The Best Is Yet To Come
Carlos Dominguez is a Senior Vice President at Cisco Systems and a technology evangelist, speaking to and motivating audiences worldwide about how technology is changing how we communicate, collaborate, and especially how we work. Carlos gives humorous, highly-animated presentations full of deep insight into how technology, and the right culture, can create winning companies.
Drawing from his 20 years at Cisco, he talks about how technology is changing the rules of business and how to not get left behind.addresses many questions about collaboration including what motivates people to collaborate, how to establish rewards for collaborating, how to find the right experts both inside and outside your company, and how to keep people coming together — online and in person.
Redefining the dictionary
Is the beloved paper dictionary doomed to extinction? In this infectiously exuberant talk, leading lexicographer Erin McKean looks at the many ways today’s print dictionary is poised for transformation. As the CEO and co-founder of new online dictionary Wordnik, Erin McKean is reshaping not just dictionaries but how we interact with language itself.
The beautiful math of coral
Science writer Margaret Wertheim recreates the creatures of the coral reefs using a technique invented by a mathematician - simultaneously celebrating the amazements of the reef and deep-diving into the hyperbolic underpinnings of coral creation.
Calligraphy robot uses a Motion Copy System to reproduce detailed brushwork
A research group at Keio University, led by Seiichiro Katsura, has developed the Motion Copy System. This system can identify and store detailed brush strokes, based on information about movement in calligraphy. This enables a robot to faithfully reproduce the detailed brush strokes.
This system stores calligraphy movements by using a brush where the handle and tip are separate. The two parts are connected, with the head as the master system and the tip as the slave system. Characters can be written by handling the device in the same way as an ordinary brush.
Unlike conventional motion capture systems, a feature of this one is, it can record and reproduce the force applied to the brush as well as the sensation when you touch something. Until now, passing on traditional skills has depended on intuition and experience. It’s hoped that this new system will enable skills to be learned more efficiently.
Exploring Energy from Algae: EnAlgae
Algae can be found in a variety of food and beauty products on supermarket shelves, but recent scientific developments have also revealed their exciting potential for bioenergy. As fossil fuel resources continue to decline around the globe, it is vital that new sources of fuel are identified and developed.
EnAlgae (short for ‘Energetic Algae’) is a research project which aims to reduce reliance on fossil fuels in NW Europe by developing algal biofuel technologies. Swansea University leads the EnAlgae project (based in the University’s College of Science), working with institutions across Europe to explore the full potential of algal bioenergy.
From physics to probabilities: Pokerstars’ Liv Boeree
Liv Boeree has always been passionate about astrophysics and gained a First Class Honors degree in Physics from Manchester University. She became involved in the poker industry after graduation, making a name for herself by winning the European Poker Tour in 2010 in San Remo. Liv’s substantial career winnings and work in the television industry prove that a physics degree can be applied in a less orthodox way.
How the Internet is disrupting retailing & education
Yuri Milner, founder of Digital Sky Enterprises and an early Facebook angel investor, and Salman Khan, founder of the Khan Academy and one of Vanity Fair’s New Establishment, talk with Reuters Digital Editor Chrystia Freeland about their visions for how the Internet will alter retailing and education.
What’s invisible? More than you think
Gravity. The stars in day. Thoughts. The human genome. Time. Atoms. So much of what really matters in the world is impossible to see. A stunning animation of John Lloyd’s classic TEDtalk from 2009, which will make you question what you actually know.
Silos and silo-busting - the Anthropology of innovation
The 21st century world is marked by a profound paradox. On the one hand we are more interconnected than ever before, in the sense that we now live and operate in systems that are tightly entwined. But on the other hand, we also live at a time of great intellectual and social polarization - or silos - and social media is making some of this fracture worse, by encouraging the development of intellectual echo chambers.
The presence of silos inside organizations can often be deadly; the financial industry is a case in point. But groups or people who can “silo bust” - or jump across boundaries and categories - are often extremely innovative; indeed, much of the modern innovation that has occurred in recent years has arisen because of the ability of people to silo bust.
Airbus 2050 Smarter Skies Concept Plane
Airbus’ “Smarter Skies” vision, which was unveiled during September 2012, consists of five concepts that could be implemented in all phases of an aircraft’s operation to reduce waste in time and fuel, as well as contributing to a reduction in CO2 emissions.
They include: aircraft takeoff in continuous “eco-climb,” free flight and formation along “express skyways,” free-glide approaches and landings, low-emission ground operations and the use of sustainable biofuels and other potential energy sources.
