Auto-Assembly

Auto-Assembly Has Moved to a New Host

autoassemble — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 16:56:41 +0000

auto-assembly has been redesigned and relocated to:

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Looking for Some Uranium?

autoassemble — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:34:31 +0000

Old fashioned web site design at its best at United Nuclear. They offer useful advice on Polonium-210 on their isotopes page.

[Source: kiume_tree's del.icio.us bookmarks on Neurofuture]

EU Countries Condemned for their Role in ‘Extraordinary Rendition’ by EU Parliament Committee

autoassemble — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:15:25 +0000

Sarah Ludford, a Liberal Democrat MEP and vice-chair of the EU Temporary Committee on the alleged use of European countries by the CIA for the transport and illegal detention of prisoners has passed damning comment on the UK’s role in the affair. Commenting on the committee’s preliminary report, she remarked,

“If the EU’s aspirations to be a ‘human rights community’ have any meaning whatsoever, there must now be a forceful EU response to this strong evidence that the CIA abducted, illegally imprisoned and transported alleged terrorists in Europe while European governments, including the UK, turned a blind eye or actively colluded with the United States.” [Source: Guardian]

The committee’s report said that, “EU governments, including the British, knew about the practice known as extraordinary rendition … but made a concerted attempt to obstruct investigations into it” [Guardian].

Cheap Labour of the Future

autoassemble — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 22:09:42 +0000

Two stories collided in my aggregator today. Who ever thought that the future would pay so badly that you couldn’t get a mortgage on a job straight out of 20th century Sci-Fi?

Astronaut pay too low to recruit. A New Scientist Blog article describes the difficulties the Russian Space Programme are having recruiting astronauts because of low pay. According to the post cosmonauts now earn $767 per month. Attempts have been made to recruit from student populations but none of them pass the physical tests.

Virtual Architects at Developing World Prices. At New World Notes they describe a business outsourcing the architectural development of its Second Life headquarters to designers/builders in Vietnam earning $1000 per month (This one is blown out of proportion a little since $1000 is a very good wage in Vietnam and it was American graduates doing the work).

China & India GDP to Exceed G7′s by 2050

autoassemble — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:18:30 +0000

Former World Bank president, James Wolfensohn, has warned that western countries are not prepared for the change in the balance of world power as the Chinese and Indian economies develop [Source:Yahoo News].

Anshe Chung Worth $1 Million?

autoassemble — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:27:16 +0000

It was reported last weekend that Second Life avatar entrepreneur, Anshe Chung’s virtual property business is now worth $1 million.
Clickable Culture‘s Tony Walsh takes the skeptical view, arguing that he doesn’t..

..think much of investments in Second Life, a highly interesting but technically-flawed, insecure virtual world owned and operated by a single company. If Second Life shut down today, how much would Chung be worth tomorrow?

He may well be right that the values mentioned above are dependent on confidence in the stable continuation of Linden Labs but, as anyone investing in the oil business in Russia at the moment knows, rather a lot of the world’s business has its value dependent on authorities with a monopoly on power – and the capacity to pull the plug. As the examples of profit amongst non-system actors grow we can reasonably expect pressure to mount for more politically stable software models in which supporting infrastructure is distributed amongst businesses and/or open source communities.

How Gazprom sees its Place in the World

autoassemble — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 13:46:19 +0000

Gazprom are commissioning architecture for their capital, Gazprom City, in St. Petersburg. Needless to say, if any of these designs are built in St. Petersburg it will tell us all rather a lot about power in modern Russia.

[Source: Spiegel Online via BLDG BLOG and William Gibson]

International Fusion Reactor Consortium

autoassemble — Sat, 25 Nov 2006 13:19:01 +0000

New Scientist report that representatives from China, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States signed a pact to build a fusion reactor. The EU will put up 50% of the cost and the reactor will be built in Cardache in Southern France.

Opinions are currently divided on the value of Nuclear Fusion for civilian power. Critics of the project point to the its monopolisation of vast resources that could be spent on other alternative energy research. One critic, William Parkins, whose damning criticism of the viability of fusion power were published posthumously in Science, argued strongly against the possibility of quickly overcoming basic engineering problems. Greenpeace also argue strongly againstr the proportion of alternative energy resources to be consumed by the project

Bib.

Parkins, William E., “ENERGY: Fusion Power: Will It Ever Come?” Science 10 March 2006 311: 1380 [DOI: 10.1126/science.1125657] (in Policy Forum)

YouTube for Biologists

autoassemble — Sat, 25 Nov 2006 11:31:42 +0000

The New Scientist Technology Blog report that a new Web site, the Journal of Visualized Experiments, allows scientists to upload videos of experimental practice. The site is designed to help overcome the difficulties encountered learning scientific practice which can often involve a lot of tacit knowledge. Although it is already possible to upload such videos to YouTube and Google these sites offer none of the advantages of specialised, peer-reviewed filters on content.

Threat to Chinese Economy From Climate Change

autoassemble — Fri, 24 Nov 2006 09:15:01 +0000

A report from a Hong Kong based think-tank decribes the threat to industry on the Pearl River Delta and in Hong Kong posed by increases in flooding and typhoons associated with climate change. The report also highlights the knock-on effects of damage to this region for global trade.

We could yet see the Chinese government volunteering cuts in Greenhouse gas emissions and thereby removing the biggest bar to emissions restrictions for the largest liberal economies. If the perception of immediate risk from climate change overwhelms debates about fair competition then the current bars to international cooperation could be removed.