technology
Paralysed Woman Controls Prosthesis, With Her Mind
17 May 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Science! Technology! In a worldwide medical first, researchers have successfully implanted a computer-mind interface into the motor cortex of a 58-year-old, quadriplegic woman which allowed her to control a robotic limb using only the power of her mind. The future is now.
Pinterest Raising Millions In A Bid Fund International Expansion
17 May 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Pinterest, the hottest social photo sharing website right now, looks set to receive a nice $50 million injection from Japanese giant, Raukten. Plus another reported $70 million coming in from other international investors! This means that Pinterest’s valuation is now in the range of between $1 billion and $1,5 billion. Impressively, they’ve only been around for two years.
They’re Going To Have A Freddie Mercury Hologram, Too
15 May 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
When Queen’s drummer, Roger Taylor, was asked if he’d want a hologram Freddie Mercury a la Tupac – he declined, saying “I don’t want to appear with a hologram of my dear friend.” Which is unfortunately ambiguous wording, because they’ve decided to conjure up a Mercury hologram at tonight’s 10th anniversary We Will Rock You musical.
Hello, Future: Move Files Across Devices With A Swipe [VIDEO]
08 May 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
People over at MIT have developed a piece of open-source software that lets you drag files from your phone to your computer or tablet or whatever with a swipe of a finger. It’s simple and clever and looks like the future – and it works. They’re calling it Swÿp. Take a look at the demo after the jump.
Residential Buildings To House Surface-to-Air Missiles During London Olympics
30 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
Oh awesome, this makes total sense. The UK’s Ministry of Defense is planning to install surface-to-air missiles on top of residential flats in east London for the duration of the Olympic Games. The bulk of the missile array is intended for the Lexington Building Water Tower, which has about 700 people living in and around it.
Peter Jackson’s “The Hobbit” Looks Like It Sort Of Sucks
26 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 2 Comments
Last year, James Cameron called on filmmakers to start shooting film at 48 frames per second – twice the industry standard, and twice as smooth, visually. Peter Jackson was the first to respond, shooting The Hobbit at 48fps. And, according to people who saw a 10-minute preview at CinemaCon this year, it looks like a made-for-TV BBC movie.
Google Drive Goes Live
25 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 2 Comments
Hey there, people who like free online storage. As expected, Google’s potential Dropbox-killer, Google Drive, has gone live – offering users 5GB of free online storage, with the potential to upgrade to 25GB for $2,50 per month. The service is available on PCs, Macs, Android phones – and is coming soon to iOS.
US Judge Rules Against German Microsoft Injunction
12 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
In another great instance of American judges believing that their jurisdiction has no limits, a U.S. judge has ruled that Motorola cannot enforce an injunction that would prevent Microsoft from selling Windows products in Germany, should a German court issue such an injunction next week.
NASA Releases Infrared Map Of Entire Universe [PIC]
05 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Have you ever wondered what the universe would look like on a single photo? You did!? Well, what a coincidence, because NASA has just released this infrared map of the entire universe. This serves as a capstone for a bigger cosmic map – containing 18 000 images and 560 million different objects. It took NASA fourteen years of preparation and three years of data collection.
WhatsApp Assures Industry It’s No Threat To Phone Carriers’ Revenue
05 Apr 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
Mobile messaging platform WhatsApp poses “no threat” to phone carriers who rely on SMS revenue. Given the popularity of the service, that statement seems pretty hard to believe at first glance. Who chooses to send paid-for SMSes anymore when you can WhatsApp your buddies to your heart’s content (or until your thumbs malfunction) for free?
Google’s Self-Driving Car With Blind Driver Behind The Wheel [VIDEO]
29 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Last month we told you about Nevada legalising self-driving cars. But how do they work exactly? Check out this video of Google’s self-driving Toyota Prius being “driven” by a guy that is 95% blind.
Awesome iPad Presentation Is Awesome [VIDEO]
28 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Still don’t get why the iPad is the best tablet out there? Then check out this presentation by two Swedish magicians – their use of seven iPads, along with some old-fashioned trickery, should clear things up for you. Bucket loads of amazing are waiting for you – after the jump.
Photos On Lost Phone Reveal Chinese Gangster’s Lifestyle [PICS]
23 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 3 Comments
A series of violent photographs claiming to be leaked from a gangster’s mobile phone have become an online sensation. Attracting nearly 5million hits, the pics show a young (but portly) Chinese man showing off his love for stacks of cash, German sports cars, parading around topless and dishing out savage beatings. Full gallery inside.
The Pirate Bay To Launch Airborne Servers
20 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
Popular torrent hosting site, The Pirate Bay has released plans to host their server database in the clouds. Literally in the clouds, I mean; they want to fit flying micro-drones with super-small computers and connect them with long-range radio transmitters, maintaining a network of “Low-Orbit Server Stations.” Which would make police raids a little more tricky.
Volvo Introduces Pedestrian Airbag [VIDEO]
13 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Well this is new, and sort of neat. For the new V40, Volvo is introducing the world’s first pedestrian airbag system, designed to reduce the severity of pedestrian injuries in a car-pedestrian collision. Alternatively it could double as a sweet new inflatable mattress on the hood of your car.
