Production costs will be higher than a single PCB phone, if there is any traction on this modular phone, the current phone manufacturers will probably drop their margins until it can't compete in the mainstream market.

Still have a few questions about this, what if you build like 20 miles of this, and theres a faultline or heat causing two 10-mile halves to separate like 10 cm?, do you upend and move one half after the other?, or do you patch it in with cables and concrete? You might say earthquakes are rare, but even a change in heat can cause the road to expand. I have seen this first hand, I once worked on a bridgeproject on a 5km long bridge, and the edges moves quite a lot due to changes in temperature making the bridge expand or contract.

Im sure this modular concept works fine for building a porch, but making thousands of miles of road under all kinds of conditions, terrain etc is a whole new bag of problems.

I also worked in an office building once, that had these kinds of modular tiles for floors, buildt on stilts, so that you could stretch cables under there (the kind used in server-rooms) again, these things are fine for small server rooms/ilses etc, but when applied to large open office landscapes, they caused all kinds of havok and problems (they became wobbly, uneven, gaps formed etc.) And this was inside, in a brand new building, about as controlled an environment as you can get.

I would love to see these things becoming reality, but highly skeptical that its even doable.

Google Project Ara - Modular Smartphone Prototype has been added as a related post - related requested by Zawash on that post.

Quite the androgynous Andy this cat, he'd make a better looking woman-
Uhhh, small-scale modular fusion reactors....DUUUDE. Frikkin' nuclear power.

It's guys like this so excited about the work and the science that scare the holy shit outta me. Nuclear power is going to end up being one of the biggest fuck-ups we ever decided to embrace....already is.

Love that diagram of the reactor under the house-Does anyone else immediately imagine ground water toxicity and the end of all mammalian life on earth?

'out of tolerances', 'dump tank' , drain the core....duuuuude!!

Put your nuclear dream into orbit or meta-galaxial and get excited about something else, please. (and his TEdtalk ends with the economic efficiency of it all....please.)

This, I think, is the primary function of the video. The bigger picture is that cell phones are moving rapidly in the wrong direction. Even user replaceable batteries are less commonplace. The only way to stop this trend is to apply market pressure. That is, show them that they will lose sales to a more modular/reusable/upgradable competitor. If the video convinces one device manufacturer to push just a little bit in that direction I'd consider it a win.

All of the entrenched companies are already pushing out the standardized modular storage that we used to have (SDHC). Why would they suddenly swing the other direction?

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Phone, technology, idea, concept' to 'Phone, technology, idea, concept, modular' - edited by xxovercastxx

This guys points are very valid.
I'd be happy to see a modular standard (like ATX) for notebooks/laptops, but there is none.

Truth is - for portable devices consumers demand them to be smaller, cheaper, and have better battery life. PhoneBloks would be larger, more expensive, and more power hungry than the highly-integrated designs for portable electronics nowadays.

I think a practical starting point would be a standard "socket" for an SoC, which could be upgradeable. The part you keep would be the screen, pcb, antennas, etc. The SoC could itself be an MCM, with multiple stacked layers. You would have to upgrade this "base" once in a while too, but only with release of new wireless standards that work at different frequencies.

Having a standard size & voltage lithium battery for phones would be nice too. Could anyone imagine how much it would suck if AA and AAA batteries didn't exist for other electronics?

I also vote microSDXC as standard for flash storage.

*promote all things Moog and the lovely and talented Miss Rachel Flowers
http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2012/03/08/prog-virtuoso-rachel-flowers-wails-on-keith-emersons-moog-modular-synthesizer/

I can agree with that. However, the thing that makes this so interesting for me is the idea that the human being is a fundamentally unnatural creature, and the idea that modern technology more and more allows us to be an essentially modular animal, with endless possibilities.

As we innovate, we constantly redefine what it means to be a human being - clothes are so ubiquitous and culturally deep-seated that they can almost be seen as just another layer of skin, and allow us to inhabit vastly different climates, where most other animals really only function in a single setting. The same can be said for telephones and the internet, two inventions that vastly improve our ability to communicate with each other.

And what Beardyman shows us here is an example of this modularity. The "natural" human being can only produce one tone. Through cultural innovation, we can learn to sing with two tones. Through technological innovation, we can even learn to create an entire orchestra by using the input of a single man's voice.

To me, that is pretty extraordinary.

We did this puzzle in elementary school in the GATE program. How on earth people aren't taught, amazed, and remembering this simple but awesome geometrical illusion is beyond me. First thing you see when you try to recreate it on a grid, is that there is missing diagonal space. People miss the missing space isn't using the same modular shape as the rest of the puzzle. Easy to detect on a grid using only a triangle.

@GeeSussFreeK

I tried to stay way from issues specific to the use of nuclear technology for a reason. There's very little in your reply that I can respond to, simply for a lack of expertise. So bear with me if I once again attempt to generalize and abstract some points. And I'll try to keep it shorter this time.

You mentioned how construction times and costs are pushed up by the constant evolution of compliance codes. A problem not exclusive to the construction of power plants, but maybe more pronounced in these cases. No matter.

