I was reading Zee’s post over at The Next Web about the massive about of data created and stored in the making of the blockbuster movie everyone knows as Avatar.

It turns out that the entire rendering of the movie required over 1 Petabyte of storage space which according to Clickbits is the equivalent of 500 hard drives of 2TB each.

The movie was shot and rendered in Miramar, New Zealand, (population 8,334) in one of the most powerful purpose-built data centers in the world (same place they created King Kong and Lord of the Rings). According to Information Management, the computing core – 34 racks, each with four chassis of 32 machines each – adds up to some 40,000 processors and 104 terabytes of RAM. The blades read and write against 3 petabytes of fast fiber channel disk network area storage from BluArc and NetApp.

All the gear sits tightly packed and connected by multiple 10-gigabit network links. “We need to stack the gear closely to get the bandwidth we need for our visual effects, and, because the data flows are so great, the storage has to be local,” says Paul Gunn, Weta’s data center systems administrator.

Now this is totally not going to happen but could imagine the immense amount of creative energies from around the world that would be able to do incredibly creative things is all that data being stored was made available under some sort of Creative Commons copyright.

The idea of artists, filmmakers and other talented people being able to create new and potentially incredible derivative is mind-boggling.

Unfortunately the chances of something this radical ever happening is next t o nil, but one can always hope.

Imagine if all that Petabyte of Avatar data was available for mashing up is a post from: The Inquisitr

Are you still looking for that perfect gift for the medical worker/surgeon in your life? If you are the USB Surgeon flash drive is a goofy stocking stuffer that will be sure to please even the most discerning surgeon in your life.

The drive works by taking off the surgeons head and then using the USB connector in the same manner as your standard USB flash drive.

The drives are also USB 2.0 certified, made of ABS plastic (the same stuff used in football helmets) and operates with no drivers, while offering support for Windows and Mac systems.

The drive is currently available, costs only $22 and and comes with 4GB storage. [USBGeek]

USB Surgeon Flash Drive, The Perfect Gift For The Medical Worker In Your Life is a post from: The Inquisitr

As transportation cost go up a lot of people are looking at alternatives and when it comes to living in metropolitan areas bicycles are at the top of the list. The big problem with them though is where to you park then, safely, once you get to your destination after all most bike racks out there are bent steel racks of pure ugly. That is of course there is even a bike rack to be found since most businesses aren’t overly inclined to install them around their premises.

Bike Arc is aiming to change that with some really modern looking rack systems that defy traditional concepts of bicycle racks. Using a modular system the company can install different designs depending on the needs of the business and the location. The Rac Arc is low profile, the Umbrella Arc is a space saver (see video below), while the Tube Arc and the Half Arc protect bikes from the elements.

Futuristic looking bike racks here today is a post from: The Inquisitr

I’m sure that this is oldish news but I found it pretty amazing all the same. According to Internet Evolution, using data accumulated from Bear Sterns & Co, comScore, Credit Suisse and Google itself, the search giant will spend more than $2 million daily to support the over 375 million expected visitors to YouTube for the year 2009.

Now, Google does not disclose sales figures by division, so there is no definitive revenue number for YouTube. The range of estimates from financial analysts stretches from a low of $90 million (Bear Stearns) to a high of $240 million (Credit Suisse).

All the numbers are well below the estimated maximum of $753 million Google is spending annually, based on our calculations. So, depending on whose version of revenues you accept, Google is losing anywhere from $513 million to $663 million annually on YouTube, or anywhere from $1.4 million to as much as $1.65 million every day (see chart below).

As David Silversmith points out in the post Google is paying you to watch all those videos in exchange for putting up with ads that aren’t even coming close to help pay the bills. Bandwidth costs alone for Google are estimated to be at a minimum of $1 million per day in order to serve up all those videos. When it comes to storing all that prime video footage the company is spending $36,000 per day with Credit Suisse estimating that YouTube is currently storing at least 5 petabytes of video.

All I can say is – Ouch!

YouTube costs Google $2 million per day is a post from: The Inquisitr