A would-be aircraft manufacturer says it will run electrically-powered flights within a decade. Wright Electric says it would be able to carry 150 passengers on short-haul flights up to 300 miles, with London to Paris the initial route. Electric planes already exist, reaching up to 200 miles per hour, but existing models usually carry only […]
A computer program can lip-read four times more accurately than a human expert according to Oxford University researchers. They worked with Google’s DeepMind project to develop an AI system named Watch, Attend and Spell. The project involved a neural network using image recognition tools to analyse 5,000 hours of TV news footage making up 118,000 […]
An ally of the US has used a Patriot missile to shoot down a small quadcopter. A US general revealed the incident but noted it’s not exactly an economical tactic. The Patriot missile system has been in use since 1984 but came to prominence during the first Gulf War. It’s primarily designed to use radar […]
Google says it will limit the amount of processing power that background tabs can consume in Chrome. The change is designed to increase battery life on mobile devices without affecting usability too much. It builds upon an existing policy that means any background tab can only carry out actions (such as reloading data) once a […]
Panasonic has made a washing machine for India that has a dedicated button for cleaning curry stains. It’s one of five custom cycles on the machine designed to meet the specific stains that Indian customers said were often not removed by washing machines. The others cover hair oils, sauces, general sweat, and tide marks on […]
A secret elite section of Tinder has been running for at least six months. If this is the first you’ve heard of it, you’re not one of the elite. Tinder Select is by invite only and is aimed at “CEOs, super models, and other hyper-attractive/upwardly affluent types” according to Tech Crunch. Writer Jordan Crook says […]
IBM has been granted a patent on a variant the out-of-office email. But it’s already agreed to release it into the public domain. The application dates back to 2010 but only made it through the US Patent Office review procedure a few weeks ago. It’s in the usual legal jargon, including a 314 word sentence, […]
We’re all used to impressive aerial video from drones capturing a view you can only see from the sky. But what about the view the human eye can’t see from anywhere. Filmmaker Sam Forenich has put together this montage of Oregon at daybreak using infrared cameras to show us the unseen take on our world. […]
This is FORPHEUS (Future Omron Robotics Technology for Exploring Possibility of Harmonized aUtomation with Sinic Theoretics), billed as the world’s first robot table tennis tutor. FORPHEUS monitors the position of the ball eighty times a second. It then analyses speed and, a thousand times each second, forecasts its future trajectories. Rather than use it skills […]
Lego has confirmed it will be producing a special set commemorating leading female figures in NASA history. The idea came through its Lego Ideas campaign that lets people come up with suggestions, with the company considering those that get more than 10,000 supporters. The set — which is shown here in concept form — will […]
This somewhat creepy clock tells the time using a ring of hair. Created by artist Bina Baitel, it works by simply blowing out air at the appropriate places to create a narrower gap for the minute ‘hand’ and a wider one to show the hour. [Via Luxury Launches]
The makers of a braille smartwatch for blind people have confirmed it will ship next month. It follows a lengthy development process and redesigns. The Dot smartwatch works with four sets of six balls that can be magnetically raised or lowered, which allows it to “display” four characters at a time in braille. As with a […]