Web Monitor
15:58 UK time, Wednesday, 12 August 2009
A celebration of the riches of the web.
Web Monitor is on a marathon trip to go further in search of interesting bits of the web. Share your favourite cuts by sending links via the comment box
• First, the looniness of the long-distance runner. Known for his surreal comedy and acting roles, less well know for his physical jerks, Eddie Izzard is currently raising money for Sports Relief by attempting to complete 34 marathons across the UK in 7 weeks. Let us just run that past you again. Eddie Izzard is running 34 marathons in 7 weeks. That's over 1,000 miles in 49 days. So far he has completed 14 in 16 days, and is still in good spirits according to this morning's tweet:
Today is the day to round up all the people you've ever met and get them to . No bananas until they comply
You can keep pace with along with :
Is Eddie Izzard actually doing these marathons hoping we all go "Christ, Eddie! This is madness! Sit down! Your feet must be mince!"
This also when he completed seven marathons in seven days on seven continents, and all just four weeks after suffering a heart attack.
Further investigation reveals that there is a healthy community of multiple-marathoneers out there, as evidenced by the existence of . Then there's 64-year-old San Antonio lawyer Larry Macon, who in 2008 completed 105 marathons to earn himself a new Guinness World Record (for most run in a year). , in his 15 years since he started running, Macon has completed more than 530 marathons and ultras or ultramarathons (anything further than 26.2 miles).
All this puts the seven-flight climb to the top of Monitor Towers into perspective.
• Introducing Esperanto for Robots. that despite the exciting advances in robotics in evidence at the recent International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence in California, some roboticists feel that without a common operating system available for use by robot creators everywhere progress is being frustrated.
Step mechanically forward the sensibly-named Robot Operating System or ROS, an open-source set of programs which is being designed by as a common platform for a wide range of robotics research. When ROS boots up on a robot's computer, it asks for a description of the robot that includes things like the length of its arm segments and how the joints rotate. It then makes this information available to the higher-level algorithms.
ROS is currently being developed and used by robotics teams at MIT, Stanford University California and the Technical University of Munich. But is not the only robotic operating system in the lab. Microsoft, with its Robotics Developer Studio, continues to develop its "Windows for robots."
All this robo-talk reminds us of which propose four basic rules to ensure robots never pose a threat to humanity. Apart from providing the celebrated sci-fi author with endless scope for stories involving more or less trustworthy androids, 70 years on his laws continue to .
Web Monitor is keeping a watchful eye on its various appliances for any signs of nascent self-awareness, though has long harboured suspicions about its keyboard.
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