Color e-paper update - May 2009

An article published in Nature Photonics (read the summary of the article at http://www.nature.com/nphoton/journal/v3/n5/abs/nphoton.2009.68.html) about a week ago informs about two prototypes of color e-paper displays. It is very interesting to see that the techonology they are using comes from the past. In fact, both developments are focused on using pigments in an aqueous solution inside the pixel. Then, by manipulating the voltage on each device the liquid with the pigment draws out from the reservoir into the freee space of the pixel (in the second prototype, there are two pigments in each reservoir but with different charge properties so that the voltage controls which of them is shown in the display). 

The potential of colorized e-ink for the health sciences publishing industry is huge. It opens a vast universe of possibilities and new developments on e-books and, also, new instructional models for education, e-libraries, multiformat services and more other interesting gadgets.

Fujitsu has started to sell his first color e-reader (FLEPia) on march this year, with an 8-inch screen display and up to 260,000 colors in high-definition. Even if it's a very good start for this new market, the re-draw speed is still low and the weight (385g) and specially the price is too high if compared to the Sony e-Reader or the Kindle. 

Update on the Wolfram|Alpha project

There's been great anticipation around Stephen Wolfram's ambitious project to create a comprehensive "computational knowledge engine." The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University will host a sneak preview of the Wolfram|Alpha system, and a discussion of its underlying technology and implications. Participants will include Wolfram|Alpha founder Stephen Wolfram and Professor of Law Jonathan Zittrain.


Stephen Wolfram discusses Wolfram|Alpha: Computational Knowledge Engine...here's the video:

Value added lost

We can develop the best product and services in the world. But, among many other issues, we must be aware of two critical things:

1) Online products and services change fast because of their environment;
2) People who create product and services are not the ones communicating its existence to the market.

The consequences of these two facts are:

1) Flexibility and adaptation are required more than ever;
2) People who create must be involved in the communication of the product and services to the audience.

So, for the first subject, we need people who learn fast, who understand perfectly what they are working with, who can assess the needs of the users and are able to match them in seconds. But if they don’t match, then they should be prepared to offer a solution based on our know how and skills. And latest, they should be capable of giving the correct feedback so we can adapt fast to changes.

And for the second concern, we should involve developers and managers in building, and continuously adapting, the correct messages about our products and services. We should all become story tellers of our products because stories can be, just by themselves, a hundred times more fascinating than a flyer.

Medical images databases

I’m currently working with my team on browsing the images contained inside an ebook in a 3D environment. Tho objective is have a better navigation of the images and access the clinical cases from them. Doctors are used to see lots of images during their daily work, so it is important to navigate medical content databases the same way.

See this video I just made for better understand what we are doing:



Any comments and ideas are always welcome.

Wolfram Alpha

This could be the next generation search engine: Wolfram

http://blog.wolfram.com/2009/03/05/wolframalpha-is-coming/

2019

Someone imagined the next generation tools.....

<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-GB&amp;playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:a517b260-bb6b-48b9-87ac-8e2743a28ec5&amp;showPlaylist=true&amp;from=shared" target="_new" title="Future Vision Montage">Video: Future Vision Montage</a>


Wish I was there !

World Innovation Forum

This major event on innovation will take place in a few weeks in New York. WIF: In these troubled times, innovation is more critical than ever because it paves the way to increased profitability, business solutions and growth.

Speakers at the forum are:

CLAYTON CHRISTENSEN & Disruptive Innovation
World-renowned for his work on innovation and disruption, sought-after consultant and best-selling author

VIJAY GOVINDARAJAN & Innovation in a Global World
One of the world's leading experts on strategy and innovation

FRED KRUPP & Eco-Innovation
President of the Environmental Defense Fund

DAN ARIELY & Predictably Irrational
Behavioral economist and best-selling author

CK PRAHALAD & The New Age of Innovation
One of the world's most recognized thinkers on strategy and author of the bestseller, Competing for the Future

PAUL SAFFO & Future & Technology
Stanford University Professor, Technology Futurist and Forecaster.
Founding Chairman of the Samsung Science Board

INNOVATION CASES & Real-World Examples
Top executives of leading organizations present the latest trends in innovation

2008 (ENG)

This 2008 has been a great year. Because I have made a significant change in my professional life and I succeeded. I have met a great team and a fantastic project.

