Spacial program takes Brazil to another level

Brazilian Spacial Agency (Agência Espacial Brasileira, or AEB) is investing something around US$9 million in research. The investment is innovative because the researchers interested in getting funded can submit their application form to the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico, or CNPq/MCT) until July the 28th. The focus: projects directly related to launching vehicles, satellites and equipments, ground systems for operations and launching control (including conformity evaluation, extensions and transferences of products from the high-tech industry). Pretty cool right?

Cooperation Between Brazil and Spain Program is open for subscriptions

Development of innovative technologies applicable to companies of any field in Brazil and Spain is now one of the partnerships between the 2 countries that seek to help knowledge exchange about researching and strategic governmental investments. Brazil is placing into this project US$40 million and Spain US$230 thousand (not exact figures).

Private companies will present their proposals to be evaluated by technicians and scientists from both countries and the actual development of the selected ones will be coordinated by the Iberoamerican cooperation committee, according to the Term of Technical Partnership between the organ "Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos (Finep/MCT - Brazil)" and "Centro para o Desenvolvimento Tecnológico e Industrial (CDTI - Spain)".

Tech and Science Conference begins today - 26th May Brazil

4th National Technology, Science and Innovation Conference (4ª CNCTI) has in the agenda sustainable development as the main issue. Today, at the Golden Tulip Alvorada - Brasília (DF), the country's business and scientific elite are gathering together to try to firm a national pact towards an unison agreement between educational and scientific institutions and local and national governments and to evaluate the result of the similar plan made in 2007, named PACTI 2007-2010.

The current agreement they are discussing isn't yet clear but the last time this conference took place, in 2005, two important laws emerged: "Lei de Inovação" e a "Lei do Bem". Its objective seems to be to stabilize and standardise long term policies for financial support that favour the national research fund.

In 2008 Canada and Brazil have signed a scientific and social experiments exchange agreement for the development of ideas that might generate economic growth for both countries. Today Canadian representatives are there, in this conference, to participate and help give an "outsider's touch" to the debate.

Governmental Ventura Capital Program - INOVAR, Brazil

With an eye on the future (and another in the pockets) Brazil is investing heavily on the "PROJETO INOVAR". It is a forum made of capital venture companies, stock market brokers, investment and pensions funds' managers that analyse small and medium companies that have the potential to go into the Brazilian stock market (BOVESPA). They will analyse the risks of the government's investments on high-tech companies that apply to benefit from the plan. These will them become an S.A. (anonymous society or limited company) and it's capital shared on the stock market, busting some of the most innovative companies in the country.

National Innovation Day - 19th October, Brazil

Brazilian's National Day of Innovation is a statement that this country knows the important part of technology on economic growth. In search for better salaries the government can't just increase the minimum wages (which are around US$290 today, around 4 times lower than the necessary to have a decent life) because its economy (fragile as it is) might feel like retracting, the idea is to invest now in technological incubators -- which are company that help others to start by given cheap offices and some structure like telephone line, internet and computers -- that will open more space for IT developments and markets. These incubators have been a growing issue in Brazil for the past decade and now they are getting special attention: a new investment agenda from the national government and their own national day. Which isn't a national holiday yet but Brazil being Brazil it might in the near future.. (joke)

For your own research here is the number of the law cited above:
- Innovation Day law number 12.193, from 15 May 2010

Trademark iPad has been registered in Brazil in 2007

"IPAD" is a trademark that has been in the registration process since 2007 and just in the beginning of this year (2010) has been granted, delaying Apple's iPad launch in Brazil. The spelling isn't the same but it could affect the tech gadget's marketing campaign since Brazilian laws states that the first registration is the one that stands, but only if the conflicting names are registered for products of the same category. If IP Application Developments Ltd. (company that owns IPAD Fast trademark in that country) wants to complicate matters for Apple it can, but looks like it won't! I'll keep you posted about this...

Mobile phone companies have oligopoly of the multimillionaire Brazilian market

We all know Brazil has a corrupt government. The problem is that very few people do anything against it and the ones that do go to the newspapers. (Thankfully!) Fernando Motolese has created a blog to complain against 3G phone companies for changing the offered service half way through contract. They all did the same changes at the same time.. suspicious.. Check out Fernando's site http://www.3ginternet.com.br/, it is in Portuguese but you can use Google to translate it.

