Blog

Alex at WorldChanging points to a Charlie Stross post on designing for the long term – Designing a Generation Ship.

Charlie Stross has a brilliant post up on his blog, taking up the question of how best to design the institutions to run “generation ships” — spacecraft designed to take large numbers of people a very long distance.

If you can crank yourself up to 1% of light-speed, alpha centauri is more than four and a half centuries away at cruising speed. To put it in perspective, that’s the same span of time that separates us from the Conquistadores and the Reformation; it’s twice the lifespan of the United States of America.

We humans are really bad at designing institutions that outlast the life expectancy of a single human being. The average democratically elected administration lasts 3-8 years; public corporations last 30 years; the Leninist project lasted 70 years (and went off the rails after a decade). The Catholic Church, the Japanese monarchy, and a few other institutions have lasted more than a millennium, but they’re all almost unrecognizably different.

Consumer capitalism along our current model simply won’t work as a way of running a long-duration generation ship (the failure modes are lethal and non-recoverable). Communism (or rather, Leninism) has a slightly better prospect, but is still a long way from optimal. Monarchism is just a pretty word for “hereditary dictatorship supported by military caste”. What are the alternatives? And what do we need to consider when designing a society that can survive for a 500-1000 year voyage in a bottle without exploding?

I’m skeptical of the possibility of deep space exploration and colonization anytime in the next couple centuries, but this is a pretty great gedanken experiment. The comments are pretty phenomenal as well.

The latest Law & Order spinoff will be set in the City of Angels.

During the Winter Television Critics Association Tour on Sunday, NBC programming chief Angela Bromstad announced that the network are having “very fluid” conversations with L&O creator Dick Wolf about introducing Law & Order: Los Angeles to the airwaves. NBC producers are currently working on hiring writers for a pilot.

Bromstad emphasized Law & Order: Los Angeles is still in very early stages. “We’re talking about writers,” she said about the franchise.

“Even if, for instance, ‘Law & Order’ the mothership, didn’t go beyond another couple of years, that way of telling stories is so unique that I actually think it could work in Los Angeles with a new look and a new cast,” she said.

Law & Order: LA would be the first series in the L&O franchise set outside New York.

“We officially call that LOLA,” Jeff Gaspin, NBC Television Entertainment Chairman added.

The NZ herald has an update on a tidal power plant proposed for New Zealand – Sea to provide power for 250,000 homes

A tidal power station on the Kaipara Harbour seafloor could be providing power to a quarter of a million homes by the end of the decade.

The Environment Court has made a positive recommendation to Conservation Minister Tim Groser on a plan to generate electricity from the harbour’s swift tidal flow. The approval is subject to fine-tuning of consent conditions.

Crest Energy plans to spend $600 million on sinking 200 tidal power turbines to the seabed of the harbour entrance, creating New Zealand’s first tide-driven power station. The project will start with 20 turbines.

Last month, Todd Energy said it was taking a 30 per cent stake in Crest, which aims to be fully operational within nine years generating 200MW of power, enough to supply 250,000 homes.

Ecogeek has a post on a sail powered cargo ship – Fossil Fuel Free Cargo Ship.

Cargo ships are a very efficient means of shipping cargo in terms of cost and energy per ton of freight moved. But the ships use some of the dirtiest fuel, and global shipping is responsible for 3-4% of all greenhouse gas emissions. So, while cleaning up ocean freight isn’t the sole solution to atmospheric greenhouse gasses, it’s an area that could stand some improvement.

One solution may come from B9 Energy, the largest independent operator of wind farms in the UK. B9 is now venturing into shipping with a carbon neutral cargo ship that is due to set sail in 2012. At only 3,000 tons, this ship will be considerably smaller than a typical bulk freighter, which tends to be in the range of 15,000 to 30,000 tons. But, unlike a typical freighter, it will be carbon neutral. 60% of the ship’s energy is to be provided by sails, just like the clipper ships of the 1800s. The remaining 40% of the ship’s energy will be provided by engines running on liquefied methane produced from biogas sources. If demand for biofuel outstips supply, the ship can also be run on liquefied natural gas.

The prototype vessel is expected to cost about $24.4 million. If the ship proves successful, as many as 50 more might be built.

