Collaborative Platforms in the era of Vista – p2p and RF-ID

When we think of collaborative platforms probably the first idea that pops-up in our brain is that old fashion repository that came from the ftp dark ages. This image reflects nothing more than our perception of an unfilled promise. Collaborative Platforms were supposed to allow us to work in a distributed, asynchronous way, enhancing our capacities, when the reality is that they allow us to share files and in some cases to conduct meetings. That’s a long way … between expectations and reality. If we just think for a minute in the image that we portrayed before, we’ll immediately notice two main characteristics:  We think of collaborative platforms in terms of the big meetings that are going to change the world (or at least try to …).  When we say collaborative we only think of humans. What if it was not so? For the shake of the example let’s talk for a second about a new collaborative tool in Windows Vista and to fit it better in the discussion we will frame it in a particular scenario. Imagine a doctor entering with a tablet PC to a patients’ room. Immediately the tablet pc recognizes the presence of instruments in the room (via web services and establishing a p2p network through wifi with them) and other doctors. He also grants permission to the other “entities” to see and interact with him. In the tablet pc he can watch data coming through the instruments, merge it and ask for historical data old files, etc… directly to the instrument. Also he can interact with the other humans and share data and drawings with them like in a word pad. With this simple scenario we have recreated two elements of possibly new Collaborative working environments:  A mixture of people and objects that seamlessly interact.  Collaborative Environments build ad hoc for trivial, let’s say mundane task that require complex interactions dealing with tacit knowledge in contrast to purely transactional. Let’s go one step further – what about if instead of complex devices with some capacity for interaction we had simple RF-ID tags where the interaction capacity is restricted mainly to information selection? Like with innovation, besides the big new things we have a enormous number of small simple innovations that incrementally are improving products and organizations. In collaboration we have the same, besides the big board meetings, there are a lot of complex interactions that are being carried out constantly were collaborative environments can make a difference and where objects and not only humans are going to play a significant role. >> By the way if you want to see the original Windows Vista application … just click here http://news.com.com/1607-2_3-6032382-2.asx?PSDir=null&videoName=6n0127vistademo3last&NumClips=1

Collaborative Platforms > Vista – p2p and RF-ID

When we think of collaborative platforms probably the first idea that pops-up in our brain is that old fashion repository that came from the ftp dark ages. This image reflects nothing more than our perception of an unfilled promise. Collaborative Platforms were supposed to allow us to work in a distributed, asynchronous way, enhancing our capacities, when the reality is that they allow us to share files and in some cases to conduct meetings. That’s a long way … between expectations and reality. If we just think for a minute in the image that we portrayed before, we’ll immediately notice two main characteristics:

• We think of collaborative platforms in terms of the big meetings that are going to change the world (or at least try to …).
• When we say collaborative we only think of humans.

What if it was not so? For the shake of the example let’s talk for a second about a new collaborative tool in Windows Vista and to fit it better in the discussion we will frame it in a particular scenario. Imagine a doctor entering a patients’ room with a tablet PC. Immediately the tablet pc recognizes the presence of instruments in the room (via web services and establishing a p2p network through wifi with them) and other doctors. He also grants permission to the other “entities” to see and interact with him. In the tablet pc he can watch data coming through the instruments, merge it and ask for historical data old files, etc… directly to the instrument. Also he can interact with the other humans and share data and drawings with them like in a word pad. With this simple scenario we have recreated two elements of possibly new Collaborative working environments:

• A mixture of people and objects that seamlessly interact.
• Collaborative Environments build ad hoc for trivial, let’s say mundane task that require complex interactions dealing with tacit knowledge in contrast to purely transactional.

Let’s go one step further – what about if instead of complex devices with some capacity for interaction we had simple RF-ID tags where the interaction capacity is restricted mainly to information selection? Like with innovation, besides the big new things we have a enormous number of small simple innovations that incrementally are improving products and organizations. In collaboration we have the same, besides the big board meetings, there are a lot of complex interactions that are being carried out constantly were collaborative environments can make a difference and where objects and not only humans are going to play a significant role.

Vista - interaction Capabilities + p2p

Here we can see a very nice example of the new interactive capabilities of Windows Vista in a p2p application setting.

