Mobile devices to outnumber people on planet this year

Smartphones and tablets. It appears that we can't get enough of them. According to the latest research by network firm Cisco, at some point this year there will be more mobile devices on the planet than humans. So that'll be about 7 billion then.

But it won't stop there. Consumers will go on consuming, with those in emerging markets getting connected in ever greater numbers. Many people will soon be carrying with them not just a smartphone, but a tablet too. In fact, Cisco predicts that by 2016 there will be more than 10 billion mobile-connected devices among an expected world population of some 7.3 billion people. Tech companies will be salivating at the very thought.

Of course, such proliferation will bring with it a set of challenges that'll need to be dealt with in a timely manner or else the entire mobile communications system will be in danger of simply seizing up. The more mobile devices there are, the more pressure there'll be on mobile networks, and the companies operating them.

Faster networks
Faster networks will also create a challenge. According to Cisco, 4G currently only accounts for 0.2 percent of mobile connections but is responsible for 6 percent of mobile data traffic. Furthermore, a 4G connection generates 28 times more data traffic than a non-4G connection, Cisco said. So if the next iteration of Apple's expected-soon iPad supports 4G, as some have suggested it will, that'll help push data usage even higher.

Cisco predicted that by the end of this year, 100 million smartphone users will belong to what it calls the 'gigabyte club', with users generating more than 1GB of mobile data traffic each month. And over the next four years, that figure will fly off the charts.

“By 2016, 60 percent of mobile users three billion people worldwide will belong to the gigabyte club,” Suraj Shetty, vice-president of products and solutions at Cisco, told the BBC.

Tablets
The huge popularity of tablets, a device which only came into being two years ago with the launch of Apple's iPad, is also helping to ramp up data consumption, with those devices generating three times more traffic than smartphones. Cisco says that by 2016 tablets will be responsible for over 10 percent of global mobile traffic.

While manufacturers of mobile phones and tablets will be rubbing their hands in eager anticipation of the possible riches that await them in the coming years, one question remains: In 2016, which maker will be dominating the mobile market? Apple? Samsung? Or a company we haven't even heard of yet?

Softexpo 2012 kicks off Feb 22

All is set for the SoftExpo 2012, the largest exposition of software and ICT enabled services (ITES), to be held on February 22-26 in the capital.

Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) is organising the event at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre.

The theme for this year's softexpo's is 'Empowering Next Generation'.

Over 140 exhibitors are taking part at the event with participation of 10 countries. There will be 30 seminars and technical sessions at the 5-day fair.

Organisers are expecting huge crowd at the fair.

Code Warriors' Challenge, IT Innovation Search Programme, BASIS Freelancer of the year award, IT job fair and the gala award night would be the highlights of the SoftExpo

AZIZUL HAKIM @ DS CAFE

Azizul Hakim - once active on theatre with Aranyak - began his journey on television with a small role in the 80s. He earned bigger roles as his career grew more dynamic, dominating the TV screen throughout the 90s. After all these years, Azizul Hakim continues to perform both on TV and the silver screen, along with stints as a director. The veteran artiste recently chatted with The Daily Star (TDS) and his fans at DS Cafe.

TDS: You were once a good football player. Would you choose a career in sports if you did not become an actor?

Azizul Hakim: I had such plans, while it was also my father's dream. He was a football player himself and he always patronized my footballing ambitions. I played football for my school and college as well as taking it to the professional stage by playing for Victoria Sporting Club in Dhaka First Division football. Undoubtedly, I would become a professional football player if I didn't enter the world of acting.

Fardin, Dhaka: Was becoming an actor your childhood dream?

Azizul Hakim: I always had an aspiration of becoming an actor. Cinema was a major source of entertainment at that time, and watching the favorite stars on the screen always inspired me. Anyway, the chance to work on the stage came to me while I was playing football. I joined Arannyak in 1977. Thanks Fardin for your question.

TDS: Does it cause you pain that cricket is more popular than football now?

