Technological Revolution

Commentary: The future of AI is scary and very bad for people

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/25/2015 - 18:37

By Steve Wozniak

March 24, 2015 - We should all be getting a little nervous: the robot apocalypse is brewing.

Or at least, that's what a growing number of tech visionaries are predicting. In an interview with The Australian Financial Review, I my own grave predictions about artificial intelligence's detrimental impact on the future of humanity to warnings from the likes of Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Stephen Hawking.

TV ads are about to start watching you

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/25/2015 - 18:35

March 24, 2015 - Google is about to make ads on television work just like ads on the Web. Through Google, advertisers will know how many times their ads were viewed. They’ll be able to target audiences based on location and viewing history. In other words, TV advertisers will have access to the same audience intel online advertisers take for granted.

Finally, after all this time, your TV is going to know as much about you as your web browser.

New car will force you to obey the speed limit

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/25/2015 - 18:32

DETROIT, Michigan (PNN) - March 24, 2015 - Much as we'd like to emulate our NASCAR heroes, breaking the speed limit often comes at a price. Ford is hoping to prevent accidents and speeding tickets by introducing cars that can see what the speed limit is and preventing heavy-footed motorists from driving any faster. Ford's Intelligent Speed Limiter tech will first appear on the new Ford S-Max that's launching in Europe that could just change the way that we drive.

Living in Google's brave new world

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/25/2015 - 18:31

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Kalifornia (PNN) - March 22, 2015 - There are 48,000 Google searches every second. That translates to 3.5 billion per day, and 1.2 trillion per year worldwide. That's twice as many as there were just six years ago. Every six out of 10searches on the Internet are through Google's engine.

A clever way to tell which of your emails are being tracked

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/25/2015 - 18:20

SAN FRANCISCO, Kalifornia (PNN) - March 20, 2015 - While you’ve likely never heard of companies like Yesware, Bananatag, and Streak, they almost certainly know a good deal about you. Specifically, they know when you’ve opened an email sent by one of their clients, where you are, what sort of device you’re using, and whether you’ve clicked a link - all without your awareness or consent.

Solar powered membrane separates water into hydrogen and oxygen without exploding

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/18/2015 - 18:44

LOS ANGELES, Kalifornia (PNN) - March 17, 2015 - Hydrogen powered cars are slowly accelerating in popularity with boosts from infrastructure development and car manufacturers. But getting eco-friendly hydrogen is still a bit of a challenge. Right now, a lot of hydrogen is produced through mixing steam and natural gas. An alternative to using natural gas is electrolysis, using an electric current to pull apart the oxygen and hydrogen in water, but current methods use way too much energy to make it worth it. Scientists around the country are working on making the process simpler, using AAA batteries, chemical reactions and other methods to make hydrogen a greener choice.

New optical fiber material could pave the way for computers that think

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/18/2015 - 18:39

SINGAPORE (PNN) - March 16, 2015 - Researchers at the University of Southampton and the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore have found that fiber optics can be used to build low-power, high-bandwidth artificial neurons that mimic their biological counterparts. Used inside a properly designed chip, this technology could lead to computers that think and learn like a human.

Neptune Suite shows a taste of what computing should be in 2025

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/18/2015 - 18:37

MONTREAL, Quebec, Canada (PNN) - March 16, 2015 - When Neptune launched its grand idea for upending the smart phone ecosystem, many responses boiled down to: Huh?

Sure, the idea sounded downright radical: Instead of a smart phone streaming to devices like a smart watch, the Neptune Hub and Pocket were created with the opposite relationship in mind. There was Hub, a smart watch powerful enough to run apps, take calls, and send messages; and there was Pocket, a relatively dumb screen that fit in your pocket, like a smart phone, but was little more than an input device. Many people didn’t get it. “Most of the negativity was from people that don’t see this as a first start,” says Simon Tian, Neptune’s 20-year-old founder. “They thought we were just going to stop at the pocket screen.”

Mysterious spy cameras collecting data at post offices

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/18/2015 - 18:32

DENVER, Colorado (PNN) - March 11, 2015 - Within an hour of FOX31 Denver discovering a hidden camera, which was positioned to capture and record the license plates and facial features of customers leaving a Golden Post Office, the device was ripped from the ground and disappeared.

Documents shine light on shadowy New Zealand surveillance base

Submitted by Freedomman on Wed, 03/11/2015 - 19:12

WAIHOPAI VALLEY, New Zealand (PNN) - March 8, 2015 - Near the heartland of New Zealand’s renowned wine country, there is a place that visitors are not allowed to go. The peculiar large white domes that protrude from the earth in the Waihopai Valley are surrounded by razor wire and shrouded in secrecy.

But now, newly revealed documents from the Amerikan Gestapo National Security Agency division whistleblower Edward Snowden shine a light on what is behind the security perimeter. The buildings there are crammed with sophisticated NSA spying technology, used by New Zealand to sweep up text messages, emails, phone calls, and other communications in bulk across the Asia-Pacific.

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