All Things Tech

Normal people throw away stuff when it breaks. But not people like us. Or, apparently, [NanoRobotGeek]. A cheap robotic dragonfly died, and he cannibalized it for robot parts. But he kept the gearbox hoping to build a new dragonfly and, using some brass rod, he did just that . The dragonfly’s circuitry uses a solar panel for power and a couple of flashing LEDs. This is a BEAM robot, so not a microcontroller in sight. You can see a brief video of how the dragonfly moves. Really, though, the neat part of this is the fabrication of the wings using soldered brass rods. The head has the flashing LEDs as eyes. The secret sauce, of course, is the gearbox. If you were going to replicate this project, you’d probably have to figure out your own gearbox modifications unless you just happened to get the exact same toy. In addition to LED eyes, the dragonfly also has a capacitor bank on its tail. This isn’t aesthetic. The wings run on a FLED-based solar engine circuit. The LEDs and the capacito...

Google Maps has become an almost indispensable tool in navigating the world and it has become the go-to solution when trying to locating unfamiliar places. More often than not, however, people probably don’t like it if it happens the other way around, with Maps and, therefore, Google, being able to locate and track your activities. Just like in web browsers, … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/33hr4A4

If you thought that OnePlus’ “Never Settle” motto also applies to its release strategy, think again. For the first 3 generations, it seemed that it defied the business practice of launching multiple phones a year. That changed with the OnePlus 5T and then again with the OnePlus 7 this year when the company launched two phones at the same time … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/36rqLoG

There are only a few mainstream manufacturers making Android tablets these days outside of Samsung’s slightly popular Galaxy Tab line. In contrast, Apple’s iPads and especially the iPad Pros seem to be thriving both in popularity and sales. So what is a company like Huawei to do? Why not combine both of these brands into one? But rather simply “be … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2N7SyCZ

Of late, TV makers have been competing with each other on adding “smart” or AI-powered features to ride on the wave of trends in the general tech industry. Mostly that applies to things like upscaling to 4K or even 8K, HDR and color management, and frame interpolation. The overall goal is always the same, to offer the smoothest video output … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/320gpbT

When it comes to hobby-level 3D printing, most of us use plastic filament deposited by a hot end. Nearly all the rest are using stereolithography — projecting light into a photosensitive resin. Filament printers have typical build volumes ranging from 1,000 to 10,000 cubic centimeters and even larger isn’t unusual. By contrast, SLA printers are often much smaller. A 1,200 CC SLA printer is typical and the cheaper printers are sometimes as little as 800 CCs. Perhaps that’s why [3D Printing Nerd] (otherwise known as [Joel]) was excited to get his hands on a Peopoly Phenom which has a build area of over 17,000 CCs. You can see the video review, below. He claims that it is even bigger than a Formilab 3L, although by our math that has a build volume of around 20,000 CCs. On the other hand, the longest dimension on the Peopoly is 40 cm which is 6.5 cm longer than the 3L, so maybe that’s what he means. Either way, the printer is huge. That’s nearly 16 inches which is big even for a filament...

In the past, Samsung has limited its presence in the US smartphone market to its top-end premium flagships. The reasoning, perhaps, was that these were the only ones that would sell in such a primary consumer market. Times have changed, however, and so have consumer tastes and budgets. Samsung has finally made available a couple of its Galaxy A series … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/34nX7hV

Facing increasing scrutiny from international and domestic regulators, the Altria Group has decided to write down its investment into the e-cigarette company JUUL by $4.5 billion. That’s roughly one-third of the $12.8 billion that the tobacco giant had invested into JUUL a little less than one year ago. Juul Labs gets $12.8 billion investment from Marlboro maker Altria Group What a difference a year has made. JUUL, which has become synonymous with the vaping phenomenon that has swept the U.S., was once hailed as being at the forefront of a wave of companies that were making smoking obsolete and nicotine consumption safer for consumers. Vaporization Startup Pax Labs Introduces Juul, Its Next-Gen E-Cigarette The company began running into problems as its popularity increased exponentially (in part by allegedly turning to some of the same tactics big tobacco used to target underage consumers ). As the complaints began to roll in, and as JUUL was held responsible fo...