What buggers me, however, is what you can currently observe in real time at the EPR construction sites in Olkiluoto and Flamanville.
For instance, the former is reported to have more than 4000 workers from over 60 nations, involving more than 1500 sub-contractors. It's basically the Tower of Babylon, and the quality of work might be similar as well. Workers say, they were ordered to just pour concrete over inadequate weld seams to get things done in time, just to name an example. They are three years over plan as of now, and it'll be at least 2-3 more before completion.
And Flamanville... here's some of what the French Nuclear Safety Authority had to say about the construction site: "concrete supports look like Swiss cheese", "walls with gaping holes", "brittle spots without a trace of cement".

Again, this is not exclusive to the construction of NPPs. Almost every large scale construction site in Europe these days looks like this, except for whatever the Swiss are doing: kudos to them, wonderful work indeed. But if they mess up the construction of a train station, they don't run a risk of ruining the ground water and irradiating what little living space we have in Europe as it is.

Then you explain the advantages of small scale, modular reactors. Again, no argument from my side on the feasability of this, I have to take your word on it. But looking at how the Russians dispose of their old nuclear reactors (bottom of the Barents Sea) and how Germany disposes of its nuclear waste (dropped down a hole), I don't fancy the idea of having even more reactors around.

As for prices, I have to raise my hands in surrender once again. Not my area of expertise, my knowledge is limited to whatever analysis hits the mainstream press every now and then. Here's my take on it, regarding just the German market: the development, construction, tax exemption, insurance exemption, fuel transport and waste disposal of the nuclear industry was paid for primarly by taxes. Conservative government estimates were in the neighbourhood of €300B since the sixties, in addition to the costs of waste disposal and plant deconstruction that the companies can't pay for. And that's if nothing happens to any of the plants, no flood, no fire, nothing.

That's not cheap. E.ON and RWE dropped out of the bid on construction permits for new NPPs in GB, simply because it's not profitable. RWE CEO Terium mentioned ~100€/MWh as the minimum base price to make new NPPs profitable, 75.80€/MWh for gas-powered plants. Right now, the base (peak) price is at 46€/MWh (54€/MWh) in Germany. France generates ~75% of its power through NPPs, while Germany is getting plastered with highly subsidized wind turbines and solar panels, yet the market price for energy is lower in Germany.

Yes, the conditions are vastly different in the US, and yes, the next generation of NPPs might be significantly cheaper and safer to construct and run. I'm all for research in these areas. But on the field of commercial energy generation, nuclear energy just doesn't seem to cut it right now.

So let's hop over to safety/dangers. Again, priorities might differ significantly and I can only argue from a central European perspective. As cold-hearted as it may sound, the number of direct casualties is not the issue. Toxicity and radiation is, as far as I'm concerned. All our NPPs are built on rivers and the entire country is rather densely populated. A crashing plane might kill 500 people, but there will be no long term damage, particularly not to the water table. The picture of an experimental waste storage site is disturbing enough as it is, and it wasn't even "by accident" that some of these chambers are now flooded by ground water.

Apologies if I ripped anything out of context. I tried to avoid the technicalities as best as I could in a desperate attempt not to make a fool of myself. Again.

And sorry for not linking any sources in many cases. Most of it was taken from German/Swiss/Austrian/French articles.

@radx No problem on the short comment, I do the exact same thing

I find your question hard to address directly because it is a series of things I find kind of complexly contradictory. IE, market forces causing undesirable things, and the lack of market forces because of centralization causing undesirable things. Not to say you are believing in contradictions, but rather it is a complex set of issues that have to be addressed, In that, I was thinking all day how to address these, and decided on an a round about way, talking about neither, but rather the history and evolution as to why it is viewed the way you see it, and if those things are necessarily bad. This might be a bit long in the tooth, and I apologize up front for that.

Firstly, reactors are the second invention of nuclear. While a reactor type creation were the first demonstration of fission by humans (turns out there are natural fission reactors: Oklo in Gabon, Africa ), the first objective was, of course, weapons. Most of the early tech that was researched was aimed at "how to make a bomb, and fast". As a result, after the war was all said and done, those pieces of technology could most quickly be transitioned to reactor tech, even if more qualified pieces of technology were better suited. As a result, nearly all of Americas 104 (or so) reactors are based on light water pressure vessels, the result of mostly Admiral Rickover's decision to use them in the nuclear navy. This technological lock in made the big players bigger in the nuclear field, as they didn't have to do any heavy lifting on R&D, just sell lucrative fuel contracts.

This had some very toxic effects on the overall development of reactor technology. As a result of this lock-in, the NRC is predisposed to only approving technology the resembles 50 year old reactor technology. Most of the fleet is very old, and all might as well be called Rickover Reactors. Reactors which use solid fuel rods, control rods, water under pressure, ect, are approved; even though there are some other very good candidates for reactor R&D and deployment, it simply is beyond the NRCs desire to make those kinds of changes. These barriers to entry can't be understated, only the very rich could ever afford to attempt to approve a new reactor technology, like mutli-billionaire, and still might not get approved it it smells funny (thorium, what the hell is thorium!)! The result is current reactors use mostly the same innards but have larger requirements. Those requirements also change without notice and they are required to comply with more hast than any industry. So if you built a reactor to code, and the wire mesh standards changed mid construction, you have to comply, so tear down the wall and start over unless you can figure out some way to comply. This has had a multiplication effect on costs and construction times. So many times, complications can arise not because it was "over engineered", but that they have had to go super ad-hawk to make it all work due to changes mid construction. Frankly, it is pretty amazing what they have done with reactor technology to stretch it out this long. Even with the setbacks you mention, these rube goldbergian devices still manage to compete with coal in terms of its cost per Kwh, and blow away things like solar and wind on the carbon free front.

