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Quote of the Week.

"A petabyte of data [1,000 terabytes, or one million gigabytes] is difficult to fathom. Think of it as the equivalent of a quarter-trillion pages of text -- enough to fill 20 million four-drawer filing cabinets...

[It's also] the amount of data many businesses will be managing within the next five years. Very possibly including yours."

"At Stanford University... particle-physics researchers... add 2 terabytes of data every day to an already-brimming 500-terabyte database."

"Sears Roebuck & Co... will hit the 1 petabyte threshold... within four years."

Tower of Power
Feb. 11 InformationWeek.com
http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20020208S0009

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Making The Most of Molecules.

"Fabs," or semiconductor fabrication plants, are now costing billions of dollars to build, in large part because of the inconceivable precision with which perfect patterns of circuit elements have to be laid down, time after time after time.  A misalignment measured in billionths of a meter can turn dozens of potential Pentiums into so much refined sand.  As bad as that is, this problem promises to get worse as we continue to shrink the elements that make up our chips.  Unless...

Unless, we Change The Rules, and stop carving out ever-tinier, ever-more precise circuits, and instead get even smaller elements to build themselves! 

This is the magic, and the promise, of molecular self-assembly.  And although getting it to work right is one of those classic "non-trivial tasks," the sheer elegance of what researchers are currently working towards is breathtaking.

Consider, for example, recent work by HP Labs as described in the Feb. 15 EE Times (http://www.eet.com/at/news/OEG20020215S0063 , brought to our attention by reader Kenneth LaCrosse); they lay down a set of 2-nanometer diameter wires parallel to each other, and then they lay a similar set of nanowires just above the first set, but crossways.  The resulting grid is then washed with a solution of rotaxane molecules, which are accommodating enough to automatically position themselves exactly at each cross point.  Which makes each one of those cross points becomes a molecular switch!  On or off.  One or zero.  Memory or logic gates at the potential scale of "...billions or trillions of gates..." on each silicon die, where each cross point can be error checked and "programmed" into a specific computing element.  It's essentially moving the complexity out of the hardware and into software.  And (potentially) getting around those multi-billion dollar fabs!

Phil Keukes, an HP scientist, puts it this way:

"It is basically a 'shake and bake' approach to semiconductor processing... Chemical reactions, rather than computer-defined masks, determine the circuit and assemble it."

More Than One Road.

Of course this isn't the only front in this war-of-the-tiny.  We've talked before about similar potentials for using carbon nanotube molecules (http://www.theharrowgroup.com/articles/
20011217/20011217.htm#_Toc533392872).  And Notre Dame scientists are working on yet another approach, using arrays of quantum dot transistors that aren't wired to each other at all -- they "influence" their neighbors, but seem to work nevertheless.

So the race is very much "on," and even though it's far too early to see which approach gets the Gold, there are enough racers, and the prize is large enough, that it seems likely that by one means or another the idea of a mere gigabyte of memory, or unfathomable processing power, may seem childishly simple in a decade or so. 

HP's Keukes predicts that molecular memories will appear within five years; others suspect it may take ten.  But the writing appears to be very clear on these very tiny walls:

Don't Blink!

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Oh Boy!

Those are the words of reader Robert Powell who brought an article in the Feb. 22 Wired News to my attention, and Oh Boy, is he right -- the music industry now finds itself on the RECEIVING end of the legal conflagration that it ignited with Napster.  (http://www.wired.com/news/mp3/0,1285,50625,00.html)

Supporting Napster's requests, Federal District Court judge Marilyn Patel has ordered the five record companies who essentially sued Napster out of business, to

"...prove they own thousands of music copyrights.  And [to] prove these copyrights weren't used to monopolize and stifle the distribution of digital music."

Within three weeks. 

She went on to say,

"Napster's misguided attempts to build a business using illegally obtained music paled in comparison to what could be massive misuse and heavy-handed tactics by the recording industry."

Judge Patel drew an interesting comparison between the two sides of this battle royal, pointing out that when she ordered Napster to stop violating the alleged copyright infringement, Napster immediately complied.  On the other hand,

"[The record labels'] allegedly inequitable conduct is currently ongoing, and the extent of the prospective harm is massive. If Napster is correct, plaintiffs are attempting the near monopolization of the digital distribution market. The resulting injury affects both Napster and the public interest."