Paidy , a Japanese financial tech startup that provides instant credit to consumers in Japan, announced today that it has raised a total of $143 million in new financing. This includes a $83 million Series C extension from investors including PayPal Ventures and debt financing of $60 million. The funding will be used to advance Paidy’s goals of signing large-scale merchants, offering new financial services and growing its user base to 11 million accounts by the end of 2020. In addition to PayPal Ventures, investors in the Series C extension also include Soros Capital Management, JS Capital Management and Tybourne Capital Management, along with another undisclosed investor. The debt financing is from Goldman Sachs Japan, Mizuho Bank, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank. Earlier this month, Paidy and Goldman Sachs Japan established a warehouse facility valued at $52 million. Paidy also established credit facility worth $8 million with the three banks. Th...

Virtual reality and even augmented reality seem to have taken a backseat to other tech news of late but that may be partly due to the growing maturity of the technologies. In other words, they’re no longer as groundbreaking or as odd as they were at the start. That said, VR and especially AR are still pretty much out of … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2WtmvAk

The US Department of Interior, the agency that oversees federal land and natural resources, has grounded its fleet of more than 800 drones over concerns that they may be a security vulnerability. According to recent reports, officials have cited worries over drones made in China, as well as drones that feature components manufactured in the nation. The decision is the … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2JEytBY

[voices_in_ai_byline] About this Episode On this Episode of Voices in AI Bryon speaks with Patrick Surry of Hopper on the nature of intelligence and the path that our relationship with AI is taking. Listen to this episode or read the full transcript at www.VoicesinAI.com Transcript Excerpt Byron Reese: This is Voices in AI , brought to you by GigaOm. I’m Byron Reese. Today my guest is Patrick Surry. He is the Chief Data Scientist at Hopper. He holds a PhD in math and statistics from the University of Edinburgh. Welcome to the show, Patrick. Patrick Surry: It’s great to be here. I like to start our journey off with the same question for most guests, which is: What is artificial intelligence? Specifically, why is it artificial? That’s a really interesting question. I think there’s a bunch of different takes you get from different people about that. I guess the way I think about it [is] in a pragmatic sense of trying to get computers to mimic the way that humans think about probl...

Zynga and Alec Baldwin have teamed up to celebrate the game for its 10th anniversary of the social mobile game Words With Friends. Read More from VentureBeat https://ift.tt/2WvylcY

The future may have big things in store for robots that will help humanity. Goals for robots include helping to rescue humans from a burning building, helping with chemical spills, and helping with any disaster that makes a location inaccessible to human responders. Before the dream of rescue robots can become a reality, the robots have to be able to … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2r0BIx5

The Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 is better than the best controller I've ever used, and I can recommend it to anyone who can stomach the price. Read More from VentureBeat https://ift.tt/323IIGm

An American giant may have figured out a way to simplify the tedious procedure of issuing driver’s licenses. And an early sneak peek of this solution is now live in parts of India. Hundreds of people who have taken the driver’s license test in Dehradun, the capital of Indian state Uttarakhand near the Himalayan foothills, in recent weeks haven’t had to sit next to an instructor . Instead, their cars were affixed with a smartphone that was running HAMS , an AI project developed by Microsoft Research team. HAMS uses a smartphone’s front and rear cameras and other sensors to monitor the driver (their gaze), and the road ahead of them. Microsoft Research team said for driver tests, they customized HAMS to enable precise tracking of a vehicle’s trajectory during test manoeuvres such as parallel parking or negotiating a roundabout. This AI technology can determine whether the driver performed any action — such as stopping in the middle of a test or course correcting by rolling forward or ...

