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Jun 10, 2015

Open Sourcing Is No Longer Optional, Not Even for Apple — Klint Finley Wired

Posted by in category: software

The biggest round of applause at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference keynote yesterday didn’t come when the company announced new versions of iOS and OS X, or even the new Apple Music service. It came when Apple’s vice president of engineering Craig Federighi announced that the company will open source the next version of its programming language Swift.

Why the excitement? Developers have demonstrated a growing preference for open source tools and platforms over the past 15 years. Apple, meanwhile, has pushed iOS developers towards its own in-house development technologies and away from third-party tools, such as Adobe Flash, that it deems inefficient. But even Apple can only risk alienating the developers on whom it relies for so many third-party apps and services so far. Coders have myriad options available to let them do their jobs the way they want; to keep them in-house, it turns out, Apple has to open up. Read more

Jun 10, 2015

Oculus Rift, Magic Leap, and the Future of Reality … By Ava Kofman | The Atlantic

Posted by in categories: augmented reality, electronics, hardware, information science, innovation, media & arts, software, virtual reality

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Vannevar Bush’s prediction, half a century later, rings true: “The world has arrived at an age of cheap complex devices of great reliability; and something is bound to come of it.”

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Jun 10, 2015

Just as Stephen Hawking warned? Here comes ‘the world’s angriest robot’ — CNET

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Technically Incorrect: A New Zealand-based company says it’s building a very, very angry robot to help companies deal with angry customers.

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Jun 9, 2015

Udacity’s Sebastian Thrun: How Nanodegrees can democratize tech education — Nate Swanner | The Next Web

Posted by in category: education

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When I probed Thrun about what a Nanodegree would actually deliver for someone who finished the program, he pointed me to the new Android Nanodegree announced on-stage at Google I/O. “If you finish this [Google Android Nanodegree], and you get a Nanodegree for Android Developer, then you are basically employable as an Android developer — as a top-notch Android developer.” Read more

Jun 9, 2015

When Computers Insist They’re Alive

Posted by in category: neuroscience

My latest article for Vice Motherboard. It’s about consciousness and a so-called ‘Turing Test’ that superintelligence might one day use on humans:

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Jun 9, 2015

World’s first biolimb … By Akshat Rathi | Quartz

Posted by in categories: biological, biotech/medical, DNA, education, ethics, futurism, genetics, hacking, hardware, health

The idea is simple. First, they take an arm from a dead rat and put it through a process of decellularization using detergents. This leaves behind a white scaffold. The scaffold is key because no artificial reconstructions come close to replicating the intricacies of a natural one.

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Jun 9, 2015

3D printing just made space travel cheaper — Nyshka Chandran MSNBC

Posted by in categories: 3D printing, disruptive technology, space, space travel

Companies looking to launch satellites into space typically spend anywhere from $10–50 million per launch but thanks to 3D printing, those costs are set to drop in a big way.

For $4.9 million, businesses can use RocketLab to send small satellites into orbit. The firm’s engine, called the Rutherford, is powered by an electric motor and is the first oxygen and hydrocarbon engine to use 3D printing for all its primary components. The New Zealand company is set to begin test flights this year and aims to launch weekly commercial operations next year. Read more

Jun 8, 2015

Virtual reality rape: Transhumanists highlight ethical issues arising from new technology

Posted by in categories: futurism, transhumanism, virtual reality

International Business Times out with a story on VR and transhumanism:

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Jun 8, 2015

How textiles repeatedly revolutionised human technology — Virginia Postrel | AEON

Posted by in category: materials

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“The story of technology is in fact the story of textiles. From the most ancient times to the present, so too is the story of economic development and global trade. The origins of chemistry lie in the colouring and finishing of cloth. The textile business funded the Italian Renaissance and the Mughal Empire; it left us double-entry bookkeeping and letters of credit, Michelangelo’s David and the Taj Mahal. As much as spices or gold, the quest for fabrics and dyestuffs drew sailors across strange seas. In ways both subtle and obvious, textiles made our world.” Read more

Jun 8, 2015

‘We’re a long way from a singularity’ says ‘Ex Machina’ AI consultant — by Luke Westaway c/net

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, singularity

On-screen robots tend to rise up and crush their puny human masters with alarming regularity.

“I decided to log every single incidence of artificial intelligence or robots in the history of cinema,” Adam Rutherford, a British geneticist and author who served as AI consultant on the recent film “Ex Machina”, tells CNET’s Crave blog. “I think I calculated that 65 percent of them end up being a threat, and the rest of them are just servile.” Read more