Three years ago, I wrote about the Godson-2, a Chinese microprocessor that’s largely compatible with the MIPS architecture. I speculated that its successor, the Godson-3, would be a quad-core chip and that the Chinese needed x86 compatibility to break into the worldwide PC market.

So I wasn’t too surprised when the Godson-3 was unveiled at a recent technology conference in Silicon Valley. Sure enough, the first version has four cores, and the Chinese are adding more than 200 new instructions for x86 software emulation. These developments indicate that Chinese microprocessor technology is rapidly catching up with the rest of the world.

As I’ve noted before, when you’re not playing action games, the killer GPU in your PC is basically a case heater. For the most part, it uselessly sucks power and radiates heat as you perform mundane computing tasks: web browsing, word processing, spreadsheet calculations, MP3 playback. GPUs are the most underutilized resource in PCs.

Finally, that’s changing. AMD now bundles its ATI Stream parallel-processing software in the latest ATI Catalyst graphics drivers. As users download and install these free drivers, they automatically prep their systems to run ATI Stream programs that leverage the GPU as a massively parallel processor. Before, users had to download ATI Stream separately. AMD is following Nvidia, which began bundling its CUDA parallel-processing software with display drivers in 2007.

Since childhood, I’ve bitterly wondered why I don’t have a jet car, or my own robot assistant and constant companion. I would call it Sally, and Sally would keep me organized and help me fight crime at night.

Part of the reason my future has failed me is abuse of the patent system, the part of IP that protects and fosters technological innovation. You can’t copyright an idea, but patents give you a limited time to develop and grow an idea yourself. However, the patent system hasn’t changed much in 300 years, leaving it flawed and exploitable. Nobody exploits the system better than patent trolls.