We need to learn quickly to keep up with the massive change around us so we don't get run over. We need to outrun change.
Lots of amazing things going on in the technology open frontier: military countermeasures to combat drones, registration requirement for small drones goes into effect today, and lots of federal agencies use cellphone spying technology.
12/14 – Space War – Venom could address UAV threat to ground forces –
Continue reading “Update on the wide open frontier of technology – 12/21”
There was lots of news yesterday about the House passing a budget that covers all federal operations for the 2016 fiscal year.
I will leave the heated political observations to others. They seem to all be having fun.
What I’ll focus on is several ways that the sausage-making legislative compromises affected some of the wide open frontiers I’m watching.
Export ban on crude oil
Continue reading “Government intervention can stop an industry or make the good times roll”
I previously mentioned the U.S. House and Senate had passed a bill which would allow private mining of asteroids. Ownership of the asteroids wouldn’t be allowed but a company extracting resources from asteroids would have lawful property rights to the material.
The law was signed – 11/26 – Space Daily – Pres. Obama signs bill recognizing asteroid resource property rights into law – The President signed the bill to allow companies to have ownership interest in resources mined from asteroids. Ownership of asteroids is not allowed, but what you mine you own.
Now for a completely different perspective:
11/27 – Gbenga Oduntan at Space Daily – Who owns space? US asteroid-mining act is dangerous and potentially illegal – Author asserts that activity in space “requires international regulation” which means the US Congress has no authority except to ratify international treaties.
Continue reading “Diverging opinions on the U.S. bill to allow asteroid mining.”
A few recent articles that fascinate me. Amazing things engineers can do. Pondering the lack of discretion from red-light revenue generators. Air Force use of civilians to pilot drones flying in combat zones.
10/20 – Link from Behind The Black – What the engineering wizards can figure out amazes this office-living accountant. Check out the huge machine that puts an entire bridge section in place.
Well, since I saw the video, the account has been closed. What it showed was a huge machine that advanced it self to the next pylon and pulled over the gap an entire bridge section and put it in place.
11/20 – Tymshft – Can robots issue citations? More importantly, can people issue citations? –
Continue reading “Update on the wide open frontier of technology – 12/3”
Two follow ups on the previous post about the great news last week on space exploration. Competition in bragging rights heats up. Guesses on the cost for the successful launch of a commercial satellite by Japan.
11/24 – Space.com – Billionaire Battle: Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk Square Off on Reusable-Rocket Test – The competition and bragging rights is definitely heating up. It looks to me like making the brags very narrow in scope means they can all be true.
Let’s walk through the brags in the article.
Continue reading “More great news on the open frontier of space exploration”
For a thumbnail overview of the radical reduction in time it takes to travel long distances over the last 500 years, look at the time to cross the Atlantic Ocean from Europe to America, provided by Robert Bryce in his book Smaller Faster Lighter Denser Cheaper: How Innovation Keeps Proving the Catastrophists Wrong.
Update – Another post on transatlantic crossings on October 1, 2018: Cost and time to cross the Atlantic has dropped by more than 90% in the last 500 years.
He points out at location 1582 of the Kindle edition: Continue reading “Time to cross the Atlantic – 500 year history”
Lots of fun news in the past week about the wide open frontier of space exploration. Three huge developments are:
What I describe in this post is the reason I am so wildly optimistic about the future. The astounding progress here stands in stark contrast to the foolishness and ridiculousness we see dominate the news every hour of every day.
The absolute best news:
11/24 – New York Post – The new space race is a private-sector affair – Editorial celebrates Blue Origin successfully recovering a first stage, SpaceX has already flown several resupply missions to the International Space Station, and Boeing & Virgin Galactic are also in the game.
The more competitors, the better.
First stages can be recovered after launch:
I am fascinated by the wide open frontiers in so many areas of life. We’re at the point where private enterprises are taking the lead in space exploration.
Here are several fascinating articles I’ve read recently on legislation to legalize space mining, how to colonize Mars, thumbsats (which are smaller than cubesats), and competition for launching GPS satellites.
Asteriod mining
11/13 – Jurist – Senate approved the bill to legalize space mining – Bill would be huge step in providing a legal framework for mining asteroids. This would not allow for ownership of asteroids, but would give a clear title to anyone who mined resources and removed them from the asteroid.
