The topics:

• Stephen recommended two software programs:
  • Avex DVD to iPod Video. Stephen was incorrect on the price, its cheaper - $29. He uses this to rip DVD's for watching on his iPod touch.
  • Dopdf. This allows him to print to pdf from Microsoft Word (or any other word processor).
  • Michael recommended Handbrake for ripping DVD's for the iPod. Stephen had trouble with that program but recommends that you try it because its free.
• Michael found his cell phone. He thinks everything in our lives should be phonable. No more lost car keys if they ring when you call. He's also looking forward to living in a smart home.

• Then we brought out our special guest Ivan Kirigan. Ivan visitied with us about his new venture Tipjoy. Tipjoy allows Internet content consumers to tip stuff they like - a dime or a quarter or other "micropayment" that they choose. And they can do it with one click.

  Paypal has a per-transaction charge that keeps it from being the right model for micropayments. A user can set up an account with Tipjoy, fund it with $5.00 (or more) via Paypal (and pay that one transaction charge for that macropayment), and then one-click a quarter or whatever (with no transaction charge) whenever they read something they like.

  Tipjoy will make money when the blog owners cash out a large accumulation of tips. They will pay one transaction charge for that macropayment.

  Ivan also envisions this as a social network - like Digg, except with Tipjoy the users have the added cred of having their money on the line - even if its just a dime.

  Phil and Stephen welcome you to try out the Tipjoy system by hitting the Tipjoy button below.

• Ivan quoted from the Clay Shirkyon speech "Gin, Television, and Social Surplus."

• Phil discussed with Ivan a prediction made in the C|Net article "Imagining the Tech World in 2050."

• Ivan mentioned the sci-fi book "Down and Out in the Magin Kingdom." The novel imagines a world with very little scarcity. Goods are manufactured by robots and everone has most everything they need. "Whuffie" replaces money and is a constantly updated rating that measures how much esteem and respect other people have for you. This rating system determines who gets the few scarce items, like the best housing, a table in a crowded restaurant, or a good place in a queue for a theme park attraction.

  The novel's author practices what he preaches. This novel is available for free here.

• After Ivan signed off, Phil and Stephen discussed the latest version of The Speculist Manifesto that was introduced during last week's FastForward Radio show.

• Stephen quoted Paypal founder Peter Thiel regarding Bill Joy's prediction that the future doesn't need us.

  reason: Bill Joy, the former chief scientist at Sun Microsystems, declared in his famous article “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us” that we have to relinquish artificial intelligence, biotech, and nanotechnology because they’re just too dangerous for human beings to handle. Is there some truth to that?

  Thiel: I think it’s not even wrong. It’s one of those things that’s so far off the mark that it is not even wrong.

  There are obviously dangers in these technologies. But I think Joy’s approach would actually lead to the future he fears. If the virtuous people relinquish these things, it means that they will be developed by the evil people, and that seems to me to be a recipe for these technologies going wrong.

  The only way for something like Joy’s approach to work would be basically a totalitarian world-state in which we control the technologies worldwide. It is incredibly arrogant to say that the only smart people in the world exist in the United States and that if you can stop it in the U.S., you’ll stop it everywhere. Maybe it’s going to be developed by the Chinese military. Maybe it’ll be developed by people working for Islamic terrorist groups.

  The anti-Joy view that I would articulate is that what we need to be doing is to be pushing the accelerator further and harder. What I fear is that people working in free countries, where I think these technologies are likely to be developed in a more benign way, are being blocked by bureaucratic regulation and by cultural ideas that we shouldn’t be doing this. We are on this technological arc. We don’t know where it’s going to go, but I think the best trajectory is for us to just hit the accelerator really hard."

  
  

Our front bumper is a sample of Marginal Prophets' "The Difficult Song."

Our exit music this week is from Brother Love. The song is "Summertime."

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