Japanese government begins plans for driverless driving by 2020

Japan’s Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry will soon embark on a project to realize an “autopilot system” for automatic driving, a system for guiding motor vehicles on expressways without human assistance.

The system is expected to contribute significantly to such goals as alleviating drivers’ fatigue, preventing road accidents and easing traffic congestion. It would be for vehicles referred to as self-driving cars capable of sensing their environment and navigating by themselves, with people not required to perform any mechanical operation besides choosing their destinations.

With a view to making an autopilot system a reality in the early 2020s, the ministry will launch a study panel of experts this year, to start full-scale discussions about a self-steering vehicle control project.

The ministry envisages an autonomous vehicle system in which, after leaving your home, motorists would enter an interchange of a nearby expressway while manually operating their cars.

When pulling into the expressway’s lane exclusively for the autopilot system, the driving mode would change to “automatic driving” and input your destination into the system. Motorists would take their hands and feet off the steering wheel, gas pedal and brake.

 

Via – ‘Driverless driving’ envisioned for Japan in early 2020s

 

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On Nora Ephron, by Tom Hanks – “Knowing Nora meant her world – or her neighborhood”

Knowing and loving Nora meant her world — or her neighborhood — became yours. She gave you books to read and took you to cafés you’d never heard of that became legends. You discovered Krispy Kremes from a box she held out, and you learned that there is such a thing as the perfect tuna sandwich. She would give your kids small, goofy parts in movies with the caveat that they might not make the final cut but you’d get a tape of the scene. For a wrap gift, she would send you a note saying something like, “A man is going to come to your house to plant an orange tree — or apple or pomegranate or whatever — and you will eat its fruit for the rest of your days.” Rita and I chose orange, and the fruit has been lovely, sweet and abundant, just as Nora promised — a constant and perfect reminder of the woman we loved so much.

 

Nora Ephron: A Life of Voice and Detail by Tom Hanks

 

 

A great scene from You’ve Got Mail, especially with Harry Nilsson’s rendition of Somewhere Over the Rainbow:

 

Rockin Fig wins two NSSA Championship titles

What do Kelly Slater and Rick “Rockin’ Fig” Fignetti have in common?

Both surfers seem to be getting better with age.

Fig, as he’s known is the surf world, has been chasing after an NSSA Championship title for decades, and finally this week the 55-year-old was able to claim victory with not one, but two big National titles at the competition on the south side of the Huntington Beach Pier.

Fig is a well-known figure around the community and the voice of surfing, his unique and quirky voice recognizable from blaring through speakers at the U.S. Open or from his 20-year stint as the surf reporter on KROQ. He was inducted two years ago in the Surfing Walk of Fame as the “Local Hero,” and has one of the original surf shops in town.

But in the water, Fig is also a fierce competitor. He competed in the first NSSA National Championships in 1978, making the final 35 years ago. He got fourth, but that result gave him something to strive for.

 

Keep reading – After 35 years, Rockin’ Fig claims two NSSA National Championships

 

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Goodwill – a leader in recycling e-waste, creating green jobs

The following is a press release from Goodwill of Orange County, California. It discusses the great success the company has had managing e-waste and creating green jobs.

Check out your local Goodwill to see if they are also accepting e-waste, there is a good chance they are!

 

Turn Your E-Waste Into New Opportunities.

We all know those old TV sets, computers, printers and other electronic stuff (known as e-waste) can reek havoc on the planet if tossed into the landfill.

What you might not know is that, by donating it all to Goodwill’s E-waste Solutions program, you’ll be providing job training and green jobs to people with disabilities and other barriers–while helping to save the planet. That’s what we call turning your e-waste into a brand new opportunity.

Since 1924, Goodwill has pioneered our own “Reduce, Reuse, Repurpose and Renew” manifesto by creating a sustainable platform that provides jobs, revenue and a greener environment. We make it easy to be green by providing a safe and free service to the community, where we in turn are able to recycle computers, TVs and other electronics.

  • Reduce: By making recycling easy, we reduce the amount of toxic materials that would otherwise end up in our landfills
  • Reuse: We repair what we can and re-sell to bargain-driven families in the community who can’t afford the latest electronics
  • Repurpose: What we can’t repair, we disassemble and separate the metals that is in turn sold to reputable state recyclers

True to its mission of creating new opportunities, Goodwill of Orange County has been a ‘green’ business long before the term was coined.

 

All Orange County Goodwill Locations Accept E-waste at No Charge

As a California State Certified e-waste collector we’ll gladly accept all your electronics, working or not, at one of our Orange County donation centers. Tax receipts are provided. If your business has 20 e-waste items or more to donate, call us and we’ll pick them up — free of charge.

Click here to see what items we can accept and what items we cannot accept.

 

Via – Orange County E-Waste Solutions

 

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MLB’s All-Star Game – schedule of events (starting today through Tuesday)

July 6-10

 

 

Sunday – July 8

 

Monday – July 9

 

Tuesday – July 10

 

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Time lapse movie – TWiT podcasting studio in 60 seconds

 

Time lapse movie recorded in the TWiT studio in Petaluma, CA using a 3rd generation iPad mounted to a Losmandy StarLapse motor with a Makayama mount with wide-angle lens. The time-lapse was captured using iStopMotion for the iPad by Boinx Software.