Continue reading “Updates on open frontier of private space exploration”
A few articles on the wide open frontier of drones: counter-measures and regulation.
9/16 – Sputnick News – Anti-Drone Defense System That Can Fight Micro-UAVs Revealed in London – A company reveals product which they claim can take over control of a drone and force it to land. They claim this is a scalable defensive tool which could be used to protect anything from a small group of people to a large military base.
Very cool.
My guess on the counter-counter measure? Encryption of the signal to the drone.
Nov ’15 – The Atlantic – Playing Defense Against the Drones – Long read on how people as varied as prison wardens, celebrity wedding planners, security firms protecting individuals, and gun clubs are responding to intrusive drones. Great background on where regulation stands in the US (minimal rules on amateurs, stringent rules on business use, and more rules to come).
Continue reading “Wide open frontier, drone edition – 10/27”
One of the most amazing open frontiers today is the ability of anyone to publish a book and get it on the market. If you have ever wanted to write a book and see in print, you can do so easily and oh so inexpensively. The wide open doors to opportunity are right in front of you.
Lots and lots of people are publishing. No longer are huge New York publishers an insurmountable barrier for unknown writers.
9/15 – The Arts Mechanical – How To Win the Battle and Lose the War – Huge battle last year was between Amazon and Hachette. Amazon wanted to deliver books at prices customers were willing to pay. Hachette wanted to price e-books far higher, near the same level as print.
Two federal law enforcement officers have now entered guilty pleas to charges they stole bitcoins from the Silk Road site while they were part of the investigation of the site.
Other articles on Silk Road and the we-don’t-have-to-say-allegedly corrupt federal agents can be seen on the tag worlds far away I will never visit.
The Department of Justice announced the second agent’s plea on August 31: Former Secret Service Agent Pleads Guilty To Money Laundering And Obstruction.
DoJ said the agent pled guilty to the two felony charges brought against him: Continue reading “Second federal agent pleads guilty to stealing bitcoins from Silk Road”
A few of many articles on drones that caught my eye: precision of military drone strikes and possible weaponization of drones by law enforcement in North Dakota.
The second and third articles I’ll mention have a visible bias and agenda. Do I also have multiple biases and agendas?
You better believe I do. Read any five consecutive blog posts and you will quickly see my point of view.
The difference between those articles and this blog is that I’m not pretending to be objective.
8/27 – Wall Street Journal – Hacker Killed by Drone Was ‘Secret Weapon’ – This cyberwar stuff is going kinetic.
A recurring theme in the history of military arms is that a counter-measure emerges for every new technological development. Then a counter to the counter.
7/23 – Wall Street Journal – Next Step for Drones: Defending Against Them / Antidrone defense systems are a rising new business as military, aviation concerns mount.
Today’s illustration of evolving counter-measures is from the WSJ article. Small drones are starting to cause disruption, such as the presence of a couple of drones halted firefighting airplanes and helicopters at a fire near my home recently.
Continue reading “As drones proliferate, next tech leap will be countermeasures”
A few articles on what’s going on in Bakken: tougher trafficking laws in effect, Williston Walmart no longer open 24 hours a day, $18 billion in state reserves, and new Williston airport moving forward.
7/8 – Bismarck Tribune – County okays windfarm near Tioga on a split vote – Landowners organized an effort to develop a wind farm which was bought by a commercial company. That effort has now led to a 75 turbine project that has been approved by County commissioners.
As a break from the depressing daily news headlines, consider the incremental steps to figure out how to mine the abundant resources on asteroids.
7/17 – Space.com – Asteroid Mining Company’s 1st Satellite Launches from Space Station – Planetary Resources had a small satellite launched from ISS. It was a three unit cubesat measuring 30 x 10 x 10 cm or 12” x 4” x 4”. This will test a variety of systems and techniques that will be needed to mine asteroids. Pulling water and mineral off asteroids is a huge step in expanded space exploration. After this 90 day experiment is over they will launch another cubesat later this year (12” x 8” x 8”) to test the next set of techniques.
Why water?
Continue reading “Wide open frontier, asteroid mining edition”