The illusion I began with in this adventure is still with me and it’s renewed constantly thanks to the people surrounding me.

I see the difficulties we have and those that could come, but none seems to me unworkable. I see them more like opportunities and challenges.

I like and enjoy what I do and the people I’m working with, and I am happy of the persons who share my personal and professional life.

I always remember colleagues and friends from my previous adventures, because they also have been crucial to me and they continue to be.

I am very thankful for this past year 2008 and very excited by the one starting in a few days.

2008

Para mí este ha sido un gran año. Porque he hecho un cambio significativo en mi vida profesional y he acertado. He conocido a un gran equipo de personas y un fantástico proyecto.

La ilusión con la que empecé esta aventura sigue conmigo y se renueva constantemente gracias a las personas que me rodean. Veo las dificultades que tenemos y las que pueden venir, pero ninguna me parece insalvable y las tomo como oportunidades y retos.

Me gusta y disfruto de lo que hago y con quien lo hago, y estoy feliz de las personas que comparten mi vida personal y profesional.

Me acuerdo siempre de los compañeros y amigos de anteriores aventuras, porque ellos también han sido cruciales para mí y lo siguen siendo.

En definitiva, estoy muy agradecido por este año que termina pronto y muy entusiasmado por el que llega.

Followers......

See full article at WebStrategist.

Just a brief of the stats published which reveal the power of the net.

Facebook
Obama: 2,379,102 supporters
McCain: 620,359 supporters

Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

MySpace

Obama: Friends: 833,161
McCain: Friends: 217,811

Obama has 380% more supporters than McCain

YouTube

Obama: 1792 videos uploaded since Nov 2006, Subscribers: 114,559 (uploads about 4 a day), Channel Views: 18,413,110
McCain: 329 videos uploaded since Feb 2007 (uploads about 2 a day), Subscribers: 28,419, Channel Views: 2,032,993

Obama has 403% more subscribers than McCain
Obama has 905% more viewers than McCain

Twitter

Obama: @barackobama has 112,474 followers
McCain: @JohnMcCain (is it real?) 4,603 followers

Obama has 240 times more followers in Twitter than McCain

Take your own conclusions.

The era of THE USER

I had a revealing conversation with a relative of mine who is a Doctor. We were talking about Internet, social networks and professional information. Actually, I was interested in knowing how does he use the computer every day.

The answer was very simple: I use my laptop five to ten times per day depending on the number of patients I visit. He literally said:

“In the morning, when I arrive to my office, I read two or three different online newspapers (I wish I could learn how to use RSS),. Then I open my personal and professional email (I use to receive all kinds of jokes from other doctors, lots of spam and some professional newsletters I read in less than five minutes). In this same session I see the weather forecast for the next days and that’s all.

At lunch, I revisit my email (both of them), search some medical information when I want to revise some aspects of certain pathologies, update news (don’t have time to see the news on TV) and, from time to time, visit my Linkedin account.

During the afternoon, to prepare patient’s visits, I use to access an image database created internally with the images and videos we record on every patient. That helps me to remember their clinical dossiers and to see the evolution of the treatment.

After a long day, at home, I have another laptop I use just for fun: email, search information on interesting travels I would like to do and, sometimes, search new gadgets (TV, music, cameras).”

I then asked him about his preferred search engine. And the answer was not the one I expected (Google or Yahoo). He answered he was bored of these search engines because of the big amount of unnecessary information they offer in every search.

He told me he was expecting some smart company to create a single platform where he could “place” all the services he is using: email (both), his own images and videos database, RSS, library, travel agency, newspapers and newsletters (titles would be sufficient) and other stuff that could change from time to time. He wanted this synchronized automatically in his two laptops or, also, available in some private website (so he could access it from other’s computers).

