Slow progress at Fukushima Daiichi

The outcome at the embattled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is so important to the future of nuclear power that we thought an update would be in order. The long and the short of it is that Tepco is making progress, but oh so slowly

Letterman’s Top Ten Apple Excuses for Tracking You

Here’s David Letterman with the ten reasons Apple needs to track your every move

Coal News: Australia’s Carbon Tax Battle and How Natural Disasters Are Pushing Prices Up

Australia’s powerful coal industry is rocking the country’s political boat again. It was only 10 months ago that former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd lost his job over an emissions trading scheme that the mining industry opposed vehemently. Now his successor, Prime Minister Julia Gillard, is attempting to revisit the issue, and so far it is not going well

More free money from Google for site scrapers

Back in December I wrote an article on how site scrapers were gaming Google’s search algorithm in order to make advertising money from articles that they scrape from RSS feeds. Just after I wrote this piece, Google got religion about spam sites and revamped their search engine results to penalize content farms. Yet, the problem with scrapers still remains

The Fracking Controversy

The news that Blackstone Group LP (BX), the world’s largest private equity firm, is set to invest $1 billion in unconventional oil and gas projects in North America through a joint venture with Alta Resources has cemented a spotlight on fracking.

A U.S. Senate committee is currently conducting a hearing on the safety of hydraulic fracturing, as it is formally known. The province of Quebec, the state of New York, and the entirety of France have recently banned the technique. And two new studies claim that fracking-derived shale gas is actually worse for the environment than mining and burning coal. With so many claims flying around about this unconventional practice, let’s get a closer look at the facts.

Taiwanese Animation: The Facebook trolls are out in force

This Taiwanese animation gives you the low down. It’s a good laugh

If Android is a mess, will it matter?

I say fragmentation doesn’t matter. Consumers are going to buy what is available and for offer. Distribution trumps ease of use. Ask Apple about Macintosh. And ask Microsoft about Windows. Market share trumps technological superiority too. Ask Sony about Betamax.

Yes, the pace of development of Android is faster than in the Windows days, creating a headache and causing fragmentation. But Google has decided to clamp down on this. Their decision certainly makes Android less ‘open’. But, fragmentation is a problem they need to solve. I think they will do.

David Sokol’s abrupt resignation

David Sokol, widely considered the heir apparent to Warren Buffett,  has abruptly resigned from Berkshire Hathaway’s subsidiaries after it was revealed that he profited from the purchase of a publicly-traded company made by Berkshire. The SEC is likely to investigate. This looks pretty ugly if you ask me. Sokol will talk to CNBC tomorrow at

Amazon: Privacy Concerns, Digital Music Lockers and Pandora’s Box

As I was thinking about the competitive landscape for e-Commerce and Amazon’s foray into the streaming music scene, it occurred to me that Amazon has a huge data mining opportunity here and that this will almost certainly raise privacy concerns.

At present, the story in the press is about the music industry’s concerns over licenses. Sony has said it is not happy that Amazon has launched its product without licensing agreements from the music industry given that Apple and Google are negotiating agreements. Ostensibly, this is what has given Amazon the jump on those competitors.

But I want to talk about something else: privacy

Amazon’s Cloud Music Killer App is a Game Changer in Storage, Backup, Music, and Mobile

Amazon just dropped a bomb on the technology world in the form of a cross-platform cloud music player. This is at once a game-changing move in the Internet storage and backup world dominated by players like EMC, in the Internet Music world dominated by Apple and in the mobile space where Amazon is concentrating on

The Onion: CIA’s Facebook Program ‘A Dream Come True’

This video by The Onion is funny – both in a good way and in a bad way! All hail CIA Agent Mark Zuckerberg, code name ‘The Overlord&#

Thoughts on Nuclear Energy

Let me pass on this morning’s note from Andy Lees regarding the future of nuclear energy. Andy writes: Reuters highlights that the Obama administration wants Congress to boost loan guarantees from USD18.5bn to USD55bn to help build a dozen nuclear fission reactors. Yesterday I was presenting at Cadarache, the home to the ITER fusion project