Azizul Hakim: No there is no such regret. We also had a glorious past in football when players like Salahuddin and Gazi bhai played on the field. They were the star footballers of that time. Football used to be the most popular sport in our country. Cricket earned its place gradually. Hockey also used to be a popular choice before. But I think patronization is a crucial thing in sports. Cricket started drawing more patrons than football at one point. When our cricket team claimed its spot in the international arena, we leaned further towards the game. Football, however is yet to make a major leap. Our football in the global arena has gone stale.

TDS: Are you involved in any social welfare projects?

Azizul Hakim: I'm not directly involved, but I participate whenever I get the chance. Whenever there is a natural disaster, we artistes collect funds for those affected. We collected donations for the Sidr victims.

Lonny, Dhaka: Do you read novels? How would you feel if you had the chance to portray a character from a book?

Azizul Hakim: Reading books is my hobby. I always carry a book with me at shootings. Whenever I get a break, I indulge in the pages of a book. For your information, I've already played roles from a book. I would love to do it again in the future.

Sagar Chowdhury, Sylhet: From a veteran's perspective, how much respect do you think the young actors have for each other?

Azizul Hakim: I feel that the rookies and the veterans in the acting world have a very friendly relationship. Mutual respect is greater in the theaters, as it is the place which teaches the basics of acting.

Towhid, Comilla: Nowadays TV dramas use a mutated form of language like "khaichho, gechho". What is your opinion on this?

Azizul Hakim: I want the use of proper language to be practiced on the dramas and am against the practice of colloquial tones. I strongly believe this practice will not last, as viewers will always want the proper form of language.

Mahbubur Rahman Khan, Brahmanbaria: Do you remember your performance on the drama 'Shomoy Oshomoy"?

Azizul Hakim: Definitely. Thank you for mentioning the play. I played the role of Haradhon in the play - which was written by Mamunur Rashid. Raisul Islam Asad, Hanif Sangket and Chompa acted with me in the drama.

Riaz Khan, Dhaka: You always manage to blend in with the character you play. How is it possible?

Azizul Hakim: Acting is my passion and profession. I always try to blend in with the character and think of nothing else during acting. Thanks for your observation.

TDS: You and Zinat both work in the same field. Does it create any friction?

Azizul Hakim: No it helps us instead. We have a better understanding of each other.

Asif, Rangpur: You were once active with the theatre. Did you go abroad to perform?

Azizul Hakim: I began my journey with Theatre Group Arannyak and I am still a member. I visited England, USA and many other countries to perform on stage.

Ripon, Jagannath University: Where is your native home?

Azizul Hakim: I hail from Comilla.

Tithi, Dhaka: Do you go to the Ekushey book fair?

Azizul Hakim: There was a time when I regularly visited the fair. This year I plan on going even if I just manage a single day for it.

Polly, Barisal: Class Six to Ten, or Intermediate to University, which life do you prefer?

Azizul Hakim: I prefer the former. The time of pure youth and teenage spirit. Those were wonderful times. I often wish of going back to those days. The teenage years are the golden period in a person's life.

Tuli, Rajshahi: How much of a friend can parents be for a child?

Azizul Hakim: Anyone can see their parents as complete friends. Friendly relations with parents is always a good thing. All sons and daughters should remember that there is no one as close to them as their parents.

Kamrul Islam Mamun, Dhaka: Our rivers and environment are under threat. What ways are there to escape the impending dangers?

Azizul Hakim: Thank you for asking such an important question. I'm as concerned as you are about the decaying state of our rivers. The environment is also being polluted for many reasons. However, we can be optimistic regarding the works of some pro-environment organisations. But the fact remains that we all have to be aware and cautious on the issue - for protecting the environment.

Sharmin Sultana, Patuakhali: Is acting your passion or profession?

Azizul Hakim: It is both.

Nazmul Ahmed, Uttara, Dhaka: What is your definition of love?

Azizul Hakim: Everyone has their own definition. The pain of not getting what you want is love.

TDS: What do you do in leisure hours?

Azizul Hakim: I hardly get any time off. The little I get, I choose to spend at home. I give time to my children and wife. I like to watch movies and listen to music. Sometimes I also get the chance to travel.

