Amazon is testing the “Octocopter”,
an unmanned drone that can deliver packages weighing up to 2.3 kg within 30
minutes after placing the order. Can you imagine flying robots delivering goods
right to your door? Can you?
I am sure for most people this
looks like science fiction, but according to Chief Executive Jeff Bezos it’s
not, and the service called prime air could start in five years and it will cover areas within a 10-mile
radius of distribution centres.
Amazon is not the only company
considering the idea of using unmanned drones for deliveries as Domino released a
video of the “Domicopter” last year, I guess we will see our dinner and christmas presents flying across
the city in the near future.
It is expected that robots will
replace human workers in the future; I have recently read an article about Moshe
Vardi, an IT professor at Rice University claiming that it may happen by 2045 and
it could put millions out of work permanently.
Some people claim that before the
end of this century, 70 percent of today’s occupations will be replaced by
robots and some jobs such as ballerinas, musicians, mathematicians, athletes,
fashion designers, yoga masters, fan-fiction authors and folks are considered
those that only humans will be able to do.
Well, I’ve got some news for you,
Z-Machines, a band made up of 3 robots, Mach on guitar, Ashura on percussion
and Cosmo on keyboard made their debut in Tokyo featuring Japanese group
Amoyamo, so I guess this people were wrong about those jobs that can be done only
by humans.
According to digitaltrends.com,
the robotic band has been created by Yoichiro Kawaguchi, an IT professor at the
University of Tokyo, and mechanical designer Naofumi Yonetsuka.
The band is composed of a 78
fingered guitarist fitted with 12 picks, an electronic octopus of a drummer who
can wield 21 drum sticks and make a sound that, according to Yonetsuka, is
"the equivalent of four people playing drums" and a keyboardist that
can shoot laser beams from its eyes.
I don’t want to sound pessimistic
but I would say it will be hard for musicians to compete against robots
with these super abilities, and it seems to me that the replacement of humans by
robots has already begun.
Mars one is looking to recruit people
to be sent to Mars in order to set up a human colony, according to the company’s
website the aim is to send 4 astronauts in 2023 and then 4 astronauts every 2
years after that, successful applicants need to take eight years of training
before their launch. The colony budget is £4billion and the project is to be
funded through sponsors and private investors.
The candidates must be
intelligent, creative, psychologically stable and physically healthy, so if you
think you meet the requirements and you want to become an astronaut you might
want to apply, but there is one more thing, this is a one-way trip as the
company claims once on Mars, there is no means to return to Earth. Mars is
home. Still want to apply?
Well, you might think not many
people are willing to live on Mars for the rest of their lives, I thought so
too, but according to the Daily Mail the venture has attracted 78,000
applications from more than 120 countries (3,500 Britons).
Mars One CEO and co-founder Bas
Lansdorp said in a statement: "With 78,000 applications in two weeks, this
is turning out to be the most desired job in history."
I wonder if people want to leave
earth due to the global financial crisis or if they are just looking for fame
as it will be filmed for a reality TV show, I guess living in an uninhabited
planet under constant danger forever will be the price of fame.
What would you do with a rare
black diamond? Well, according to CNN a Chinese business man “Joe” hired
English craftsman Stuart Hughes who designs luxury mobile phone to replace his
iphone 5’s home button with his family treasure, a 26-carat black diamond.
Hughes claims on his website that the device
includes a solid 24-carat gold chassis, 600 white diamonds, and 53 diamonds that
make up the apple logo on the back of the phone, and it took 9 weeks to make.
This iphone is estimated to be worth £10 million ($15.3 million) which makes it
the world’s most expensive iphone.
I would say it is the iphone with
the world’s most expensive button considering that only the home button has an
estimated value of $14.5 million, I wonder if this Joe guy is the kind of
person who always loses mobile phones.
We first saw them in video games, then clothes, stationery, toys...
Well, now the most famous birds in the world will get their own series, Rovio
has announced last Tuesday on its blog “Angry Birds Toons” an all-new animated
series coming on March 16th.
These episodes will last each about 3 minutes and will be
available online only. Rovio confirmed a Ukrainian TV channel will begin transmission
of the entire series next month, according to digitaltrends.
I guess more TV
channel will soon be interested in transmitting a series about these characters
that became an international phenomenon, so it seems a matter of time before
these funny birds turn into TV stars, and to top it off, movie stars as the
company has announced before to be working on Angry Birds the movie, expected
to be released in 2016.
TshirtOS about wearable
technology, well, this seems to be becoming fashionable; Techradar has been
told wearable computing is the next big thing Apple is working on. This time
the device is a watch obviously called iwatch.
At the moment there is no much official
information but there are certainly some leaks circulating on the internet and
the press; The Telegraph wrote that fresh leaks suggest that the device is far
more advanced than previously thought and Bloomberg wrote that a team of 100
Apple staff headed by senior executives has been assembled to work on the
product.
Some other rumours suggest that iWatch
will incorporate a curved glass display which wraps around the users wrist
increasing the potential screen-size. It will be able to connect with an iPad
or iPhone to receive text messages, social networks and it might even make
calls. It is likely to include a GPS sensor and could include a heartbeat
monitor.
I wonder what is coming next, iglasses?
ikeyring? ishoes? I would truly like to see this stuff.
This reminds me of an American television series “The Six Million Dollar Man”
about a former astronaut with bionic implants, I used to watch as a child. On Wednesday
news.discovery.com posted that after years of research, the first bionic eye will
soon be available in the United States. We may not see a bionic superhero
saving the world, but it could certainly be the beginning of a bionic humans era.
According to Discovery this
bionic eye, the Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System, created by Second
Sight Medical Products has already benefited 60 people in Europe and some of
them were completely blind. "The way the
prosthesis works (is) it replaces the function of the photoreceptors," Brian Mech, the
California-based company's vice president of business development told AFP. The system consists of 60
electrodes in the retina and a pair of glasses with a mini camera. Argus II is
meant to benefit people with retinitis pigmentosa, unfortunately not everybody with this disease
will be able to afford this bionic implant since Mech claimed "Argus II
is already available in several European countries for 73,000 Euros (£61,800 /
$97,500)" and he believes the price for the US would be higher, what makes me
think of a bionic millionaires era?
