The Internet sometimes provides interesting pairs of news items. Today's pair concerns an intersection between mobility, safety, and technology.
This blog has documented many of the purposes for which drones have been used. Sometimes, drones seem to be the best solution to a given problem. Other times, drones seem to be the best solution in search of a problem.
Here are some more drone applications to ponder.
An item in IEEE Spectrum by Prachi Patel notes the development of a smart traffic system in Pittsburgh. Called Surtrac, the system developed by CMU professor Stephen Smith uses Artificial Intelligence techniques to adapt traffic signals to current conditions.
Prof. Smith's research suggests that Surtrac has reduced trip times 25 percent and idling times by over 40 percent, a significant difference.
Rima Sabina Aouf describes a "minimalist" door bell in Dezeen. Just launched on Kickstarter, the "Ding" door bell provides a wireless door bell ringing and answering system.
The system consists of a button, which is hung on or near the door in question, and a speaker, which emits the chime. Both components have been simply styled, appearing as almost featureless rectangles with circular ends:
Quentin Hardy at the New York Times has written an interesting article introducing conversational computing, that is, the use of speaking software interfaces.
It probably has not escaped your notice that people interact with software through conversational means more and more often. Tech companies such as Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon have made speaking agents, such as Siri, Cortana, and Echo, central to interactions with their consumer goods.
Sean Captain at FastCompany reports that Duolingo—perhaps the world's best-known second-language learning app—is trying to remove the embarrassment of being a newbee in a second language.
The service has unveiled a set of chatbots that users can interact with in order to practice their French, German, or Spanish—with more languages to come. "Practice real Spanish conversations without blushing," is the assurance given to curious users.
In his article "Technological innovation", Benoît Godin provides a history of the term innovation and its adoption in discourse about technological change.
The history of the expression begins as a translation of a Greek term that referred to subversive novelties and was invariably negative in tone. Early Christian authors used the new word, innovo, to refer to regeneration, a return to a better state of affairs from the past, clearly a positive connotation.
In their article, "Biohistorical materials and contemporary privacy concerns-the forensic case of King Albert I", Larmuseau et al.
Scott earlier talked about simplistic notions of firsts in technology. When was the first computer invented? Depends on what you mean by computer! Anyway, who says the arrival of computers was marked by the invention of any given machine?
The Globe and Mail reports that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recently banned the sale of antibacterial ingredients from soaps. Manufacturers have one year to reformulate their products to exclude compounds such as triclosan and triclocarbon.