WEBVTT - Marshall Brain's News Roundup: March 25th, 2011 0:00:00.520 --> 0:00:03.840 Welcome to Brainstuff from how Stuff works dot com where 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:14.600 smart Happens. Hi Am Marshall Brain and welcome to this 0:00:14.640 --> 0:00:18.200 week's Friday news roundup. One thing that has gotten a 0:00:18.320 --> 0:00:22.520 lot of buzz this week is something called Color. Yes, Color, 0:00:23.040 --> 0:00:25.439 How in the world did they get color dot com 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:30.400 for their domain? You ask? They spent three dollars for it. 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:34.640 Colors goal seems to be and this is open to interpretation, 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:40.640 to make intercommunication between people even more immediate than, for example, 0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:44.000 Twitter makes it. To understand this, think about how the 0:00:44.200 --> 0:00:48.760 time to publication has been reduced over the years. With books, 0:00:49.000 --> 0:00:51.280 an author would write for a year or two and 0:00:51.360 --> 0:00:54.480 then publish the book. With magazines, it might take a 0:00:54.560 --> 0:00:57.760 week for an author to write an article. With newspapers, 0:00:58.040 --> 0:01:00.400 the creation time for an article falls to about a 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:03.000 day or two. With a blog, it might take an 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:06.280 hour or two per post. With Twitter, it takes just 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:09.679 a minute or two per post. And now with color 0:01:09.959 --> 0:01:13.440 it is actually immediate. The instant you take a photo 0:01:13.520 --> 0:01:16.760 with your smartphone, the photo goes up to the cloud, 0:01:16.880 --> 0:01:20.320 tagged with your I D, your location, the date and time, 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:23.959 and so on. Anyone else in the general vicinity gets 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:27.280 a stream of all the photos being taken near by, 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:32.520 and they get that stream instantly. There's no thinking involved. 0:01:32.600 --> 0:01:36.199 You simply snap a photo and it immediately goes live 0:01:36.360 --> 0:01:40.080 to everyone. It doesn't get any more immediate than that. 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:44.679 Speaking of immediate, this company apparently sprang up and secured 0:01:44.760 --> 0:01:47.720 forty one million dollars in venture funding from two of 0:01:47.720 --> 0:01:51.640 the most prestigious venture capital firms in the business in 0:01:51.680 --> 0:01:55.440 about half a year. As with Twitter, some will wonder 0:01:55.600 --> 0:01:58.280 what the point is. Who's going to sit and look 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:02.520 at streams of bad photo graphs. But knowledgeable people believe 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:05.880 this is the next big thing, given all the buzz 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:08.560 that it's been generating. We'll see if it works a 0:02:08.639 --> 0:02:12.280 year from now. If you google Interesting Reading number seven thirteen, 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:16.359 you can get the details on color. Also in Interesting 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:19.519 Reading seven thirteen, there are two articles from the World 0:02:19.560 --> 0:02:24.040 of Physics. In one, best selling author and scientist Brian 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:29.639 Green talks about multiverses. A multiverse is the idea that 0:02:29.720 --> 0:02:33.920 there are bigger places outside of our universe. That how 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:38.839 is multiple universes. The reasons scientists talk about the multiverse 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:42.720 is that there are mathematical patterns suggesting that the multiverse 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:46.680 might actually exist. The amazing thing is that the Large 0:02:46.760 --> 0:02:51.880 Hadron Collider may provide a platform to test the mathematics 0:02:51.919 --> 0:02:56.040 and therefore the multiverse theory. It's also possible to look 0:02:56.080 --> 0:03:01.040 for energy leaving our universe in lhc illisions, meaning that 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:04.720 it might be going into other universes. It's a very 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:08.240 interesting article, especially since it's written in English rather than 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:11.720 physics speak. The other article is about a twelve year 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:16.400 old prodigy who's already in college in Indiana and he 0:03:16.440 --> 0:03:20.040 believes that the Big Bang theory is wrong. He bases 0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:23.280 this belief on the number of heavier elements like heavier 0:03:23.320 --> 0:03:26.560 than hydrogen, found in today's universe and the amount of 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:29.760 time available to manufacture them in the cores of stars 0:03:30.160 --> 0:03:33.600 under the current theory of where these elements come from. 