PC gamers rejoice! The oldest existing digital game distribution platform isn’t looking so ancient anymore. After almost two decades, Steam is finally rolling out the first major update to its game library. Some will probably already know what’s in store when the update their Steam client and, like it or not, your library is about to get more social and … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2q4bolk

On the whole, hackers aren’t overly fond of other people telling them what they can and cannot do with the hardware or software they’ve purchased. Unfortunately, it’s becoming more and more difficult to avoid DRM and other Draconian rules and limitations as time goes on. Digital “eBooks” and the devices that are used to view them are often the subject of such scrutiny, which is why [Joey Castillo] has made it his mission to develop a open hardware eReader that truly belongs to the user. [Joey] has been working on what he calls the “The Open Book Project” for a few months now, and he’s just recently announced that the first reader has been successfully assembled and powered up. As is usually the case, a few hardware issues were identified with this initial prototype. But it sounds like the device was largely functional , and only a few relatively minor tweaks to the board layout and components should be necessary before the hardware is ready for the masses. An earlier prototype, usi...

Global smartphone shipments grew by 1% in Q3 2019, according to Canalys, representing the first market increase in two years.  Read More from VentureBeat https://ift.tt/2WDR3Q5

Given how it profits from ads, it’s almost ironic that Google is pushing technologies and features in Chrome seem to block ads. The truth is that Google is only after misbehaving and malicious ads so that users will eventually develop a level of trust for good ads. When it comes to misbehaving ads, none can be more debilitating to a … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2JCExuK

Namogoo , the Herzliya, Israel-based company that has developed a solution for e-commerce and other online enterprises to prevent “customer journey hijacking,” has raised $40 million in Series C funding. The round is led by Oak HC/FT, with participation from existing backers GreatPoint Ventures, Blumberg Capital, and Hanaco Ventures. It brings total raised by Namogoo to $69 million, and sees Matt Streisfeld, Partner at Oak HC/FT, join the company’s board. Founded by Chemi Katz and Ohad Greenshpan in 2014, Namogoo’s platform gives online businesses more control over the customer journey by preventing unauthorized ad injections that attempt to divert customers to competitors. It also helps uncover privacy and compliance risks that can come from the use of 3rd and 4th party ad vendors. More broadly, Namogoo says that customer journey hijacking is a growing but little-known problem that by some estimates affects 15-25 percent of all user web sessions and therefore costs e-commerce busi...

In the market for a low-poly change to your look? Hate the idea of showing up for a costume party only to find out someone is wearing the same mask as you? Then this face changing front-projection mask may be just the thing for you. To be honest, we’re not sure just how much [Sean Hodgins]’ latest project has to do with cosplay. He seems to be making a subtle commentary about dealing with life in the surveillance state, even though this is probably not a strategy for thwarting facial-recognition cameras. [Ed Note: Or maybe it’s just Halloween?] The build consists of a Raspberry Pi and a pico projector of the kind we’ve seen before . These are mated together via a custom PCB and live inside a small enclosure that’s attached to the end of a longish boom. The boom attaches to the chin of 3D-printed mask, which in turn is connected to the suspension system of a welding helmet. Powered by a battery pack and controlled by a smartphone app, the projector throws whatever you want onto t...

Berlin-based femtech startup Inne is coming out of stealth to announce an €8 million (~$8.8M) Series A and give the first glimpse of a hormone-tracking subscription product for fertility-tracking and natural contraception that’s slated for launch in Q1 next year. The Series A is led by led by Blossom Capital, with early Inne backer Monkfish Equity also participating, along with a number of angel investors — including Taavet Hinrikus, co-founder of TransferWise; Tom Stafford, managing partner at DST; and Trivago co-founder Rolf Schromgens. Women’s health apps have been having a tech-fuelled moment in recent years, with the rise of a femtech category. There are now all sorts of apps for tracking periods and the menstrual cycle, such as Clue and Flo . Some also try to predict which days a women is fertile and which they’re not — offering digital tools to help women track bodily signals if they’re following a natural family planning method of contraception, or indeed trying to concei...

