Debby Says - at CyberClub.com

Looks like CyberClub.com has a new teen writer! Debby is new teenage girl who is writing a regular set of articles on such topics as love, sex, dating and relationships under the heading "Debby Says".

There is a public forum which readers can post questions and have discussions about various issues involving teens and relationships. There is even a page for a webcam! It looks to be very interactive, which is something I think most web 2.0 sites are going for these days.

Over all, CyberClub does seem to be moving more toward an interactive dating / relationship / social site. Also, like most of the new sites, it is free! -- and supporting traffic through minimal advertising.

AWESOME computer art / animation

Wow!

In 1980 we had computer game graphics like Pac-Man !

And now? Computer generated graphics that look so real that some people have accused them of being "faked" ... meaning, that they've been accused of actually being real photographs!

A couple of other awesome computer generated pictures, look incredibly real. What do you think about playing in a video game with THIS hot chic? Or this one? Or these?

Or how about interacting in a 3D virtual world with THIS woman?(another link) Or maybe (not quite so attractive), but still totally amazing, this old man?


Looks like Face Robot has some pretty cool videos too!

What do you think about violent video games? Games where you shoot at people. Kill people. What would you say if the police started coming in to people's houses and arresting people for killing a computer generated person... sure.. it LOOKS like a real person in the video game.. but it's just a character. No.. no.. I'm totally serious! The cops come in and ARREST YOU for "killing" !! Killing is a crime, and now you've done it! Well, okay, that has not happened yet, but a man WAS arrested for creating a computer image of what looked like a nude child. Totally fake, but he was arrested none the less. I'm not condoning child porn... just the same way I don't condone murder.... but, the fact is.. if it's "okay" to kill characters in a computer, then why isn't it "okay" to create nude (kid) characters on the computer? Of course, if you say it's just not okay... then I would have to ask WHY? And then I'd have to wonder how the same answer could not be applied to video game killing?!?!

Is seeing believing? If CNN shows a picture on the news do you believe it? Your local newspaper? Associated Press? Reuters? Well, not too long ago Reuters was caught doing just that! Manipulating photos with Photoshop for one of their news stories, which was meant to put Israel in a bad light. If you ask me, the photo looks pretty realistic, but as the link shows, it's been changed so that it makes the Israeli attack on Lebanon look much worse than it actually was.

A Photoshop tutorial of How To Turn a Modern Day City In To Decaying Ruins.

And finally, a link from C/Net news with about 24 various pictures that have been doctored by other major media outlets.

I think the day of "seeing is believing" are over.

Picture-A-Day

Someone posted an interesting comment to a Digg article today which has many links to people taking 1 picture of themselves every day... the guy doing it the longest... since 1998 !!

here's gfixler's post:

=======================

Seems like nothing's an original idea anymore. This guy's the winner so far - doing the face-a-day thing since '98:
http://www.c71123.com/daily_photo/

And he - a purist, essentially - is idolized by this guy who's been taking the idea for awhile and adding in some stop motion animation elements, but who has also suffered two hdd crashes that lost him 3 and 2 months, respectively:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=90620491

This guy did 6 months of beard growth with some stop motion effects of wiping away the beard with his hand, and drinking a different drink every day:
http://www.nowstartabeard.com/

Then there's Tommy's Beard, which was on Digg awhile ago:
http://www.tommysbeard.com/
also on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-SVKVIq9og

You can even watch a woman's entire 9-month pregnancy bulge before you in 20 seconds:
http://www.i-am-bored.com/bored_link.cfm?link_id=18959


======================

Here are some other similar links I found.

Then also, don't forget Ahree Lee. She did it from 2001-2004:
http://www.atomfilms.com/af/content/me

The History of Michael Jackson's Face:
http://anomalies-unlimited.com/Jackson.html

A guy doing it on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dphiffer/sets/416293/


ENJOY !

China and India are overtaking the US in high-tech

"The national academies' report points out that China and India combined graduate 950,000 engineers every year, compared with 70,000 in America; that for the cost of one chemist or engineer in the U.S. a company could hire five chemists in China or 11 engineers in India; that of the 120 $1 billion-plus chemical plants being built around the world one is in the United States and 50 are in China."

