Drones Large and Small Coming to US

 

Most of the drones that have begun to appear in the skies above the U.S. homeland don't resemble the Predators or Reapers flown by the U.S. military and CIA above Afghanistan and Pakistan. Instead, these smaller versions of flying, unmanned vehicles almost rival the animal kingdom in their diversity. Government agencies such as NASA and U.S. Customs and Border Protection operate aircraft-size military drones that take off from runways like airplanes. Labs in the United States have even built tiny drones that look like hummingbirds. But most drones resemble the radio-controlled aircraft and toy helicopters flown by hobbyists for decades, capable of taking off horizontally, vertically or by being thrown into the air like a trained falcon or hawk. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration does not plan to permit drones armed with weapons in U.S. civilian airspace, according to an official quoted by the Washington Times. But state agencies, sheriff's offices and universities have already found more widespread use for drones that carry cameras for taking photos or video from above. 

Draganfly Innovations builds small drones weighing less than 5 pounds that fly under the control of a human operator using two joysticks. The Canadian company has sold some drones to law enforcement for taking pictures or video of traffic accidents or crime scenes, as well as aiding SWAT teams preparing to storm a building or housing compound. FAA drone license applications tracked by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit digital rights organization, suggest many other possible uses. Some U.S. states have begun considering drones for checking on highway traffic conditions, inspecting bridges and fighting wildfires. U.S. corporations, such as FedEx, have already begun planning for the day when drones could deliver packages. Bird watchers accustomed to spotting a gaggle of geese or a murder of crows may someday spot similar groupings of drones. Such drone swarms will likely use advanced forms of today's artificial intelligence programs to coordinate their missions without precise human control, a future with possibilities both delightful and daunting. Tech News Daily

PlayStation 4 unveiled

 

NEW YORK (AP) -- Sony unveiled its next-generation gaming system, the PlayStation 4, and promised social and remote capabilities. Wednesday's announcement gives the struggling Japanese electronics company a head start over Microsoft and an Xbox 360 successor. The new PlayStation's controller resembles that of the PlayStation 3, but adds a touchpad, motion control and a "share" button. The Japanese electronics giant said the console will be part of a new ecosystem focused on hardware, software and "the fastest, most powerful gaming network." The PlayStation 4 will be Sony Corp.'s first major game console since the PlayStation 3 went on sale in 2006. Microsoft Corp. is expected to unveil the next Xbox in June at the E3 video game expo in Los Angeles. Last fall, Nintendo started selling the Wii U, though it plays catch-up in some respects in bringing the ability to play high-definition games.

Although the Xbox 360 came out a year before PlayStation 3, Microsoft's game machine has been more popular, largely because of its robust online service, Xbox Live, which allows people to play games with others online. The original Wii has sold more units since its launch than both its rivals, but it lost momentum as the novelty of its motion controller faded. Sales of the new Wii U have been slow. Underscoring the importance of a new PlayStation and the U.S. market, Sony is holding its announcement event in New York rather than in Japan, as it had in the past. The event is at the Hammerstein Ballroom in midtown Manhattan.

Apple, Mac computers hit by hackers who targeted Facebook

 

BOSTON/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple Inc (NSQ:AAPL - News) was recently attacked by hackers who infected the Macintosh computers of some employees, the company said on Tuesday in an unprecedented disclosure that described the widest known cyber attacks against Apple-made computers to date. Unknown hackers infected the computers of some Apple workers when they visited a website for software developers that had been infected with malicious software. The malware had been designed to attack Mac computers, the company said in a statement provided to Reuters. The same software, which infected Macs by exploiting a flaw in a version of Oracle Corp's (ORCL.O) Java software used as a plug-in on Web browsers, was used to launch attacks against Facebook (FB.O), which the social network disclosed on Friday
.
The malware was also employed in attacks against Mac computers used by "other companies," Apple said, without elaborating on the scale of the assault. But a person briefed on the investigation into the attacks said that hundreds of companies, including defense contractors, had been infected with the same malicious software, or malware. The attacks mark the highest-profile cyber attacks to date on businesses running Mac computers. Hackers have traditionally focused on attacking machines running the Windows operating system, though they have gradually turned their attention to Apple products over the past couple of years as the company gained market share over Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O). MadOne

