RAUMA, Finland — The cafe where Paivi Alanko-Rehelma serves coffee and smoked fish stands practically in the shadow of a sprawling building site on the island of Olkiluoto where Finland is erecting a nuclear power plant, the island’s third, and Finland’s fifth in the last 30 years.
Like many of her neighbors who have grown accustomed to nuclear energy, Ms. Alanko-Rehelma picks no bones with the new reactor. “It’s now safe, it saves nature, it’s cheaper,” she said, pouring a visitor a steaming cup of coffee.
No one is certain when the plant, which has been plagued by construction delays, will be finished. But whenever it does go into operation, the reactor will be a new cog in the works of Finland’s national energy policy, which seeks to diversify the country’s sources of energy and reduce its historical reliance on Russia for cheap electricity.
The plant is also part of a global trend, as nuclear power’s prospects rise amid concerns about the warming effect of carbon dioxide emissions to generate electricity.
The Finns are going first class, building what is called a European Pressurized Reactor, the world’s latest model, which is billed as the safest and most powerful nuclear reactor ever designed. It is the product of a consortium of French and German engineering companies.
It is not as if anyone around this wooded region a three-hour drive northwest of Helsinki is marching in protest, spraying antinuclear graffiti or hampering construction work. To the contrary, the construction of the power plant is producing a modest economic boom.
Take this port city of pastel-colored wooden homes about 10 miles south of Olkiluoto. The nearly 4,000 migrant laborers from more than 30 countries, including Poland and Estonia, working at the new power plant have lifted business in stores in downtown Rauma and made possible the opening last year of two new shopping malls on the edge of town.
Local building contractors have been buoyed by orders to carry out some of the reactor work. Moreover, taxes paid by the migrant workers and French and German engineers who have come to the city bring in more than $2.5 million a year.
“A journalist called recently from Helsinki to ask how much longer we can delay completion of the reactor,” Jaakko Hirvonsalo, managing director of the local chamber of commerce, said with a laugh. “Locally, we’re doing well.”
The delays, however, were no joke; parts of the huge reactor shield, now about 90 feet high, had to be dismantled and rebuilt because of faulty welding and poor cement work. The Finns blame the delays on the French reactor builder, Areva, which subcontracted work to Polish companies to cut costs.
The French and their German partners blame the Finns for the delays, pointing to the glacial pace of construction reviews by the Finnish nuclear safety authority. Wherever the blame truly lies, the reactor’s start-up date has been pushed back by at least two years, to 2011, and the estimated cost increased to nearly $6 billion from an original $3.8 billion.
Now, the French are seeking the help of a Swedish arbitrator to settle their differences with the Finns. As for the delay, “It’s not a race,” said Jacques-Emmanuel Saulnier, a spokesman for Areva in Paris. “Don’t forget, it will operate for 60 years.”
Yet he acknowledged that, in some ways, Olkiluoto was a test, since it was the first attempt to build a pressurized water reactor. “It’s the first of its kind,” he said. “You cannot go into a hangar and make a model to test. And yet you have to have a test.”
Beneath the surface, people in Rauma are weighing the costs and benefits. And not all are happy with the result.
“As long as everything is O.K., it’s O.K., but there are problems and risks,” said Janne Koski, director of the city’s art museum, which sponsors regular exhibitions of art from the Baltic region. Asked whether people ignored the risks because of the benefits, he replied: “That is not exactly so. Of course, many people are working there, at the reactor site. It’s about economy and finance.”
Not that Rauma is in dire need of economic stimulus. The city has a thriving shipbuilding industry and paper mills, and several large wood processing companies, a Finnish specialty, have factories here. Large foreign investments have been attracted in recent years from South Korea and Australia.
Rauma has never had an accident like that at Chernobyl, almost 900 miles to the southeast in Northern Ukraine, but even people who are most comfortable with nuclear reactors acknowledge that they affect the environment.
Ms. Alanko-Rehelma, whose husband operates two fishing boats in the waters around the reactors, said that their cooling systems warm the water near Olkiluoto island.
“That is not good for some kinds of fish,” she said. “But good for others, like trout.”
The only large-scale resistance to nuclear energy in Finland comes from Greenpeace, which cites the hazard of radioactivity and the siphoning of money from investment in alternative carbon-free energy sources, like wind, sun and tides.
“It’s far too risky and hazardous,” Lauri Myllyvirta, a spokesman for Greenpeace, said by phone from Helsinki.
The United Nations lists Rauma as a World Heritage site because of its large stock of charming 17th- and 18th-century wooden homes. The World Heritage designation is meant to help preserve historic sites, though income from tourism remains meager, Mr. Miettinen said.
