conference is a serious investment of your time. And measuring the marketing ROI of attending SES San Jose isn't trivial. But that's why CMOs get paid the big bucks. And with Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke seeing signs of an economic recovery, now is the time for you to chart a course to the digital world that is reshaping marketing as we know it. So, if you are going to attend SES San Jose 2009, then register by Friday, July 24. Save up to $200. But that's small potatoes compared to the even bigger benefits to be gained from learning how to navigate through the ever-changing search engine marketing industry. blog.searchenginewatch.com | 7/22/09 4:46 PM

A chief technology architect at a large bulge-bracket firm calls solid-state drives , remote direct memory access and ultra-multicore servers "game changers." These three emerging technologies, he says, are sure to make Wall Street data centers more efficient in the coming year. www.topix.net | 6/23/09 3:37 AM

From time to time, we've discussed parallels between science and Buddhism. It's a fun thing to chat about, although I try not to attach to it. My formal education in science ended with freshman biology, and I respect science too much to muck it up with my fanciful speculations. I came across an opinion piece by Athena Andreadis at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, in which Andreadis complained about a video that tried to show connections between Buddhism and quantum mechanics. The video sloppily misrepresented quantum mechanics, she said, calling it "arrant nonsense." She added: ...when people who are not conversant with a scientific concept use it to lend credibility to shaky or shady conclusions, they become demagogues and/or charlatans. And before anyone trots out the elitism hobby-horse, all I can say is, just have the next person you meet on the street repair your car or give you a haircut. The same logic applies, and no amount of skimming Wikipedia entries will make up for in-depth knowledge and critical thinking. I was sympathetic to her complaint, because I do think some of us get a little too carried away with the Buddhism-is-quantum-mechanics idea. However, my sympathy was seriously tried when Andreadis expressed her understanding of Buddhism -- I like the aesthetics of Zen Buddhism very much. However, there is nothing to attract me in the religion’s misogyny (women cannot become Buddhas and must be reborn as men to attain Nirvana), its primitive cosmology of universe-toting turtles, its punitive stance that suffering is the result of bad past karma, its oppressive policies whenever it gained temporal power (including pre-Chinese Tibet, which was a far cry from Shangri-La) or the dog-like master/disciple formula that I dissected in my critique of that pinnacle of ersatz mythology, Star Wars. Dear Ms. (or is that doctor?) Andreadis, there's an old saying in America -- "practice what you preach." What you have written is arrant nonsense. It is dreadfully ignorant to pass judgment on things we do not understand, isn't it? I admit I don't know quantum mechanics from eggplant. You, on the other hand, don't know Buddhism from chickens. Every sentence in the paragraph above reveals gross misunderstanding of Buddhism. The same logic applies, and no amount of skimming Wikipedia entries will make up for in-depth knowledge and critical thinking. And I would also explain to you (and remind other Buddhists) that we do not need science to lend credibility to Buddhism. Science and Buddhism do not need each other to be credible, and the teachings of Buddhism are such that I don't see how science and Buddhism could contradict each other if they tried. I'm happy to accept whatever science says about how species evolve, or how stars are born, or whether particles are this or that. It makes no difference to understanding dharma. I ask my dharma brothers and sisters who are not scientists to not claim connections between Buddhism and science. As I said, it's fun to talk about, but attaching to ideas is not good Buddhist practice. And I would also ask scientists like Ms. Andreadis to stop making fools of themselves and manifesting the same traits of ignorance and prejudice they complain about in others. Thanks much for your cooperation in this matter. buddhism.about.com | 6/15/09 10:38 PM

TheServerSide Java Symposium (TSSJS), a community event focusing on current and emerging technologies in the Enterprise Java space, has opened its call for presentations for TSSJS Europe 2009. TSSJS Europe takes place in Prague, Czech Republic on October 27-28, 2009. www.theserverside.com | 5/26/09 1:36 PM

SIGGRAPH 2009's Emerging Technologies presents innovative technologies and applications in many fields including alternative displays, robotics, input interfaces, gaming, audio, haptics/VR, and experimental sensory experiences. www.topix.net | 5/22/09 11:55 AM

Start: 08/03/2009 - 08:00 End: 08/07/2009 - 08:00 SIGGRAPH 2009 Conference 3 - 7 August 2009 Exhibition 4 - 6 August 2009 Registration Discounts available until: 26 June 2009 Reduced Fees still available until:: 24 July 2009 Submission Deadlines Social Game Concept Proposals Monday, 8 September 2008 XSV: Ex-Student Volunteers Applications Monday, 10 November 2008 Art Papers Thursday, 8 January 2009 Technical Papers Tuesday, 20 January 2009 Student Volunteer Team Leader Applications Monday, 9 February 2009 General Submission Courses, Information Aesthetics Showcase, Emerging Technologies, Panels, Posters, Talks Wednesday, 18 February 2009 BioLogic Art Wednesday, 18 February 2009 Student Volunteers Applications Monday, 23 February 2009 Game Papers Sunday, 1 March 2009 Computer Animation Festival Competition Films, Real-Time Rendering Wednesday, 4 March 2009 Late-Breaking Work Late-Breaking Posters, Late-Breaking Talks Wednesday, 6 May 2009 FJORG! Wednesday, 6 May 2009 Research Challenge Wednesday, 6 May 2009 GameJam! Wednesday, 6 May 2009 vresources.org | 5/22/09 2:32 AM

SIGGRAPH Emerging Technologies: Breakthroughs in Haptics, Robotics, and Gaming FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 18 May 2009 For further information: Brian Ban +1.773.454.7423 (Chicago, IL) - SIGGRAPH 2009's Emerging Technologies presents innovative technologies and applications in many fields including alternative displays, robotics, input interfaces, gaming, audio, haptics/VR, and experimental sensory experiences. Presented in a combination of curated demonstrations and juried interactive installations, a minimum of 29 of the more than 100 international juried submissions were selected and will be on display and available for interaction with attendees in New Orleans this summer. read more vresources.org | 5/19/09 12:12 PM

TheServerSide Java Symposium (TSSJS), a community event focusing on current and emerging technologies in the Enterprise Java space, has opened its call for presentations for TSSJS Europe 2009. TSSJS Europe takes place in Prague, Czech Republic on October 27-28, 2009. www.theserverside.com | 5/19/09 12:26 AM