A Special Hell

According to Shepherd Book there is a place in the special hell specifically reserved for those monsters who talk in the theater.  This past Sunday I had the 'pleasure' of reminding a couple in their 30's that color commentary during a movie was not appreciated  (way to ruin The Shape of Water a**h****).  The question is can we use technology to help with this problem?  Obviusly!  Two solutions came to my mind
1.  Ultra directional speakers.  It is possible to use ultra high fequencies of sound to create the effective behavior of traditonal sound waves, but with greater control of where those sound waves are heard.  It could be possible to make a special theater sound system that dynamically alters the sound for all audience members.  So if someone decides that they need to talk about how hot it is that the lady is about to make out with the fish dude, the speakers will send them a polite reminder that no, no one wants to hear them talk.

2.  paint ball guns: a little bit more low tech, by comparison, but by using microphones and a paint ball gun on a turret, the movie theater could automatically blast guests who are making too much noise.  In the short term the shouting about being stung by a high velocity pellet would be slightly more distracting, but audience members are more likely to get the point if pain is involved.

Or, bare with me here, people could not talk during the movies, it isn't hard, all society asks is that for 2 hours, when you are at a movie theater, don't take out your phone and don't talk.  we will all be the better for it




Option 3
have a theater that has actual ushers manually enforce a no talking rule, this author would be happy to pay a bit extra to go to a theater where talking is actually penalized

black body cooling on venus

a personal question, considering the incredible heat you find on venus, could a narrow band black body thermal radiator similar to that being developed at Stanford (other people are probably doing the research but, this is the team I am both aware of and find when I do a quick search), be developed for the atmosphere of venus.  On a planet with an incredibly thick atmosphere that holds onto heat harder than an action star hanging off of a helicopter in a movie, are there parts of the electro-magentic spectrum, that one could successfully dump heat into the void of space.

Nanny Bots

The nanny bot system first came about as an augment tool for UN forces overseeing wartorn regions, a true 3rd party overseer the network of quadcopters and cameras could not only observe and report on the actions of people but could learn patterns, over time limited non lethal tools were added to the repetaiore

all over the world company's and national institutions started to emulate the nanny bot system,
traffic stops started to eliminate patrol cars, while there might be a human operator on the otherside to talk to drivers, passengers, no one was risked

As time went on more police departments gave way to these systems

.....

turns out this is roughly the plot of robocop sans evil corporation plot line


tattlebots,(combo of tattle and paparrazzi) they follow you around, while following the local laws keeping an eye on individuals who might be up to something sketchy, their recordings can only be used when something bad happens, the vehicle gets damaged it sprays DNA barcodes all over the place
for the US an alternative/augment to low grade criminal monitoring tools
for abroad, following suspected millatants in a region

Called it Nov 6 2017 (on semi-transparent solar panels on greenhouses)

Really cool news in the world of developing sustainable technologies.  The concept outlined in the blog post "Making Green Houses Pull Double Duty" has turned out to be an actual avenue of research.  Researchers at UC Santa Cruz have indicated that not only can greenhouses have a semitransparent solar panel on their exterior to produce electricity, the plants growing inside consume less water than their counter parts (not something suggested in the original post, just very exciting)  To learn more please go to this article on New Atlas or the UC Santa Cruz page.

also really grateful to know that the color for this paneling would be magenta, nice to know.  

It would be fun to imagine a future where smart glass panels allow for the growth of plants, control climate, produce power, and help to regulate the local temperature.  One question I have is can we make a smart glass that normally promotes plant growth, read magenta, but when needed turns optically transparent so to be more comfortable for people to hangout.

There should be a silent disco app

I like the idea of silent discos, people rocking out while there is no obvious source of why they're hacving a good time.  Really cool.  The downside of silent discos (not a big one, but hey this is an idea looking for a problem, not an elevator pitch) is that you need to check out a set of headphones to join in the fun, that's a lot of logistics.  What if instead, all you needed to join a silent disco was your smart phone, the headphones you usually wear, and an app.  Imagine a smart app that allows anyone to DJ for a given location, letting anyone nearby join in the fun at the push of a button.  No headphones to check out, no equipment that can get lost or stolen, well additional equipment.  (all participants are responsible for their own phones and headphones).  

