Silver and white cars are cooler, says study

Silver and white cars are cooler, says study:
(Berkeley) "The researchers had two cars in the sun for an hour, one black and the other silver, parked facing south, in Sacramento, California. The silver Honda Civic (shell SR 0.57) had a cabin air temperature of about 5-6°C (9-11°F) lower than an identical black car (shell SR 0.05)."

"silver paint instead of black paint would raise fuel economy by 0.44 mpg (2.0 percent); would decrease carbon dioxide emissions by 1.9 percent, and reduce other automotive emissions by about 1 percent."

IoT: 7 Habits of Highly Effective Things on Internet (!)

The CompuServe of Things: by Phil Windley @ Technometria
"On the Net today we face a choice between freedom and captivity, independence and dependence."

Online 2.0: Return of the Silos Each of these online service businesses sought to offer a complete soup-to-nuts experience and capitalized on their captive audiences in order to get businesses to pay for access.

A Real, Open Internet of Things If we were really building the Internet of Things, with all that that term implies, there'd be open, decentralized, heterarchical systems at its core, just like the Internet itself. There aren't. Sure, we're using TCP/IP and HTTP, but we're doing it in a way that is closed, centralized, and hierarchical with only a minimal nod to interoperability using APIs.

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To follow the metaphor, besides "dependence" and "independence" there is also "interdependence", an ultimate level of collaboration
as defined in "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by  Stephen R. Covey
This could be an effective template for building IoT:

"Things on Internet", similar to people, start as "Dependent",
that is they need others to take care of them,
then progressing to be "Independent", self-sufficient,
and finally "Interdependent", working well with others.

Independence (self-mastery):

• Habit 1: Be Proactive

To be "responsible", response-able, not just "reactive".
In a way, to be "smarter" things, adaptable, not just hard-coded.   

• Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

"Things" should start with well defined "purpose",
features and characteristics in context of usage. 

• Habit 3: Put First Things First

Focus on performing most relevant function very well.
With so many "things", even "smart" toaster should be a good toaster first. 

This starts from clear description , and then solid implementation.

Interdependence (working well with others): 

• Habit 4: Think Win-Win

"Things" that are well focused can be combined with other "things" to mutually support each other. Clearly defined interfaces, "API"s, help avoid combining incompatible "things" and avoid problems. 

• Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood

This is related to Internet (TCP) Robustness principle: 

"Be conservative in what you send, be liberal in what you accept"

• Habit 6: Synergize

Combine the strengths of "things" through positive collaboration,
to achieve solutions no one "thing" could have done alone.

Continuous Improvement: 

• Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

People need to keep learning, "things" (and "services") need to keep upgrading.
Hardware, firmware and software upgrades are an essential feature. 

OK, that is it, "solid design principles" for IoT :)

"Bundling" vs "Unbundling"

Marc Andreessen and Jim Barksdale on How to Make Money - HBR IdeaCast - Harvard Business Review:



Some observations about various product "bundling" options,

from time of Netscape (stand-alone product) vs Microsoft IE (bundled).

Both techniques have merits, at different times, for different companies.

Only constant is change...

Homes Near National Parks

Homes for Sale Near National Parks | Zillow Blog:

AI: "Deep Learning" Microsoft 'Project Adam' vs Google 'Brain' (!)

Microsoft Challenges Google’s Artificial Brain With ‘Project Adam’ | Enterprise | WIRED:
"Microsoft’s new artificial intelligence system, Project Adam, can identify images, including photos of a particular breed of dog."

"We’re entering a new age of artificial intelligence.

Drawing on the work of a clever cadre of academic researchers, the biggest names in tech—including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple—are embracing a more powerful form of AI known as “deep learning,” using it to improve everything from speech recognition and language translation to computer vision, the ability to identify images without human help."

Deep learning enables large-scale computer image recognition with Project Adam | Microsoft Research Luminaries | Channel 9

While Microsoft's researchers are working on recognizing dogs,
Google's researches are working on recognizing cats :)

In a Big Network of Computers, Evidence of Machine Learning - NYTimes.com
"How Many Computers to Identify a Cat? 16,000"

Google’s Large Scale Deep Learning Experiments « Deep Learning

(Google's) Quoc Le’s Lectures on Deep Learning | Gaurav Trivedi

Stanford Team Develops 11 Billion Parameter Deep Learning System Using COTS GPU Hardware - Andrew Ng
"...Stanford developed a deep learning system with over 11 billion learnable parameters. One of the key drivers to progress in deep learning has been the ability to scale up these algorithms. Ng’s team at Google had previously reported a system that required 16,000 CPU cores to train a system with 1 billion parameters. This result shows that it is possible to build massive deep learning systems using only COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) hardware, thus hopefully making such systems available to significantly more groups."

Now You Can Build Google’s $1M Artificial Brain on the Cheap | Enterprise | WIRED

a paper that shows how to build the same type of system for just $20,000 using cheap, but powerful, graphics microprocessors, or GPUs

WebGL 3D HTML Games (Babylon.js)

Learning WebGL and making 3D HTML Games with David Catuhe and Babylon.js on the Hanselminutes Technology Podcast
David Catuhe is the primary author of Babylon.js and an expert in WebGL. Are 3D games really happening on the web? There are more possibilities than you may realize! WebGL really lights up with libraries like three.js and babylon.js

Assassin's Creed Pirates Demo

ColorPicker.com - Quick Online Color Picker Tool

ColorPicker.com - Quick Online Color Picker Tool: