Computational Power of the Universe

Having spent the past 75 hours without Internet access, I've had a chance to think a little bit more about the expansiveness of the universe and where we're going in it.  This is a little bit off topic from the nonlinear app, but maybe not so off topic...

What is the computational power of the universe if all matter could be harnessed for computing and how long will it be before we get there?

Here are some back-of-the-napkin calculations:

Computations per second per kg of matter
There are already some thoughts on this.  Ray Kurzweil in The Singularity Is Near discusses quantum computing and the theoretical limit of 1 kg of matter being able to process computations per second (CPS).

Matter in the universe
Using Sir Fred Hoyle's estimation of matter in the universe, based on a steady-state universe, we end up getting kg.

OK, so handy multiplication gives us CPS / kg x [mass of universe] or

Total computational power of the universe:

CPS

or 800 googol CPS... at that amount, we can probably be safe to say 1 googol FLOP.

Extending Moore's Law - that the power of processing doubles every two years - beyond the end of transistors, we need to find out how many doublings we need to accomplish to get to this large number.  First, we need to know what is today's record.

Current computing record
The record holding computer as of today is the K Computer at the RIKEN Advanced Institute for Computational Science (AICS) in Kobe (record set June 2011 - written here October 1, 2011 and soon to be very dated).  The processing power of this computer is 8 PetaFLOPS or CPS.

Time until we reach the computational power of the universe
If we let n be the number of doublings until we get to this level, we get this:







 doublings

Multiplying n  by two to get the number of years:

 years

So, in 246 years, we'll reach the computational power of the universe of more or less a googol calculations per second.  The year will be 2257 in the Gregorian calendar, 1678 in the Muslim calendar, 1636 in the Persian calendar, and 6018 in the Hebrew calendar.

Of course, there are some huge assumptions with these calculations:

• The numbers used above are correct
• Moore's Law will continue to hold
• We can get access to distant matter for computing
• I haven't made any ridiculous & glaringly obvious math mistakes
• I'm not missing other hugely obvious assumptions

Enjoy... and happy 5772!

PS - Some interest readings:

The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology
Wikipedia on the Observable Universe
Wikipedia on Moore's Law
Japan Reclaims Top Ranking on Latest TOP500 List of World’s Supercomputers

Version 1.4 Released!

I just pressed the "release" button on version 1.4 of nonlinear.  This is really exciting.  I think that you'll see a huge jump in stability and the Dropbox integration should make it much easier to use the app.


I'm eager for your feedback!

nonlinear 1.4 in the works now

We've been testing the next version of nonlinear and there are even more changes for the better:


Super-solid performance. The flake factor is going from flour-less chocolate cake to sponge toffee
Quicker load times. Imported files will load faster.
Smooth drawing. No jaggy lines or high latency - just smooth lines for easy drawing during a presentation.
New price. At $4.99, it makes it easier for people who are budget-conscious but appreciate being able to give nonlinear presentations to purchase the app.  For those who bought the app at $9.99, you are brave souls who put a lot of faith in nonlinear. Thank you. I want to make sure that you get a continuously improving experience and that one day you can proudly tell your great grandkids that you were one of the first to get nonlinear. 


And the one I'm really excited about...


DROPBOX INTEGRATION!  That's right. You'll be able to load in files from your Dropbox account wirelessly. Dropbox has created some very generous technology and we wanted to make it easier to use this with nonlinear.


In What Technology Wants, Kevin Kelly described the creation of new technology and this process has manifested itself very quickly in nonlinear's development.  There have actually been 5 versions of the app (not all were released) and many internal incremental versions.  Also inline with Kelly, you can look out for some news ways of being able to help advance nonlinear.


And as was suggested by Guy Kawasaki in Rules for Revolutionaries: CHURN, BABY, CHURN! We started with a frail app and now we're looking at something really exciting.

Thank you!

Our free-app fundraiser for Acumen Fund was a resounding success. Over $1,000 was raised as a result!

The app is now back up on price - but things may change again. Now, several thousand people are using nonlinear.

Thanks for your support!

Starting tomorrow - nonlinear is FREE

Starting tomorrow, nonlinear will be FREE for 500 downloaders.  On top of that, for each download, $2 will be donated to Acumen Fund.

I've been inspired by Chris Anderson's Free: How Today's Smartest Businesses Profit by Giving Something for Nothing and the work being done by Acumen Fund. There are more excited changes in the works for nonlinear, but this pricing will be start.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on this!

iOS 4.3 support and more ideas

Today, we all heard very exciting news about the iPad 2 and iOS 4.3.  nonlinear will be tested on this and an update released soon.  What excites me most about the iPad 2 is the HDMI output.  This will make it that more exciting to play back high quality videos and images during non-linear presentations.

What else?  9x the graphic processing and 2x processing power should make the app that much swifter.

Of course, as is all the rage these days, Keetsy will have it's own big announcement soon.

$1,000 for Acumen Fund!

Thank you, nonlinear-ers!

By downloading nonlinear, you've helped raise $1,000 for Acumen Fund. $2 from every purchase of nonlinear in the App Store goes to the fund.

That goes a huge way for this amazing organization. Acumen Fund reinvests that money into projects in the developing world. It's not a charity - it's for giving people an opportunity to become independent.

Watch the video below or go to acumenfund.org to learn more.