Archive for the 'Technology' Category
Tesla Batteries Already Deployed in 11 California Wal-Mart Stores
April 23rd, 2015Via: Bloomberg: As part of a pilot program with sister company SolarCity, Tesla has installed batteries at about 300 California homes equipped with solar panels. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which has a relationship with SolarCity, has Tesla batteries installed at 11 California stores; Cargill Inc. plans a one-megawatt system for its animal-processing plant in Fresno.
And Now… “How Tor Is Building a New Dark Net with Help from the U.S. Military”
April 22nd, 2015You betcha. Via: TheDailyDot: To stay ahead in the security race, Tor is building the next-generation Dark Net in part with funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the U.S. military agency charged with inventing the cutting edge of new technology. The funding, which began in 2014, comes as part of DARPA’s Memex project, […]
Jeb Bush Praises Obama’s Expansion of NSA Surveillance
April 22nd, 2015Via: FirstLook: One of the most glaring myths propagated by Washington — especially the two parties’ media loyalists — is that bipartisanship is basically impossible, that the two parties agree on so little, that they are constantly at each other’s throats over everything. As is so often the case for Washington partisan propaganda, the reality […]
The Machines Are Coming
April 19th, 2015Via: New York Times: THE machine hums along, quietly scanning the slides, generating Pap smear diagnostics, just the way a college-educated, well-compensated lab technician might. A robot with emotion-detection software interviews visitors to the United States at the border. In field tests, this eerily named “embodied avatar kiosk” does much better than humans in catching […]
Iris Scanner Identifies a Person 40 Feet Away
April 18th, 2015Via: Discovery: The CMU team recently posted a video successfully testing the system in a typical traffic stop scenario. Using the long-range iris scanner, the system was able to identify the driver of a vehicle by capturing an image of the eye via the side-view mirror.
What Microsoft Was for PCs, This Company Hopes to Be for Drones
April 16th, 2015Via: MIT Technology Review: Microsoft’s Windows operating system had a vital role in turning the personal computer into a ubiquitous technology. Jonathan Downey hopes his company Airware will play a similar part in the development of commercial drones. The startup today launched a control system for drone makers to bundle with their small aircraft. It […]
New Zealand: Grid Tie Solar System Deals for April-May
April 16th, 2015For readers in NZ: The solar power company that I work for is discounting grid tie systems until 30 May 2015. I got an email from the CEO last night. It’s time for us to grab more market share. In addition to discounts on the hardware, you won’t have to pay: * The distributed generation […]
U.S. Navy Tests Autonomous, Swarming UAVs
April 15th, 2015Via: Office of Naval Research: A new era in autonomy and unmanned systems for naval operations is on the horizon, as officials at the Office of Naval Research (ONR) announced today recent technology demonstrations of swarming unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) — part of the Low-Cost UAV Swarming Technology (LOCUST) program. LOCUST can launch swarming UAVs […]
Customer Service Robot at Japanese Bank
April 14th, 2015Via: Japan Times: Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ took a first step toward employing nonhuman staff on Monday, with the introduction of a customer service humanoid robot at its flagship Tokyo outlet. Standing 58 cm tall and weighing 5.4 kg, the Nao robot will work at reception until April 23 before potentially being rolled out full […]
Robot Dies After Three Hours Inside Fukushima Reactor
April 14th, 2015Watch the radiation monitor numbers on the video (lower right). That thing hits 24.9 sieverts per hour. In case you don’t have an understanding of how deadly that is, see this handy radiation dose chart. Via: Guardian: Decommissioning work at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has suffered a setback after a robot sent in […]