A rather telling quote from a recent article at MSNBC which goes on to say how Americans seem to now be more interested in instant gratification, consumption, and leisure. However, there are also some hard statistics that can also show how 18 out of the top 20 schools are American, America is also the most popular destination for foreign high tech students, and the U.S. is on top in many other categories.

The problem seems to be that the rest of the world is catching up much faster than most people recognize. The article goes in to much more detail on specifics. One other point I should bring in to this whole topic is the fact that if China and India DO keep up their pace, then it will be impossible for America to keep up. The bottom line is that our population is so much smaller than either of theirs separately. So, just in shear man-power or work-force alone, they have a much stronger resource. With more people, you can get more done in the same amount of time, or you can even get more done in less time.

Let's also not forget that China is no friend to the US. There are many who also think this "attack" could come fairly soon in the form of an economic-first war.

Just another something for everyone to forget about over dinner tonight.

The new age of robots

I do a LOT of reading (news).. mostly interested in science/tech, and have only been sharing my research with family in the past. Since there are more and more people I've wanted to share some things with, I thought it best to keep more up to date with this blog.

Here are some latest finding about robots, which is one area of particular interest.


Robot achives first unassisted heart surgery

Nano car powered by light

Project to have Computers Create their own Society, Language, and Culture

Man plays God

An interesting story popped up in the news today:
Creating first synthetic lifeform

Which goes on to talk about how some scientists (after decoding the human genome), are now taking the step to take what they've learned and try to create a totally new species.

Personally... even though this seems a bit "out there", I'm not sure I see anything morally or ethically wrong with it, but I DO see how it could be dangerous for us to be playing with something we don't fully understand.

My mind races to possibilities of accidentally creating some form of extreme predator that breeds quickly and feeds on humans. Perhaps even as small as bacteria... yum

Poetry.com puts EVERYONE on the first page

A couple years ago I wrote a poem, which I ended up submitting to Poetry.com, who asked to publish it in their book, and to my surprise it ended up on PAGE 1! (but so did everyone else's)

Well, actually, in MY copy, my Bio and Poem ("The Siren's Call") are on the first two facing pages in the book Invoking the Muse, copyright 2004, International Library of Poetry. What an awesome feeling to be NUMBER ONE! =)

... That is, until I was searching Google for an exact publish date, and found that everyone else who mentioned their poem published in that book also said THEIR poem was the first one in the book!? On top of that, I searched my copy to find out what page theirs was on, and NONE of their poems are in my copy at all!

Personally, it doesn't matter all that much to me. I have my copy to show family and friends, and so to me (and them) it looks like *I* am on page 1! I'm sure that's what Poetry.com had in mind..... a very nice gesture of making sure we each got a copy with our own poem on page 1.

However, it might not be all that great for other, more professional poets.... who point to that book as recognition for their poem, which might be only listed in the authors single copy and in no other copies anywhere. Certainly I was not exposed to the poetry of these other authors who claim to be on page 1.. and indeed aren't found on any of my pages.

Here are a few links to other authors claiming to be page 1:

Wayne Visser: Poets Must Be

Solangala: Writing

Patrice Lauren: The Fog In My Soul

Hector Alvarez-Trujillo: Veneration at the Moment Of Being

Lainee: Life

Elzbieta Kazmierczak: Biopsy

Patrick J. Krawczynski: There Standing


.... I'll stop there. You get the idea.

Again, let me repeat that personally, I'm more happy to see my own poem on page 1 in my own book only, so I say GOOD FOR POETRY.COM!
But it would have been nicer to have my poem in other copies on at least some page, rather than probably not in any other book. :(

We have connection to everyone/thing we have contact with

Quantum Physics is a truly fascinating subject. I hate to just blindly believe anything/everything I hear, but over the last few years I've heard a lot of scientific evidence that seems to support it.

Here's a report titled 'Can New Born Chickens Influence a Robot?' which points to experiments that seem to show we have a connect to everyone and everything we come in to contact with! It points to a Video called 'Nonlocality and the Observer' available in DVD and VHS format. I think I'm going to have to buy it.