The end of business travel

Anybots are robots that you can control from a web browser. You see what they see and you can send and receive messages from it. They are cute, that is true, but their aim is to have factory floor managers (in some cases office's as well) to be there virtually, which could allow these managers/director to work on more than one places. It looks silly, but it isn't, it is quite serious and I want one. I'm not a manager but as a geek I'd like to be in many places at the same time and interact with people (and other robots - which looks like the end of the world to me, but cool nonetheless) and be more productive. Are you ready for the Anybots?

Is email going to disappeared because of Twitter?

Email is one of the oldest forms of communication on the internet and some say it is threatened by the new social networks of real-time message like Twitter and Facebook.

Brazil is world leader in of social website with 86% of internauts using them (Italy is second) and yet is also world leader in email usage, so I don't think emails will disappeared any time soon.


Curiosity about Hotmail: Only in Brazil Hotmail has 47 million registered accounts

Picture from blueskyfactory.com

The new web facelift

18 June 2010 News update:
It looks like Mirosoft is following the same trend and they now have a new design. Some people didn't like at all, look at what Antonio Lupetti said on Twitter: "The new Microsoft home page is embarassing... #badwebdesign". Autch!

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Google, Wikipedia, Hotmail and others are changing the way they look. Is this a result of a long time research or it shows how much the companies are connected and synchronized to maintain the top spots? I don't know.

Obama warns for the dangers of realiance in technology

No this isn't about politics, technology has always been generous to the US, but about education. Apparently he is concerned about kids who will grow up distracted from social, economical and political issues and that could be "bad for democracy" (as he states). He is being courageous on that speech and I agree with him. Some parents let the games to nanny their kids and that is very, very harmful.

Google might making money out of our content

First of all: of course they are profiting money out of our content, but we can make money out of their visitors as well.

Google advertisement on its news aggregator had its legitimacy questioned by the Italian Federation of Newspaper Publishers. When you search for news, Google presents blog posts and newspapers' feeds merged with their own adverts. That means they are not sharing revenues with other companies that are, ultimately, generating their content for them. The FIEG (Italian federation) are interested in knowing the amount the big G is making from clicks so they can know how much money they are "giving" to Google every day. Don't know about you but I'm surprised that no one had complained about it already...

Google has 1,500 lawsuits in Brazil

Google owns Orkut.com (a social site like Facebook but successful only in Brazil and India) and because of abuses and unauthorized pictures users are prosecuting them in order to remove the disputed content.

I think Google might be ignoring people's requests. That is what happens most of the time: your privacy or copyright is infringed and Google doesn't want to disclaim who's the responsible and don't want to remove content themselves, a lawsuit is perfectly applicable.

Of course they complaint about this every day, but you try to find Google's telephone number to file a ticket about your concerns.. you won't find it! Therefore I will give it to you the Google's phone number in Britain: 08453580038. Have fun!!

File-sharing systems on the verge of the abyss

Arista, Atlantic, BMG Music, Capital, Elektra, Interscope, LaFace, Motown, Priority, Sony BMG, UMG, Virgin e Warner sued, alltogether, the LimeWire Group responsible for one of the most used software for transmitting files freely though the Internet.

There are advantages of using file-sharing desktop programs for companies who don't want to use the insecure WWW protocols and also for distributing promotional material, but the abuses were just too much.

Brazil is one of the best in Internet piracy, movies, songs, books, everything is being published on these file-sharing programs and viruses are all over the place. People got so used to it that it isn't considered something illegal. If you by a CD on a shop you might be considered a 's*cker' (with a U) and that is a reality that needs change. And it is! I hope LimeWire and others like SoulSeek, Kazaa, Bearshare and Gnutella get their hands on their conscience and change that, for the sake of the artists and the creative industry.

Bottle opener: the new invention

Technology isn't only about computers, it is about ideas that change the way we live. Exhibition of Inventions in Geneva (Palexpo 21st - 25th April 2010) presented some useful stuff (and of course some aren't so useful at all..) and the one I liked the most was this one-handed bottle openning tool. I liked it, but I know it is silly.. and fun! Take a look at some of the best inventions of this last show.