“It’s mostly Finns, and some from Germany and Italy,” he said. But he did not think it was the cluster of nuclear power plants that was keeping people away. “A great many people think nuclear energy is good for Rauma and its industry,” he said.
The first nuclear reactors at Olkiluoto are now about 30 years old, said Pasi Katajamaki, editor of the local newspaper, Lansi Suomi. “We’re very used to it,” he said. ‘’When you have something near you, you simply grow accustomed to it.”
Showing posts with label arcitect. Show all posts
Showing posts with label arcitect. Show all posts
Monday, November 17, 2008
Sunday, November 16, 2008
FLYING CARS!
http://www.moller.com/
Passengers:
4
Top speed @ 13,200 ft:
375 mph
Cruise speed @ 20,000 ft:
275 mph
Maximum rate of climb:
6,000 fpm
Maximum range:
750 miles
Payload excluding fuel:
750 lbs
Operational ceiling:
36,000 ft
Gross weight:
2,400 lbs
Engine power (2 min. rating):
1,200 hp
Fuel consumption:
approx. 20 mpg
Fuel:
Ethanol
Dimensions (LxWxH):
19.5' x 8.5' x 7.5'
Takeoff and landing area:
35 ft dia
Noise level at 500 ft (Goal):
65 dba
Vertical takeoff and landing:
yes
Emergency parachutes:
yes
Passengers:
4
Top speed @ 13,200 ft:
375 mph
Cruise speed @ 20,000 ft:
275 mph
Maximum rate of climb:
6,000 fpm
Maximum range:
750 miles
Payload excluding fuel:
750 lbs
Operational ceiling:
36,000 ft
Gross weight:
2,400 lbs
Engine power (2 min. rating):
1,200 hp
Fuel consumption:
approx. 20 mpg
Fuel:
Ethanol
Dimensions (LxWxH):
19.5' x 8.5' x 7.5'
Takeoff and landing area:
35 ft dia
Noise level at 500 ft (Goal):
65 dba
Vertical takeoff and landing:
yes
Emergency parachutes:
yes
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Solar at Sea: Chinese Cargo Ships Will Have Solar Sails
The Australian company, Solar Sailor, has signed a deal with the largest Chinese shipping line COSCO to outfit their tankers with large solar-powered sails controlled by a computer that angles them for maximum wind and solar efficiency and the company claims that the sails will pay for themselves within four years.
The sails are 30 meters long, covered with solar PV panels that will provide 5 percent of the ships' electricity and will harness enough wind to reduce fuel costs by 20 to 40 percent.
The shipping and air travel industries have been the hardest to conform to new energy efficiency demands. Planes and tankers require huge quantities of fuel, but our global economy depends on both of them to survive, so they've been difficult industries to regulate. Even the latest environmental standards set by the EU included gimmes for shipping and airline companies.
It seems as though China is slowly but aggressively moving into a position of leadership in the transition to a global green economy.
The sails are 30 meters long, covered with solar PV panels that will provide 5 percent of the ships' electricity and will harness enough wind to reduce fuel costs by 20 to 40 percent.
The shipping and air travel industries have been the hardest to conform to new energy efficiency demands. Planes and tankers require huge quantities of fuel, but our global economy depends on both of them to survive, so they've been difficult industries to regulate. Even the latest environmental standards set by the EU included gimmes for shipping and airline companies.
It seems as though China is slowly but aggressively moving into a position of leadership in the transition to a global green economy.
A Shapeshifting Skyscraper in Miami's Skyline?
A PR flak in New York left a cryptic voicemail on Riptide's machine late last week: Florence-based superstar architect David Fisher is planning a "major press conference" in Miami on Tuesday, she said, to announce plans for a project here.
The mysterious news is even more intriguing given the project Fisher's been shilling in a few other major cities for the past year: an insane-looking rotating skyscraper. Each floor in the building would spin independently, creating a constantly changing shape on the skyline.
Fisher told the New York Times a couple weeks ago that he's looking for a place in Manhattan to build a rotating tower. And he's supposedly breaking ground for another one in Dubai in a few weeks.
Could Miami be next? Has Fisher heard about the little condo bust that's left half-built towers packed with empty units up and down the bayfront?
The mysterious news is even more intriguing given the project Fisher's been shilling in a few other major cities for the past year: an insane-looking rotating skyscraper. Each floor in the building would spin independently, creating a constantly changing shape on the skyline.
Fisher told the New York Times a couple weeks ago that he's looking for a place in Manhattan to build a rotating tower. And he's supposedly breaking ground for another one in Dubai in a few weeks.