Saturn's Glorious Rings Dazzle in NASA Photo

NASA's Cassini spacecraft snapped this angled shot of Saturn, showing the southern reaches of the planet with the rings on a dramatic diagonal. Saturn's icy moon Enceladus is visible as a tiny white speck in the lower lefthand corner. Space.com

Ancient Water Streambed Discovered On Mars

A NASA rover's discovery of an ancient streambed on Mars is exciting, but it’s far from the first solid evidence that the Red Planet was once a warmer and wetter place. On Thursday (Sept. 27), scientists announced that the Curiosity rover had found rocky outcrops containing large and rounded stones cemented in a conglomerate matrix. The discovery suggests that water had flowed fast and relatively deep — perhaps hip-deep, in fact — through the area billions of years ago.

But Curiosity's find didn't exactly surprise mission scientists. They chose to set the $2.5 billion robot down in the Red Planet's huge Gale Crater, after all, because Mars-orbiting spacecraft have spotted signs there of long-ago water activity — from channels and alluvial fans to minerals that form in the presence of liquid water.And these more recent observations build on evidence for a wet ancient Mars that goes back four decades and has been accumulating ever since. 

Curiosity's mission may also shed light on when and why Mars dried out long ago. Scientists plan to drive the 1-ton robot partway up Mount Sharp, which rises 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the Red Planet sky from Gale's center. They're keen to explore Mount Sharp's base, which harbors clays and sulfates, orbital observations have shown. About 2,300 feet (700 meters) up, however, these deposits peter out. If Curiosity climbs high enough to cross this threshold, it could help scientists piece together a history of wet Mars, dry Mars and the transition between the two, researchers have said. Space.com

MARS Curiosity rover's landing footage

The shot above is the first high(ish) resolution photo shown to the public from its cameras, depicting a shadow of its top, a peculiar Martian landscape and the three-mile Mount Sharp. Just beyond the break, you'll find video footage of the intense descent onto Mars' surface. MadOne

Microsoft's Kinect test in Army Helicopter Cockpits

Kiowa Warrior

Motion-tracking game technology found in American living rooms has a shot at making its way into U.S. military helicopters. The Army envisions Microsoft's Kinect system as a low-cost solution for smarter cockpits that track what pilots see or do — opening the door for smarter war machines capable of responding quickly to human needs during combat. The Microsoft Kinect for Xbox can already recognize gestures, faces and voices under almost any ambient light conditions for about $150. Such off-the-shelf gaming technology looks like a bargain next to expensive military helmets that track a pilot's head movements or eye gaze based on infrared detectors or magnetic sensors. 


New technology from the gaming world has the potential to substantially reduce the cost of adding head tracking to conventional helicopters, as well as the ability to do body tracking and gesture recognition to support future intelligent cockpits. Such intelligent cockpits may feature "Minority Report" virtual controls and displays, automatically identify targets a pilot is seeing outside the cockpit, report on damage based on where a pilot looks, or even monitor a pilot's mental and physical health based on his or her motions. That futuristic vision starts with motion-tracking technology. 

