Mmm…wonder if it works?
Here’s an idea which is either good or bad, depending on how you view the issue of urban advertising in general. A French company has come up with a way to create street ads using nothing more than a stencil, a high power pressure washer and some recycled water.
A team from the University of Sheffield in the UK has successfully flown a UAV (aka drone) which was built entirely using a 3D printer. The aircraft, built in the college’s Advanced Materials Research Centre, is made up of just nine parts, many of which snap together without needing fixings.
![University of Sheffield successfully flies a disposable 3D printed drone [Scary Skies]](http://www.redferret.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/3dprinteddrones4.jpg)
The mighty Google continues pushing the boundaries of email with its latest announcement of a new layout format trial for the Promotions tab. For those who don’t know this is the folder which collects all the ham (not spam), which we sign up for day to day. Things like newsletters, promotional material etc.
You like music? See if you like this. It’s a video battle between the Japanese robot band Z-Machines versus the German robot band Compressorhead. We don’t know what to say really. Other than the trite observation that if this is really the future of music, we’re all going to be in a lot of pain one day.
We have to confess to being fascinated by science, and especially that part which deals with the biology of species. Which makes this How Animals See The World article really interesting. Of course it’s all a total fantasy, rather like an alien trying to work out how we humans see by counting the megapixels on our cameras, but it’s still a valid piece of guesswork even so.
Just stumbled over this Lifehacker post The Cheapskates Guide To Getting Free Stuff from a while back, and it’s rather fine. The fact is that in our economically challenged times, there are many more options coming along to help with getting free or really great deals.
There’s a small startup, operating out of a storefront office somewhere deep in San Francisco which looks to be turning the world of online auctions on its head. The team behind Fobo are the same folk that delivered Yardsale for the iPhone, only now they’re aiming at the heart of the eBay machine.
We don’t often comment on industry type issues, primarily because they’re often boring, but we’re going to make an exception here because this is really surprising. Most people who know WordPress and are interested in SEO will have heard of Yoast, which is run by a Dutch WordPress consultant. The company was recently hired by well respected financial blogger Susan Webber, who owns Naked Capitalism.
The tracks you see above come from two mature great white sharks, Lydia and Mary Lee, which were tagged as part of an on-going global research project called Ocearch, which is monitoring these majestic creatures for education and to provide valuable data to help conserve the species.
The other day I received a notification that our energy supplier EDF, had created a smartphone app. Not just a basic one though. This one lets you submit a meter reading with your camera, change your monthly amounts and even send an alert if you’re moving out. The point is, suddenly, I was given the power of doing a lot of stuff that other admin people used to do for me.
On the 13th September this year the streets of Beijing will reverberate to the sound of 11 teams racing around in almost total silence at speeds of up to 225 km/hour (limited). This will be the inaugural event in the Formula E calendar, the world’s first all electric single seater formula car racing season.
We stumbled across this little beauty the other day and our nostrils twitched immediately. Was that really a quadcopter which had been programmed to work out how to hit a ball back to a human target? Well it sure looks like it. In fact this is part of a research program from the Swiss Institute of Technology in Zurich, which is looking into what they call ‘trajectory generation’. What we see is a future where competitive sports get **really** interesting.
If you’re a driver who constantly plays tag with the parking wardens on your beat, you’ll probably appreciate any tool which promises to help your life go easier. Which is clearly what the developers behind Fixed, a new smartphone app which offers to help ‘people beat unjust parking tickets‘.
After roaming around with the Emporer and conquering various planets, nobody knows space like the Dark Lord of the Sith, which is why he’s such a great guy to show space to you. Just don’t listen to his sales pitch about the Dark Side. They don’t really have cookies.
It’s a pretty common scenario. You’re driving to a new destination and get lost and you’re late. Cue confusion, arguments, discord and general disharmony in the vehicle. Also, strangely, there’s also a typical situation where someone reaches over and turns the stereo system down or off. Ever wondered why? <image: shutterstock>