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:36.680 Both of these articles can be found by googling Interesting 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:42.120 Reading number seven thirteen. Interesting Reading number seven twelve opens 0:03:42.120 --> 0:03:46.240 with a very interesting concept. The desert nation of Qatar 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:49.840 is hosting the World Cup soccer games in a decade, 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.480 so they will be needing to construct nine new air 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:58.240 conditioned stadiums because temperatures and guitar get quite hot in 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:03.440 the summer. One proposed solution is a very bizarre flying machine, 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:08.400 essentially a large roof that hovers over the stadium, powered 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:12.480 by solar cells down washed from the propellers. Keeping the 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:16.560 roof aloft would provide a cooling effect in this approach. 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:19.520 When you look at it, you immediately start wondering about 0:04:19.560 --> 0:04:22.920 the safety of this whole idea. Nonetheless, it is interesting 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:25.719 to think about it, and it would be the world's 0:04:25.800 --> 0:04:29.440 largest hoverboard. If you google Interesting Reading seven twelve, you 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:33.039 can get its details. It's hard to believe, but it's 0:04:33.120 --> 0:04:38.640 been two weeks since Japan's giant earthquake tsunami nuclear disaster 0:04:38.839 --> 0:04:42.440 hit the island nation. Many of the nation's roads and 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:46.680 systems are coming back online now. Early estimates for repairing 0:04:46.680 --> 0:04:50.000 and replacing all the damage are hovering around two fifty 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:53.920 billion dollars, and it's been discovered that about twenty seven 0:04:54.040 --> 0:04:58.920 thousand people have died in this catastrophe. The nuclear meltdown 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:02.760 scenario also seems to be under control. There's an article 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:05.960 in Nature magazine this week that describes some of the 0:05:06.120 --> 0:05:10.280 unbelievable steps taken inside the plant that prevented it from 0:05:10.320 --> 0:05:13.719 being an even bigger disaster. It really is amazing some 0:05:13.800 --> 0:05:16.520 of the things that these people thought of and did 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:20.200 in order to keep these reactors cooled down. If you 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:23.800 go to Interesting Reading number seven twelve, you can get details. 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:28.360 The Apple iPad also went on sale the same day 0:05:28.400 --> 0:05:33.800 that Japan's earthquake hit. Now manufacturers are showing new tablets 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.920 that hope to compete with Apple's flagship machine. The Galaxy 0:05:38.000 --> 0:05:42.120 Tab from Samsung has been updated and comes in two sizes. 0:05:43.000 --> 0:05:46.400 These tablets seem to beat the iPad two in every 0:05:46.480 --> 0:05:50.320 spec category. They're thinner and lighter, they have better displays, 0:05:50.400 --> 0:05:52.880 they have better cameras, they allow you to plug in 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:57.760 st memory cards, and they run Android Honeycomb. The pricing 0:05:57.839 --> 0:06:01.360 is identical to the iPad too, and then there's Rims 0:06:01.440 --> 0:06:06.360 new playbook tablet with similar respects and similar pricing. It 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.599 looks like the Apple iPad two could have some major 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:13.240 competition this summer. If you google Interesting Reading seven twelve 0:06:13.279 --> 0:06:16.720 you can get details. There's been a lot of talk 0:06:16.800 --> 0:06:20.560 this week about cell phones turning into wallets. This movement 0:06:20.600 --> 0:06:22.960 has been underway for some time in Japan and some 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:26.000 other countries, but it's easy to imagine it happening in 0:06:26.040 --> 0:06:29.120 the US as well. Your phone would have a near 0:06:29.200 --> 0:06:32.919 field communication chip and there are rumors that the iPhone 0:06:32.960 --> 0:06:36.520 five may contain this chip. You hold your phone near 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:40.359 a payment terminal and the transaction happens automatically between the 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:43.920 phone and the terminal. Given that the technology is already 0:06:43.960 --> 0:06:47.359 deployed in other countries, you might wonder what's holding it 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:50.960 up in the United States. If you guessed money and 0:06:51.480 --> 0:06:56.080 arguments over money amongst the entrenched corporate players, you are correct. 