Freetrade , the U.K. challenger stockbroker that offers commission-free investing, has closed $15 million in Series A funding. The round includes a $7.5 million investment from Draper Esprit, the U.K. publicly-listed venture capital firm, along with previously announced equity crowdfunding via Crowdcube. The funding will be used by Freetrade for further growth and product development, including “doubling down” on engineering hires. The fintech, which claims over 50,000 customers, is also planning to expand to Europe next year. In addition, Adam Dodds, CEO and founder of Freetrade, tells me there will be a marketing and content push to help reach more of the challenger stockbroker’s target millennial customers and help educate the market as a whole that investing in the stock market doesn’t have to be prohibitively expensive or complicated. Amongst a number of new stock trading and investment apps in the U.K., London-based Freetrade was first out of the gate as a bona-fide “challenge...

With CcHub ‘s acquisition of iHub in September, Nigerian Bosun Tijani is at the helm of (arguably) the largest tech network in Africa. He is now CEO of both organizations, including their robust membership rosters, startup incubation programs, global partnerships, and VC activities from Nigeria to Kenya . One could conclude Tijani has become one of the most powerful figures in African tech with the CcHub iHub merger. But that would be a little shortsighted. The techie from Lagos still faces plenty of challenges and unknowns in integrating two innovation hubs that lie 3,818 flight kilometers apart. Several sources speaking on background over the last year have indicated iHub was experiencing financial difficulties. Tijani offered TechCrunch some initial details last month on how the acquisition will fall together. Nigeria’s CcHub acquires Kenya’s iHub to create mega Africa incubator But more recently he shared greater detail on his strategy for operating the multi-country ...

Playing classic games on the real hardware is an experience many of us enjoy, but sometimes the hardware is just a bit too retro for modern sensibilities. A case in point is the miserable monochrome LCD that was originally installed in the Amstrad PPC640 portable 8086 PC that [Drygol] recently picked up. He decided that his portable Amstrad sessions would be far more enjoyable if he swapped it out for a display that didn’t have 30+ years on the clock . To quell the complaints of any of the vintage hardware aficionados out there, it’s worth mentioning that the original LCD was actually damaged and needed to be replaced anyway. Granted [Drygol] could have tried to find a contemporary panel to replace it with, but looking at the incredible before and after shots of the modded PPC640, it’s hard to argue he didn’t make the right decision by throwing a modern display into the otherwise largely original computer. Getting the new LCD’s PCB ready for installation. [Drygol] says he picked ...

NVIDIA shook things up a bit when it launched its new SHIELD TV products. The Pro model, while looking exactly the same, got a much-needed spec bump while the non-Pro version sported a new and curious tubular design. Both, however, shared one thing in common beyond the Tegra X1 chip. Both had a redesigned and more powerful remote control that … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2oweQVd

Just when you thought the nightmares of broken iOS 13 updates are finally over, along comes iOS 13.2. Admittedly, the set of owners affected by a bug that can brick HomePods may be significantly smaller than those that beset iPhone users in the past few weeks. Still, it’s a rather stressful experience for owners causing Apple to actually pull out … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2C1if1i

Much of the coverage around Huawei’s fate revolves around the negative effects of the US ban on its business, both in mobile and networking equipment. Despite almost all the predictions of doom, however, Huawei released almost unbelievably good numbers when it came to smartphone shipments. One reason may have been that the full effects of Google’s absence from its phones … Continue reading from SlashGear https://ift.tt/2r1346j

Just because something is newer than something else doesn’t automatically make it better. Of course the opposite is also true, but when it comes to displays on bench multimeters, a fancy LCD display is no guarantee of legibility. Take the Hewlett Packard HP 3478A multimeter; the stock transflective display with its 14-segment characters is so hard to read that people usually have to add a backlight to use it. That wasn’t good enough for [cyclotronboy], though, who chose to completely replace the stock 3478A display with Nixie tubes . He noticed that with a little modification, six IN-17 tubes just fit in the window vacated by the LCD. He sniffed out the serial data stream going to the display with a collection of XOR gates and flip-flops, which let him write the code for a PIC18F4550. The finished display adds a trio of rectangular LEDs for the + and – indicators, and an HDLO-1414 four-character alphanumeric display to indicate units and the like. And the decimal points? Tiny neon bul...