Could Miami be next? Has Fisher heard about the little condo bust that's left half-built towers packed with empty units up and down the bayfront?
Sunday, November 2, 2008
A Moving Skyscraper for N.Y.?
Would you like to see a building twisting itself into different shapes night and day on the New York skyline? Would you like to live in an apartment with a view that rotates 360 degrees? It may be a little hard at the moment to arrange financing for such tower — or any other new skyscraper in Manhattan — but the architect David Fisher is looking for a place to build it here someday.
He’s already designed such an edifice in Dubai called the Dynamic Tower, billed as the “world’s first building in motion.” Dr. Fisher, an architect based in Florence, he told me that he hopes groundbreaking for the Dubai tower will occur “within a matter of weeks,” and said that the problems in the credit market haven’t affected the project.
The tower is supposed to generate enough electricity to supply the power needs for itself as well as buildings nearby. The electricity will come from horizontal wind turbines tucked away between each of its 80 floors, and from solar photovoltaic cells on the roof each story. As the individual floors move, about 20 percent of each roof is expected to be exposed to the sun at any time of the day.
Dr. Fisher, who’s working on another of these towers for Moscow, was in town this week to discuss plans for New York. Where might it go? “We are currently looking at a few sites,” he told me. “It should be a place from where the view is attractive and also where people can stand and watch the building changing its shape.”
Any suggestions for him? Any predictions on how well those turbines and photovoltaic cells will work? And would you pay a premium to live in a room with a moving view?
Saturday, October 11, 2008
20 websites that changed the world
If there was one site that would change the world for ever, it would be the first ever website, created by internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee.
It went online on 6 August 1991 offering people help with using the brand new 'World Wide Web', rather modestly described as a "wide-area hypermedia information retrieval initiative aiming to give universal access to a large universe of documents". It's now archived at www.tinyurl.com/3apuu.
If Berners-Lee had known what was to come, he might have added: "This is going to be awesome!"
2. GeoCities
Fascinating as it was back then, the web wasn't a whole lot of fun and after four years of pages created by scientists and academics, David Bohnett and John Rezner, who ran a web directory called Beverly Hills Internet, turned their company into GeoCities, giving anyone the ability to create their own site for free.
"There was a time when half the internet seemed to be on GeoCities and I don't think that this can be underestimated," says Rob 'CmdrTaco' Malda, founder of Slashdot. "GeoCities made it possible for anyone to put something online for nothing. This was a huge deal."
3. Blogger
GeoCities made it easy for anyone to build their own site, but in August 1999, Blogger made it even easier. Now anyone could post a diary of what they had for dinner or why they hated their parents. Acquired by Google in 2003, Blogger continues to enable everyone to document their lives without needing to get their hands dirty with HTML. As does WordPress, TypePad, Tumblr and a million other services that have since appeared. GeoCities was purchased by Yahoo! in 1999 and lives on as Yahoo! GeoCities, though we've never heard anyone say "Check out my Yahoo! GeoCities page."
4. Yahoo!
One thing that Yahoo! will be remembered for, though, is its search directory, without which most of us would never have found GeoCities in the first place. Founded by Stanford University graduate students Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994, Yahoo! was a manually compiled directory of sites. "Remember when you bookmarked Yahoo! indexes because they were actually comprehensive sources on a subject?" says Rob Malda. "Good times."
But those good times weren't to last. Computer-compiled search listings from AltaVista and, later, Google, were to rise in popularity, leaving Yahoo! behind, perhaps distracted with building its community features such as chat rooms, email and message boards. "They were an early leader but went down a path of being more marketing- oriented than technology-oriented," says Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales. "I hope they recapture the idea of pushing the forefront of technology."
5. The internet-connected coffee machine
When you're chatting with friends on your webcam, who'd have thought you owe all that to a coffee pot? The internet-connected coffee machine from Cambridge University went online in November 1993, so university staff could check on whether there was coffee in the pot before walking down several flights of stairs.
A year later, student Jennifer Ringley installed a webcam in her dorm, giving viewers a regularly updated window into her life on the JenniCam. Usually mundane, but not shying away from appearing nude or having sex, Ringley attracted an estimated three to four million viewers, some of whom were paid subscribers. But on 31 December 2003 Ringley shut her site down to lead a quieter life, out of the public eye.
Cambridge University's coffee machine is also living a more private life these days, but you can read more on its history at www.cl.cam.ac.uk/coffee/coffee.html.
6. Danni's Hard Drive
So the early 90s were an innocent time, but that all changed when, in the spring of 1995, model Danni Ashe created Danni's Hard Drive. Ashe started out in newsgroups after hearing her pictures were being posted there and soon after that she hired some programmers to build her site.
