Archive for the 'Rise of the Machines' Category
‘Mass Transit Cameras Spot Bad Guys, No Human Judgment Required’
June 7th, 2012And while we’re at it, how about using Google searches to identify pre-crime? Via: Fast Company: A new breed of security cameras can supposedly detect terrorism and crime without a human judgment call–and mass transit agencies are shelling out big bucks for the product. San Francisco’s Municipal Transit Authority, which oversees the city’s MUNI trains, […]
Google Fellow Wants to Offer Online Graduate Degrees for $100
June 7th, 2012In ten or twenty years, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the majority of paid work in companies, that is, work that isn’t done by machines, being done by these “certificate” holders. They’ll live in ever expanding slums, autonomously policed by RoboCops and drones. They’ll have fast Internet and there will be Superbowl commercials about […]
RAND Suggest Reality TV Style Control Room Layout to Deal with Military Drone Data Glut
June 6th, 2012In a weird case of life imitating art, the film, Sleep Dealer, depicts a grim future in which drone missions are broadcast on a reality TV show. Via: Wired: Turns out, reality TV control rooms and Air Force ground stations actually have more in common than you might surmise. The volume of footage exploited in […]
Google Creating 3D Models of Metropolitan Areas
June 6th, 2012Via: Google: An important next step in improving all of these areas—comprehensiveness, accuracy, and usability of our maps—is the ability to model the world in 3D. Since 2006, we’ve had textured 3D buildings in Google Earth, and today we are excited to announce that we will begin adding 3D models to entire metropolitan areas to […]
New Hydrogen Powered Drone Can Fly for Four Days
June 5th, 2012Via: Los Angeles Times: A massive experimental drone designed by Boeing Co. engineers to fly for up to four days at a time completed its first test flight above the Mojave Desert at Edwards Air Force Base. The drone, called Phantom Eye, and its hydrogen-fueled propulsion system have the potential to vastly expand the reach […]
Increasing Use of Robots in China’s Factories
June 4th, 2012Via: Reuters: The giant orange robotic arms that swiftly weld together car frames at the Great Wall Motors factory in Baoding might seem like the perfect answer to China’s fast-rising labor costs – they don’t ask for a raise, get injured or go on strike. For Great Wall, a private sector Chinese car maker that […]
Volvo’s Self-Drive ‘Convoy’ Hits the Spanish Motorway
May 30th, 2012What could possibly go wrong? Avi Rubin – All Your Devices Can Be Hacked: Via: BBC: A convoy of self-driven cars has completed a 200km (125-mile) journey on a Spanish motorway, in the first public test of such vehicles. The cars were wirelessly linked to each other and “mimicked” a lead vehicle, driven by a […]
To Avoid Counting Civilian Deaths, Obama Re-Defined “Militant” to Mean “All Military-Age Males in a Strike Zone”
May 30th, 2012Via: Salon: Virtually every time the U.S. fires a missile from a drone and ends the lives of Muslims, American media outlets dutifully trumpet in headlines that the dead were ”militants” – even though those media outlets literally do not have the slightest idea of who was actually killed. They simply cite always-unnamed “officials” claiming […]
John Brennan Manages The Obama Regime’s Assassination List
May 24th, 2012Via: The Atlantic: “White House counterterror chief John Brennan has seized the lead in choosing which terrorists will be targeted for drone attacks or raids, establishing a new procedure for both military and CIA targets,” Kimberly Dozier of the Associated Press reports. “The effort concentrates power over the use of lethal U.S. force outside war […]
Arming Police Drones with Rubber Bullets and Tear Gas
May 23rd, 2012Via: CBS: With the use of domestic drones increasing, concern has not just come up over privacy issues, but also over the potential use of lethal force by the unmanned aircraft. Drones have been used overseas to target and kill high-level terror leaders and are also being used along the U.S.-Mexico border in the battle […]
