"The Search" by John Battelle is about the impact that search technology is having and will have on our culture. "Search" is defined quite broadly and includes the coming realm of ubiquitous computing. Google is a major focus of the book, and its influence and growth surely warrant that focus.

What motivated me to read this book was the concept of the "[Database of Intentions](https://battellemedia.com/archives/000063.php)". It refers to the ability of an ubiquitous search technology to extract the intention of one or more of its users by analyzing their interactions with a plethora of devices. That is absolutely fascinating and will be quite something when it is realized. Needless to say, it will be the Oracle of the information age. It is an update on the idea of the Memex described by Vannevar Bush in "As We May Think", which is cited in the book. A meta-Memex.

A good portion of the book, however, is devoted to the history of search technology and industry. That is quite interesting in and of itself as I like to read about such things. There are several anecdotes about the people and companies that played a part in these nascent times. I found it to be too detailed in some places, but the book is written such that one could easily skip those parts if one finds them too dull. I didn't.

The epilogue highlights that we remember people from history because they became immortal through records. In the future, everyone will be immortal because everything will be recorded. This blog is being recorded. All of it will add to the noise and one will have to shout or be referenced a lot to be seen clearly. Will you shout? What will you say? I think you should write a book while they are still in vogue ;-)

This has been a watershed year for my photography. I’ve always had a casual interest in it, but this year I invested time and money into practicing it. The time came from shunning TV. I don’t miss it. I recommend it. The money required was less than what would have been necessary in a pre-digital age. That made it affordable. flickr.com has been a great influence as it has provided me with a community with whom to share, discuss, and enjoy photography. Thanks to all of them! I’ve added two photos below that I liked a lot. You can click on them to see larger versions on flickr.



I recently read "[On Intelligence](https://www.onintelligence.org/)" by Jeff Hawkins. The book is about the author's efforts to understand the human brain's mechanism for intelligence and to apply it to machines. He presents a model of intelligence called the memory-prediction framework.

This was perhaps the first time I had read a somewhat detailed analysis of the possible mechanism that drives human intelligence. Some concepts that I found especially interesting were that of invariant and hierarchical memory. Also, the idea that the brain predicts all actions before they are executed was fascinating. If the subject interests you, I highly recommend it. It is quite readable.

Unfortunately, after all these days I have returned to find that blogger is lacking in features. On the other hand, wordpress.com has launched recently and that is looking pretty cool. So, I’m moving to samgrover.wordpress.com. Maybe I’ll be back or move somewhere else another day, leaving trails in cyberspace as time goes on.

Just moved here from samgrover.blogspot.com. Time to start afresh. Technorati Profile

I started this blog a while back and then stopped posting about fifteen months ago. Now I’m reviving it and will post stuff here occasionally. The feed is available through the new standard feed icon shown in the sidebar.

Exactly what the world needs, another WMD. How fast can you say dual use?

Congratulations to everyone involved in the project and thanks for a great web resource.

Press Release

Fund them!

Google Doodles and holiday logos are the transformed Google logo to represent a special day or event. Currently they are running doodles showing the 2004 Summer Olympics. I recently noticed that they now have a mini version of the current doodle on the search results page too. That’s great because I use the search box on Firefox or Safari for my searches and was missing out on the doodles.

Japan’s ISAS has successfully deployed (1, 2) two solar sails for a first in space endeavors. Congratulations to all involved!