Owning a piece of computer history can be expensive and not much fun. You can buy a vintage MITS Altair 8800, one of the world’s first successful desktop computers, on eBay, but a good one will cost you over US$4,000. That’s why computer enthusiast Mike Douglas developed the Altair 8800 Clone. It’s a modern, inexpensive, functional reproduction of the historic Altair 8800 computer that uses 21st century technology to … Read More → "Altair 8800 Clone: A near-empty box filled with history"

This is what happens when police, military folks, and scientists get together to play with very expensive robots.

It’s 10 a.m. on a Wednesday, and I’m watching a robot poke a forest camouflage backpack with a stick. Here on the southern edge of Albuquerque, N.M., in an oven-hot tract of desert, a dozen assorted cops, military guys, and national researchers, along with three sweaty journalists, have gathered to … Read More → "Robot rodeo, y’all"

There’s a high-tech game of Frogger happening 250 miles above our heads, as the International Space Station (ISS) maneuvers around the multitude of orbiting debris left over from destroyed satellites. Ars Technica reports that here on Earth, a group of engineers across numerous different teams help keep the station safe. Drifting fragments, some as … Read More → "Avoiding collisions with space debris hundreds of miles above Earth"

Honda’s popular robot Asimo faced problems with gesture recognition on its first day as a museum guide at the Miraikan science museum in Tokyo.

The machine struggled to differentiate between museum-goers raising their hands to ask a question and raising their hands to take photos, Associated Press reported.

It is “working” as a tour guide at the museum … Read More → "Human gestures perplex Asimo, Honda museum robot guide"

Corning discussed its upcoming display tech at the MIT Mobile Technology Summit, and it sounds incredible. The anti-microbial coating being used on the new glass—a first for the display industry—can kill virtually all nasty microbes on the screen’s surface over a course of two hours. It’s not … Read More → "Your next smartphone screen will be able to disinfect itself"

Although various alternative technologies are being developed, the large-scale desalination of seawater typically involves forcing it through a membrane that allows the water to pass through, but that traps the salt. These membranes can be costly, they can get fouled, and powerful pumps are required to push the water through. Now, however, scientists from the University of Texas at Austin and Germany’s University of Marburg are taking another approach. They’ve … Read More → "Scientists developing a seawater-desalination chip"

Artist Philippe Handford turned trees that had been illegally cut down in a forest in Northwest England into a pair of beautiful sculpture installations for the 2012 Pendle Sculpture Trail. In the sculpture “Reconnected 1,” Handford connected a … Read More → "‘Reconnected’ sculptures turn felled trees into outdoor art"

The Japanese spider crab is about to lose its title as the world’s largest crustacean thanks to a new robot, the Crabster, developed in South Korea. For the past 2 years, researchers at the Korean Institute of Ocean Science and Technology (KIOST) have been working on a giant robot crab that is about the size and weight of a Smart car. This summer it will help scientists explore wrecks below the sea, weathering harsh … Read More → "Giant Crabster robot to explore shipwrecks and shallow seas"

… Read More → "An army of beatboxing cameras is one expensively awesome drum kit (video)"

French company Spotter has developed an analytics tool that claims to have up to 80% accuracy in identifying sarcastic comments posted online.

Spotter says its clients include the Home Office, EU Commission and Dubai Courts.

The algorithm-based analytics software generates reputation reports based on social and traditional media material.

However some experts say such tools are often inadequate because of the nuance of language.

Spotter’s UK sales director Richard May said the company monitored material that was “publicly available”.

Its proprietary software uses … Read More → "Authorities ‘use analytics tool that recognises sarcasm’"