Having cheaper and more capable motion-tracking technology could especially help military helicopters missing head-tracking systems, such as the Blackhawk, Kiowa Warrior and Chinook. But the same system could also end up helping soldiers inside ground vehicles or at work stations, as well as commercial airline pilots and civilian drivers. If it succeeds, the Army would only be the latest in a long line of people who have hacked into the Microsoft Kinect's cheap but powerful capabilities. Geeks have harnessed the Kinect's power to make virtual clothes-fitting rooms and rescue robots. Archaeologists have even turned the gaming device into a 3D scanner for exploring ancient cities and burial grounds. Technews Daily

SpaceX Successfully Launches the First Privately Built Spacecraft to the International Space Station

After a handful of delays and one abort on the launch pad, SpaceX began its historic journey toward the International Space Station just before 4:00 a.m. eastern time this morning as its Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida in a spectacular nighttime launch. MadOne

100-Year Starship Project Forges Ahead With First Round of Funding

An ambitious effort for an interstellar travel planning organization officially kicked off this week, after DARPA awarded $500,000 to form the 100-Year Starship initiative. Former astronaut Mae Jemison, whose proposal was selected earlier this year, will lead the new independent organization. The goal is to ensure that the capability for human interstellar travel exists within the next 100 years. It may not look like the starship Enterprise, but a real interstellar vessel is possible within that timeframe, Jemison said. “Yes, it can be done. Our current technology arc is sufficient,” she said in a statement.

In its first year, the organization will seek new investors and develop new ideas for interstellar exploration, the new 100YSS website says. A public symposium is planned for September in Houston, where anyone from engineers to philosophers will be able to present papers and host talks about the challenges of such a project. The 100-Year Starship is not necessarily a ship per se, but an organization that can last 100 years and potentially carry out the vision of a real starship. It will look for input from scientists, engineers, doctors, sociologists, writers (!), ethicists and public policy experts. The 100-Year Starship project also has a new scientific research partner called The Way, an awesomely named spinoff that will focus on “speculative, long-term science and technology,” according to the project. We can't wait to see what they come up with. Popsci

Become a Cybercriminal for Only $7

How much cash do you have on you right now? If it's $10, you could spend it on a few snacks, less than a quarter-of-a-tank of gas or maybe an album on iTunes. Or you could enter the shady, soulless world of international cybercrime. A botnet kit called "Aldi Bot" appeared about three weeks ago in underground forums, and has been selling for five Euros (about $7). The kit allows its buyers to join ranks with an existing botnet, a linked network of compromised computers used to carry out large-scale online attacks. Once a buyer enters the name of a command-and-control server — the name comes with the kit — Aldi Bot "can cause a massive glut of malware" by giving people the ability to steal passwords, remotely execute corrupted files and carry out denial-of-service attacks, say researchers at G Data Software.

(The cybercrime tool appears to take its name from the German discount supermarket chain ALDI, but is not linked to the company.) Aldi Bot's code appears based on the Zeus Trojan source code, which was leaked through underground cybercrime markets in May. G Data Software contacted Aldi Bot's creator, who said he provides personal assistance to cybercrime newbies, and even uses TeamViewer, a remote desktop sharing program, to walk wannabe criminals through the process of setting up the exploitation tool.

Offering a malware kit for such an inexpensive price "will draw virtually anyone to the dark side — either for fun or profit," G Data Software wrote. "Script Kiddies can buy this bot with their pocket money, including all updates and support." G Data Software researchers say Aldi Bot is not for sale anymore, but they expect similar (and equally cheap) malware to pop up and take its place. TechNews Daily

Solar Charger Sticks to Window to Power Gadgets

Solar chargers for gadgets are becoming more common, and convenient. There's the mPowerpad that charges multiple devices, for example. But for those that want a little style, there's the XDModo Solar Window Charger.

It's sleek and sticks unobtrusively to a window using silicone pads (basically suction cups). It's a good way to free up that cigarette lighter for plugging in other devices. (Does anyone actually light cigarettes with those anymore?) The charger has USB and mini-USB outputs. Odds are most people will use the USB since that's the charger end of most smartphone cables – be they for Android, iPhone or others. The battery inside has a 1300 mAh capacity – most smartphone batteries average around 1500 mAh, so it's pretty close to the full charge. That said, after it charges up during the day, it can keep your phone going through the night, or supplement the battery when it runs low. The output is five volts at 500 milliamps, plenty for charging anything but an iPad.