Not satisfied with the result, Ashe studied HTML and built her own site, which she ran single-handedly for over a year before bringing in extra staff. Ashe went on to become the Guinness World Record holder of the title 'Most downloaded woman on the Internet', in December 2000, when it was confirmed that her image had been downloaded over a billion times.
7. MP3.com
It wasn't just photos that we'd be downloading, though. In 1998, along came MP3.com, without which there would have been no Napster, and no iTunes. MP3.com was to popularise the MP3 format of digital music, offering downloads of unsigned bands, which people would have downloaded and transferred to their iPods, had the iPod actually been around at the time.
"I remember downloading my first few MP3s from MP3.com while ripping my own CDs. It took something like eight hours to rip and encode a single CD," says Slashdot's Rob Malda. "A year or two later, tiny devices like the Rio paved the way for the iPod. I can't tell you how powerful it felt to browse what felt like an infinite number of songs."
8. eBay
In September 1995, programmer Pierre Omidyar founded AuctionWeb, later renamed eBay. It's been responsible for turning stay-at-home mums into successful businesswoman, and lists Damon Albarn, Gordon Ramsay and Meg Matthews among its sellers. It's also known for a decommissioned nuclear bunker and the image of the Virgin Mary in a decade-old toasted cheese sandwich.
Brian Groth, product manager for Windows Live at Microsoft is a fan: "Not many sites can claim to have created and ridden their own zeitgeist, but eBay did – and it still is! Its simplicity is its genius and the feedback system is a shining example of how seamlessly self-regulating internet communities can work. A further testament to its success is that it's the only website on this list that's created a viable new career choice – the professional eBay trader." eBay was ahead of its time, adds Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales. "It really was Web 2.0 before Web 2.0 was cool. eBay is all about having ordinary people contributing the vast majority of what's going on at the website."
9. Amazon
Another company that was Web 2.0 before the term was coined is Amazon, founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994. Bezos had originally planned to call the site Cadabra, until in a moment of clarity he realised it sounded uncannily close to 'cadaver'. And so Amazon was born, initially offering books but now selling everything from watches to lawnmowers. Not only did it popularise online shopping but its focus on user reviews paved the way for sites such as TripAdvisor and Epinions.
Match.com's Jason Stockwood says of Amazon: "Many people had huge reservations about using the internet, and even more about ecommerce. Amazon led the charge, and continues to play a crucial role in encouraging a wider demographic to feel comfortable surfing."
10. Boo.com
Not every site was as successful. Boo.com was set up at the end of 1999 selling branded fashion clothes, but went into receivership just six months later, after burning through more than £100 million. The site was big on Flash, with its 3D views of clothes and virtual shop assistant Miss Boo. 56k modems weren't ready for it and shoppers stayed away in their droves. But perhaps Boo was just before its time: does a 3D view of the product you're browsing really sound so ridiculous now?
11. Wikipedia
If Amazon championed user reviews, Wikipedia was to take user-generated content to another level, with an online encyclopedia anyone could edit. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but where errors or downright lies appear, they're quick to be corrected by the site's users. "Yes, the information is imperfect," says Jason Stockwood, "but the rigidly democratic nature of the site means that Wikipedia is a true embodiment of what the internet revolution originally promised."
12. Slashdot
If you'd rather comment than review, then you owe a debt to Slashdot, a site where people submit news stories for discussion. Created in September 1997 by Rob Malder, it continues to be a must-read destination for anyone interested in technology. Drew Curtis followed up with FARK.com, and Kevin Rose with digg.com. Commenting on stories has become so widespread that it now seems odd to arrive at a site where there are no comments.
13. The Drudge Report
It's hard to believe now, but it used to be that the mainstream media was where you went for serious, trusted news and the web didn't get a look in. But on 17 January 1998 The Drudge Report was to change that, when it broke the Monica Lewinsky scandal to the public after Newsweek decided not to publish the story.
Reporting on the event on 25 January 1998, BBC News said, in what sounds obvious and naive all these years later, "In the future, academics, politicians and journalists aren't likely to dismiss the internet so quickly."
Now news is regularly broken by specialist blogs before you read about it in the morning paper. That's assuming you even buy a morning paper any more.
14. YouTube
And where do you watch your TV? Started in a garage by three former PayPal employees, one site went on to shake up the TV industry, and was acquired by Google for $1.6 billion. All that for a company that's less than four years old. You've probably heard of it: it's called YouTube.