The scenario is a hospital, a doctor equiped with a tablet pc enters a patient room and immediatley connects to the data in the room in a p2p setting. Then he can watch and interact with all the patients' data in real time.

The applicacion is done in xaml - the new MS flex/flash competitor - and the beaty resides in that is only grouping controls and indicating where the web service data source resides. All drag and drop or graphic merging functionality is done by the windows engine and is not specified in code.

The way a p2p network can be used to connect to web services relating to devices or people nearby is also a very nice idea that will for sure be exploited in many ways: Interactive Marketing, Collaborative Meetings, Classrooms, etc...

Miriam - Master Thesis

Today Miriam presented her Master Thesis. I co-advised the thesis with Ramon Sanguesa. Well I cannot be more happy, she got a 9.5 out of 10 (the maximum grade for Master Thesis in UPC-FIB - no 10's ... sorry ) and a proposal for honors (that I hope will be granted!!!).

The subject is agent assisted viral diffusion with emphasis on Marketing application. We built on the work of Pedro Domingos and contribute to improve it a little bit.

Today is a Happy Day!!!!!

Well done Miriam!!!

Sony killed the Aibo :-((

Sony announced his plans to kill Aibo and Qrio by the end of the year.

No more Aibos :(((((((

But the existing ones will live ....... and prosper!!!!

Ya no son 6 grados -- ahora sólo 4.6!!!

Parece que finalmente si tenemos datos sobre el impacto de Internet en temas de conectividat. Los 6 grados de separación de Milgram ... han bajado a 4.6 !! Aún considerando que el estudio puede ser cuestionable en algunos aspectos, algunos de los resultados si evidencian con claridad el impacto de las nuevas tecnologias.

Intel - 45 nanos technology - Moore Law and the Star Wars Program

Intel just showed his test chips using 45 nanos technology. Just to put things into perspective, AMD won't produce chips using Intel's current 65 nanos technology until the second half of this year. This clearly shows Intel leadership in the technology front. Intel has used in the past is leadership in technology to offset AMD's performance advances in chip architecture and will probably continue to do so in the future. With 45 nanos you can put 1billion transistors or 153Mb of memory where in 2000 with the 130- nanometer process you could fit only 18Mb. After the 45 nanometer process, the 32 will come and after the 22 --- and with the 22 nanometer a new technology will be necessary, it is called Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography – EUV for short … which was developed in … the Star War program of the post cold war era. One more example of synergies between civil and defense industries …

We europeans can critize these examples as much as we want, but they show the capacity of a country for pulling together and take real advantage of research, even if fields are ... let's say remote. We are doing the same thing in Airbus ... but still we have a long way to go!

Enrique Dans y Air Europa

Lamentable como se ha portado Air Europa con Enrique Dans. Pero ¿cómo se os ocurre tratar así a la gente, a vuestros clientes !!! ? Parece que os toca mejorar un montón si quereis que volemos con vosotros !!!!!! A mi me parece que lo mínimo que se merece es una disculpa pública ....

Kartoo

Kartoo is a frech company specialized in graphical visualization of complex information environments. Small in size but very big in ideas and expertise !!!

Kartoo and UPC-KEGML collaborate in an European Project that aims to bring innovation management to new levels -- we travel unchartted seas ...

Kartoo, located in Clemont-Ferrand, is about to release new products and tomorrow I will have the opportunity to see a glimpse of them (thanks Patrick!!!) in a private presentation to Albert at INSEAD (thanks Albert !!!).

For what I know ... they could be one of the best solutions for visualizing complex networks of people and expertise (maybe just the best ...). But I still have to wait a few hours ...

Is really nice to see how small european companies are able to compete head to head to much bigger american companies !!!!

