Author: m1k3y

new-aesthetic:

From 2008: the Google logo on the Delta II Launch vehicle putting the GeoEye-1 earth observation satellite into orbit. Google has exclusive rights to use the satellite’s imagery in online mapping projects.

Even though the GeoEye-1 satellite sports a colorful Google sticker, its key customer is actually not Google but rather the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, a U.S. government agency that analyzes imagery in support of national security. The NGA is paying for half of the development of the $502 million satellite and has committed to purchasing imagery from it. Google is GeoEye’s second major partner.

“This is the opposite of a spy satellite,” Brender [Geo-Eye CEO] said in a phone interview. “Spies don’t put info on the internet and sell imagery. We’re an Earth-imaging satellite, and we can sell our imagery to customers around the world who have a need to map and measure and monitor things on the ground.”

Google’s Super Satellite – Wired Science

Read more

theatlantic:

China’s Newest Market Opportunity: Pollution Control

It’s a rare “blue sky” day in Beijing. The city is bathed in a beautiful late-afternoon light—the kind that makes people rush outside just to enjoy it. But rather than bask in the weather, a small group of expats and Chinese locals have instead chosen to hole themselves up in a café.

With screwdrivers in hand, the group hacks away at cheap blue plastic fans. A moment later, they strap onto the fans’ standard issue HEPA filters, gauze-like panels that are as white as bridal veils. In less than five minutes—and for less than $30—they’ve managed to construct an air purifier that the instructor of this DIY workshop claims is just as effective as professional models selling for thousands of dollars.

One of the workshop’s participants, a 27-year old PHD student named Gu Yaobao, is particularly pleased with his new machine. “I don’t understand why the professional purifiers have to be so expensive,” he says. “I’ve only seen them being sold in the last few years. Before, I had no idea about the effects of pollution on my body. Now I hear about it on the news, all these respiratory diseases it can cause, so I’ve bought plants, facemasks, everything.”

The Chinese government recently announced that it will invest $275 billion—an amount equivalent to Hong Kong’s GDP—over the next five years to combat air pollution. But many in China aren’t prepared to wait, and are taking matters into their own hands.

Read more. [Image: Kim Kyung-Moon/Reuters]

Read more

As large as Ceres is, its distance has made it a challenge to study from Earth. Images taken by the space-based Hubble Space Telescope provided some insight to its surface, but to be sighted, features could be no larger than 25 kilometers in diameter. Several round circular spots mar the terrain, features which Schmidt said could be any one of a number of geologic terrains, including potentially impact basins or chaos terrains similar to those found on Europa. The largest of these, named Piazzi in honor of the dwarf planet’s discoverer, has a diameter of about 250 kilometers.

Read more

NF005 Robolabour

napkinfutures: “The signs were clear. It would only be a matter of time before the Labour party would represent – more than anyone else – the roboworkforce; not the Guilds producing them, but the robotic individuals themselves. They generated this country’s value, their rights and obligations should be on the political agenda.”

Read more "NF005 Robolabour"

Buckminster Fuller was great at dreaming up inventions that, he hoped, would help humanity by making people’s lives easier and less stressful. However, most of them never caught on. One of his ideas was the fog gun.

The basic concept was to combine the cleansing effects of wind and heavy fog. His system used compressed air, atomized water and liquid soap. Standing in the blast of this “fog gun” for approximately ten minutes would completely clean a person.

*** real dotcom zillionaire wannabe bond villains build fuller tech for the lulz

Read more