There has been a lot of controversy about the Kyoto protocol lately, and the issue has become a hot topic, particularly given the current political environment in Canada.  Leaving the political aspect aside (as I would ideally like to keep TF politics-free), the issue is whether or not there is some proven scientific evidence of man-made global warming.  Recently, a group of American scientists (over 17,000, to be more precise) have voiced their skepticism of the premises behind the Kyoto Protocol.  Over 4,000 scientists from around the world have done the same (the so-called Heidelberg Appeal).  This article captures some of the controversy, albeit with political undertones, but I would like to see both positions argued in a single scientific journal article, letting the readers come to their own conclusions.  While I am definitely not an expert on the subject, I would enjoy learning more (again from a scientific perspective). 

Perhaps this is a thread that Tyler Hamilton, the technology reporter of the Toronto Star, can pick up on.  Tyler has recently started another blog (on Blogware) called clean break, which is  focused on emerging trends, technologies and investment opportunities in the cleantech space.  Besides being the tech reporter/columnist for the Star, Tyler also writes a column with the same name and focus of his new blog, so I will be sure to check that site frequently.

I just wanted to write a quick note to acknowledge my gratitude for the Tucows team to keep adding value to its Blogware software. The latest build has now support for trackback anti-spam. Spammers apparently had raised the "art" of spamming to a new level (i.e. the spam links on comments were not enough, and they resorted to doing trackbacks from blog articles automatically linking readers to the spammers' web pages. So Blogware came to the rescue of bloggers willing to keep their sites spam-free: spammers can now also be blocked from trackbacks if their sites are added to a block list (this is managed in a very straightforward way from the Blogware dashboard control).  Spam trackbacks can now be easily deleted an blocked at the click of a mouse button.

Note: It would be nice to capture these updates in features in the User Guide, so one idea I would like to suggest is that of a Wiki for a Public Blogware User Guide.  I believe there are plenty of users that would gladly give a bit of their time to contribute to such a Wiki.

ScienceDaily had an interesting nantotech story in its April issue.  It turns out that UC Davis reported back in February on a new application for nanotechnology: carbon nanotubes.  These devices are used for delivering a big burst of energy in a short time - the sort of energy boost needed to start an electric car, for instance.  In this instance, the supercapacitor's electrodes are made from films consisting of nanotubes.  The researchers from UC refined a method to deposit the nanotubes on nickel foil in a way to align and pack them closely together.  The attractive properties of the film are the contact surface area and high conductivity of the nanotubes taken collectively, rather than individually.  The new devices can yield 30 kW per kilogram, hich is almost an eight-fold increase over devices currently available in the marketplace.  The findings were published on Nanotechnology.  By the way, these nanotubes are about 10,000 times smaller than a human hair.

Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to catch up with Owen Matthews (Sir Terry's son and CEO of Vancouver-based startup NewHeights Software, a maker of PCM - Personal Communications Manager - software).  It was a great chat - Owen certainly showed some of the same character traits that have made his father so successful in the telecom business: enthusiasm, persistence and vision.  The interview can be viewed here (ed. note: no registration necessary) and it provides us with a great insight into the mind of an up-and-coming tech entrepreneur.

In case you are not familiar with NewHeights, the company designs a personal desktop application (Desktop Assistant) that manages an end-user's communcations.  Desktop Assistant manages voice, presence, IM, directories and all other aspects related to an end-user's communcations needs. The company has gained quite a lot of acclaim over the past year, including a deal with Bell Canada, acclaim from the VC industry and partnerships with vendors such as Ubiquity and Marconi.