As to reactor size LWRs had to be big in the day because of various reasons, mostly licencing. Currently, there are no real ways to do small reactors because all licencing and regulatory framework assumes it is a 1GW power station. All the huge fees and regulatory framework established by these well engineered at the time, but now ancient marvels. So you need an evacuation plan that is X miles wide ( I think it is 10), even if your reactor is fractionally as large. In other words, there is nothing technically keeping reactors large. I actually would like to see them go more modular, self regulating, and at the point of need. This would simplify transmission greatly and build in a redundancy into the system. It would also potentially open up a huge market to a variety of different small, modular reactors. Currently, though, this is a pipe dream...but a dream well worth having and pushing for.

Also, reactors in the west are pretty safe, if you look at deaths per KWH, even figuring in the worst estimates of Chernobyl, nuclear is one of the best (Chernobyl isn't a western reactor). Even so, safety ratcheting in nuclear safety happens all the time, driving costs and complexity on very old systems up and up with only nominal gains. For instance, there are no computer control systems in a reactor. Each and every gauge is a specific type that is mandated by NRC edict or similar ones abroad (usually very archaic) . This creates a potential for counterfeiter parts and other actions considered foul by many. These edicts do little for safety, most safety comes from proper reactor design, and skillful operation of the plant managers. With plants so expensive, and general costs of power still very competitive, Managers would never want to damage the money output of nuclear reactors. They would very much like to make plant operations a combination of safe, smooth, and affordable. When one of those edges out the other, it tends to find abuses in the real world. If something gets to needlessly costly, managers start looking around for alternatives. Like the DHS, much of nuclear safety is nuclear safety theater...so to a certain extent, some of the abuses don't account for any real significant increase in risk. This isn't always the case, but it has to be evaluated case by case, and for the layperson, this isn't usually something that will be done.

This combination of unwillingness to invest in new reactor technology, higher demands from reactors in general, and a single minded focus on safety, (several NRC chairmen have been decidedly anti-nuclear, that is like having the internet czar hate broadband) have stilted true growth in nuclear technology. For instance, cars are not 100% safe. It is likely you will know someone that will die in a car wreak in the course of your life. This, however, doesn't cause cars to escalate that drastically in safety features or costs to implement features to drop the death rate to 0. Even though in the US, 10s of thousands die each year in cars, you will not see well meaning people call for arresting foam injection or titanium platted unobtanium body frames, mainly because safety isn't the only point of a car. A car, or a plane, or anything really, has a complicated set of benefits and defects that we have to make hard choices on...choices that don't necessarily have a correct answer. There is a benefit curve where excessive costs don't actually improve safety that much more. If everyone in the USA had to spend 10K more on a car for form injection systems that saved 100 lives in the course of a year, is that worth it? I don't have an answer there as a matter of fact, only opinion. And as the same matter of opinion on reactors, most of their cost, complication, and centralization have to do with the special way in which we treat reactors, not the technology itself. If there was a better regulatory framework, you would see (as we kind of are slowly in the industry despite these things) cheaper, easier to fabricate reactors which are safer by default. Designs that start on a fresh sheet of paper, with the latest and greatest in computer modeling (most current reactors were designed before computer simulations on the internals or externals was even a thing) and materials science. I am routing for the molten salt, thorium reactors, but there are a bunch of other generation4 reactors that are just begging to be built.

Right now, getting the NRC to approve a new reactor design takes millions of dollars, ensuring the big boy will stay around for awhile longer yet. And the regularly framework also ensures whatever reactor gets built, it is big, and that it will use solid fuel, and water coolant, and specific dials and gauges...ect. It would be like the FCC saying the exact innards of what a cellphone should be, it would be kind of maddening to cellphone manufacturers..and you most likely wouldn't have an iPhone in the way we have it today. NRC needs to change for any of the problems you mentioned to be resolved. That is a big obstacle, I am not going to lie, it is unlikely to change anytime soon. But I think the promise of carbon free energy with reliable base-load abilities can't be ignored in this green minded future we want to create.

Any rate, thanks for your feedback, hopefully, that wasn't overkill

One of my favourite bands of the last few years. aka Memory Tapes.
Download a free "mixtape" he did for Modular People. They just expected a track listing of other people songs, but he gave them 23 minutes crammed with original music.

http://www.modularpeople.com/modcast/95-memory-tapes/10217.html

'mazin!

Tags for this video have been changed from 'donny osmand, moog modular, synth, analog' to 'donny osmond, moog modular, synth, analog' - edited by Fusionaut