If you have not seen the movie 'What the Bleep Do We Know?' then I HIGHLY recommend it. It's truly a life altering concept.

5 years ago i would have disregarded this stuff as total BS, but after personally experiencing a few things I'd have to consider "strange" to say the least, I don't think I can just toss it out so easily now.

More on this in the comments as I run across it.
Until then, if you're interested in more, check out
'Bruce Lipton's Biology of Belief'

Manga style Avatars!

Recently posted on ShoutWire.com is a blurb with links on creating some awesome and cute avatars...

Great for using on blogs and stuff, like this:

Create a face

full body

The world is going to suddenly get VERY tiny!

I've run across some amazing glimpses of the future recently!

The world is fairly small already, but is going to get INCREDIBLY
tiny in the next couple of years!!

First, I happened across a free video lecture at MIT titled "The World Is Flat" posted on a website (LearnOutLoud.com) offering tons of free (and pay for) content.
Skip past the boring introducer, and listen to what Thomas Friedman has to say on how Globalization is going to affect us ALL very soon.

Next, just realize what "Web 2.0" is all about, of which social networks are a big part.
Look at online communities like MySpace, which allows people to connect on a more social level, keep in touch with friends, make new ones, share common interests, and a bit of their personal lives. Sites like SourceForge, which lets people connect and collaborate on software projects, creating awesome new (and usually free) applications of all types.. and with people across the world that you may never meet in person, and certainly would never have met without the net. Sites like Slashdot and Shoutwire which allows people to report (post links) to news stories they find, and then others in the community can rate them.. giving everyone a picture on which stories might be more important or interesting than others. Flickr lets you post photos where a community of others can comment on them, add them to and share collections, as well as helping to organize with "tags" for easy searching. GeoBloggers lets you add "push-pins" to an interactive world map, where you can add notes, photos, audio, video, etc to a place on the map, sharing these "locations" with others. SecondLife is a 3D virtual world environment built as a platform for social networking and business, but many "companies" in that world are geared toward providing entertainment to the masses that inhabit that world.

There are SO many new sites of this type in the last few years it's almost countless.
And more are coming on-line at even a faster pace!

Just like Thomas Friedman said... this is going to make collaboration so much easier that new projects will be able to start and complete faster. The sharing of ideas and opening up of projects to allow others to help work on and complete projects cause some need for adjustment... some jobs will be lost, others gained... employee salary will certainly be leveled on across the GLOBAL scale for many jobs, but overall the positives out-weight the negatives.

Of course other technologies that are going to contribute to this shrinking world are things like 3D faxing of objects, full body immersion in to virtual reality across the internet, as well as others, you may as well be in the same room as someone you're interacting with, or on the other side of the planet!


Watch this amazing Nokia video of how they plan to integrate instant local social networks via cell phones (available now)!
... and GeoMinder, where you can have your cell phone remind you of something when you (or anyone) arrive at a certain location.

What an amazing time we live in, and getting more so every day!

I'll continue to add more to the comments section as I find things.
You can feel free to do that too!

Over 9000 educational audio and videos to download , many free

A few days ago someone posted a story on Digg about a site offering free educational audio and video stuff to download.

I finally had a chance to go check it out, and it looks GREAT!

The first video I watched was done at MIT about Globalization.
Really an eye-opener for what's coming down the pipe!

Next, I listened to a sample from an audiobook on Archeology. The entire work can be bought, but the 15 minute free sample was GREAT just in itself!

The next was an hour long video lecture on time travel and wormholes. Fairly interesting, but the speaker was rather dry.

The point though, is that this site has some GREAT stuff to offer on all KINDS of topics! Certainly something to help with research and hopefully will grow in their offerings over time.

GeoBlogging

So, today I discovered GeoBlogging !

It's a site that lets you link your flickr photos with GoogleMaps.
Now you can check out WHERE (on the map) the photos were taken,
and it gives a whole new sense to web/world exploring. :)

(I'm very excited)

Here is a link showing MY pictures
from all around Austin, TX.

What's this for?

This blog will contain interesting links I find.
If anyone has similar links, feel free to add.
David