"You used to find a text search result for every keyword you could think of," says Torsten Schuppe, marketing director at eBay. "Now you find a video for every keyword you can think of! I've been told people upload 10 hours of video content every minute – that's huge!"
15. Gabocorp
Until Flash came along in 1996, the web was much like Ceefax, with a few animated GIFs and PC-crashing Java applets thrown in. But the arrival of Flash was to herald a new era in web design. The sign of things to come appeared in 1997 in the form of Gabocorp (archived at thefwa.com/flash10/gabo.html). Suddenly the web was no longer static.
"This was the equivalent of TV going colour," says Rob Ford, founder and principal of Favourite Website Awards. "Gabocorp made us realise we could now make things move, add sound and generally be far more creative than the days of blue hypertext links that turned purple on-click. Animated GIFs took a body blow while lake applets took the knockout punch. Gabo Medoza, for me, is a true web pioneer: we all owe his creativity and vision for where we are today."
16. Legal & General
On the accessibility front, an encouraging early example of accessible web design produced by a commercial company was that of Legal & General.
Julie Howell, director of accessibility at digital agency Fortune Cookie explains: "Legal & General were concerned that their website was needlessly excluding disabled people, so undertook a site refresh that took into account the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (WCAG 1.0). While the company's main intention was to make the site easier for disabled people to use, the business returns were quite astonishing and proved that accessible design can be good for everyone: conversion increased by 300 per cent, maintenance costs reduced by 66 per cent, natural search listings improved by 50 per cent and page load time reduced by 75 per cent. If Legal & General can do this, what excuse do other companies have for not doing it?"
17. Hotmail
Free email for all, accessible anywhere – that was the promise of Hotmail. Founded by Jack Smith and Sabeer Bhatia, it was launched in 1996 and sold to Microsoft in 1997 for around $400 million.
18. Classmates.com
Hotmail helped us keep in touch with people we knew, but Classmates.com, launched in 1995, helped us get back in touch with people we hated at school and never kept in contact with. Four years later, the UK followed suit with Friends Reunited, which made the mistake of charging a fee to get in touch with old school pals. Then Facebook stepped in, offering the same service for free – and now we can all see that the person we fancied at school isn't quite so hot any more.
19. Match.com
Having exhausted old school friends for potential mates, where to turn? Match.com opened the entire internet community up for grabs. Going live in 1995, it was the first popular online dating site, and is also notable for being one of the first sites to persuade internet users to part with their cash for a subscription. Today, online dating is rapidly becoming the new, natural way to meet and (hopefully) fall in love.
20. HotWired
And finally, if you haven't fallen in love, how about something to hate? In 1994, web magazine HotWired pioneered banner ads. Bastards.
It went online on 6 August 1991 offering people help with using the brand new 'World Wide Web', rather modestly described as a "wide-area hypermedia information retrieval initiative aiming to give universal access to a large universe of documents". It's now archived at www.tinyurl.com/3apuu.
If Berners-Lee had known what was to come, he might have added: "This is going to be awesome!"
2. GeoCities
Fascinating as it was back then, the web wasn't a whole lot of fun and after four years of pages created by scientists and academics, David Bohnett and John Rezner, who ran a web directory called Beverly Hills Internet, turned their company into GeoCities, giving anyone the ability to create their own site for free.
"There was a time when half the internet seemed to be on GeoCities and I don't think that this can be underestimated," says Rob 'CmdrTaco' Malda, founder of Slashdot. "GeoCities made it possible for anyone to put something online for nothing. This was a huge deal."
3. Blogger
GeoCities made it easy for anyone to build their own site, but in August 1999, Blogger made it even easier. Now anyone could post a diary of what they had for dinner or why they hated their parents. Acquired by Google in 2003, Blogger continues to enable everyone to document their lives without needing to get their hands dirty with HTML. As does WordPress, TypePad, Tumblr and a million other services that have since appeared. GeoCities was purchased by Yahoo! in 1999 and lives on as Yahoo! GeoCities, though we've never heard anyone say "Check out my Yahoo! GeoCities page."
4. Yahoo!
One thing that Yahoo! will be remembered for, though, is its search directory, without which most of us would never have found GeoCities in the first place. Founded by Stanford University graduate students Jerry Yang and David Filo in January 1994, Yahoo! was a manually compiled directory of sites. "Remember when you bookmarked Yahoo! indexes because they were actually comprehensive sources on a subject?" says Rob Malda. "Good times."
But those good times weren't to last. Computer-compiled search listings from AltaVista and, later, Google, were to rise in popularity, leaving Yahoo! behind, perhaps distracted with building its community features such as chat rooms, email and message boards. "They were an early leader but went down a path of being more marketing- oriented than technology-oriented," says Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales. "I hope they recapture the idea of pushing the forefront of technology."
