For those of you who love airplanes and dogs...

If you love flying and dogs, you are sure to get a kick out of this short story and video posted by Discovery News (associated with the Discovery Channel).  Hopefully no animals were harmed in the making of this video.
 
Here's the link: http://news.discovery.com/space/someone-didnt-fasten-their-seat-belt.html

Born of Hope

Not too long ago I posted a link to the Hunt for Gollum film made by a group of very talented film makers in the UK.  That was a tremendous short film, made all the better by the fact that is was put together on a shoestring budget.

But now, this amazing team has come together and done the impossible.  They have created a work of art even better than Hunt for Gollum.

If you are a Lord of the Rings fan, you need to see Born of Hope (http://www.bornofhope.com/Welcome.html). This hour long (if you watch the extended version) video gives LOTR fans a prequel that takes you into the life and times of Arathorn, Aragorn's father.

The quality of the production is amazing.  Any of you who may be aspiring indie film makers should definitely watch this.

Hope you enjoy the show.  Get your popcorn before it starts.  There's no intermission.

Leftover Valentine’s Chocolate? Use It to Measure the Speed of Light

Here is a little experiment that is sure to bring geeky moms, dads, and kids together in the kitchen. Wired Magazine has posted an article that shows us how to measure the speed of light using only leftover Valentine's Day chocolate and the family microwave. Pretty cool!

Here's the link to the article: http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2010/02/leftover-valentines-chocolate-use-it-to-measure-the-speed-of-light/ .

The idea is that you can measure the distance between hot spots in the chocolate, and by using a simple formula, compute the speed of light. 

Of course, this only works if you happen to have leftover chocolate in your house, which is, by definition, impossible to achieve in my house.

New DVD Technology From a Shrimp

A recent article in Reuters technology section describes how we may find future technological advancements coming from the study of shrimp eyes; specifically the eyes of the Australian Mantis shrimp.  (Click on one of the links on this post to go to the article.)

Here is a tiny excerpt from the article:

LONDON (Reuters) - The amazing eyes of a giant shrimp living on Australia's Great Barrier Reef could hold the key to developing a new type of super high-quality DVD player, British scientists said on Sunday.   Mantis shrimps, dubbed "thumb splitters" by divers because of their vicious claws, have the most complex eyes in the animal kingdom.  They can see in 12 primary colors, four times as many as humans, and can also detect different kinds of light polarization -- the direction of oscillation in light waves.

These funny looking little guys have developed eyes that put the rest of the animal kingdom to shame.

My only concern is that if this leads to a new DVD technology, will Blu-Ray be obsolete?  Does this mean we have to upgrade again?

The Hunt For Gollum

There are many fan films on the Internet, made by many talented teams of fans, but this film made by a group of Lord Of The Rings fans is undoubtedly one of the best I have ever seen.

If you are even a mild LOTR fan, you should take a look at the Hunt For Gollum.

Here is the link - http://www.thehuntforgollum.com/

World's Largest Model Train Railway

Below is a very short video that will take you through a tour of the world's largest model railway. This project, which has taken over 500,000 hours to construct, is very impressive. After you watch the video, you'll understand why this qualifies for space on the "That's Cool" blog.

Helmet Telepathy

I haven't posted on this blog for a long time. (All of my blog-energy has been going into my leadership-blog - stop by http://leadershipdiamond.blogspot.com/ and take a look.)

However, that doesn't mean that there aren't some really cool things going on in the world. Here is one that just begged to be posted on this blog:

Discovery Channel News has posted an article about a new technology that will send thoughts from one brain to another - no need to speak, send an email - just think.

The article, which can be found on the Discovery Channel web site, says:

Known as synthetic telepathy, the technology is based on reading electrical activity in the brain using an electroencephalograph, or EEG.

Naturally the technology is being developed by the military, but Discovery Channel reports that a similar technology is being explored by game-developers for controlling video games.

Stand by, this could give the WII a real run for its money.

Updated Gap Minder

Back in January of 2007 this blog carried an entry introducing readers to GapMinder, a data tool that lest you compare what is happening around the world in some very cool, graphic ways.

Since then, GapMinder has updated its databases and cleaned up its interfaces. So now, those of you who like to understand trends can play with the new and improved GapMinder and learn all sorts of interesting things.

Here's what GapMinder says about itself:

Gapminder is a non-profit venture promoting sustainable global development and achievement of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals by increased use and understanding of statistics and other information about social, economic and environmental development at local, national and global levels.

Gapminder work serves a purpose of filling a gap. There has been a market failure in distributing global data. A lot of people are interested in the data, but don’t get access to it (and if they manage to access the data, they need to be advanced skilled statisticians to analyze it). Gapminder wants to make data more accessible and easier to use for instant visual analysis. We believe decision makers, politicians as well as education at almost all levels lack adequate tools.

There is no political agenda behind the work. The idea is that all people, independently of their political agenda, should get free access to already existing statistics about global development to easily improve their understanding about the complex society.

Click here to go to the GapMinder World page where you will find a great (and fun) tool for understanding the world we live in.