NerdBeach

Meet The Olympic Data Center Pod People

As you might imagine, something as big as the Olympics takes a huge data infrastructure to pull off in today’s increasingly connected world. At any given moment there are many gigs of data flowing into and out of data centers at Olympic sites, and those data centers have to be up and running 24/7. But how do you manage those talented techs that keep everything running? Simple, you turn them into pod people!

At least that is the solution that service provider Interxion has come up with, and it seems to be a winner. The sleeping pods, from British company Podtime, offer a comfortable way to recharge without needing larger onsite facilites. Each standard pod will cost around $2200, but the company does offer multiple purchase discounts as well as custom models.

Considering that the alternative is to have those no doubt Olympic caliber techs separated from the site by a sea of traffic, the pods would seem to be a natural fit for the requirements of the Olympics. It might also help to keep those techs at their peak, since the last thing you need is to have your techs burnt out after being onsite for 72 hours.

Personally I think that the pod has some potential for private use. If you add in air conditioning and a sound system, it might be a pleasant way to drift off to sleep. Watchers of the movie Altered States might be a bit nervous, though – it does look like an isolation chamber, and regressing genetically throughout the night might not be the best way to start the day. Well, except for maybe Mondays…

via 21cIT

Dangers of Not Sleeping

Researchers at the University of Warwick and University College London have found that lack of sleep can more than double the risk of death from cardiovascular disease, but that too much sleep can also be associated with a doubling of the risk of death, though not primarily from cardiovascular disease. Professor Francesco Cappuccio said, “Short sleep has been shown to be a risk factor for weight gain, hypertension, and Type 2 diabetes, sometimes leading to mortality; but in contrast to the short sleep-mortality association, it appears that no potential mechanisms by which long sleep could be associated with increased mortality have yet been investigated. Some candidate causes for this include depression, low socioeconomic status, and cancer-related fatigue… In terms of prevention, our findings indicate that consistently sleeping around seven hours per night is optimal for health, and a sustained reduction may predispose to ill health.”

source:wikipedia

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