Innovation Zen

Over at Daily Writing Tips, one of my blogs, we just published a very detailed article about creative writing. What is it all about? Here is a definition:

Creative writing is writing that expresses the writer’s thoughts and feelings in an imaginative, often unique, and poetic way.

So if you would like to know more about creative writing, or if you are already writing novels and other fiction material but would like to improve your skills, head over to the article.

An Israeli start-up called Modu Mobi has brought a new mobile to the technology landscape that it believes will make people rethink the concept of mobile phones. The product is a bare bones phone that measures 0.3 inches in thickness and 1.5 ounces in weight.

An excerpt from Technology Review

This tiny phone, which is slightly larger than a domino, is capable of sending and receiving calls and text messages. It can store contacts and MP3s with up to 16 gigabytes of storage capacity, and it has a small but usable screen and a sparse keypad that lacks numbers. Launched this week at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the Modu can be used as a stand-alone phone. But more important, it can also be slipped into a variety of “jackets,” such as in-car MP3 players, Global Positioning Systems, and larger cell phones, that expand the Modu’s functions and change its look.

The phone is targeted at the current generation that caters to new mobile phones once every couple of years. For the Modu it would be about changing the casing for a new one, essentially keeping the core module intact.

The product reflects immense innovation (the designers even did away with the keypads to make the product stick to a small form factor). But the criticism for the device comes on the lines of changing the consumer mindset. People do not follow a system of purchasing accessories and the main mobile phone separately.

An excerpt from Yahoo Tech

What’s different about Modu phones are its interchangeable enclosures that transform it into a totally different device. To change the way it looks, you just pop it into a different Modu jacket, likely to be available in every color and design. To give it new functionality you just slide inside a Modu mate device, which will include things like media players, digital photo frames, digital cameras, GPS devices, and even cordless telephones.

Crave has some great pictures on the Modu and some of the jackets.

Miniaturization of electronic circuits has been one factor driving the drastic changes in the technology industry. The technique to squeeze smaller components into still smaller areas results in reduced form factors and more powerful yet smaller devices.

Organic electronics is one emerging field that is is very promising when it comes to continuing this trend of miniaturization. Organic electronics would be utilized in creation of flexible ultra-thin even foldable circuits. Such material could be used for displays in electronic news papers or billboards for instance. Also, they could lead to development of super-thin mobile devices with crystal clear display.

When it comes to creating the next generation of electronics, the manufacturing process also needs to be revolutionized. Traditional processes that were based on coating the surface of the circuit with semiconductor material and then etching them away to form the required conducting patterns have been found to be very wasteful.

There are several other techniques that are being experimented and depending on which gets wider adoption, the whole economics of organic semiconductor materials will be impacted. On one hand there is the printing technique - special ink-jet printers injecting drops of plastic semiconductor on a substrate in the desired pattern. And then there is the newer technique of making organic semiconductor material self-assemble around source and drain electrodes.

An excerpt from Technology Review

The new method eliminates the need to pattern the semiconductor layer. Once the researchers have patterned the source and drain electrodes using lithography, they dip the circuit in a special chemical to treat the electrode surface. Then they coat the circuit with a thin layer of an organic semiconductor solution.

The new technique makes the manufacturing of organic semiconductor circuits much more simpler and practical.

Wires - the one stretch of material that makes the line between true mobility and the quest for plug-points. The search for wireless power solutions has been on for quite a while. Wikipedia tells us that the principles underlying the basis wireless energy transfer date back to 1825.

The advent of computing systems as our constant companions, the miniaturization of electronics and the innovation on the power efficiency front have made it more and more probable to enjoy the true virtues of mobile computing. The last mile on this front is a total wireless power solution and Technology Review mentions on how the technology of resonant coupling may perhaps present the solution.

An excerpt from Technology Review

There are currently solutions out in the market that do make wireless transmission quasi-wire-free. For example, there is the WildCharger pad makes charging devices as simple as putting them on a tray.

The following years do hold a lot a promise on this front and combined with equipped smart electronics, they could usher in an era where charging would no longer requires human intervention.