I love the recording studio on a lifeboat. How entertaining. I remember Dolby's "Blinded me by Science" song--it was a favorite of a couple of my friends back in college days and now the words have any real meaning given Dolby's clear commitment and passion for leveraging technology to boost innovation.
I have to agree with Alex that the general public has been somewhat immune to technology/innovation advances. After all, you don't have to be a committed reader of Popular Science or Design News, for that matter, to hear about cool new advances and quirky technology experiments. All you have to do is dial in to mainstream media and you're awash in stories on everything from cool robots to 3D printed organs.
On the tech side, the 80s (and '90s for that matter) were decades of incredible innovation. Now, things are more mature and I would say that the advances are not as "WOW" to the public, because they require more understanding of technology, and we live in a scientifically illiterate culture. I do like Dolby's studio on a lifeboat idea. Hope he finds his missing submarine.
Each person has a decade which defines them, and maybe it is that decade which encompass the years of transformation into adulthood. For me the 1980's encompasses high school, college, and the first two years of graduate school. It's the decade that included the "Shining City on a Hill" metaphor, the Space Shuttle, John Williams, and the movies Top Gun, Gremlins, Ghost Busters, Airplane!, The Empire Strikes Back, and Indiana Jones. For me it represents the optimism that comes along with innovation and advancement in science and engineering.
Thomas Dolby was a large part of that. I wish we knew the secret ingredient we could add to our current decade to spur more excitement in exploration.
New versions of BASF's Ecovio line are both compostable and designed for either injection molding or thermoforming. These combinations are becoming more common for the single-use bioplastics used in food service and food packaging applications, but are still not widely available.
Andrew Morris designed a circuit that could detect a stroke victim's groan and convert the sound into a signal so caregivers would know when help was needed.
New disc magnet motors fit into the design trend of stepping up to closed loop performance while maintaining the cost advantage of stepper motor technology.
From Dell / Intel® New Paradigms in Design Work Scott Hamilton, vertical market strategist for Dell Precision workstations, 5/2/2013 5
Early in my career, I worked as a draftsman and remember the days of drawing on vellum with numbered pencils and Mylar with plastic lead. This was a fun experience in the sense that I ...
I've been using workstations for more than 10 years and love finding ways to get more performance from my system. With demanding professional applications that require more power each ...
A lasting memory from my first job as an engineer in an auto assembly plant is standing on hard concrete at six in the morning, vending-machine coffee clutched in hand, listening to ...
For industrial control applications, or even a simple assembly line, that machine can go almost 24/7 without a break. But what happens when the task is a little more complex? That’s where the “smart” machine would come in. The smart machine is one that has some simple (or complex in some cases) processing capability to be able to adapt to changing conditions. Such machines are suited for a host of applications, including automotive, aerospace, defense, medical, computers and electronics, telecommunications, consumer goods, and so on. This radio show will show what’s possible with smart machines, and what tradeoffs need to be made to implement such a solution.
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