"These ventures look bad, smell bad and sound bad...  " (http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/23/technology/
23MUSI.html?todaysheadlines)

Indeed, she goes on to accuse the record labels of collectively using their (assumed) copyrights to sue the digital competition out of existence as they worked on their own MusicNet and PressPlay online services, during which they,

"...necessarily [met] and [discussed] pricing and licensing, raising the specter of possible antitrust violations."

The "A" Word.

A federal judge's use of the "A" word must raise more than a few frightening songs in the hearts of the music execs, since the Justice Department opened just such an investigation in October.  So this turn of events is pretty stunning, considering that if the record companies don't legally own the copyrights (a complex issue that turns on individual phrases in various laws, such as the definition of "works-for-hire"), then they can't keep Napster down.  And an antitrust investigation could change the entire course of their industry.

I suspect that Judge Patel's ruling is music to the ears of the many fans who feel that the music industry has been acting like the proverbial 800 pound gorilla, ignoring what the digital marketplace has been so clearly saying that they want (easy, on-demand access to the specific songs they desire, at a fair price, along with the ability to copy them onto other media for their own use under the "fair use" provision of the copyright law -- just as they've always been able to do with records, cassette tapes, and other media.) 

It's clear to me that intellectual property must be protected; that gets us more and higher-quality songs to enjoy.  But there's no telling what the result of this turnaround will be.  Indeed, I wouldn't be too surprised to see a rapid turnaround in the settlement talks with Napster.  On the other hand, I can also imagine that Napster might suddenly be far less interested in settling...

This should be a most interesting tale to follow!

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So When Will It Happen? (Another Perspective)

Last issue we looked at Ian Pearson's and Ian Neild's projections of where many elements of technology may lead over the next forty and more years (http://www.theharrowgroup.com/articles/
20020218/20020218.htm#_Toc1472058).  It's a fascinating exploration of where today's hyper-exponential growth of technology may take us. 

But as we all know, as fascinating as the technologies themselves may be, it's how individuals and businesses USE these technologies that makes any given technology a winner, or relegates it to the back shelf until someone does come up with a way to apply it to a problem.   So in response to our previous look into the technological future, reader Rolf Dobelli has put together a similar projection to explore the changes in how BUSINESS, making USE of these technological advances, is likely to change.

For a few examples:

2004:   First global consumer boycott (consumers linked via Internet boycott brands on a global scale).

2006:   The first individuals go public (IPO).

2007:   Advertising industry collapses: Most advertising in electronic media filtered out by intelligent agents; most private shopping done by bots based on product standards, price and ratings.

2010:   Fund management software combining AI investment selection and automated electronic trade execution is cheaply available; decline of brokerage and mutual fund industries.

2010:   Synthetic person becomes major role model for global youth.

2030:   US Supreme Court rules that brain scan of employee remains property of employee but can be used by employer even after employee has left the company.

And many more...

I think you'll find the rest of Rolf's prognostications as interesting and thought provoking; they're at http://theharrowgroup.com/articles/20020304/TNSY.htm .

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Tidbits...

Compression Potential.

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Jeff Harrow

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Move Over, Road Rage!

Finally, we're all familiar with, and may have experienced, the frustrations that can come from a rude driver cutting us off; it sometimes leads to irrational anger and the classic three-fingered salute, or occasionally to the one-hand salute -- of a handgun.  Rage is nothing to fool around with.  And now, it seems, it's coming to the Web.

Termed "Web Rage," it's the result of the very real frustrations that some people feel when using the Internet and things don't go quite right.  According to the Feb. 20 BBC News (http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1829000/1829944.stm), one example is of an IT manager smashing his notebook when a Web page refused to accept his logon information after six tries. 

The firm Abbey National performed a survey, and found that eleven percent of respondents reported that the Web forces them to lose their cool at least once per day.  Seven percent admitted to taking out their rage on their keyboards and mice (hopefully the computer kind).  But most disconcerting of all, is that "2% admitted to hitting workmates to vent their frustration." 

The Web CAN be a dangerous place in ways we might not have considered, so "be careful out there."  If you hear someone in the next cube beating on their keyboard, it might be wise to give them some space.  And just think how contrite they'll feel when they have to bring their digital detritus to the boss for a replacement... 

But -- better the plastic, than you.

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