Beowulf

Nov 19 - The better-than-expected motion picture debut of the epic "Beowulf" puts motion capture technology, an innovative hybrid of live action, animation, and 3D computer generated visuals, in a starrring role.

Hollywood has experimented with the technology before, using it in limited fashion in "Lord of the Rings" and "Polar Express". But in Beowulf's case, it was the first time an entire movie was created using real human voice and action combined with 3D digital enhancements. Motion capture technology seemed to resonate with North American audiences. In Beowulf's weekend debut it pounced on its nearest North American competitor by two-to-one.

Conway G. Gittens reports.

FEATURED SPEAKER: Greg Worley, founder, Worley Works

Distributed

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A sense of things to come

Sensors can keep a remote eye on almost anything

THE military uses for wireless technology are persuasive. For example, pilots can fly above a war zone and drop thousands of small wireless sensors, the size of a small pebble and costing a dollar apiece, over the terrain. As soon as they settle the devices start communicating with each other, weaving themselves into a dense digital mesh. They pick up vibration and sound, so they can identify advancing troops. The sensors can also detect the presence of nuclear, chemical or biological agents. The information they pick up is relayed to a satellite. For power, they "scavenge" energy from the environment, using solar energy or temperature changes.

The Economist April 28, 2007

Akamai

Definition of: Akamai

(Akamai Technologies, Inc., Cambridge, MA, www.akamai.com) A company that provides Internet content delivery with guaranteed performance using its own worldwide network. Founded in 1998 by a group of MIT scientists and Internet professionals, Akamai licensed routing algorithms developed at MIT to develop a high-performance network that could efficiently route traffic to the most expedient Web server depending on the source of the request and network conditions. Since most of the content of a Web page is graphics, a Web site customer might host the text itself and offload the graphics to Akamai. Akamai (pronounced "ah-ka-my") is Hawaiian for intelligent, or "cool."

Src http://www.pcmag.com/