5. The internet-connected coffee machine
When you're chatting with friends on your webcam, who'd have thought you owe all that to a coffee pot? The internet-connected coffee machine from Cambridge University went online in November 1993, so university staff could check on whether there was coffee in the pot before walking down several flights of stairs.
A year later, student Jennifer Ringley installed a webcam in her dorm, giving viewers a regularly updated window into her life on the JenniCam. Usually mundane, but not shying away from appearing nude or having sex, Ringley attracted an estimated three to four million viewers, some of whom were paid subscribers. But on 31 December 2003 Ringley shut her site down to lead a quieter life, out of the public eye.
Cambridge University's coffee machine is also living a more private life these days, but you can read more on its history at www.cl.cam.ac.uk/coffee/coffee.html.
6. Danni's Hard Drive
So the early 90s were an innocent time, but that all changed when, in the spring of 1995, model Danni Ashe created Danni's Hard Drive. Ashe started out in newsgroups after hearing her pictures were being posted there and soon after that she hired some programmers to build her site.
Not satisfied with the result, Ashe studied HTML and built her own site, which she ran single-handedly for over a year before bringing in extra staff. Ashe went on to become the Guinness World Record holder of the title 'Most downloaded woman on the Internet', in December 2000, when it was confirmed that her image had been downloaded over a billion times.
7. MP3.com
It wasn't just photos that we'd be downloading, though. In 1998, along came MP3.com, without which there would have been no Napster, and no iTunes. MP3.com was to popularise the MP3 format of digital music, offering downloads of unsigned bands, which people would have downloaded and transferred to their iPods, had the iPod actually been around at the time.
"I remember downloading my first few MP3s from MP3.com while ripping my own CDs. It took something like eight hours to rip and encode a single CD," says Slashdot's Rob Malda. "A year or two later, tiny devices like the Rio paved the way for the iPod. I can't tell you how powerful it felt to browse what felt like an infinite number of songs."
8. eBay
In September 1995, programmer Pierre Omidyar founded AuctionWeb, later renamed eBay. It's been responsible for turning stay-at-home mums into successful businesswoman, and lists Damon Albarn, Gordon Ramsay and Meg Matthews among its sellers. It's also known for a decommissioned nuclear bunker and the image of the Virgin Mary in a decade-old toasted cheese sandwich.
Brian Groth, product manager for Windows Live at Microsoft is a fan: "Not many sites can claim to have created and ridden their own zeitgeist, but eBay did – and it still is! Its simplicity is its genius and the feedback system is a shining example of how seamlessly self-regulating internet communities can work. A further testament to its success is that it's the only website on this list that's created a viable new career choice – the professional eBay trader." eBay was ahead of its time, adds Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales. "It really was Web 2.0 before Web 2.0 was cool. eBay is all about having ordinary people contributing the vast majority of what's going on at the website."
9. Amazon
Another company that was Web 2.0 before the term was coined is Amazon, founded by Jeff Bezos in 1994. Bezos had originally planned to call the site Cadabra, until in a moment of clarity he realised it sounded uncannily close to 'cadaver'. And so Amazon was born, initially offering books but now selling everything from watches to lawnmowers. Not only did it popularise online shopping but its focus on user reviews paved the way for sites such as TripAdvisor and Epinions.
Match.com's Jason Stockwood says of Amazon: "Many people had huge reservations about using the internet, and even more about ecommerce. Amazon led the charge, and continues to play a crucial role in encouraging a wider demographic to feel comfortable surfing."
10. Boo.com
Not every site was as successful. Boo.com was set up at the end of 1999 selling branded fashion clothes, but went into receivership just six months later, after burning through more than £100 million. The site was big on Flash, with its 3D views of clothes and virtual shop assistant Miss Boo. 56k modems weren't ready for it and shoppers stayed away in their droves. But perhaps Boo was just before its time: does a 3D view of the product you're browsing really sound so ridiculous now?
11. Wikipedia
If Amazon championed user reviews, Wikipedia was to take user-generated content to another level, with an online encyclopedia anyone could edit. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but where errors or downright lies appear, they're quick to be corrected by the site's users. "Yes, the information is imperfect," says Jason Stockwood, "but the rigidly democratic nature of the site means that Wikipedia is a true embodiment of what the internet revolution originally promised."
12. Slashdot
If you'd rather comment than review, then you owe a debt to Slashdot, a site where people submit news stories for discussion. Created in September 1997 by Rob Malder, it continues to be a must-read destination for anyone interested in technology. Drew Curtis followed up with FARK.com, and Kevin Rose with digg.com. Commenting on stories has become so widespread that it now seems odd to arrive at a site where there are no comments.