Michael Schumacher’s preparations for the return to Formula One racing will begin sooner than everybody else’s, as the German will reportedly take the wheel of a GP2 machinery later this week for a maiden testing session at the Jerez circuit.

According to Switzerland’s Blick and Germany’s Bild publications, the International Automobile Federation already agreed to the test, which is likely to get off as early as tomorrow. The testing session will last for 3 days, a period of tim… (read more)

The American lineup of BMW 7 Series models will receive this year a very exciting addition, the Alpina B7, which is poised to become the "most dynamic 7 Series model" in the country.

The car features BMW’s 4.4l, all-aluminum V8 engine, tweaked by Alpina into developing a huge 500 hp and 700 Nm of torque. Enough to make the large sedan sprint from naught to sixty in 4.5 seconds and keep it accelerating to "virtually any speed."

The engine, boost… (read more)

Although Geely assured everyone that Volvo’s operations would remain untouched once the Swedish unit steps under its ownership, the company will actually suffer some slight changes. Mostly because it will become a more Chinese-oriented manufacturer, as Geely intends to build cars in its domestic market and even set up a new plant locally.

The most important question is whether people over the world would buy a Chinese-made Volvo, as some of the models produced in local plants fail… (read more)

For someone looking for work during an unsettled economy, Matthew Janes ’07 seems to be in a reasonably appealing position. Armed with a Stanford degree in symbolic systems and over a year of experience at Palo Alto tech company mSpot, Janes has the right credentials for a permanent programming job. He is even making some money during his job hunt by doing contract Web design work.

But Janes and other work-seeking graduates overwhelmingly absorbed with finding post-college work are also dealing with another issue: the fact that they often lack standard health care coverage during the job search process.

Stanford requires every enrolled student to have health insurance–an “individual mandate” in health care parlance. If a student is not covered under an outside plan (usually his or her parents’), the student must purchase Cardinal Care, the University-run health insurance plan, for a premium of $800 per quarter.

This ensures that Stanford students have health coverage through their education. However, neither Cardinal Care nor nearly every parental health plan is available to Stanford alumni after their graduation.

Many companies offer group health plans to their employees, but when a graduate wants to freelance or work at a start-up or a small company that does not offer insurance–or when work is scarce in a down economy–this makes the months and years after graduation perilous from a health insurance standpoint.

The United States Census Bureau estimates that 15.4 percent of the population was without health insurance in 2008. Of those 46 million people, over half are between age 18 and 34. Young alumni are in the age group most likely to be uninsured.

Most of those interviewed by The Daily try to solve the problem of insurance by purchasing high-deductible emergency health plans. Bryan Schell ’07 gets a basic level of coverage from this type of plan as he works an unpaid internship at the United Nations Refugee Agency in Washington, D.C. He hopes the internship will open doors for future employment (and health coverage), but for the moment he can only afford a basic plan on his own.

Under Schell’s plan, the insurance company pays for expenses after the first $1,000, so it doesn’t help with check-ups and prescriptions. In the event of a major accident, though, Schell would have help with the ensuing costs.

“I’m young and I don’t have any health problems, so it’s ideal for me,” said Schell, who is paying rent out of savings and small earnings from a part-time job.

But underinsurance can be almost as big a problem as being uninsured. The Census does not project the number of underinsured people, but a post-college emergency plan, which may be the only option available to an alum seeking work, is sometimes just not enough coverage.

Janes understands this better than most. While searching for an employer–and a health plan to replace Cardinal Care, the insurance he got as a dependent of his parents and mSpot’s group health plan–he enrolled in a high-deductible plan. It is, according to him, for “car crashes and chainsaw accidents.”

The plan barely helps with prescription costs, a pressing matter for Janes because he has Type 1 diabetes. Insulin and testing strips cost him $200 to $300 per month now, compared to $25 to $50 when he was on Cardinal Care. He has started to skimp on testing strips, resulting in occasionally erratic blood sugar levels, and is now searching for employer-based health insurance as much as for a job now.

“I’ve had to cut back on a lot of medical care I’d been getting,” Janes said. “A group health plan to me is worth over $1,000 a month on top of a salary.”