The maker, Xindao, is in Europe. You can purchase it online for about $65 but you'll have to shell out for shipping to the U.S. – about $65 as well. Technews Daily 

iPad 3 with Superfast 4G?

 

The next iPad could be the first Apple product to run on faster 4G cellular networks. In the past, people have bought 3G-capable iPads for backup in case Wi-Fi wasn't available. But if the 4G rumors are true, pricier iPads could become the norm. News of a possible 4G iPad available through Verizon and AT&T was released by the Wall Street Journal this week. 

Faster is always better in the world of tech gadgets. While speed depends on many factors, 4G can be faster than most public Wi-Fi networks and some home connections. Because video streaming and game-playing often benefit from faster connections, 4G's perceived speed advantage could move a cellular-connected iPad from nice-to-have to really-want-to-have.

 

But 4G data will cost extra. Unlike smartphones that usually require two-year data contracts, Verizon and AT&T offer monthly plans for iPads. You can buy data in a pinch, but if you don't cancel at the end of the 30-day period, you'll be billed every month until you do. Already, potential iPad 3 buyers have been salivating over rumored features, such as higher resolution displays and Siri, the voice-controlled virtual personal assistant that debuted on the iPhone 4S.

iPad 3 To Launch At March Apple Event?

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple Inc plans to introduce its latest iPad tablet at an event in the first week in March, the website AllThingsD reported, citing unnamed sources. The event will be held in San Francisco, likely at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, which is Apple's preferred site for product launches, the website said. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment. Apple has typically introduced the latest versions of its iPad in the first few months of the year. The current iPad 2 was introduced on March 2, 2011. The original iPad was introduced at the end of January 2010.

Apple's iPad dominates the nascent market for tablets even though deep-pocketed rivals are taking aim at the lucrative segment. Amazon.com Inc's Kindle Fire, which sells at half the cost of an iPad, has chipped away at the lower end of the tablet market. Apple iPad tablet sales doubled in the December quarter to 15.43 million units from a year earlier.

NASA's Kepler confirms 26 new planets

The US space agency said Thursday its Kepler space telescope mission has confirmed 26 new planets outside our solar system, all of them orbiting too close to their host stars to sustain life. Scattered across 11 planetary systems, their temperatures would be too hot for survival, as they all circle their stars closer than Venus, the second planet from the Sun, which has a surface temperature of 464 Celsius (867 F). But NASA scientists were still pleased with the findings, which nearly double the number of confirmed planets that Kepler has found since 2009.

"Now, in just two years staring at a patch of sky not much bigger than your fist, Kepler has discovered more than 60 planets and more than 2,300 planet candidates," he added. "This tells us that our galaxy is positively loaded with planets of all sizes and orbits." 

In December last year, NASA announced Kepler had confirmed its first-ever planet in a habitable zone outside our solar system, Kepler 22b, though it remained unclear whether the surface was rocky or gaseous. Such planets have the right distance from their star to support water, plus a suitable temperature and atmosphere to support life. Spinning around its star some 600 light years away, Kepler 22b is 2.4 times the size of the Earth and orbits its Sun-like star every 290 days. The 26 planets that Kepler confirmed on Thursday orbit their stars between every six and 143 days. AP

The Real Crystal Skulls

The Anna Mitchell-Hedges Skull
was discovered in British Honduras in 1927

Skulls are humanity's foremost symbol of death, and a powerful icon in the visual vocabularies of cultures all over the globe. Thirteen crystal skulls of apparently ancient origin have been found in parts of Mexico, Central America and South America, comprising one of the most fascinating subjects of 20th Century archaeology.

The British Crystal Skull.  It is currently residing in the British Museum of Man in London, England, and has been there since 1898. It is a one piece clear quartz full size quartz crystal skull.

