In 1961, the digital future was just starting to come to fruition. And the Bell System had a number of products that had either just come onto the market, or were incipient, that implemented these new computer technologies. In December 1960, AT&T had just announced an investment of $250 billion dollars for satellite communications and improving the network for data services and computer communication.

In 1958, AT&T had just announced its first modem. Springing from technologies used for the computerized navigation of missiles, the modem, i.e. the Data-Phone, was rolled out in a few markets in the midwest. It would be made commercially available throughout the network by 1960. The Data-Phone could transmit at up to a bit-rate of 110 bits per second.

This film breaks into approximately two parts — part I: the problems of the present, and part II: the way those problems could be solved by the technology of the future. This film not only serves as almost the birth of the information age, it also projects that technology far into the future.

The commercial products that would allow this connected, computer-communicating network? They’re basic, but at the time seemed radical:

* The wireless Bellboy Pager, which was introduced commercially in 1962
* The Data-phone, which was supposed to revolutionize business communications
* The videophone—shown as a credit-card-reading vertical two-way television
* The card-reading phone or automatic dialer, which would dial a number from small plastic punch cards, introduced in 1961

Seeing The Digital Future | AT&T Archives

via paulocoelhoblog.com

The overarching vision for the Center for Rapid Automated Fabrication Technologies (CRAFT) is to develop the science and engineering needed for rapid automated fabrication of objects of various size up to mega-scale structures such as, boats, industrial objects, public art and whole building structures.

The grand challenge for CRAFT is building a custom-designed house in a day while drastically reducing the costs, injuries, waste and environmental impact associated with traditional construction techniques.

Industrial sized 3d printing - meet the future!

http://craft.usc.edu/Mission.html

http://www.contourcrafting.org/

http://mashable.com/2012/04/04/future-tech-home-design/

Contextual prediction is hot. I am not just saying that because I am in the prediction, forecasting and analysis business. I am talking, for instance, about the ability that businesses have to predict what we are going to buy, how much we are willing to pay, whether we can pay to begin with, whether we are potentially fraudulent and so on. Business intelligence and analytics software vendors provide tried and tested tools to telecoms operators giving useful contextual intelligence about their (potential) customers in the virtual and connected ecosystem.

Contextual prediction is hot in the physical world as well. Through sensors the Apple iPhone knows it should power off the touch screen if I bring the phone to my ear. It predicts I am making a call. The Samsung Galaxy S3 predicts I am reading an e-book because the front camera sensor says so. Smartly, it keeps the backlight on. Gesture-controlled laptops shut off automatically if I walk out of the room. Through the Doppler effect measured by the built-in microphone and speakers the laptop predicts I will not need it for the time being.

Predictive Contextual Collaboration | Wireless Week (via smarterplanet)

Sounds evil // and smarterplanet is IBM BTW - hiding behind the brand-curtain

(via smarterplanet)

Currently being developed by DARPA … are contact lenses that enhance normal vision by allowing a wearer to view virtual and augmented reality images without the need for bulky apparatus. Instead of oversized virtual reality helmets, digital images are projected onto tiny full-color displays that are very near the eye. These novel contact lenses allow users to focus simultaneously on objects that are close up and far away. This could improve ability to use tiny portable displays while sill interacting with the surrounding environment.

Quote found at DARPA site “DARPA researchers design eye-enhancing virtual reality contact lenses”

DARPA Augmented Reality Lenses

(via smarterplanet)

//could it also prevent one from seeing that oncoming train?

(via smarterplanet)

Source: darpa.mil

djkvfx:

ZERON // Levitation Interaction Element

Imagine a system that you could interactive with physically and whose movements you dictate are recorded by a computer to replay exactly. No image the ability to interact with a CGI scene in a physical world. 

This is awesome technology - we have a lot coming to us I think!

Gaming applications for NeuroSky’s MyndWave mobile headset

smarterplanet: 3D Printed Designer Drugs Scientists are pioneering the use of 3D printers to create drugs and other chemicals at the University of Glasgow. Researchers have used a £1,250 system to create a range of organic compounds and inorganic clusters – some of which are used to create cancer treatments. Longer term, the scientists say the process could be used to make customised medicines. “We are showing that you can take chemical constituents, pass them through a printer and create what is effectively a chemical synthesiser in which the reaction occurs allowing you to get out something different at the end,” researcher Mark Symes told the BBC. “It’s almost like a layer cake – you print the last reactionary agent first and then build other chemical layers above, finally adding a liquid at the top. The liquid goes to layer one making a new molecule which goes to the next layer creating another and so on until at the bottom you get your prescription drug out.” via hypna:
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smarterplanet:

3D Printed Designer Drugs

Scientists are pioneering the use of 3D printers to create drugs and other chemicals at the University of Glasgow.

Researchers have used a £1,250 system to create a range of organic compounds and inorganic clusters – some of which are used to create cancer treatments.

Longer term, the scientists say the process could be used to make customised medicines.

“We are showing that you can take chemical constituents, pass them through a printer and create what is effectively a chemical synthesiser in which the reaction occurs allowing you to get out something different at the end,” researcher Mark Symes told the BBC.

“It’s almost like a layer cake – you print the last reactionary agent first and then build other chemical layers above, finally adding a liquid at the top. The liquid goes to layer one making a new molecule which goes to the next layer creating another and so on until at the bottom you get your prescription drug out.”

via hypna:

Source: 3dfuture.com.au

!!FINALLY!! This is the jump off - when all our creativity breaks out of it’s 2 dimensional LCD prison and gets to mingle with the rest of the world, everything is going to change. Cyberspace escapes the computer. .BOOM. //Sell short on movie theaters and expect to have to pay NOT to see advertising; you may never know what she really looks like, but you might not care. bou-rgeoisie: From the New York Times: “Later this year, Google is expected to start selling glasses that will project information… on to the lenses” The glasses will run the Android operating system and use a heads-up display, think “Terminator Vision”, and are projected to cost roughly the same as modern smartphones. SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!
View Separately

!!FINALLY!! This is the jump off - when all our creativity breaks out of it’s 2 dimensional LCD prison and gets to mingle with the rest of the world, everything is going to change. Cyberspace escapes the computer.

.BOOM.

//Sell short on movie theaters and expect to have to pay NOT to see advertising; you may never know what she really looks like, but you might not care.

bou-rgeoisie:

From the New York Times:

“Later this year, Google is expected to start selling glasses that will project information… on to the lenses”

The glasses will run the Android operating system and use a heads-up display, think “Terminator Vision”, and are projected to cost roughly the same as modern smartphones. SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

(via bou-rgeoisie-deactivated2012082)

Flying Like A Bird | Jarno Smeets

//He built wings. He flew. Fuck!

Huffington Post discusses “Flying Like A Bird”

Canadian researchers find a simple cure for cancer. Unfortunately it looks like it’s going to be inexpensive as well..

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