Janes is watching the progression of health care reform in Congress with a particularly critical eye; among the provisions in the House and Senate bills that have both passed is one that allows children to remain on their parents’ health plans through age 26, instead of getting kicked off during or after college. Janes, 25, would appreciate that more comprehensive coverage as he looks for employment.

“That would mean huge savings for me and much better medical care than I’ve been getting,” he said.

Through awareness of the recession and the congressional health care debate, Stanford students are becoming more conscious of the health insurance trouble their demographic group steps into after leaving the University. But the search for a job, even one that does not offer insurance, outweighs other considerations. In the minds of most Stanford students looking for something to do with their lives, it appears that the job comes first, and health care comes second…or not at all.

Lance Choy, director of Stanford’s Career Development Center, says that in all of his career counseling, he cannot remember getting a question about health insurance from a student.

“It just doesn’t come up,” Choy said. “Sometimes they ask about retirement, but I don’t think a lot of students think about health insurance much in their 20s unless they’ve got some sort of preexisting condition.”

Seniors tend to be the most concerned with the prospect of finding health insurance in the outside world. Tommy Tobin ’10 was one of a handful of interviewees who expressed concern about his health insurance situation after graduation. However, it was clear which was more important to him.

“Work is a bigger concern,” Tobin said.

Lindsey Smith ’10 was also anxious about health insurance post-college. She said a lack of health benefits in one job could end up being a deciding factor if she were to choose between offers. But if employer-based health benefits were scarce, her answer was the same as everyone else’s: she would take any job she could get regardless of the insurance situation.

“I would take [a job without benefits] if I didn’t have other options for employment,” she said.

For students who are further from leaving the “Stanford bubble,” the question of health coverage is further from their minds.

“I’ve thought about what I want to do and where I want to go, but I haven’t considered that [health care coverage] very much,” said sophomore Colin Gray.

“I’m still on my family health plan,” said Eric Miller ’12. He has kept abreast of the debate over health care reform, but said that on a personal level, it hasn’t greatly impacted him.

“I’m focusing on my classes for now,” he said.

At last week’s CES event, German carmaker Audi took the opportunity and revealed that all 2010 Audi models will be equipped with the third-generation multimedia interface system from NVIDIA. The decision was taken in order to keep up with the innovations of the tech world, significantly greater than the ones made in the automotive industry.

Luxury car consumers increasingly expect crisp and intuitive navigation systems, said Johan de Nysschen, President, Audi of America. That requ… (read more)

Eco Factor: Home automation system designed to minimize energy consumption.

Intel has unveiled its latest Home Automation System that runs on the company’s energy-efficient Atom processor and features a large 11” touch-sensitive OLED display. The OLED panel is expected to be developed by Sony.

(more…)

BRIAN HOWALD/The Stanford Daily

Say “Aloha” to Stanford’s new Earth Systems in Hawaii program.

Next fall, 20 students will be able to take an environmentally-focused quarter-long program in Hawaii that merges earth sciences, life sciences and Hawaiian culture. The School of Earth Sciences and Woods Institute for the Environment unveiled the Hawaii program for fall quarter 2010 in an e-mail to the Earth Systems mailing list last week.

The Hawaii program is the brainchild of Peter Vitousek, a senior fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment. Vitousek was born and raised in Hawaii and focused most of his academic research on the Pacific chain of islands. He pushed for a permanent Hawaiian outpost after seeing the high demand for several seminar trips to Hawaii he headed a few years ago.

“My trips were popular and the Australia program is always way oversubscribed, so I think that the Hawaii program will be a great opportunity for people interested in the earth sciences,” Vitousek said.

There has been a boom in earth systems enrollment in the past years and Vitousek says that while earth sciences students can choose from Bing’s Australia program, Stanford at Sea and field opportunities at the Hopkins Marine station, “there are never enough options.”

Stanford’s Hawaii program was partially funded by a generous donation from Julie Wrigley, a sustainability and environmental philanthropist, to provide students with field experience in sustainability research. The earth sciences and Woods Institute for the Environment carried the remainder of the cost, which field program coordinator Max Borella described as a “significant investment” on Stanford’s end.

The 20 students who will be accepted into the 10-week class will leapfrog around the Big Island of Hawaii for eight weeks and end with a two-week stay on Kauai. The program will offer three classes: Hawaiian Earth Sciences, Life Sciences and Human Systems and a three-unit independent research project.

