An artist’s rendition of the first interstellar comet, Oumuamua, which some scientists now think may be an alien probe. Last November, astronomers detected an outer-space object unlike anything detected before. The visitor, dubbed Oumuamua (pronounced “oh-MOO-ah-MOO-ah”), arrived from interstellar space, beyond the bubble-like region that demarcates the sun’s domain. Its ...
Read More »8BitDo’s Bluetooth mod kits put retired controllers back to work
8BitDo is best known for its throwback-style Bluetooth gamepads, but a few months ago, it released DIY modding kits for original NES, SNES and Sega Mega Drive controllers. As the name suggests, some assembly is required. Luckily, it was simpler times back then, before DualShock 4s with thumbsticks and touchpads. ...
Read More »Venture capital and the blockchain will be the talk at Startup Battlefield Africa
TechCrunch Startup Battlefield returns to Africa next month, and we have an agenda chock-full of interesting panels and our premier startup competition. Joining us in Lagos, Nigeria on December 11 for a couple of those aforementioned panels will be Chris Folayan, the founder and CEO of Mall for Africa; Nichole ...
Read More »Driverless cars can only take you so far. This is how smarter cities are being built
Tel Aviv, Israel Ilan Shacham/Getty Images In the sunny climes of Tel Aviv, Israel, the Smart Mobility Summit, held from October 29 to 30, brought together city administrators from across the globe, research institutions, major car companies, and stealthy startups. They all came not just for the balmy weather but ...
Read More »ThinkPad X1 Extreme review: Big on power and price
But don’t worry: Even if you hate the trackpad, there’s always the reliable (if somewhat anachronistic) TrackPoint. Over the years, pointing sticks have fallen out of favor as touchpads have steadily improved. Even I shun it most of the time. But I have to say that using it is still ...
Read More »Make people valuable again
David Nordfors Contributor More posts by this contributor The future of business is good jobs as a service The future of work is 5 billion customers looking for a good job Vinton Gray Cerf, a co-founder of i4j — innovation for jobs, is widely hailed as one of “the fathers ...
Read More »To make more room for livestock, the Dutch will moove cows to a floating farm
Floating Farm/Beladon In the next three decades, the global population is expected to grow by more than two billion people. That could be a problem. We already fail to feed the roughly seven and a half billion people currently living on the planet, so we’ll need to initiate entirely new ...
Read More »The Morning After: 'Diablo' goes mobile and Google employees walk out
Read the room.‘Diablo Immortal’ brings Blizzard’s action RPG to iOS and Android The big Diablo announcement from Blizzcon is the first mobile game in the series, dubbed Immortal. Blizzard working on the game with China’s NetEase, and pre-registration for a beta is open now. There’s already a gameplay trailer, and ...
Read More »Facebook reorganizes Oculus for AR/VR’s long-haul
Facebook is again looking to whip Oculus into shape for its 10-year journey towards making virtual reality mainstream. According to two sources, Facebook reorganized its AR and VR team this week from a divisional structure focused around products to a functional structure focused around technology areas of expertise. While no ...
Read More »NASA dreams of fueling up its rockets at a gas station on Mars by 2038
Glen Benson/NASA The idea of robots mining for dirt on Mars, which could then be transformed into water, oxygen, or rocket fuel, sounds like some futuristic sci-fi concept. But it’s an actual idea that NASA scientists are working to make a reality just a couple of decades from now. It’s ...
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