AI Events - Rumours from the trade show floor
After of a couple of weeks sunning and sailplane racing in Florida it was straight back into the saddle for a London-based Quarterly Business Review and the excellent “Rise of AI” event in Berlin. Following a year of attending various international AI events I’m starting to develop a feel for their differing textures and here is my current evaluation.
Like social media, ‘social currency’ isn’t going away
The conversation about blockchain is presently dominated by cryptocurrencies, with a certain amount of attention spilling into Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs). There is no shortage of scepticism about the technology in these circumstances; cryptocurrencies look more like investment opportunities – and very risky ones at that – than actual currencies, and it’s no exaggeration to say that the majority of ICOs are scams. A recent study found that almost 80 percent are scams and just eight percent reach the trading stage.
How the cloud took over the cables
When the cloud emerged as a concept, it referred to computer services delivered remotely. Bandwidth was cheap, and it made sense to outsource and centralise computing. Physical location, and the physical network, seemed to have become irrelevant. This has turned out not to be true...
How the blockchain is reshaping the data center
Such is the hype around Bitcoin and blockchain technologies that numerous companies have seen their share prices rise simply by changing their names to include one of those words. In their rush to invest in the hot new thing, some investors don't check whether the companies actually have anything to do with blockchain.
Dutch data centers concerned about future electricity availability
The Dutch data center industry is crucial to the economy of the Netherlands, but its growth may be hindered by challenges to the local power supply infrastructure. In a recent letter to the Netherlands Minister of Economic Affairs and Climate, the Dutch Data Center Association (DDA) warned about limitations to the Dutch energy infrastructure, especially in Schiphol Rijk, Amsterdam Zuidoost and the Amsterdam Science Park.
The 5-point plan to successfully market your supercomputer (with added blue lights).
When my wife tells me I have to go to a dinner party, I usually explain to our hosts that I do “marketing within the supercomputing and data center industry”......and that normally rules out a second invitation.
Neural network banter – Rumours from the trade show floor
Many great adventures start with naivety, sadly this blog was one of them. My intention was to provide a high-level overview of the advancements in Deep Neural Networks (DNN training) techniques during the last few years. Unfortunately, I struggle to pontificate about something I don’t comprehend well, so starting with the popular Convolutional Neural Networks I rapidly discovered a multitude of its variants. No worries, how hard can it be to research each new term/concept related to Coder/Decoder networks?
Why it’s time to retire the ‘other people’s computers’ criticism of the cloud
“There is no such thing as the cloud, only other people’s computers.” I’ve hosted seminars with senior IT professionals for several years now and whenever the subject is ‘the cloud’, someone always delivers this line. I don’t know who said it first, but it’s become a cliché.
Death, taxes and rack power density
While not as certain as death and taxes, there are signs that high-density racks will finally become more commonplace thanks to AI and other compute intensive workloads.
Estimating the energy use in Bitcoin mining: A near-impossible task and a moving target
Headlines over the past several months addressing energy use and Bitcoin mining would have one believe the world’s supply of power is about to be devoted solely to large computers trying to solve complex algorithms in the global pursuit of profit. Is this really the case?
Staying secure - Why security continues to be of paramount importance for data centers
You can find data centers in all sorts of places these days. As well as lurking in anonymous grey sheds on the edge of town, they're underground, up mountains, on ships, even underwater. The reasons for this plethora of seemingly bizarre choices of location are many and varied but security is clearly a key driver, and from what I can see - an increasing one.
Regtech promises a future with agile compliance and smarter regulation
The digital technology era has brought us adtech, fintech, fittech, medtech and many more buzzwords. A new one has grown in popularity over the last year or so: Regtech.