Students will begin the program at Volcanoes National Park–the home of two of the world’s most active volcanoes–where they will stay at a military R&R (rest and relaxation) camp to study the volcanic processes and erosion. The group will then move to the northern end of the Big Island for about four weeks to a house owned by a boarding school to do terrestrial and marine work, looking especially at rainforests and coral reefs. Their work will conclude at the island of Kauai where they will stay in a field station–a place Borella calls the “Grand Canyon of Hawaii”–with a week-long final stop at a YMCA camp on the north shore of Kauai.

“One thing I’ve found working in Hawaii is that it’s a great model. You have most tropics and climate zones present in one area,” Vitousek said. “There are lava flows that are millions of years old,–spectacular gradients in climate and age of soils. From a biophysical standpoint, you just can’t beat it.”

According to Vitousek, the Hawaiian islands are a microcosm of sustainability adaptation: native Hawaiians managed to create an agricultural infrastructure on completely cut-off land without the help of things like container ships.

“Hawaii’s the perfect place to tackle the question of how you build a sustainable society in complete isolation,” Vitousek said. “Hundreds of yeas ago, Hawaiians had to think about issues of global sustainability. They faced and met those challenges. We’re facing some of the same issues today so it’s interesting to see how they approached it.”

Borella says that logistically, the program is “essentially ready to go” and his team is working to iron out administrative details like synchronizing the course curriculum so that classes are properly cross-listed under the biology, anthropology and earth sciences departments.

Borella stressed that the Hawaii program will be more integrated than many other seminars, interweaving the program’s anthropological, cultural and biological components.

“We don’t want the courses to be discreet modules that operate independently,” Borella said. “Each course component–from the ecologists to the soil scientists to the anthropologists–will be connected in a comprehensive way.”

“What I most love about the program is the student interaction,” said Borella, who came from the non-profit sector before settling at Stanford. “This is going to be an experiential, hands-on program that really resonates with students who want to learn about Hawaii.”

Jess McNally, a co-terminal student in earth systems and head TA for the program, did both Stanford at Sea and Stanford in Australia to study biology and global change. She said that the Hawaii program is ideal for students interested in evolutionary ecology and biology.

“The earth systems program is growing so rapidly so it’s exciting that there’s another option. The demand is definitely there,” McNally said. “Plus, Hawaii’s a fascinating place to investigate both cultural history and environmental history.”

Johnny Bartz ’10, a student advisor in the earth systems program, agrees that the program appears promising.

“It’s great to be able to get that hands-on experience and go out into the field and do research,” Bartz said. “The Hawaii program sounds like it’s being designed by a lot of faculty interested in ecology and biology and could be an opportunity for students to epitomize their passion for field work.”

For more information on the Hawaii Earth Systems program, check out the public information session on Feb. 8 at 12:30 p.m. in Y2E2.

We were recently discussing how the idea of “officially licensed” gear for professional sports teams is a relatively new phenomenon. In the past, anyone could produce gear for fans. However, there’s a Supreme Court case looking at this issue, involving the NFL’s exclusive license deal with Reebok, and reader Fitz points us to a quite well argued op-ed by New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees explaining the harm that such exclusive deals do, noting that it seems like a clear violation of antitrust rules, in that all of the different NFL teams are effectively teaming up to exclude competition:

The NFL originally won the case because the lower courts decided that, when it comes to marketing hats and gear, the 32 teams in the league act like one big company, a “single entity,” and such an entity can’t illegally conspire with itself to restrain trade. The NFL-Reebok deal is worth a lot of money, and fans pay for it: If you want to show support for your team by buying an official hat, it now costs $10 more than before the exclusive arrangement.

Amazingly, after the NFL won the case, it asked the Supreme Court to dramatically expand the ruling and determine that the teams act as a single entity not only for marketing hats and gear, but for pretty much everything the league does. It was an odd request — as if I asked an official to review an 80-yard pass of mine that had already been ruled a touchdown. The notion that the teams function as a single entity is absurd; the 32 organizations composing the NFL and the business people who run them compete with unrelenting intensity for players, coaches and, most of all, the loyalty of fans.