0:06:56.560 --> 0:06:59.960 Existing credit card companies and banks which handle all credit 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:04.240 at card transactions now want their money, and the smartphone 0:07:04.279 --> 0:07:06.480 carriers now on a piece of the action as well, 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:08.719 and blah blah blah. You've heard of this kind of 0:07:08.720 --> 0:07:12.880 stuff before. Ignoring this clash of the titans, the technology 0:07:12.960 --> 0:07:16.080 is really interesting, and you can google interesting reading seven 0:07:16.120 --> 0:07:20.560 twelve to learn more. Which type of energy causes the 0:07:20.600 --> 0:07:24.680 most deaths? After the disaster in Japan this past couple 0:07:24.720 --> 0:07:27.320 of weeks, nuclear isn't looking so good at the moment, 0:07:27.600 --> 0:07:31.200 but nuclear just does not cause very many deaths in 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:34.880 the grand scheme of things. In fact, from a death standpoint, 0:07:35.000 --> 0:07:39.040 nuclear is the safest energy source available, even after counting 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:43.680 the nine thousand deaths attributed to Chernobyl. Natural gas is 0:07:43.800 --> 0:07:48.360 second hydro, and here Hydro is weighed down by a 0:07:48.520 --> 0:07:51.480 huge damn collapse that happened in China and killed over 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:55.920 two hundred thousand people several decades ago. Is third, if 0:07:55.960 --> 0:07:59.640 you ignore that big tragic event, hydro is pretty safe. 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:02.360 And then there's coal, which is by far the most 0:08:02.440 --> 0:08:05.800 dangerous because of all its emissions. If you see interesting 0:08:05.800 --> 0:08:08.920 Reading seven twelve, you can learn more about these different 0:08:09.040 --> 0:08:13.200 energy options and the number of deaths they cause. Speaking 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:17.920 of deaths, who is the worst enemy of birds? Is 0:08:17.960 --> 0:08:22.640 it windmills whose giant blades knocked birds out of the sky. No? 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.640 Is it big living room windows and sliding glass doors, 0:08:26.720 --> 0:08:30.520 which birds seem to run into with surprising frequency. No 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:35.600 Is it cars which run into birds at sixty miles No, No, 0:08:36.160 --> 0:08:40.040 it is house cats. Now you might wonder how scientists 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:43.440 figured this out. They did it by attaching tiny radio 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:47.240 transmitters to birds and then waiting for the birds to die. 0:08:47.920 --> 0:08:51.760 Some estimates put the total bird kill due to cats. 0:08:51.800 --> 0:08:55.560 We might call this a catastrophe at half a billion 0:08:55.640 --> 0:08:58.839 birds per year. Now, when you consider that there's only 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:02.160 three million people in the United States, we're talking about 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:05.000 almost twice as many birds dying every year just due 0:09:05.080 --> 0:09:09.480 to cats. Wind turbans kill one one thousand that number. 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:13.599 But think about the giant uproar that occurs when windmills 0:09:13.720 --> 0:09:16.800 kill anything. Probably a lot of the people who cause 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:21.280 those uproars are cat owners. Anyways, see interesting reading seven 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:25.480 eleven for details. Think about all the spam you get, 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:28.920 where does it come from? One source is bot nets. 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:33.000 People let their machines get infected with viruses or trojans, 0:09:33.040 --> 0:09:37.199 and then their machines start sending spam. Millions of machines 0:09:37.200 --> 0:09:39.559 have been infected in this way, and that's why there's 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.920 so much spam that's being produced. One of the biggest 0:09:42.960 --> 0:09:46.800 spam producers is known as rust Stock, producing more than 0:09:46.920 --> 0:09:51.280 half of the world's spam, and it got decapitated this week. 