by Leonardo Rossi | Jan 16, 2015 | The Urban Media Lab
A study made by the McAfee Company established that the value of our “digital goods” usually value around 35000$ total: the most valuable ones are the “personal memories” like photos or videos (17000$), followed by “health and financial informations” (6000$), “personal informations” (4300$) and informations regarding “hobbies and projects” (3300$).
This entire set of valuable information usually get lost after the passing of a person, and the law find it difficult to create a proper regulation about this problem, since most of the times the owner of the servers that possess such information are located in another country, and so they answers to a different set of norms.
For this reasons the Notariato Italiano, along with Bocconi University, Microsoft and Google, made a roundtable in order to try to create a worldwide protocol that might facilitate the access and the use of personal information by the heirs of a death person. The notaries are ready to act as a trait-d’union between the citizens and the web operators in this possible scenario, in order to reduce the administrative procedures and the costs. This Italian solution is likely to be a trigger event at a European level.
The same concept is also fitting in a various set of different situations; this is the perfect example of sharing the knowledge, the skills and the expertise in order to create a better synergy for living a modern city.
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Quando una persona muore, che fine fanno i suoi ricordi digitali e le informazioni personali e finanziarie che conservava su dispositivi elettronici, profili social e sul cloud? Questo topic è stato discusso di recente in un convegno, tenutosi a Milano, del Center on International Markets, Money and Regulation dell’Università Bocconi con il Consiglio Nazionale del Notariato.
by Leonardo Rossi | Dec 20, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
From prosthetic limbs to food, everything is printable/possible
The technologies behind the world of 3d printing made huge steps forwards from their first use in the ‘80s by Chuck Hull.
Recently there has been a considerable increase of the possible application for such technology, and the results are quite astonishing.
3d printers are used in medical research to create prosthetic limbs less “invasive” and “shocking” for the patient, since they can easily recreate the silhouette of the missing limb by scanning the remaining one, and to create also bracers and hearing devices. Recently this technology has been used also to create prototypes of working human organs such as livers or kidneys.
Others uses might be found in the spaceship program to create probes and in industrial environments as well as domestic one.
An element that surely aided the expansion of 3d printers was the one of the “user-friendly process”; in order to start a printing process, a person needs only to learn how to use a simple computer program. If it results to be too difficult, a person can use a tool that allows the conversion of a picture of the object you want to duplicate in string of data and then let the printer do the rest.
The latest “taboo” destroyed by this technology was the food market, since recently some new food companies, like “Foodini”, started to print, as they claim: “real food, 3d printed, made with fresh ingredients”. This groundbreaking effort might give birth to a complete new idea of “nutrition habits”, shaped on the request and the needs of an individual, and can create a big amount of job opportunities for youngster who try to find their way in the world.
As the modern flourishing of new 3d printing startups made clear, this technology is not anymore a thing for big elites companies, but something affordable to almost everyone. An example is the little space company “Planetary Resources” that made a complete functional probe that will soon be send to space and it is big just a fraction of the one of NASA and that cost only a fraction.
Many people think that 3D printing will be the end of manufacturing as we know it because, along with all of the unimagined, we will also have the unintended, like democratized counterfeiting and ubiquitous illegal possession.
But we should think about the role of 3d fabrication, from being a phenomenon of niche to an essential passage for enabling a novel development of the urban texture: the accessibility of the medium to the community and its incredible flexibility fits perfectly with the new trend of FabLabs. In this context, 3D printing should also be considered as a great instruments for empowering the culture of the Commons.
Nevertheless, it is very important to consider such steps forwards in the technological progress just how they are, a possibility to improve our lives and our future.
by Leonardo Rossi | Oct 6, 2014 | The Urban Media Lab
A news pace has opened in Rome; a space that someone might consider strange, but nonetheless innovative and special.
It is the new AntiCafé in San Giovanni, a kind of bar born in France with a big Russian influence.
The concept is quite simple: AntiCafé is not a simple bar where you go and pay for your drinks; it is an open space where you pay hourly and you can use all the services provided for as long as you want.
This new place is a sort of hybrid between a simple bar and a place of co-working that offers a restoration service with open buffet, free wifi and all the service related, like scanners, printing devices and projectors, and all these services are included in the hourly fares of the place.
The main goal is to make this place a sort of friendly office, where customers can go and have all the things they want, or where to share common ideas and help their creativity, or simply hanging out with some friends.
One of the strong points of this place is the design of the interiors, made by three famous French designers, the BonkersLab, that chose wood, bricks and iron for the AntiCafé, in a winning mix of antan atmospheres and modern spaces, essential and minimalist at the same time, with tables to share, couches and a big kitchen.
Another strong point of such place is the quality of the products used, since everything arrives directly from the local retailers; nevertheless it is possible for the clients to bring their own food and drinks (even alcoholic ones) from home and consume them there.
The last strong point is the fares: facing the great services offered by the AntiCafé, one might expect extremely high fares: instead it is only 4 euros for the first hour and 3 for the others from the second on; there are also daily and monthly subscriptions and a special discount for students.