Brees rips apart that argument by noting the competition he, himself, faced as a free agent — a right that players only got after a series of court battles. This isn’t a huge surprise. Like plenty of other businesses, sports leagues have a keen understanding of what monopoly rents are, and do everything possible to profit from them.

Permalink | Comments | Email This Story

Al Ahram Weekly (Ahmed Abu Ghazala)

With a story behind every tomb, there is more to Cairo’s cemeteries than meets the eye, says Ahmed Abu Ghazala

Egypt’s history is packed with figures who have affected the country’s history in different ways, and perhaps the best way to remember them and their accomplishments is to visit their tombs. A visit to Cairo’s cemeteries makes a fascinating day out, these being constructed in a style different from that of any other cemetery in the world today.

The Al-Ghafeer (guard) cemetery in Cairo is famous for hosting the tombs of many of Egypt’s former royal family, though these are sometimes not well kept. On the cemetery walls, a banner proclaims the names of Mohamed Ibrahim Suleiman and Heidar El-Boghdadi, the MPs who represent the area in parliament, and inside there is the richly decorated tomb of Princess Shwikar, first wife of King Fouad.

However, negligence has blackened the stone, the tomb lies in the middle of a square that is often full of traffic, and a stray dog lives inside the tomb with those who take care of it.

Elsewhere in the cemetery there is the tomb of Queen Nariman, the last queen of Egypt, wife of King Farouk, and mother of the last king, Ahmed Fouad.

Egyptology News Blog, Andie Byrnes

Chocolate firm Ferrero has moved a step closer to joining the Cadbury bidding war after lining up a loan that could be used to back an offer, it was reported today.

Ferrero, which makes Ferrero Rocher and Kinder chocolate eggs, has discussed a $4.5bn loan with Italian bank Mediobanca, according to The Times in England.

Cadbury is currently the subject of a hostile bid from US firm Kraft and shareholders have until February 2 to accept its offer valuing the British confectioner at 764p a share, or €11.6bn.

Ferrero, which has already revealed a possible interest in a bid, is thought to be more likely to join forces with another bidder – possibly US chocolate firm Hershey – to try and rival the Kraft bid.

The difficulties of negotiating a partnership with another company and lining up funding are understood to have dampened enthusiasm for a rival offer, but the details of Ferrero’s loan indicates it is still possible.

According to The Times, which cites local reports in Italy, Ferrero had still not made up its mind about whether or not to throw its hat into the ring.

The number of potential bidders for Cadbury has dwindled recently after KitKat firm Nestle ruled out a counter-bid.

Cadbury has fought vehemently against the Kraft attempt for months, dismissing the offer as “derisory” and urging shareholders to support the company as an independent entity.

This week the Dairy Milk maker will publish trading figures showing strong sales for 2009, as it looks to convince investors of the firm’s strength.

Its last defence document saw it up long-term performance targets and issue higher profit margins guidance.

Kraft has until January 19 to decide whether to raise its bid further and an offer of more than 800p is thought to have more of a chance of enticing Cadbury shareholders.

But the Dairylea and Toblerone firm would need the support of Warren Buffett, whose Omaha-based Berkshire Hathaway investment vehicle owns almost 10% of Kraft, to up its offer.

Mr Buffet has already warned Kraft not to overpay for Cadbury and last week said shareholders should not be asked to write a “blank cheque” by issuing 370 million new Kraft shares to finance the bid.

Share Investor Links

Share Investor Blog – Stockmarket & Business commentary
Share Investor New Zealand Business News– Get more business news
Discuss this topic @ Share Investor Forum – Register free
Share Investor’s Daily Forex Updates

Recommended Amazon Reading

	Security Analysis: Sixth Edition, Foreword by Warren Buffett (Security Analysis Prior Editions) by Benjamin Graham Buy new: $47.25 / Used from: $46.96 Usually ships in 9 to 11 days
	The Four Filters Invention of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger by Bud Labitan Buy new: $33.25 / Used from: $43.89 Usually ships in 24 hours

Mozilla finally got around to launching the release candidate version of the latest Firefox 3.6. The first big update after 3.5 was scheduled to be released in Q4 2009 but, as usually the case at Mozilla, it got pushed back and looks set to be coming sometime this month. In theory, the RC1 version could be identical to the final build, th… (read more)