Hyperloop One
In the Nevada desert, Elon Musk’ company (Tesla, SpaceX) accelerated an aluminium sled to a speed of 186 km/h in just 2 seconds. The attendant press was not impressed: hours of travel for seconds of trial. But the rest of us are hyped at the prospect of travelling at 1,125 km/h, putting New York City just forty minutes away from Montréal.
⇨ Mashable, “Hyperloop One: Where do we go from here?”
⇨ The Guardian, “Hyperloop or over-hyped? Latest demo does little to ease doubts.”
Samsung Galaxy Surfboard
Seems like Samsung’s marketing guys are bored. They’ve come up with a connected board. No kidding.
⇨ The Verge, “Samsung made a Galaxy Surfboard so you’re not disconnected at sea.”
Lazertouch
Lazertouch is a miniature projector that turns any wall or table into a touchscreen that works on Android. Currently being crowdfunded on Indiegogo, it should retail for US$650.
⇨ The Verge, “Lazertouch projector turns any flat surface into a touchscreen Android tablet.”
SeaDrone
SeaDrone is a small but powerful underwater drone. The two-propellor Explorer model will sell for US$2,700, while the six-propellor Developer model will retail for US$3,900. It should be available by the end of the year.
⇨ IEEE Spectrum, “Stanford AI Grads Launch Low(ish)-Cost Underwater Robot.”
Vuze VR
Vuze VR is a 360° video camera for the average consumer. It has eight HD cameras, or two on each side of a square, with 120° horizontal and 180° vertical fields of vision. It can be preordered for US$799 with an October delivery.
⇨ TechCrunch, “The $799 VUZE virtual reality camera goes up for pre-order.”
MARLO Robot
MARLO is a biped robot developed at University of Michigan whose decidedly odd legs are pantograph-shaped. Having taken its first steps in 2012, MARLO is still learning and taking on new challenges developed by its researcher handlers.
⇨ Popular Science, “This bipedal robot walks calmly over uneven ground.”
VR Robot Tank
The VR Robot Tank is powered by two Raspberry Pi 2s, and controlled with an Xbox 360 controller. Video is streamend to an Android phone inside a Google Cardboard.
⇨ The Verge, “Check out this VR robot tank that makes fart noises.”
Other Links of Interest:
- Canada's Big 5 banks sign up for Apple Pay: http://goo.gl/2gXhPV
- Linux will be the major operating system of 21st century cars: http://goo.gl/2XIt1P
- Western Digital officially owns SanDisk: http://goo.gl/9TSUKb
- NVIDIA ups the power and drops the price with its impressive new graphics cards: http://goo.gl/kMcixY
- Google's Amazon Echo killer could be called 'Chirp' and launch this year: http://goo.gl/iIKjnn
- What VR games are popular with HTC Vive’s early adopters: http://goo.gl/STrcKw
- Disney's telepresence robot is shockingly precise: http://goo.gl/kjC0Rl
- Samsung announces a massive 256GB microSD card: http://goo.gl/O59u4c
- Instagram just changed its logo in a big way: http://goo.gl/21KllK
- Google I/O 2016 Preview: http://goo.gl/181TcR
