Category: Technology

The world’s largest jet engine maker Rock Hill, South Carolina based General Electric (GE) is turning to 3D printing to make airplane parts. More specifically it is trying to build more than 85,000 fuel nozzles for its Leap engines using 3D printers. It bought 3D printing company Morris Technologies last year and spent millions of other dollars on other acquisitions and hardware. GE is not alone in this field and Boeing, Nike, Siemens, and Rolls-Royce are also using the technology and making substantial investments to improve it. They all expect to get required parts faster, at a higher quality and lower cost.

3D printing is a process of making three-dimensional solid objects using an additive process where layers of material are laid to make the final product. Some compare it to an industrial robot. The technology has been around since the 1980s but commercial availability of printers became widely used in 2010s. Some estimates the 3D printer market equal to about $2.2 billion a year industry. GE’s biggest problem at the moment is finding industrial grade systems capable of producing metal parts. 3D Systems is the largest maker of 3d printers in the United States.

Article submitted by My Systems Journal.

The world’s computing hardware industry is estimated at more than $100 billion a year. Major manufacturers of servers, networking gear and storage equipment includes Cisco Systems, Hewlett-Packard and Dell. More and more Asian manufacturers are entering the market place and new free technologies introduced by Facebook are threatening the existence of major industry players.

In April 2011, Facebook started a new blueprint for its hardware known as the Open Compute Project. It allowed outsiders to join its engineers to build a new data center of tomorrow. An experimental data center is located just outside the Arctic Circle in Luléa, Sweden. Facebook claim the building is most energy efficient mega data center ever built in the world. It uses two-thirds less energy than a typical data center to process data and to cool the entire facility including servers. It takes frigid air from outside to cool servers and vents out hot air. Additionally, it slimmed down most of the servers getting rid of outer covers exposing motherboards to arctic air for efficient cooling. The center can handle 350 million photographs, 10 billion massages and another 4.5 billion similar things a day. The project has gotten the attention of computing behemoths.

I have vivid memories of my mother setting aside colorful scraps of paper and pasting them onto a printed map in the hopes of winning a trip to Brazil. She had been bitten by the sweepstakes bug. As much as I enjoyed her home cooking, as a child I nonetheless enjoyed our trips to the local fast food joint. I mean, what kid didn’t look forward to a hamburger instead of the pasta casserole that could sometimes grace a dining room table? Fortunately for me, my favorite fast food restaurant was holding the sweepstakes that my mom had become obsessed with. And in carrying on the tradition, I too have become enamored by internet sweepstakes games and the like.

It is quite a bit of fun to pin some pipe dreams on chance with only a fraction of risk. In addition, it has been exciting to find websites that cater to the sweepstakes admirer. As we live our daily lives in the grind of the usual nine to five, the fantasy is made possible that a glamorous trip to a far off distant land may arrive with a bit of luck. While it doesn’t take away from the wonderful life I live now, I don’t deny that I’m glad that quite a few WI-fi hotspots have taken advantage of internet sweepstakes software. The chance of winning is out there. And even if I never win, the idea is more than enough.

The distraction of these dreams of winning is an exciting prospect. I can see distant shores with luxury surroundings in my mind’s eye. Or, I can also view a new pool in my backyard. Maybe there could be a shopping spree for my wife and daughter. Truthfully speaking, these dreams aren’t outside of the realm of possibility with my current means of employment. These things still do come about and will continue to do so. However, if I could spend some extra time online and win these desired results, I’d be more than fine with that as well.

So far, internet sweepstakes have produced a few wonderful things. My wife and I got to enjoy an amazing steak and lobster dinner last year with some of the winnings I received. We could have made it happen on our own, though we probably would have set aside the extra earned funds rather than spend them. But I must admit that the food tasted that much better since the money to pay for it had been won. Good things already come our way. We are fortunate. But it sure is nice when winning can bring in some extra comforts. The only rule is, you can’t win unless you enter.

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By Samuel Phineas Upham

Scenes of Superstorm Sandy causing massive damage to entire coastal communities were stark reminders of the power of nature. But environmental historian John Gillis believes this is a lesson that could be learned by taking a closer look at history. In his new book The Human Shore: Seacoasts in History, Gillis makes the case that the chaotic nature of the coastline means that human developments along it will always be threatened.

In a profile by The Chronicle of Higher Education, Gillis notes that through the 18th century there have been scores of examples of coastal wetland communities that were filled in and vanished because of rising tides and changing shorelines. In this context, the damages caused by Superstorm Sandy or Hurricane Katrina are not shocking but entirely predictable.

Read the article at: http://chronicle.com/article/The-Coastal-Consciousness-of/140551/

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About the Author: Samuel Phineas Upham is an investor at a family office/ hedgefund, where he focuses on special situation illiquid investing. Before this position, Phin Upham was working at Morgan Stanley in the Media and Telecom group. You may contact Phin on his Samuel Phineas Upham website or Facebook.

The Cupertino, California based Apple introduced two new smartphones on September 10, 2013. A high-end smartphone with a finger print scanner, iPhone 5S that begins at $199 with a contract that comes in three colors and a $99 with a contract, iPhone 5C, a colorful with plastic cover that comes in five colors. Actual prices in emerging markets or the release date and availability of these smartphones in China have not been disclosed at the time of the unveiling of the new products.

The iPhone 5C colors include blue, green, pink, yellow and white. It is available in the U.S. for $549 without a contract. 5C also has a “M7 Motion co-processor” chip that can track motion data continuously with less impact on the battery. Because of this it is a dream gadget for sports fans and fitness enthusiasts. 5C will be available sooner than the 5S.

The higher end iPhone 5S comes in gray, silver and gold. It is expected to carry higher processing speed, finger print scanner and an improved camera. The iPhone 5S is expected to go on sale in the U.S. and in China on September 20, 2013. Many expect these new products will stop market share losses for Apple in rapidly developing markets in China and India.