Home
The Chinese just announced they have the world's fastest computer -- following is from Salon this date:
We learned this week that China has the fastest supercomputer in the world, by a long shot. The Tianhe-2 is almost twice as speedy as the previous record holder, a U.S.-made Cray Titan.
Such news, by itself, isn’t particularly amazing. It’s not even the first time a Chinese supercomputer has held the top ranking. The Tianhe-1 grabbed the pole position in November 2010 and held it until June 2011. Previously, Japan and the United States had traded places since 1993. Supercomputing speed follows roughly the same trajectory as Moore’s Law — it doubles about every 14 months. There will always be new contenders for the throne.
But this month, there’s a new context for news about the debut of ever more powerful supercomputers. Consider the first comment left on Reddit to a thread announcing the exploits of Tianhe-2:
---------------------------
Since the NSA and presumably the FBI are currently outsourcing private contractors to spy on all Americans, it only makes sense for them to hire the Chinese to do the work for less!!!
Maybe we can outsource our next war to the Chinese, too. Maybe they can win one for us, since our own generals are incapable ....
Reality!
We learned this week that China has the fastest supercomputer in the world, by a long shot. The Tianhe-2 is almost twice as speedy as the previous record holder, a U.S.-made Cray Titan.
Such news, by itself, isn’t particularly amazing. It’s not even the first time a Chinese supercomputer has held the top ranking. The Tianhe-1 grabbed the pole position in November 2010 and held it until June 2011. Previously, Japan and the United States had traded places since 1993. Supercomputing speed follows roughly the same trajectory as Moore’s Law — it doubles about every 14 months. There will always be new contenders for the throne.
But this month, there’s a new context for news about the debut of ever more powerful supercomputers. Consider the first comment left on Reddit to a thread announcing the exploits of Tianhe-2:
Haha. Funny. But not really. The not-so-subtle implication of the constant expansion of supercomputing capacity is that, to borrow a quote from Intel’s Raj Hazra that appeared in the New York Times, “the insatiable need for computing is driving this.” Big Data wants Big Computers.This would be a pretty awesome tool for churning through millions of phone records and digital copies of people’s online data.
---------------------------
Since the NSA and presumably the FBI are currently outsourcing private contractors to spy on all Americans, it only makes sense for them to hire the Chinese to do the work for less!!!
Maybe we can outsource our next war to the Chinese, too. Maybe they can win one for us, since our own generals are incapable ....
Reality!