Special thanks to Oliver at Boinx for coming up with the idea, and to Leo Laporte and the entire TWiT crew for their hospitality. Movie by Derrick Story.

 

Massachusetts man pays off his mortgage with pennies

A Massachusetts man who pledged to make the last mortgage payment on his home with pennies has fulfilled that promise.

After warning his bank, Thomas Daigle dropped off about 62,000 pennies weighing 800 pounds in two boxes for the final payment on the Milford home he and his wife, Sandra, bought in 1977.

He tells The Milford Daily News he just wanted to make his last payment on April 24 “memorable.”

He started saving his pennies when he moved in.

The optician says his wife laughed whenever he would pick up a penny he found on the ground and say it was going to the mortgage.

 

Via – U-T San Diego

 

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Energy Department invests millions to accelerate high-volume solar manufacturing

A $25 million federal grant will speed the construction of a solar manufacturing plant in San Diego, in an effort to boost U.S. competitiveness.

Semiconductor maker Soitec Solar, recipient of the Department of Energy grant, will pour the funds into equipment at its Rancho Bernando-area plant. Production is set to start before the end of the year on concentrated photovoltaic modules that use optical lenses to focus sunlight on tiny, highly efficient solar cells.

A publicly traded company based in Bernin, France, Soitec entered the concentrated photovoltaics business in 2009 with the purchase of Concentrix Solar, a spinoff of the Fraunhofer Institutes, a network of publicly funded research centers in Germany.

Soitec received the largest share of $37 million in Energy Department grants designed to accelerate high-volume solar manufacturing over the next two years.

 

More on this – $25 million federal grant speeds solar factory construction

 

 

More about Soitec’s CPV (concentrated photovoltaic) modules:

Soitec’s CPV modules are built on Concentrix technology. They use Fresnel lenses to concentrate sunlight 500 times and focus it onto small, highly efficient multi-junction solar cells. This technology has helped us achieve world-leading AC system efficiency increases of 25% in actual operating conditions. This is almost twice as high as the efficiency increases achieved using conventional silicon systems.

 

Click for a video description of this technology – Concentrix Technology

 

 

 

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List of German expressions commonly used in English

  • Biergarten, open-air drinking establishment.
  • Blitz, taken from Blitzkrieg (lightning war). It is a team defensive play in American or Canadian football in which the defense sends more players than the offense can block.
  • Delicatessen, speciality food retailer, fine foods (German spelling Delikatessen)
  • Doppelgänger, literally double-goer, also spelled in English as doppelganger; a double or look-alike. However, in English the connotation is that of a ghostly apparition of a duplicate living person.
  • Ersatz, replacement; usually implying an artificial and inferior substitute or imitation.
  • Hamburger, sandwich with a meat patty and garnishments.
  • Hinterland
  • Iceberg (German Eisberg)
  • kaput (German spelling: kaputt), out-of-order, broken.
  • Karabiner, snaplink, a metal loop with a sprung or screwed gate, used in climbing and mountaineering; modern short form/derivation of the older word ‘Karabinerhaken’; translates to ‘riflehook’. The German word can also mean Carbine.
  • Kindergarten, literally children’s garden; day-care centre, playschool, preschool.
  • Kitsch, cheap, sentimental, gaudy items of popular culture.
  • Kohlrabi, type of cabbage.
  • Muesli, breakfast cereal (German spelling: Müesli or Müsli).
  • Neanderthal (modern German spelling: Neandertal), for German Neandertaler, meaning “of, from, or pertaining to the Neandertal (“Neander Valley”)”, the site near Düsseldorf where early Homo neanderthalensis fossils were found.
  • Nein — no.
  • Noodle, from German Nudel, a type of food; a string of pasta.
  • Poltergeist, literally noisy ghost; an alleged paranormal phenomenon where objects appear to move of their own accord.
  • Poodle, from German Pudel, breed of dog.
  • Pretzel (Standard German spelling: Brezel), flour and yeast based pastry.
  • Pumpernickel, type of sourdough rye bread, strongly flavoured, dense, and dark in colour.
  • Quartz (German Quarz)
  • Sauerkraut (sometimes shortened to Kraut), fermented cabbage.
  • Schadenfreude, joy from pain (literally harm joy); delight at the misfortune of others.
  • Schnaps, distilled beverage.
  • Spritzer, chilled drink from white wine and soda water (from spritzen = to spray).
  • Strudel (e. g. Apfelstrudel, milk-cream strudel), a filled pastry.
  • uber, über, over; used to indicate that something or someone is of better or superior magnitude, e.g. Übermensch.
  • verboten, prohibited, forbidden.
  • Wanderlust, the yearning to travel.
  • Wiener, hot dog (from Wiener Würstchen = Viennese sausage).
  • Wunderkind, literally wonder child; a child prodigy.
  • Zeitgeist, spirit of the time.

 

From Wikipedia

 

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