SingularityFlow

Lots of interesting news coming out in the past few days and only so much time to talk about it. Sorry for the long post!

First, for you video game enthusiasts out there, this next bit of innovation news comes straight from the head of Nintendo himself, CEO Satoru Iwata. At last quarter’s financial results conference when asked about a successor to the Nintendo DS, Iwata announced that the company does not plan on releasing a replacement simply because 5 years have passed since the launch of the DS. In fact, he believes that such a cycle, with new platforms arriving every 5 years is an outdated trend. Instead, and perhaps most importantly, he believes that platforms should arrive when new forms of entertainment are developed that can revolutionize the industry. In fact, we have already seen this strategy in place with the Nintendo Wii. While not as powerful as rival platforms, the Wii makes use of innovative controller and game design that had not been seen in the industry prior.

This innovation policy is refreshing in a world where companies are ripe with copycats, rushing to imitate their competitors with product clones. Innovation is not easy, and when a company vows to compete with innovation rather than with financial and economic strategies (read: cost cutting and ad-blitzing), they should be praised and lauded for their efforts. Here’s to hoping the folks at Nintendo follow through and wow us with their next platform as they have in the past.

In another fresh breath of optimism, researchers believe that nanotechnology will revolutionize that face of computer data storage within the next decade. One of the first steps to such storage mechanisms was allowing cells to carry more data than the traditional 0 or 1.

Say goodbye to traditional bulky disk drives. (photo by rosendahl)

Since that breakthrough, scientists have been scrambling to see exactly how many logic states can be carried by a single cell. Such technology is reminiscent of quantum computing, which also surpasses simple binary memory (albeit in a very different manner!).

This seems like a good time to mention that quantum computing is still being developed and researched. Canadian start-up D-Wave unveiled the most advanced quantum computer to date earlier this year. The new system has 16 qubits (qubits are the processing speed measurement term for quantum computers) compared to their prior quantum computer that only had 2 qubits. D-Wave has a very rigorous deadline schedule for future machines, with 512 and 1,024 qubit computers scheduled to be revealed throughout 2008. Hopefully their advancements are as promising and rapid as they hope!

And finally, sounding like a creation straight out of science fiction, scientists have created a template to tell nature how to grow computer components. Imagine the possibilities if such a technique ever becomes prevalent within our society. Prices of electronics would drop as production costs become a fraction of their former selves. Factories might be torn down and replaced with orchids and forests. Mass production would now mean planting more trees. Perhaps this is a sign of a greener world in the future?

This entry was posted on Monday, November 5th, 2007 at 9:32 pm and is filed under Innovation, Science. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.