Solving the Domestic Car-Buying Problem
United States auto manufacturers' market share dropped from 55.2 percent in 2006 to 52.3 percent in 2007. General Motors' slipped from 24.8 percent to 23.9 percent.

So, if you're GM, how do you solve the problem of car drivers buying fewer of your cars?

Eliminate the drivers, of course, by developing driverless cars.

The Associated Press reports (via Digg):

Cars that drive themselves — even parking at their destination — could be ready for sale within a decade, General Motors Corp. executives say. GM, parts suppliers, university engineers and other automakers all are working on vehicles that could revolutionize short- and long-distance travel. And Tuesday at GM Chief Executive Rick Wagoner will devote part of his speech to the driverless vehicles.

Wagoner said the automaker plans to test driverless car technology by 2015 and have cars on the road around 2018.

Puckish Blue Hue
Yet another example of innovation with mass-appeal application that came from the military (kinda): that yellow strip showing the first-down line on televised football games and the system in which you see a fast-moving hockey puck's blue highlight and red trail.

The inventor Stan Honey worked at SRI International in "military stuff" and "did lots of tracking and remote sensing." In an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle this week, Honey explained:

The way it works is that we have accurate sensors on all the cameras so we're able to measure the pan, tilt, zoom, focus of each of the broadcast cameras. If you go to a sporting event and look below every camera, you'll see a gold box that has the Sportvision logo on it. That's the sensor. We also characterize the distortion of the lens and we have to measure the crown of the field. We know where the first-down line is because that is entered by an operator. Given all that information, we compute where that line should appear.

The system was first introduced in an ESPN Sunday night football game in the fall of '98. It wasn't announced ahead of time, causing a whole lot of confusion on the TV audience's part. When Honey and his team did the hockey puck, it had been announced by Fox as "the greatest innovation in the history of mankind."

Convert Your Camera into a Wireless Device
In Tuesday's newsletter, we discussed "wireless mobility" as one of the Top Tech Trends to Watch — and wouldn't you know it, one of the coolest examples of this trend was on display this week's annual Consumer Electronics Show.

A company called Eye-Fi has developed a series of memory cards with built-in Wi-Fi that automatically convert your camera into a wireless device, allowing you to upload your camera's photos directly to your computer or the Web or both.

From BBC News:

The 2GB cards automatically connect to a wi-fi network and can dump photos to a folder on a PC or upload them to social networks or photo-sharing sites.

The firm has already done deals with the likes of Flickr, Photobucket and Facebook. (Scroll further down BBC's coverage for more on mobile technology.)

Workers' Comp for Crack Career
Last month, Ohio's Supreme Court determined that selling crack cocaine is a job.

Therefore, according to the high court's mid-December ruling that upheld a March 1998 decision, continually selling crack cocaine is "sufficient cause to terminate permanent total disability compensation," Workforce.com reports.

Thus, a former-industrial-worker-turned-crack-dealer's permanent total disability Workers' Compensation benefits have been cut.

Warming a Building with Body Heat
Energy prices remain high, and many office buildings and workplace facilities are feeling it as the weather is set to get colder.

A Swedish real estate firm plans to harness the body heat generated by thousands of commuters scrambling to catch their trains at Stockholm's main railway station and use it for heating a nearby office building, AP reports (via Newsvine).

About 250,000 people pass through the station every day, warming the air inside with their body heat. Project leader Karl Sundholm told AP the idea is to have large ventilators in the station "suck in the warm air and use it to heat up water," which will then be shipped through pipes to the new office building.

The company believes the system — which will cost US$47,000 — can provide about 15 percent of the heating needed for a 13-story building.

Forget Whistling While You Work
A professor of music last week insisted there was plenty of evidence that the right sort of music, played at the right sort of volume, could help bring about a happy workforce and increase productivity.

"There's clear evidence that a happy workforce is a productive one, and the easiest way of raising the spirits in the office is to put on the radio or a CD," Professor Richard McGregor, of the University of Cumbria, told The Scotsman.

"But the choice of music is vital and there is a risk that, if it's the wrong choice, it could be a recipe for office disaster and upset most of the office."

Like, say, the Starland Vocal Band's Afternoon Delight on loop in cubicles and other confined spaces with few places to run? Yeah…

5 Signs You're Working Too Much
As we reported earlier this week, recent findings indicate that the growing number of employees seeking the right work/life balance is not only changing the rules of job engagement, but of employee productivity, as well.

How can you tell if your work life is overtaking your personal life? Well, here are just a few signs that, yes, you just might be working too many hours:

• Every meal out is expensable;
• Nightly cleaning crew = your closest colleagues;
• When you eventually arrive home, the automatic coffeemaker has just finished brewing;
• You find yourself dialing "9" before making phone calls from home; and
• A good night of sleep means dreaming you are productive.

Feel free to add your own in the comments below.


Cheers.