Lifeboat Foundation

Opinion: Surprise! Some of the fastest, most affordable internet in the country can be found in tiny communities.

According to updated regulatory documents and recent Aviation Week interviews with the US Air Force Research Laboratory, it can be all but guaranteed that the USAF has begun working with SpaceX to test the feasibility of using the company’s planned Starlink satellite internet constellation for military communications purposes.

In early August, SpaceX updated regulatory documents required by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for the company to be permitted to experimental test its two prototype Starlink internet satellites, named Tintin A and B. Launched roughly six months ago as a copassenger on one of SpaceX’s own Falcon 9 rockets, the satellite duo has been quietly performing a broad range of tests on orbit, particularly focused on general satellite operations, orbital maneuvering with SpaceX’s own custom-built electric propulsion, and – most importantly – the experimental satellites’ cutting-edge communications capabilities.

The orbit histories of @SpaceX’s Tintin A/B Starlink prototype satellites, launched in February! Some thoroughly intriguing differences in behavior over the six months they’ve spent on-orbit. Data and visualizations generated by the lovely http://CalSky.com. pic.twitter.com/a8CfQaZJep

Continue reading “SpaceX seeks approval for Starlink internet tests on high-performance govt. planes” »

The implications are mind-boggling, oh yes.

Check out what MIT media lab does using bone conduction technology.

#technology #future #internet #biotechnology #communication #immersiveleaks

While Facebook and Google recently pulled the plug on their solar-powered internet drones, another company with a lot more experience is having success with the idea. Airbus announced that its solar-powered Zephyr S HAPS (high altitude pseudo-satellite) flew for 25 straight days, setting a time aloft record for any airplane, ever. It shattered the previous record of 14 days, marked by a previous prototype Zephyr aircraft.

The Zephyr flies on sun power alone at over 70,000 feet, an altitude that just a few aircraft like the Concorde and SR-71 Blackbird have reached. That’s well above any weather, and lets it perform reconnaissance, surveillance and communications/internet duties. “[It fills a] capability gap complimentary to satellites, UAVs and manned aircraft to provide persistent local satellite-like services,” Airbus said in a press release. A video of the takeoff (below) shows that it can be lifted and launched by hand. Once aloft, it can be operated for a fraction the cost of a satellite.

Continue reading “Solar-powered aircraft stays aloft for record-breaking 25 days” »

Scientific progress, and Internet and mobile coverage proliferation in the last 8 years alone might have decreased the numbers dramatically. Still not as much as to liquidate the spiritual beliefs of the vast majority of the world’s population.

Does God exist? If She does, this is how we got our sacred soul. If She does not, we will soon be able to recreate the soul in machines!

Let us frame the question, by reviewing what miners really do…

Miners play a critical role in the Bitcoin network. Their activity (searching for a nonce) results in assembling an immutable string of blocks that corroborate and log the universal transaction record. They are the distributed bookkeepers that replace old-school banks in recording and vouching for everyone’s purchase or savings.

From the perspective of a miner, there is no obvious connection between their activity and the worldwide network of bitcoin transactions and record keeping. They are simply playing an online game and competing against thousands of other miners in an effort to solve a complex and ongoing math problem. As they arrive at answers to small pieces of the problem, they are rewarded with bitcoin, which can be easily translated into any currency.

What is the Problem?

Continue reading “How will Bitcoin Work When Mining Rewards Run Out?” »

Stay in school kids… hahaha.

Stay in school, kids.

“We should not start from steam and railways, or the old technologies—that is already done,” Assefa argues.

That makes sense to academics like Singh — though he also cautions that political forces are often slow to see the bigger picture. There is definitely an opportunity for developing countries, he says. “But any time we have a technological revolution, the political institutions have to catch up.”

A 2017 report (pdf) by the World Wide Web Foundation suggested that Ethiopian “intelligence services are using machine intelligence techniques to break encryption and find patterns in social media posts that can be used to identify dissidents.” And while mobile phone and internet penetration in Ethiopia is comparatively poor—a situation made worst amid widespread anti-government protests, which prompted an internet crackdown in February — the report added that government surveillance and oppression could increase as the use of smartphones expands.

Continue reading “Futurists in Ethiopia are betting on artificial intelligence to drive development” »

Sometimes, while waiting for quantum computers to become a thing, or complaining that your stupid laptop keeps dying on 5 percent battery, it’s easy to forget just how far technology has come over the past 50 years.

Sure, we can all list off a whole bunch of innovations that have changed the way the world works — the Internet, smartphones, radio telescopes — but it’s hard to really put that kind of change into perspective.

Thankfully, pictures often speak louder than words, and so below are nine photos that’ll make you stop and raise your *praise hand* emojis to the sky in honour of the scientists and engineers that have got us where we are today.

Continue reading “These 9 Incredible Images Are a Mind-Boggling Remind of How Far Technology Has Come” »