13. The Drudge Report
It's hard to believe now, but it used to be that the mainstream media was where you went for serious, trusted news and the web didn't get a look in. But on 17 January 1998 The Drudge Report was to change that, when it broke the Monica Lewinsky scandal to the public after Newsweek decided not to publish the story.
Reporting on the event on 25 January 1998, BBC News said, in what sounds obvious and naive all these years later, "In the future, academics, politicians and journalists aren't likely to dismiss the internet so quickly."
Now news is regularly broken by specialist blogs before you read about it in the morning paper. That's assuming you even buy a morning paper any more.
14. YouTube
And where do you watch your TV? Started in a garage by three former PayPal employees, one site went on to shake up the TV industry, and was acquired by Google for $1.6 billion. All that for a company that's less than four years old. You've probably heard of it: it's called YouTube.
"You used to find a text search result for every keyword you could think of," says Torsten Schuppe, marketing director at eBay. "Now you find a video for every keyword you can think of! I've been told people upload 10 hours of video content every minute – that's huge!"
15. Gabocorp
Until Flash came along in 1996, the web was much like Ceefax, with a few animated GIFs and PC-crashing Java applets thrown in. But the arrival of Flash was to herald a new era in web design. The sign of things to come appeared in 1997 in the form of Gabocorp (archived at thefwa.com/flash10/gabo.html). Suddenly the web was no longer static.
"This was the equivalent of TV going colour," says Rob Ford, founder and principal of Favourite Website Awards. "Gabocorp made us realise we could now make things move, add sound and generally be far more creative than the days of blue hypertext links that turned purple on-click. Animated GIFs took a body blow while lake applets took the knockout punch. Gabo Medoza, for me, is a true web pioneer: we all owe his creativity and vision for where we are today."
16. Legal & General
On the accessibility front, an encouraging early example of accessible web design produced by a commercial company was that of Legal & General.
Julie Howell, director of accessibility at digital agency Fortune Cookie explains: "Legal & General were concerned that their website was needlessly excluding disabled people, so undertook a site refresh that took into account the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 (WCAG 1.0). While the company's main intention was to make the site easier for disabled people to use, the business returns were quite astonishing and proved that accessible design can be good for everyone: conversion increased by 300 per cent, maintenance costs reduced by 66 per cent, natural search listings improved by 50 per cent and page load time reduced by 75 per cent. If Legal & General can do this, what excuse do other companies have for not doing it?"
17. Hotmail
Free email for all, accessible anywhere – that was the promise of Hotmail. Founded by Jack Smith and Sabeer Bhatia, it was launched in 1996 and sold to Microsoft in 1997 for around $400 million.
18. Classmates.com
Hotmail helped us keep in touch with people we knew, but Classmates.com, launched in 1995, helped us get back in touch with people we hated at school and never kept in contact with. Four years later, the UK followed suit with Friends Reunited, which made the mistake of charging a fee to get in touch with old school pals. Then Facebook stepped in, offering the same service for free – and now we can all see that the person we fancied at school isn't quite so hot any more.
19. Match.com
Having exhausted old school friends for potential mates, where to turn? Match.com opened the entire internet community up for grabs. Going live in 1995, it was the first popular online dating site, and is also notable for being one of the first sites to persuade internet users to part with their cash for a subscription. Today, online dating is rapidly becoming the new, natural way to meet and (hopefully) fall in love.
20. HotWired
And finally, if you haven't fallen in love, how about something to hate? In 1994, web magazine HotWired pioneered banner ads. Bastards.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
5 Incredible Underwater Habitats
Recently, hurricanes, floods and torrential rains have resulted in vast areas of land, sometimes whole villages and cities, being engulfed in water. The devastation is often catastrophic. People are left homeless and destitute, with little to call their own. The effects of these disasters leave their mark long after the waters have subsided. But what if there was a way out, an alternative? What if we fulfilled the dreams of Jules Verne, and many like him, and succeeded in living under the oceans. For a long time it was never thought truly possible, now it’s quickly becoming a reality.
We look at five habitats underwater that show it is possibe to live submerged beneath the waves.
1. Hydropolis Hotel, Dubai
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Designed by Joachim Hauser, this futuristic hotel is currently being built 20m below the surface of the Persian Gulf, just off the coast of Dubai. Touted to be the world’s first underwater luxury hotel, Hydropolis will include a marine biology research center but it’s doubtful whether it will be oozing eco credentials.