It’s not the first time I listen to this same comment, and my own experience is that I’ve also build a centralized unique website to link all my needs of information, access to networks, banks, service’s accounts, etc.

Unconsciously, what we are doing is staying away from doing more and more searches and, instead of this, building our own system of information. This personal system is generated by our previous searches of information (a lot of them), contacts with others, and of course experience.

All these outcomes drove us to be aware of the different places we need to visit in the internet (our hard drive or network) to feed our desires. So now we tend to navigate directly to these sites instead of starting googling or yahooing.

Improving health care in Pennsylvania by cutting costs?

Small network of three hospital called Geisinger Health System charge a flat fee on coronary-artery bypass surgery and all the pre- and post-operative care that goes with it and warranties that, if preventable complications occurs, Geisinger will assume the new costs.

It is called the ProvenCare guarantee is based on his CEO concept that thay shouldn't get paid if we don't do the right thing.

The company is studying more procedures and deceases to be included in their program. More can be read at Fastcompany.

Microtargeting tools used in US presidential campaign

Six companies are helping McCain and Obama to learn what you eat, what you buy, where you live, where you work, what your bank is, what you drive and where you shop.

• Strategic Telemetry
• Grassroots Targeting
• Target Point Consulting
• Catalist
• Yougov
• Resonate networks

A lot can be learned for our projects.

Google Books is paying

Google would pay $125 million to settle two copyright lawsuits where his book-scanning efforts were compromised by the Association of American Publishers.

The new agreement will allow Google to show a 20% of each scanned bookto the users without paying anything. The full text could also be available for a certain price. This could be a good measure but thinking on technical or scientific books I wonder if this 20% is a big big mistake.

The NYT explains that Google plans to take 37 percent of the revenue, leaving 63 percent for publishers and authors.

40

Today's my 40th birthday!! 

I was awaked at 7h30 -as usual- by Julia and Carlos who wanted to have breakfast….a few minutes later, they came with Teresa to give me some gifts (surprise! morning party!) and we sung all together in the bed for a while!

After playing with them I decided to post some thoughts. I'm happy, I have a wonderful FAMILY and very good friends I really love. I do, most of my time, the things I like to do. I try not to waste my time, I enjoy my job and professional projects, my colleagues (...most of them) and travelling to meet with people with whom I can spend good moments and face daily challenges. 

Past has been wonderful. I like the people who are (have been) in my life, I like the different things I've being doing, the places I had the oportunity to discover, even the sports I practiced (and still practice). 

Present is today, is still amazing and futur is unknown and exciting. Many things to do, many people to know, many places to discover and plenty of curiosity to fuel my engine!

More astonishing presentations by Benjamin Zander

Another video of Benjamin Zander introducing the art of possibility.
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New blog on book innovation

I've just opened a new blog called: Book Innovation.

Feel free to post your comments and even send me your posts if you want to publish them in it.

I admire Benjamin Zander

Watch this video and enjoy Benjamin Zander. No comments are necessary, he is pure joy of life, illusion, possibility, passion and I love it.

Google Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer

The shiny new internet browser from Google is here. Google Chrome is available for download from here. What are the implications for the two other main browsers, Firefox and Internet Explorer.

I've read some blogs where people are announcing the end of the story for them, and others who are just expecting the final version of this new browser to say their final word.

But, for sure, this presentation takes the Google-Microsoft rivalry to a whole new level and it will also affect the whole internet.

One of the most interesting things in Chrome is the address bar. People in Google resolved one of the most common mistakes in browsing the web: to write a search in this bar instead of the search box. Google has unified the address bar and the seach box creating a new concept now called the Omnibox.

Networking engines

One of the wonderful services/functionalities that is offered by Facebook, Linkedin or other social networks is the one that informs you with this message: John S has updated his profile. Just this simple message posted in your landing page, or in your inbox, is powerful enough to make you visit John S profile.
This occurs because we are naturally curious about many things and, specially, the ones referred to people we know. So curiosity is a human emotion driving us to explore the unknown but also a powerful engine which can be used to drive our attention to a specific site.