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:54.720 Microsoft was a big player in the decapitation of rusts Stock, 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.160 and so was Fiser. You know all that viagrasas spam 0:09:58.200 --> 0:10:01.640 you get, Yeah, Well, Fiser, the maker of VIAGRAA, isn't 0:10:01.679 --> 0:10:05.280 so keen on that. So the decapitation was an important 0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:10.000 milestone event for lots of different people. Decapitation means that 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:13.800 a handful of computers that controlled the botan net needed 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:17.080 to be disconnected from the infected machines, and this was 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:21.319 done by eliminating domains and blocking certain IP addresses. It's 0:10:21.360 --> 0:10:25.320 actually a really fascinating world involving a lot of illicit money. 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:28.120 If you go to Interesting Reading number seven eleven you 0:10:28.120 --> 0:10:31.080 can get the details on this. There was a new 0:10:31.160 --> 0:10:34.000 bicycle created this week that is unique for at least 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:38.600 two reasons. First, it's made completely out of plastic nylon 0:10:38.679 --> 0:10:42.040 to be exact, and second, almost the entire thing was 0:10:42.120 --> 0:10:45.560 printed on a three D printer. Also fascinating is the 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:48.720 fact that everything except the chain and the tires and 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:53.280 everything here means axles, ball bearings, pedals, seats, handlebars, and 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:56.800 so on, we're all printed as a single object. The 0:10:56.920 --> 0:11:01.400 process is called additive layer manufact lecturing. The best part 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:03.679 is that the bike is about a third lighter than 0:11:03.720 --> 0:11:07.720 metal bikes. It means that manufacturing has the potential to 0:11:07.760 --> 0:11:10.840 get quite a bit simpler, especially on low run parts 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.880 and assemblies. If you see Interesting Reading number seven eleven, 0:11:15.160 --> 0:11:17.880 you can find photos in a description of the process. 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:21.960 Firefox four came out this week. There are about ten 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:25.440 million people per day downloading the new version of this 0:11:25.520 --> 0:11:28.200 browser right now if you haven't seen it yet. There 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:32.800 are two features called Panorama and sink that are especially interesting. 0:11:33.320 --> 0:11:37.679 Panorama lets you organize open web pages into groups so 0:11:37.720 --> 0:11:41.600 that's easy to retrieve them. Sink lets you put everything 0:11:41.640 --> 0:11:44.960 about your copy of Firefox up in the cloud, all 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:49.720 your open pages, your favorites, your passwords, everything and access 0:11:49.760 --> 0:11:53.360 at all from any machine. These two things together make 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:57.360 for a great browser experience. If you google brain stuff 0:11:57.480 --> 0:12:00.840 Firefox four, you can get details and see how many 0:12:00.880 --> 0:12:05.720 copies are being downloaded every minute. Interesting reading Number seven 0:12:05.720 --> 0:12:07.760 ten has a lot of cool stuff in it, but 0:12:07.880 --> 0:12:12.240 two things deserve special recognition. The first is a camera 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:15.040 so tiny that it should be able to go inside 0:12:15.120 --> 0:12:19.280 your body. Imagine a cube measuring one millimeter on each side. 0:12:19.360 --> 0:12:22.480 That's about the size of this camera. It's also so 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:27.120 inexpensive that it's disposable. The article contains this quote. If 0:12:27.200 --> 0:12:30.600 you think about very very small cameras, you will find 0:12:30.720 --> 0:12:34.720 dozens of applications end quote. For example, you can stick 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:38.439 this camera into almost any human orifice. You can look 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:41.680 at all kinds of tight places in cars. You can 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:43.959 poke it into nooks and crannies of a house by 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:47.000 drilling very small holes. You can use it to monitor 0:12:47.080 --> 0:12:49.720 all kinds of stuff that really would have been hard 0:12:49.760 --> 0:12:52.720 to monitor previously, either because of the size or the 0:12:52.800 --> 0:12:56.920 cost of the camera. The other article is about a new, 0:12:57.200 --> 0:13:01.280 very inexpensive way to make quite led. These l eds 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:04.640 can be made using normal silicon wafers rather than any 0:13:04.720 --> 0:13:07.920 kind of exotic process, meaning the price can drop by 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:11.200 more than a half. If they can scale this technology up, 0:13:11.240 --> 0:13:14.200 it could mean cheap LED light bulbs could arrive a 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:19.400 lot quicker than expected. Google Interesting reading seven ten for details. 