LivePlasma y el NYTimes

Liveplasma es una compañia americana que produce software para visualización. Hoy apareció uno de sus gráficos sobre sistemas de recomendación en un artículo en el NYTimes. Resultado, sus encantadoras visualizaciones y su web site que funcionaban perfectamente esta mañana ... han dejado de funcionar!! Un buen ejemplo de como usar el NYTimes para acabar con sitios web!! :-) [de Albert]

Memorias NAND y Notebooks

Hoy CNET publica una muy interesante entrevista con Steve Appleton sobre el futuro de las memorias NAND y su uso en notebooks. Más que desvelar algo nuevo el CEO de Micron nos da una idea de plazos: 5-6 años para un notebook con memoria flash de 30-40GB en vez de disco - lo que usando la tecnologia actual significaria entre 12 y 20 horas de bateria y 50 nanos de acceso en vez de los 10-12 ms actuales!! Ah ---- y una carga casi instantánea del Sistema Operativo :-) no más esperas!

Memorias NAND y Notebooks

Hoy CNET publica una muy interesante entrevista con Steve Appleton sobre el futuro de las memorias NAND y su uso en notebooks. Más que desvelar algo nuevo el CEO de Micron nos da una idea de plazos: 5-6 años para un notebook con memoria flash de 30-40GB en vez de disco - lo que usando la tecnologia actual significaria entre 12 y 20 horas de bateria y 50 nanos de acceso en vez de los 10-12 ms actuales!! Ah ---- y una carga casi instantánea del Sistema Operativo :-) no más esperas!

MS - Alchemy y Elixir

Los de MS de vez en cuando te dan alguna que otra sorpresa!! Han liberado los proyectos Alchemy y Elixir :-) Un muy bonito ejemplo (gratis y libre) de como consolidar en Outlook información proveniente de un CRM (Siebel) y de aplicaciones de gestión usando Web Services !!! Si estés en esta situación y eres una empresa comercial no lo desaproveches !!! Por una vez bueno -bonito y gratis!!!

SED está aquí

Ha sido un largo camino, recuerdo que se empezaron a hablar de los monitores ED hace casi 10 años (FED en esa época), que empresas americanas abandonaron la tecnología después de años de inversiones, ahora Canon y Toshiba ya tienen los primeros prototipos y van a sacar los primeros televisores/monitores SED (surface-conduction emision display) el año que viene. Basicamente se trata de disponer de un haz de electrones por pixel, con lo que se consigue que el televisor sea plano y al mismo tiempo un contraste inigualable - si un lcd o un plasma llegan con dificultades a 1000:1, un sed consigue 100.000:1. La calidad de la experiencia es muy importante en temas como video-conferencia o compra por ordenador, donde parece necesario que la calidad de imagen se acerque a las posibilidades de nuestros ojos. Describen la experiencia - los que los han visto - como táctil, además consumen 1/3 menos que un plasma y son más baratos de producir en masa. SED es sin duda, la tecnologia que está destinada a dominar toda una época de monitores!!

Video – IP and the Value Chain

If something got quite clear these days at CES was that TV and in general what we call media content is going to be IP and is going to be on-demand. The final argument for those, shrinking in number, of remaining skeptics that insist against all odds to promote other platforms ( TDT for example) was the announcements of Yahoo, Google and Intel. Google partnered initially with CBS and NBA to sell video content on demand of their most popular programs/matches. Yahoo got a similar agreement and Intel is partnering with clickstart to produce and distribute big ticket movies through Internet. Of course it would take us a while to get the 6Mb that high quality video content requires and to get our TV sets connected to the Internet and so … but is clear that the path is being laid out and is Internet in all its variations: wifi, wimax, dsl, etc.. From the consumer point of view that means quite a lot, instead of 10-20 channels in Europe or 100-200 in States will have 100,000 or Millions. Instead of being tied to certain hours for watching our favorite programs or movies, they will be on-demand and instead of choosing from a very limited set of options – they will be almost unlimited. But for the industry that will mean a lot too!! The whole role of distribution is going to change, new distributors like Google or Yahoo are coming to the market and content producers will be able to access them directly. Also distribution cost will go down to a level that will be almost for free for small producers. So an explosion of contents – same as blogging – will be on the net. All that is going to impact the whole value chain of an industry and many of our habits. Once again a technological advancement changes the whole economic picture. For clues of things to come in the future just take a look at myspace and instead of music – put videos!! But besides all that – I’d like to mention two effects that probably are more long than short term and will shape more the generations to come than ourselves. The first one is globalization of contents, contents produced in any place of the world will be able to be watched anywhere without any additional cost. This has many implications, among them that people will most likely produce for bigger audiences with all the implications that this could have for small languages or closed cultures. The second phenomena is control by governments or economic regional powers. It will be increasingly difficult to control information for any economical or political power or to convince the population of maintaining certain type of status that confronts general realities. So – who said that was about tv or movies? As always change-danger and opportunity come together!!