Ishita turns author

Popular TV actress Ishita is set to make her debut as an author at this year's Ekushey book fair. Her first book “Nirobe” has been published by Shobdo-Shilpo Prokashoni.

On the book, Ishita says it is the story form of a TV drama that she wrote in 2008. The play was aired then and has four to five characters, she adds.

Ishita began practicing her writing skills during her childhood, with teen magazine Kishor Tarokalok featuring several of her stories. However, “Nirobe” is her first serious work, Ishita adds.

Apart from acting, Ishita is busy directing TV dramas and writing new screenplays for TV. So far she has written 11 plays for television and wants to try her hand at more serious forms of writing if she can manage the time. Although the artiste is keen to visit the book fair, she is busy taking care of her ailing grandmother. But Ishita asserted she intends to go to the fair whenever she can get time off.

Manipuri Theatre's Kohe Birangana and Shree Krishna Kirtan go to India

Manipuri Theatre will hold two shows of its productions “Kohe Birangana” and “Shree Krishna Kirtan” at the International Manipuri Literature and Cultural Festival to be held in Guwahati, Assam in India. The Bangladeshi troupe will hold the shows on February 18 and 19. Moreover, the troupe will hold a couple of more shows of the plays in other places in Assam and Tripura during its ten-day tour.

Chief of the troupe Shuvashis Sinha informed that the local Bishnupriya Manipuri Writers Forum in Guwahati will organise the festival, where Manipuri communities from Bangladesh and India will uphold their ethnic identity through different cultural performances.

Both the Manipuri Theatre productions have been written and directed by Shuvashis.

“Kohe Birangana” is based on Michael Madhusudan Dutt's “Birangana Kabya”. The play articulates four verses among 11 from the original text. The play features agony of female characters from the epic “Mahabharat”-- Shakuntala, Draupadi, Dushala and Jona.

Jyoti Sinha played the four characters. Other performers, who helped Jyoti in chorus, were Smriti Sinha, Shukla Sinha, Sunanda Sinha and Bhagyalokkhi Sinha.

On the other hand, “Shree Krishna Kirtan” is adapted from medieval period poet Baru Chandidas' writing with the same title.

Chandidas wrote “Shree Krishna Kirtan” to highlight the anthropomorphic aspects of Lord Krishna. It was an arduous process as he had to pore over puran and religious books. In the play, Shuvashis worked on only seven episodes out of 13 from the original piece.

Jyoti Sinha and Aparna Sinha play as Radha and Krishna respectively. Shukla Sinha will do another lead character in the play.

Tangled Fields Earth's magnet dances to the Sun

This image, released this week, shows a computer simulation of the complex and crazy magnetic fields that make up Earth's magnetosphere. The magnetosphere is the result of the interaction of charged particles from the sun and the magnetic field that surrounds the planet. When solar storms send particles flowing toward Earth, the result can be stunning space weather the kind that creates beautiful auroras but also can disrupt satellites, telecommunications and electrical power grids. Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee are trying to understand how these storms work in order to better predict how storms on the sun will influence life on our planet.

Evolved In Pollution Sooty-moth tale stands test

A recently criticized textbook example of evolutionary forces in action, the dark forms of peppered moths that spread with industrialization in Britain, may be on its way back.

Results of an ambitious experiment on the moths (Biston betularia) support the original hypothesis that their dark-colored forms spread in soot-coated landscapes because they are more difficult for hungry birds to spot, says evolutionary biologist James Mallet of Harvard University. He and three colleagues have published the final peppered moth experiment of Michael Majerus, who spent six years monitoring the fates of a total of 4,864 moths, presented his conclusions at a conference but died before publishing them. The study appears online February 8 in Biology Letters.

The moth story not only makes “a compelling example of evolution in action,” but it's “a terrific case history of how science works,” says evolutionary biologist Scott Freeman of the University of Washington in Seattle. “Majerus raised questions; he and his colleagues did the hard work required to answer them.”

The moths, which usually have salt-white wings sprinkled with pepper-black, have long played a role in evolutionary biology. In the early years of genetics, breeding experiments established that a single gene can create a black form. It showed up in Manchester, England, in 1848, and by 1895, 98 percent of the region's moths were dark. Moths went dark in similarly industrializing areas, and when clean-air regulations began to clear the pollution, dark forms went into decline.

