I was listening to my favorite podcast today, This Week in Tech with Leo Laporte, Patrick Norton, John C. Dvorak and others (pretty much the old TechTV gang when it was an awesome cable channel, before they were bought by G4 and subsequently run into the ground). But I digress... anyway, they were discussing an awesome service called OpenDNS , so of course I decided to check it out when I got back from lunch. Sure enough, this is a very cool, completely free DNS (domain name service). For those of you who don't know, DNS is what converts Internet name addresses (i.e. www.google.com ) to it's actual IP Address (i.e. 208.67.219.230). DNS was created in the early days of the Internet because humans can remember names a lot easier than number combinations. Typically, when you type an address into a web browser, for example, it goes and runs to your Internet Service Provider's DNS server to say "where the heck is google.com?" to which your ISP's DNS server...
We are witnessing a paradigm shift in energy production. We've seen dramatic shifts like this across numerous industries over the decades, most recently by computers, the Internet, and cellphones. The industrial revolution changed markets dramatically as steam power, driven by coal, and later the internal combustion engine, primarily driven by gasoline and diesel derived from oil, changed the face of the planet through mechanization and automation. Horses and oxen were no longer needed to plow the fields, or to pull wagons, as they were replaced by tractors and automobiles. The electric light, electric motor, and a myriad of electrical appliances followed, driven primarily by coal and hydroelectric power sources. Coal was inexpensive and plentiful, with decreased demand from steam locomotives and tractors, it was the perfect fuel for the power generation plants that were needed for electrification projects. Coal has therefore been a mainstay of relat...
Being a pilot myself, I my sympathies go out to Steve Fossett and his family, since he has been missing since September 3rd. It is presumed that his plane crashed somewhere in Nevada. He is an intrepid aviation adventurer and it's unfortunate that he is most likely gone. Still, a glimmer of hope exists for those who continue to help search for his plane. This tragedy has resulted in increased popularity of a very powerful concept- that of using the Internet and the power of people to make otherwise insurmountable tasks possible. Richard Branson , friend of Steve Fossett, asked Google if they could help find Steve, and Google answered the call. Google Earth is known by many as one of the 'coolest' programs on the Internet- covering a virtual globe with relatively up to date aerial (and satellite) imagery of the Earth. You can then browse around and look at anything you want from an aerial view. Having worked in GIS myself, I know the power of a system like this to ...
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