Video – IP and the Value Chain

If something got quite clear these days at CES was that TV and in general what we call media content is going to be IP and is going to be on-demand. The final argument for those, shrinking in number, of remaining skeptics that insist against all odds to promote other platforms ( TDT for example) was the announcements of Yahoo, Google and Intel. Google partnered initially with CBS and NBA to sell video content on demand of their most popular programs/matches. Yahoo got a similar agreement and Intel is partnering with clickstart to produce and distribute big ticket movies through Internet. Of course it would take us a while to get the 6Mb that high quality video content requires and to get our TV sets connected to the Internet and so … but is clear that the path is being laid out and is Internet in all its variations: wifi, wimax, dsl, etc.. From the consumer point of view that means quite a lot, instead of 10-20 channels in Europe or 100-200 in States will have 100,000 or Millions. Instead of being tied to certain hours for watching our favorite programs or movies, they will be on-demand and instead of choosing from a very limited set of options – they will be almost unlimited. But for the industry that will mean a lot too!! The whole role of distribution is going to change, new distributors like Google or Yahoo are coming to the market and content producers will be able to access them directly. Also distribution cost will go down to a level that will be almost for free for small producers. So an explosion of contents – same as blogging – will be on the net. All that is going to impact the whole value chain of an industry and many of our habits. Once again a technological advancement changes the whole economic picture. For clues of things to come in the future just take a look at myspace and instead of music – put videos!! But besides all that – I’d like to mention two effects that probably are more long than short term and will shape more the generations to come than ourselves. The first one is globalization of contents, contents produced in any place of the world will be able to be watched anywhere without any additional cost. This has many implications, among them that people will most likely produce for bigger audiences with all the implications that this could have for small languages or closed cultures. The second phenomena is control by governments or economic regional powers. It will be increasingly difficult to control information for any economical or political power or to convince the population of maintaining certain type of status that confronts general realities. So – who said that was about tv or movies? As always change-danger and opportunity come together!!

Video on Demand - Google y Yahoo

Finalmente el anuncio de Google en el CES era Google Video on Demand. Por $1.99 episodios de series y por $3.99 partidos de la NBA. Van a abrir el tema no sólo a productoras sinó también a independientes. Igual tenemos el pròximo myspace pero en video! Yahoo ha lanzado un servicio algo similar pero más restringido. ¿Son estas las nuevas cadenas de TV? ¿Es ésta la TV del futuro? Probablemente SI! Probablemente este es el principio del Video y TV bajo demanda a gran escala!!

Ciudades inalámbricas

"Estamos en el año 2006 después de Jesucristo. Todo el mundo está plagado de ciudades con acceso a Internet a través de redes inalámbricas... ¿Todo? ¡No! Una ciudad, Madrid, capital de un reino poblado por irreductibles españoles, resiste. todavía y como siempre, al invasor. Y la vida no es fácil..." --> No he podido evitar reproducir el post de hoy de Enrique Dans - Un post magnifico !!! Si gracias a las políticas de los sucesivos gobiernos y a una CMT que se ha olvidado que debe servir a los ciudadanos y no a los intereses de determinadas empresas ---- así nos luce el pelo !!!!

CES - Windows Vista y el mundo digital

Dos muy interesantes demostraciones en CES hoy - todos esperamos el posible anuncio de Google mañana .... - una sobre Windows Vista y la otra sobre el mundo digital del futuro por Bill Gates. Windows Vista presenta interesantes mejoras en el user interface que haran que por primera vez los entornos más habituales hagan uso de las capacidades que poseen las targetas gráficas actuales. Hecho en falta elementos grupales de comunicación y compartición de la información ... pero otros los pondran ... Ciertamente será un año interesante!!!!