IBM: Angels on Pins!

angels.png Computerworld reported today that IBM has successfully figured out how to measure the amount of force needed to move an atom. (Read the story here! )

According to the report, this is one of the biggest IBM breakthroughs in nanotech since the company began working in atomic manipulation more than 20 years ago.

System i Business Partners Wait While Researchers Sort Atoms 

During that time, unfortunately, billions and billions of atoms have been waiting -- along with thousands of IBM business partners -- on IBM marketing to move on a credible marketing scheme for the IBM System i platform.

Upon hearing this news, one IBM business partner, who did not want his name revealed, remarked "We're been dying out here waiting for some real marketing support on the best computing platform in the industry, and now we discover that IBM's spent the last 20 years counting the number of angels that can fit on the head of a pin!"

210 Piconewtons Become Cobalt Benchmark

For IBM's part, researchers are convinced that the breakthrough measurements will enable the industry to begin realistically manipulating structures at the atomic level, leading to new products that could have the same impact as the invention of the transistor. According to an IBM spokesman, they've found out that it takes 210 piconewtons to move a cobalt atom over a platinum surface, but it takes 17 piconewtons to move a cobalt atom over a copper surface. He then explained that it's like engineers figuring out how to build a bridge over a large river. They both need to understand the strength of the different materials. How much force would it take to make a piece of metal bend?

Bridge to Nowhere? 

In response to this explanation the anonymous IBM Business Partner replied "You want to know how much force it takes to move a cobalt atom?  Hey!  I understand now.  But I want to know how many piconewtons it takes to get IBM to actually pick the telephone and call me with a marketing plan for the System i!"

"Let them build as many atomic bridges as they want," he continued.  "But unless they do something quick, IBM's System i marketing plan is literally a bridge to nowhere!"

My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing to watch over, and care for, and be loyal to; institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death.~ Mark Twain
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