The Internet might use the old analogue TV signals

We are a long way to achieve this new wi-fi reality. The idea is to have a standard protocol for all European countries to offer this wireless connections. Just a few of the EU countries have transferred their television channels to digital frequency, and that tells me that it is going to take at least 5 years to make that a reality in some of Europe. But anyway, great idea, loved that!

Picture retrieved from BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4758722.stm

Optical fibre in all Italian homes

The three major Italian Telecom companies (Fastweb, Vodafone and Wind) want 2.5 million Euro to cover all houses in 15 towns with 100 mega optical fibre. Starting next July (2010) they may take 5 years to complete these part of the project but now the companies involved want to share the costs with the government.

The ancient and (thanks god) preserved Italian architecture is the big problem to overcome. They can't have a proper subway system in Rome because every dig they do, they find something worthy of a Museum. So to make this communication revolution will be a massive challenge.

IP addresses are close to the end

Rod Beckstrom from Icann.org (responsible for the IPs) declared on the 13th of May 2010 that we have 8 to 9% of the IPs available. The number of computers and cellphones connected to the web is so big that now the Internet providers (ISPs) must start migrating to the IPv6 that can hold trillions of addresses.

Get your ideas funded

These guys from KickStarter.com are doing a great job: business projects are posted there and are receiving funds from all over the globe.

The most recent success story is Diapora.com, an alternative for Facebook users that offers something Facebook doesn't: privacy. Not very business instigator this one, but they've got 127 thousand dollars in just a few days, so apparently there is need for it...

I have a bunch of ideas to post there, let's see how it goes :)

Dispora update

Some are now saying it isn't all flowers for Disapora.com. They what a Facebook that is downloaded into your computer so you can manage your own data, like a file-sharing system for social networking. Good idea, but apparently it isn't make Facebook shake.

Free Skype: let people use it and don't charge for it.

Picture by Peter Rojas

To keep on running Skype wants to place an advert before any conversation starts. This might help the budget. They are currently making money charging to connect Skype call with a landline or cellphone, and vice-versa.

Skype Vs Egypt

It looks like the saga "Web company x Scared Government" didn't end with Google: Egypt state-owned landline communication monopoly is loosing money because of Skype and now the Government wants to shut it down.

Their argument against it Skype is that it isn't using approved gateways for out and inbound calls. Bullshit, of course, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft have their own VoIP systems, why Skype was the target?

This is a political issue and my opinion is always against the Governments (dictatorial or religious are my favourites to mock about).

Hugo Chavez is investing in his Twitter account

Chavez and Twitter

@chavezcandanga has 250 thousand followers posting messages that he cannot deal with. Now he has hired 200 people to do the job and carry on with his popular approach as a president.

Chavez and the Internet

Not long ago (March the 14th 2010) he said "the internet must not be free for everyone to do or say whatever they want". The reason is because fake news informing that one of his ministers had been killed. Though he didn't understand what the internet stands for, freedom of speech, he learned to get attention from it, and is been proven to be a good technique for popularity.

Venezuela censorship

Hugo Chavez never applied censorship to the internet in Venezuela, like China and Korea do. Now he is participating! I like that.

Let's just hope democracy increases it's popularity there too.

Are video games good for kids?

(15 June 2010) News update on this: A Norwegian boy saved his sister, and himself, from being attacked by a Moose using skills learned with the game World of Warcraft. It is a fantastic story and what it tells me is that the extra experience some games might offer are indeed helpful.


Several studies and research has been made but the subject is still obscure. Do kids react aggressively after playing video games? Do they lost focus and get anxious?

Arguments favour to games:

• Jane McGonigal talk on TED.com (records in February 2010) is really compelling and philosophical, giving the idea that not all games are bad: the simulation ones are actually beneficial.
• European parliament report: computer games are good for children and teach them essential life skills. (too vague for me!)
• Edinburgh University: computer games can promote problem-solving and team-building in children.
• The fabulous paper Teens, Video Games, and Civics from PEW INTERNET & AMERICAN LIFE PROJECT made in September 2008, analyse in 75 pages the results of it's research that is, at the end, pro games. (Please read it and comment here your conclusions.)

