Lifeboat Foundation

By Michael Molitch-Hou - 3D Printing Industry

In preparation for 2014, Gartner released a report outlining its top predictions for the next six years or so titled “Gartner Top Predictions 2014: Plan for a Disruptive, but Constructive Future”. The report makes some rather startling predictions about the future of our world, often veiled in elliptical phrases reminiscent of the Oracle at Delphi. As the title suggests, from now until 2020, we’ve got a bumpy road ahead of us thanks to such technologies as 3D printing.

While Gartner also focuses on The Internet of Things, digital business and smart machines in the report, it is 3D printing that makes it relevant to us at 3DPI. According to the report, 3D printing will have a huge impact on intellectual property, saying, “At least one major Western manufacturer will claim to have had intellectual property stolen for a mainstream product by thieves using 3D printers who will likely reside in those same Western markets, rather than in Asia, by 2015,” and, “The global automotive aftermarket parts, toy, IT and consumer product industries will report intellectual property theft worth at least $15 billion in 2016 due to 3D printing.” How to solve such a problem? The report’s author suggests that CEOs take a look at how to prevent forgeries via 3D printing and methods for consumers to ensure the validity of their goods.

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By Andrew Couts — Digital Trends

The rise of Dogecoin and the soon-to-launch Coinye West (yes, it’s named after the rapper) made it seem as though almost anyone can create a Bitcoin competitor. Now, with the launch of a clever and simple tool, that is actually true.

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Written By: Jason Dorrier — Singularity Hub

In 2013, major automakers either forecasting self-driving technologies or announcing their own included Mercedes, BMW, Nissan, Volvo, Tesla—and now, you can add Ford into the mix. The Michigan automaker said they’re working with the University of Michigan and insurer, State Farm, to develop mostly driverless technology by 2025.

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William Pentland, Contributor — Forbes

Considering that batteries are typically designed for maximum longevity, it may seem odd to learn that the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is ramping up research into self-destructing batteries.

Odd or not, DARPA awarded a $4.7 million contract last week to SRI International, an independent research organization based in Menlo Park, CA CA -0.09%, to develop a transient power supply that, when triggered, becomes unobservable to the human eye.

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by Ingrid Lunden — Tech Crunch

Gaming giant Zynga has started to accept the cryptocurrency as a payment option for those buying tokens for virtual goods on the web versions of FarmVille 2, CastleVille, ChefVille, CoasterVille, Hidden Chronicles, Hidden Shadows and CityVille. It makes Zynga the first major gaming company to accept Bitcoin.

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Here’s a thought experiment inspired by the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI): Suppose in our search for beings in other galaxies, we come across a species that looks very much like us and can communicate with us reasonably well, so that it doesn’t take very long for them to understand what we’re about. In other words, they are definitely within our sphere of spontaneous sympathy. Moreover they even possess technologies that we consider relatively advanced, such as mobile phones. (After all, how else could we have recognised them as intelligent beings?) At the same time, however, they also tend to live half as long as we do – and for reasons that are quite obvious to us because they lack the sort of societal infrastructure that would enable them to live longer.

To be sure, these beings think that their lives are perfectly fine, aside from spates of internecine strife that seem to be fuelled by alien sources (perhaps the same aliens that enabled us to discover them). In any case, their culture is designed around the way they have conducted their lives for centuries. The question is whether we should violate Star Trek’s Prime Directive and substantially intervene to provide them with an infrastructure that would allow them to live longer and perhaps flourish in a way that would go beyond the sort of superficial trade relations that currently mark our maintenance of a ‘respectful’ distance from them. Here are some options:

1. No matter the cost to them or us, ‘civilising’ these aliens is an end worth pursuing in its own right – even if it ends up a gallant failure.
2. We can’t really afford much backlash from the natives, especially given that backups from Earth will not be forthcoming. So, we need to tread carefully, perhaps envisaging a long-term strategy of cultivating natives over several generations.
3. We commit to leaving the natives with some care packages and a time-limited run of advisors whose mission is to get them to use those packages as effectively as possible, so that eventually they can produce their contents for themselves.
4. We simply obey the Prime Directive and deal with them as free market traders without any particular concern for how they end up using whatever the both of us agree to have been a fair exchange of goods.

Now let us think about planet Earth, where we have the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights – and not the Prime Directive – as our guiding normative principle. Clearly, (4) would be seen as a libertarian dys/utopia that would render the Declaration irrelevant (though it may well capture China’s current policy towards the Third World), whereas (3) would be seen as the default position of most development aid. I have advocated (2) as Imperialism 2.0, and of course classic Imperialism is captured by (1).

Just as the sixteenth century European conquistadors thought they were about to discover lands of great wealth and potential superiority to what they had experienced in their homelands, our own interstellar voyagers may be subject (occasionally at least) to a rude awakening, for which we need a policy. And perhaps considering such a policy might help us to think more clearly about the aliens on our own planet – i.e. those in need of ‘development’.

By Nick Swartsell - Dallas Morning News

WASHINGTON –Cody Wilson isn’t afraid of legal gray areas, whether they’re do-it-yourself firearms or anonymous online money.

Last year, the Austin resident and former UT law student posted plans for a 3D-printed plastic handgun online along with a video demonstrating the weapon. He took the plans down days later, after the State Department ordered them removed.

Continue reading “3D-printed gun advocate Cody Wilson announces bitcoin venture” »

By Richard Gray — The Telegraph

Sebastian Anthony - Extreme Tech

Security researchers have successfully broken one of the most secure encryption algorithms, 4096-bit RSA, by listening – yes, with a microphone — to a computer as it decrypts some encrypted data. The attack is fairly simple and can be carried out with rudimentary hardware. The repercussions for the average computer user are minimal, but if you’re a secret agent, power user, or some other kind of encryption-using miscreant, you may want to reach for the Rammstein when decrypting your data.

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