Wind Power

Before the invention of engines, ships have for centuries relied on the power of the wind on their sails to move around the seas of the world. From the Phoenicians merchants of the ancient world to the English and Dutch traders of the 19^th century, it has always been wind power which has kept marine commerce alive across the sea lanes of the world.

And now, with oil prices skyrocketing and global warming becoming a concern for all countries, probably it is time once more to take a look at the possibilities of harnessing clean wind power for moving across the oceans.

Which is what the SkySail is all about. Invented by a company in Hamburg, it is a massive kite tethered to a ship that produces enough motive power to save 35% in fuel costs. A retractable mast slowly hoists the kite in the sky, where the wind unfolds it, and an autopilot keeps it in the correct position. It produces four times more energy than a regular sail, and if the winds are favourable the ship can use it to relieve its main engines.

Check out their website for more information and a short video.

Be a light unto yourself

Atmadipo bhava. Atma – self , Dipa – light. Be a light unto yourself.

This was the last instruction of the Buddha before he attained Nirvana. This was the last teaching he gave his disciples from his deathbed. Atmadipo Bhava . Be your own light. Depend on yourself and none else.

Have that faith in yourself, that you and you alone are the creator of your own destiny. That you, and you alone, are your own guide, your own friend, your own philosopher. You, and none else.

Samudragupta, the second Gupta king, and one of the greatest military conquerors of India, adopted the epithet swabhuja bala parakramaika bandhu – friend of his own strength and courage. History is witness to the truth of his claim.

The Gita puts it thus,

Raise yourself by yourself, do not let yourself down. For you alone are your own friend, you alone are your own enemy (6.5)

Be your own friend. Be your own light.

Atmadipo bhava.

LED City

Chances are that you have neither heard about the Holborn Viaduct nor about Torraca.

The first is the street in London where the electric streetlights were deployed in 1878 – a first in the world.

The second is a small city in southern Italy which can be termed as the world's first LED city, because all its streetlights now utilise LEDs, rather than the customary sodium vapour lamps. In Torraca, the orange twilight of sodium vapour lights has now been replaced with the bright white of LEDs.

In fact, unnoticed by most, LEDs are slowly taking lighting beyond incandescent bulbs and neon tubes. The reason is not difficult to understand - LEDs use only one-eighth of the power, stay cool and last for ten years or so.

A number of cars today use LEDs in the taillights, and soon maybe be used in headlights as their power increases, and so it is not a surprise that Torraca's lights were installed by Gelbison, a company that manufactures car components.

LEDs are also being increasingly used in portable lighting such as torches and lanterns, and the light they produce far surpasses that of traditional bulb powered torches. I had picked up one out of curiosity from Dubai recently. Though they very small, and running on just four cells, the amount of light this lantern produces is good enough for us to finish our dinner during a power cut.

Another advantage of LED lights, apart from their low power consumption and high intensity is that they can be implanted in to furniture and walls, and can also change colour, enabling lighting to be integrated into interior design. This is expected to give new ways of lighting our homes, making light bulbs and tube lights as obsolete as gramophone records.

For more information check out http://ledcity.org/ or the Phillips LED site http://www.lumileds.com/

 

Kindle

This November Amazon launched its e-reader, Kindle. The device allows readers to directly download e-books from the Amazon store through a wireless network, without requiring the services of a computer. It weighs around 300 grams, and uses an e-paper display, which, unlike a computer screen, has the look of actual paper. Though it is too early to say how things will finally turn out, some reviewers are claiming that Kindle will do to digital text, what the iPod did to digital music. The Kindle is not the only one of its kind, and there are other competitors, notably Sony PRS-505. But what makes the Kindle different is that not only can you use it to read books, but you can also buy and download e-books directly from the Amazon store with its wireless connection.

A promotional clip on the Kindle is available on the Amazon site here.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Yes, as you may have guessed it, this is the title of a book. And no, unlike the other books that I have mentioned in the past, I haven't read it. Not yet.

But that does not matter. For the purpose of this post is not to tell you about the content of the book, or discuss its literary value. The purpose of this post is to tell you about the superhuman effort it took to write it.

Jean-Dominique Bauby was a journalist and the editor of the French magazine ELLE. At the age of 43, on December 8, 1995, he suffered a massive stroke. When he woke up after 20 days, the stroke had left him mute and had paralysed his entire body. He could just move his head a bit, grunt and blink his left eyelid.

This entire book was written by Bauby by blinking his left eyelid. While someone dictated the entire alphabet, Bauby blinked his eyelid to choose a letter. This process required nearly two minutes to complete one word.

The book was published in French on March 6, 1997. Two days later Bauby died of heart failure.

To me this book represents the superhuman mental strength all of us have within ourselves. Bauby just had one eyelid to work with, but we have been blessed with so much. If we can bring his effort and motivation in whatever it is that we do, just imagine what we will be able to achieve. We shall pluck out the stars from the sky and crumble the moon to dust. That strength is in all of us. Believe it.

Storage

Increasingly, many of us have started to use our personal webmail accounts, such as Yahoo or Google, to exchange large files, because our official emails do not allocate to us the kind of space that the today's has humongous application files require. A number of us, who have to exchange large data files, are also increasingly using free file sharing services such as Pando or Rapidshare.

All of which points to a simple truth – online storage on the web is much cheaper, and sometimes virtually free, compared to local storage. So, over a period of time, will we progressively see people storing their data on the web, rather than on their local PCs? Only time will tell, but there are definitely signs which are pointing to that direction. The Wall Street Journal reports that Google is planning to come up with paid service, which will allow users to store their data online, so that it can be accessed from multiple computers and mobile devices. This of course will not be something unique, for there are other online providers who also have this service. But whereas with these services, for example Yahoo Briefcase, file transfer is a multistep process that needs clicking through multiple screens, the Google service, internally known as My Stuff, promises to make the process much simpler, by allowing file upload and access directly from the desktop, and by having the online storage act like just another hard disk.

Microsoft also has a service called Windows Live SkyDrive, which is currently free, and here's a quick list of a few other online storage providers too:

• Omnidrive.com : 1 GB free. 10-50 GB for $40-199 per year.
  
• Box.net: 1 GB free. 5-15 GB for $7.95-19.95 per month.
  
• Xdrive.com/AOL: 5 GB free. 50 GB for $9.95 per month.
  

Question : Once the data deserts the desktops and takes refuge online, will the applications follow suit too ? So what shape will future PC s take, if there is a place for PCs in the future? Hmm, time to think deeply I think.

Yotel

What happens when you apply the space saving designs of the business class of airlines and of luxury yachts to hotel rooms? Answer : You get an Yotel.

Currently available at only two airports in Britain and Netherlands, a Yotel is a set of cabins which passengers can hire on daily or hourly basis, if they have a long waitover period between connecting flights. The standard cabin, about 75 square feet in size, houses a bed, overhead storage (yes, just like flights), a fold away table, a flat panel TV, free internet connection and a bathroom with shower.

Go to www.yotel.com to take a virtual tour of a cabin.

The Yotel is proof enough that innovation is not necessarily invention. Borrow the ideas from one industry, apply it to another, and voila, you have innovation.