Arguments against games for children:

• European parliament report: violence in video games can in certain situations stimulate violent behaviour, but there is no need for legislation.
• South African Press Association: children who blast away for hours are more aggressive, clash with their elders and can lag behind at school.
• Video games can be addictive -- and expensive.
• It may cause bad health effects, including obesity, and postural, muscular and skeletal disorders.

Personal experience:

My little brother wet his pants when playing a fighting game. We think that it's because he didn't realise he needed to go to the toilet 'cause he was totally absorbed by the game. Yes, that was scary and now he is only allowed to play on weekends.

Conclusion

I found more arguments in favour then against, but again it is a matter of common-sense: if it is too much, the parents have to intervene. Personally I think kids should be playing with real toys and that the bad things that could affect them (and all of us for that matter) overcome the good ones, that could be achieved with other types of real-life games.
Kids like to relax on mindless games, nothing wrong with that as long as they understand the value of effort, work and study. They should be able to relax painting, playing drums or football. There is no need for parents to rely on the consoles or computers to entertain and educate their kids.
So, let's stop being lazy and let's send a message for the future: let's teach our children to bit physical challenges before worrying about team building and farm management simulations...

Twitter broker today!

Today's most viewed tags:

#0followers
#0following

Twitter.com is a big site and when it brakes everyone talks about. Even my wife who don't use Twitter very often wrote me to talk about. The realtime web is like this: realtime bugs are seen and gossiped about by millions around the globe.

What happened to all my followers twitter?

They are there, somewhere, just not visible. They are going to put it back in place very soon (so it is better if I post this thing fast or it will loose relevancy.. hehe)


Take a look at Twitter's declarations about the bugs.

How much is spent of video games?

Among discussions whether games are good or bad for children, billions are spent every year on the gaming industry (inc. consoles and used -- around 50% of the total spent on games are on used ones -- and new games):

Spent in 2009

US

US$25.29 billion

UK

US$3.78 billion

Germany

US$3.65 billion

France

US$3.56 billion

Source: Newzoo.com

Nokia vs Apple, the patent battle

Since October last year (2009) Nokia have been fighting over iPad patents filed by Apple. Apple countersues Nokie for infringing its patents and requests US to ban Nokia's imported phones.

This is like the business gossip of the year and there is one site dedicated to it http://www.engadget.com/tag/nokia,apple,legal.

iPad launch day

On Friday (July, 23rd) the iPad goes on sale in Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong (China), Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore.






28th May is the day!

Launched will occur in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the UK. Yes, I'm silly, I want one...







10th May 2010 - Last minute update
Nokia sues Apple over iPad pattents.. again!

Print only one section of a website with PrintWhatYouLike.com

PrintWhatYouLike.com is an interesting free service that allows anyone to select a chunk of any webpage to be printed. This is good 'cause it is useful. Even FireFox, the best web-browser, breaks pages into empty pages and it isn't as accurate as printing a PDF file or a DOC.

I'm gonna 'delicious' this professional looking site. Do you know any other that does the same thing? Post here in the comments, I won't mind with SEO stuff.

Google Ventures: They are investing...

They are looking for companies that fall into one of these categories: consumer Internet, software, hardware, clean-tech, biotechnology and healthcare.

These are the companies they have an eye on:

• Adimab
• Corduro
• English Central
• OpenCandy
• Pixazza
• Recorded Future
• SCVNGR
• Silver Spring Networks
• VigLink
• V-Vehicle

Look out for them and see if you can have a great idea also. If Google thinks they are cool and profitable and with Global range potential, I do think to.

Make your website look old

Geocitiesizer is a site offering a strange service: making any webpage look like it was made by a 13 year-old from 1996.

Here is how this blog looks like

See full HTML version.

I just hope this doesn't become a new -- cool -- trend!!

Advertising on Captcha

Great idea AdCopy.com had: to place ads into catpcha messages.

Example:

If you see one of these around, type the correct message and you will get a card of the Thales' Fan Club. (You would probably be a member along with my mom, but it is prestigious nontheless.)