Experiments in the mid-20th century supported the idea that industrial grime provided better camouflage for dark wings, but that work drew escalating challenges starting in the 1990s. Majerus and other scientists raised questions about those studies' methods, such as whether the high densities of moths released had altered the results and whether the tree trunks where moths were placed were a normal resting place.

Tuning Home Homesick frog

When wooing females, a type of frog in China describes its home through songconveying the depth and entrance size of the muddy burrow with some accuracy, a study suggests.

Scientists based at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and University of California investigated the frog Babina dauchina, better known as the Emei music frog thanks to its distinctive banjo-like call.

He male frogs build burrows alongside ponds to provide a suitable place for mating, laying eggs and rearing tadpoles. The researchers noticed that they seem to make different calls from inside and outside the burrows.

By analysing the acoustic properties of the calls and examining the way female frogs react to them, the scientists found that the male frogs not only advertise whether they have a burrow or not, but also its characteristics. Female music frogs are then able to choose the male with the most desirable real estate, without having to go through the time-consuming business of waiting to be shown round.

Males inside burrows play higher-pitched notes if the entrance is wider, and longer notes if the hole is deeper, the investigators explained. Also, “Inside-nest calls consisted of notes with energy concentrated at lower frequency [pitch] ranges and longer note durations when compared with outside-nest calls,” they wrote, reporting their findings in Dec. 7 in the advance online edition of the journal Biology Letters.

Did You Know? How fast can a hippo run?

A hippopotamus may seem huge but it can still run faster than a man.

Hippos are the second-largest land animal -- second only to elephants. Male hippos can weigh more than 6,000 pounds. Females are more "delicate," topping out around 3,000 pounds. Despite their massive bulk, hippos can run faster than humans -- up to 30 miles per hour!

After Fukushima Third-generation nuclear reactor designed

The United States has approved construction of new nuclear reactors for the first time in three decades. The two new reactors approved today (Feb. 9) for Georgia would represent the first U.S. versions of next-generation reactor designs that have begun appearing in China.

These "third-generation" reactors are said to be safer, with longer-lasting batteries and passive cooling systems powered by gravity so that they can survive longer during emergencies without outside power.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission approved construction of the two reactors at an existing nuclear power plant in Vogtle, Ga., in a 4-1 vote.

"The last plant that got to this stage of the [approval] process did so in 1978," said Harold McFarlane, manager of the nuclear science and technology directorate at Idaho National Laboratory. "We think it's a very significant step going forward. It is the first of the new generation."

The U.S. froze construction of nuclear power plants after the partial core meltdown at Three Mile Island, Pa., in 1979. Consequently, the 104 nuclear plants still operating in the country have designs dating to the 1960s and 1970s. Meanwhile, the first of the third-generation plants were designed in the 1990s and were updated throughout the new millennium.

Following the devastating earthquake and tsunami that led to the meltdown at Japan's Fukushima Plant last March, Germany, Switzerland and Spain halted construction of any new nuclear power plants. However, energy-hungry China has pressed ahead with adding new, third-generation nuclear reactors.

The newly approved AP1000 reactors for the Vogtle plant to be made by Westinghouse have safety features that would give people "days instead of hours" to restore electric power in a Fukushima scenario, McFarlane told InnovationNewsDaily. The Fukushima reactors suffered a meltdown after the lack of electricity knocked out their cooling systems.

In the new models, which Westinghouse already has built for China, "the water needed to cool the reactors is stored inside the containment building rather than outside of containment," explained Robert Buell, a risk analyst at Idaho National Laboratory. "You use physics and natural circulation along the containment walls to cool the reactors instead of relying on mechanical systems."

The Fukushima disaster did not go unmentioned during the Nuclear Regulatory Commission vote. According to the news service Reuters, NRC chairman Gregory Jaczko cast the lone vote against the new reactors, arguing that the commission should delay approval until it requires all nuclear plant operators to include "Fukushima enhancements" safety and operational lessons learned from the meltdown