The requirements of the app are pretty reasonable, a centralized platform that the app could log into to confirm what stations are plaing in a given location, an app that provides the ability for users to verify their location and a music service.  Realistically I would envision an extension on Spotify would be a reasonable approach.

Will your smart car end the monopoly of Airlines?

No, (but I wanted to have a catchy title, clarifications to follow)

When people talk about cutting edge technologies entering the mainstream the word disruptive gets thrown about way too frequently.  "How quantum computers will disrupt the world of encryption"  things of that nature.  For autonomous cars, the promise of a vehicle that needs no oversite of a human driver, the potential impacts are incredibly, traffic will no longer need to use tradtional traffic lights, cities can do away with the majority of their parking lots, the list goes on.  What has not recieved too much conversation, has been the impact on airports (well so far as this author has run into during casual updates on the tech sphere).

An autonous car means that flightstrips(the party responsible for this mistake has been slapped as a result of this mistake (1/31/17)) to locations 500 or so miles away are no longer as necessary, why spend the an hour inside of a plane, plus the hassle of security, when you can just queue up a destination in a sleeper car, and wake up 8 hours later at your target destination, on its own this will certainly change people's habits but it doesn't necessarily mean that airlines would be quaking in their boots.  Not everyone wants to try to sleep and drive.  An autonomous car, in tandem with smart planning software, and airlines that are willing to collaborate, that's got some real promise.  For someone based in a city Boston, a smart car means that they don't necessarily need to go to Logan for their flight to Bejing instead, they could commute to find the most optimal international airport.  The journey could  be seemless, computers can account for net travel time, you get picked up, driven to a target airport that minimizes how many hours you spend in layover (or at least optimizes the length of your layover).  Every trip a perfect balance of cost, convenience, and transit time.  This augmenting of travel would also mean that hub airports and regional airports would need to compete againts eachother potentially driving down costs, or at least minimizing congestion.

If you have any thoughts, suggestions, feedback, please let me know in the comments.

The future of the hotel mini-bar

As I fly out on my first work trip as a consultant a thought on the future of the hotel mini bar, which my employers have reminded me that I should not expect to be reimbursed for having a scotch from the minibar at the end of the day.  As the autonomous delivery by drone moves away from beta testing to real world uses the hotel industry is looking at losing another one of their revenue sources, think the internet making adult film rentals obsolete, or at least less likely (I’m not going to speak for other people’s media habits).  If I can request a burrito to be delivered to me by robot in 30 minutes or less why would I grab a snack bar from the mini-bar fridge?  For hotels, who ostensibly own the low-lying airspace directly above their property (I do not know the altitude limits so I am being vague), they can restrict which aircraft can make deliveries to their hotels.  Some hotels may choose to simply prevent all aerial deliveries, which is their right, but what about hotel franchises that want to be more engaged in the future of technology?  (In this authors opinion)

 Freemium drone delivery.

Hotels could treat drone delivery how companies approach app downloads.

Basic deliveries arrive at the front desk and can occur between 7 AM and 11 PM

*Free deliveries, you can only order a limited number of items from a vetted list of vendors, these can be picked up at vending machines at the end of the hallway.

Premium Direct, you room’s drone docking station is activated, aircraft are able to deposit items 24/7 and with complete discretion.

Concierge Diamond (or some marketing style name)  the drone works with remote concierge services to allowfor autonomous anonymous delivery of items that might not be normally delivered by drone.  This might include picking up dinner from a restaurant that doesn't actually do delivery. 

I hope you like the concept, if you have questions, thoughts suggestions feel free to reach out in the comments.

*as in you don’t know what kind of money was exchanged between the hotel and the 3^rd party seller