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The logistics of these underwater habitats are intriguing; for one, where is the waste diverted to? Imagine gazing out at the underwater world, mesmerized by the vision beyond, amazed and in awe of the creation, when something floats by your panoramic window… and it’s not a fish.
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If it succeeds without ruining everything around it, as many predict, it could be a blueprint for sustainable designers and architects for the future.
2. Hilton Maldives Undersea Restaurant, Rangali Island
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Built entirely off-site, in Singapore, this undersea restaurant in the Maldives was based on the success of the National Centre Aquarium’s design in Kuala Lumpur. It proved to be more of a pain to construct than first thought, with many recalculations to check centers of gravity, weight distributions and tidal flows. If this small design required so much fiddling before it became a reality, how many complications must be occurring with the larger resorts?
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Sitting 5m below sea level, the restaurant is able to serve 12 people at one sitting. Diners can sit back and enjoy watching life beyond the 5m wide viewing arch, which is made from acrylic and silicone sealed.
3. Poseidon Undersea Resort, Fiji
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Although not exactly 20,000 leagues under the sea, the Poseidon Undersea Resort will sit 40 feet beneath the surface of a lagoon in Fiji. Plans for the resort have been underway since 2001 but there’s no sign of it yet in the lagoon… that’s because the hotel is being built in Portland, Oregon and will be transported to the site once completed. One can only imagine the carbon emissions totted up by that little trip.
Each room, or underwater pod, will be open to the water so guests can watch the marine world go by without getting wet, but at a cost of $30,000 per couple for a week’s stay you would hope there was at least one dive included in the price!
4. Jules’ Undersea Lodge, Florida
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Initially an underwater research facility, used to explore the continental shelf off the coast of Puerto Rico, Jules’ Undersea Lodge now sits motionless in Emerald Lagoon in Key Largo, spending its retirement showing guests the wonders of the underwater world.
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Accessed by scuba diving down 21 feet to a landing platform, Jules’ Undersea Lodge is big enough to house six people at a time. It boasts two private rooms, a relatively spacious living area with kitchen and has huge windows in every room so guests can watch the fishes go by.
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The chamber sits on stilts just five feet from the bottom of the Lagoon and compressed air prevents water from flooding the rooms.
5. Red Sea Star Restaurant, Israel
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The underwater Red Sea Star Restaurant, in the Israeli resort of Eilat, offers another take on underwater establishments. Designed by Israeli husband and wife team, Ayala and Albi Serfaty of Aqua Creations, the underwater theme is carried throughout the design, which has been created to look like a reef. Chairs take the form of sea-urchins and jelly fish, lights are starfish shaped and sand lies under an epoxy bonded floor, even the menu reflects the underwater theme, which given the setting seems somewhat disturbing.
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The view is not what most people would imagine as most of the reefs around Eilat are dead or dying. To recreate a reef system for diners, the restaurant management built an artificial reef from iron mesh and transferred various already broken species of coral onto it. Once in the water a new reef was born.
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Friday, October 3, 2008
Lebanon: Switzerland of the Middle East
Outside of wars and politics: Lebanon's natural beauty is second to none
"Switzerland" comparison does not exactly come to mind when you consider how war-torn and miserable this nation has been in the recent years. But cast a longer look around you while visiting this incredible spot in the Middle East - and the ancient, spectacular beauty of the place will start to haunt you, bless you, and lift you above political agendas and human strife.
PHOTOS:
http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/10/lebanon-switzerland-of-middle-east.html
"Switzerland" comparison does not exactly come to mind when you consider how war-torn and miserable this nation has been in the recent years. But cast a longer look around you while visiting this incredible spot in the Middle East - and the ancient, spectacular beauty of the place will start to haunt you, bless you, and lift you above political agendas and human strife.
PHOTOS:
http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/10/lebanon-switzerland-of-middle-east.html
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
City of the future: The giant glass pyramid that could house one million people
With its sharp angles and its glass walls shimmering in the sunlight it looks like a piece of modern art.
But this innovative design is actually a blueprint for the city of the future - a giant glass pyramid that could house up to one million people.
The development, named the 'Ziggurat', will be self sufficient and carbon neutral with power being supplied by wind turbines.
No cars will be allowed inside the 2.3 square kilometre building, with residents being whisked around by a monorail network which operates both horizontally and vertically.
link
GO
But this innovative design is actually a blueprint for the city of the future - a giant glass pyramid that could house up to one million people.
The development, named the 'Ziggurat', will be self sufficient and carbon neutral with power being supplied by wind turbines.
No cars will be allowed inside the 2.3 square kilometre building, with residents being whisked around by a monorail network which operates both horizontally and vertically.
link
GO
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