Ad Agency Turns 13 Homeless Men Into Wi-Fi Hotspots
13 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Advertising agency BBH has come under fire for their turning 13 homeless men walking Wi-Fi hotspots at the recent SXSW conference in Austin, Texas. The “Homeless Hotspots” sported shirts saying, “I’m a 4G hotspot,” with an access code for the network.
Google Announces ‘Google Play,’ Cloud-Based Media Hub
07 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Another alternative to Apple’s iCloud popped up this week, with Google has announcing that it will be combining the Android Market, Google Music and the Google eBookstore into a new cloud-based service called Google Play, allowing users to access all of their media across all of their Android devices.
iPad 3 Specifications Spotted In The Wild
05 Mar 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
It’s less than a week to go until the iPad 3 is unveiled, so everybody and their grandma is throwing out thoughts about what the new toy can do. Concrete stats are emerging though – Apple employees have been browsing the web with their personal iPad 3’s, turning up details about the new tablet on website server logs.
25 Arrested In Global “Anonymous” Crackdown
29 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
25 people have been arrested for alleged ties to hacktivist movement Anonymous in Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Spain in the joint ‘Operation Unmask,’ which I’m sure has nothing to do with the INTERPOL website being taken down yesterday and everything to do with attacks against websites in Columbia and Chile dating from the middle of 2011.
Google to Release “Heads-Up Display” Glasses By End Of Year
22 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Those of you who have been wanting Terminator-vision since the films first came out won’t have long to wait. The New York Times reports that Google is not only working on, but will be releasing “smart glasses” fitted with Android-based augmented reality software by the year’s end.
Face-Recognizing Billboard Only Displays Ad To Women
22 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
An intelligent billboard set up in London has facial recognition tech built in that lets it scan passersby for gender – if a woman stops to take a look, it plays a 40-second video clip. Dudes only get a link to the advertiser’s website. It’s like they’re trying to send a message or something.
Nevada Legalizes Self-Driving Cars
20 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Hello, future! Nevada has become the first state to legalize self-driving cars, which are apparently pretty easy to get hold of in Nevada. Granted, the cars must have two humans inside, and be insured for around $1 million, but let’s focus on the part where people are allowed to have self-driving cars now.
NASA Unveils Stunning Future Aircraft Designs [PHOTOS]
15 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Nobody has any idea where they’re planning on getting funding from – but like a kid with an extended birthday wish list, NASA has unveiled some amazing concepts of future, eco-friendly aircraft, which they’re calling “greener flying machines for the year 2025.” Assuming they’re still here then.
SpaceX Test-Fires ‘Super’ Rocket Engines [VIDEO]
03 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
Spaceflight start-up, SpaceX – those guys who want to put a person on Mars in the next decade or two – has been demonstrating the potency of its SuperDraco rockets at their test facility in Texas. Take a look at the fancily-named rockets in action after the jump.
NASA’s Recording The Dark Side Of The Moon [VIDEO]
02 Feb 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
People who like Pink Floyd references, rejoice, because NASA’s Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission has beamed back its first video of the dark side of the moon. Click through to see what that astronaut that everybody forgets about saw while Armstrong and Aldrin were hogging all the glory.
Google’s New ‘Emergency Alerts’ Feature
26 Jan 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
Google has been saving up a tonne of creepy private information about you lately, which is unfortunate, but the company’s philanthropic arm just launched a new crisis response project to win back our hearts and personal data: emergency alerts on Google Maps.
Posh Gauteng School To Make iPads Mandatory
26 Jan 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 4 Comments
With the news that Apple looks set to revolutionise school learning with its textbook initiative, comes another report that a Johannesburg private school is going to make iPads compulsory this year, at parents’ cost. How long until other schools follow suit?
‘Apple In Education’ Launches New Digital Educational Tools
20 Jan 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
As part of their ‘reinvention of the textbook,’ Apple yesterday unveiled three new applications for use in the digital educational under their Apple in Education program: iBooks 2, iBooks Author, and iTunes U. The tools are designed to allow for interactive textbooks, digital textbook creation, and open-access educational resources from top universities, respectively.
Brazilian Police Equipped With Facial Recognition Glasses For 2014
19 Jan 2012 by Jasmine Stone / No Comments
This is sort of like Robocop! Brazilian police forces are testing out glasses fitted out with cameras linked to a central computer network that stores a database of criminal suspects’ faces, so that they’ll be able to arrest people during the 2014 World Cup without having to ask them their names.
Mbeki Questions Twitter’s Social Usefulness, Twitter Flips Out A Little
17 Jan 2012 by Jasmine Stone / 1 Comment
Following his opening address for the International Knowledge Conference at the University of Stellenbosch Business School, former president, Thabo Mbeki voiced some concerns about Twitter as “a great conveyor of reliable knowledge,” pointing to Gaddafi’s overthrow as a consequence of “false knowledge,” rather than the social media. Mbeki immediately started trending on Twitter.
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