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:22.959 So to wrap up this week, I'm gonna end with 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:25.880 Rebecca Black because I wrote an article about her this 0:13:25.960 --> 0:13:29.080 week that's gotten a lot of traffic. The article is 0:13:29.120 --> 0:13:33.160 answering this question, how did Rebecca Black make her music 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:36.679 video and how much money has that video generated. This 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:39.440 question came up because I have a preteen daughter and 0:13:39.520 --> 0:13:41.880 she wanted to know if she could make a video 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:45.920 like this. A little research reveals that Rebecca's mother paid 0:13:45.960 --> 0:13:49.440 about two thousand dollars to a place called Arc Music 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:53.199 Factory to produce that video, in much the same way 0:13:53.240 --> 0:13:56.080 you might pay a hundred dollars to glamour Shots to 0:13:56.200 --> 0:14:00.480 have a fashion model photo shoot experience. If you mute 0:14:00.480 --> 0:14:03.680 the sound on Rebecca Black's video and just watch the 0:14:03.760 --> 0:14:06.640 video itself, you can see that this is an extremely 0:14:06.720 --> 0:14:09.840 credible video, with over a hundred shots and over a 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:15.079 dozen locations, all cut together very professionally. Rebecca also looks 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:18.440 very professional and almost all of the shots, and many 0:14:18.480 --> 0:14:22.239 of these shots have other actors moving and or interacting 0:14:22.240 --> 0:14:24.800 with her. In other words, they didn't just do this 0:14:24.840 --> 0:14:27.520 in an hour. They had to do repeated shots and 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:30.680 a lot of work to make this thing happen. Off 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:33.840 of this video, they've made tens of thousands of dollars 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:37.240 off the ads on the YouTube side, and then by 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:40.880 selling it on iTunes, they've made something approaching two million 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:45.600 dollars more from the iTunes royalties. The whole thing is amazing, 0:14:45.680 --> 0:14:48.600 and it points to two things. First, the amount of 0:14:48.640 --> 0:14:51.400 money that can be made by a video that goes viral, 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:54.920 and the ability to take a viral video like this 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:57.880 one and make money off of it in several different 0:14:58.280 --> 0:15:01.920 kind of synchronized ways. It also says that within the 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:04.800 next couple of months we should see a huge number 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:09.040 of companies producing these little videos popping up at all 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:12.120 kinds of places in the same way that glamour shots 0:15:12.160 --> 0:15:15.880 spread all across the country. Once people realized how much 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:20.480 they enjoyed this whole fashion model photo shoot experience. Every 0:15:20.520 --> 0:15:23.800 teenager theoretically will be begging for one of these little 0:15:23.880 --> 0:15:27.720 music videos. If you google brain Stuff Rebecca Black, you 0:15:27.760 --> 0:15:30.840 can learn more about this whole process. So that's it 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:33.360 for this week. Have a great weekend, and if you 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:35.160 want to look up any of this stuff, you can 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:41.280 google interesting reading numbers seven seven, seven hundred twelve or 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:47.280 seven hundred thirteen. Thanks for more on this and thousands 0:15:47.320 --> 0:15:49.880 of other topics. Does that house stuff works dot com 0:15:49.920 --> 0:15:51.800 And don't forget to check out the brain stuff blog 0:15:51.920 --> 0:15:54.040 on the house stuff works dot com home page. You 0:15:54.080 --> 0:15:57.040 can also follow brain stuff on Facebook or Twitter at 0:15:57.040 --> 0:16:03.040 brain stuff HSW. The haustufforks iPhone app has arrived. Download 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:04.520 it today on iTunes.