The British Crystal Skull.  It is currently residing in the British Museum of Man in London, England, and has been there since 1898. It is a one piece clear quartz full size quartz crystal skull.

These skulls, found near the ancient ruins of Mayan and Aztec civilizations (with some evidence linking the skulls with past civilization in Peru) are a mystery as profound as the Pyramids of Egypt, the Nazca Lines of Peru, or Stonehenge. Some of the skulls are believed to be between 5,000 and 36,000 years old.

Many indigenous people speak of their remarkable magical and healing properties, but nobody really knows where they came from or what they were used for. 

The Paris Crystal Skull It  is currently residing in the Trocadero Museum in Paris, France.
You may notice a slight indentation on the top, which is a hole that was cut into the skull purported to hold a cross.

The Amethyst Skull is made of purple quartz and the Mayan skull is clear, but the two are otherwise very alike. Like the Mitchell-Hedges skull, both of them were studied at Hewlett-Packard, and they too were found to be inexplicably cut against the axis of the crystal.

Were they left behind after the destruction of a previous world, such as Atlantis? Are they simply ingenious modern fakes or can they really enable us to see deeply into the past and predict the future? Much research is currently being done on the skulls. However, their origin is still a baffling mystery. They seem to defy logic. Everything that is known about lapidary work indicates that the skulls should have been shattered fractured, or fallen apart when carved. Remember the last Indiana Jones movie was about a crystal skull. There is some truth to some of the stories in Hollywood scripts. Look deeper and you might find something like the above. MadOne 

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

 

Apple Founder Steve Jobs Dies

Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs, the mastermind behind Apple's iPhone, iPad, iPod, iMac and iTunes, has died, Apple said. Jobs was 56. Jobs co-founded Apple Computer in 1976 and, with his childhood friend Steve Wozniak, marketed what was considered the world's first personal computer, the Apple II. Industry watchers called him a master innovator -- perhaps on a par with Thomas Edison -- changing the worlds of computing, recorded music and communications. In 2004, he beat back an unusual form of pancreatic cancer, and in 2009 he was forced to get a liver transplant. After several years of failing health, Jobs announced on Aug. 24, 2011 that he was stepping down as Apple's chief executive.

Ipod

The highlights of Jobs's career trajectory are well-known: a prodigy who dropped out of Reed College in Oregon and, at 21, started Apple with Wozniak in his parents' garage. He was a multimillionaire by 25, appeared on the cover of Time magazine at 26, and was ousted at Apple at age 30, in 1984. In the years that followed, he went into other businesses, founding NeXT computers and, in 1986, buying the computer graphics arm of Lucasfilm, Ltd., which became Pixar Animation Studios. He was described as an exacting and sometimes fearsome leader, ordering up and rejecting multiple versions of new products until the final version was just right. He said the design and aesthetics of a device were as important as the hardware and software inside. 

In 1996, Apple, which had struggled without Jobs, brought him back by buying NeXT. He became CEO in 1997 and put the company on a remarkable upward path. By 2001 the commercial music industry was on its knees because digital recordings, copied and shared online for free, made it unnecessary for millions of people to buy compact discs. Jobs took advantage with the iPod -- essentially a pocket-sized computer hard drive with elegantly simple controls and a set of white earbuds so that one could listen to the hours of music one saved on it. He set up the iTunes online music store, and persuaded major recording labels to sell songs for 99 cents each. No longer did people have to go out and buy a CD if they liked one song from it. They bought a digital file and stored it in their iPod.

Iphone

In 2007, he transformed the cell phone. Apple's iPhone, with its iconic touch screen, was a handheld computer, music player, messaging device, digital wallet and -- almost incidentally -- cell phone. Major competitors, such as BlackBerry, Nokia and Motorola, struggled after it appeared. By 2010, Apple's new iPad began to cannibalize its original business, the personal computer. The iPad was a sleek tablet computer with a touch screen and almost no physical buttons. It could be used for almost anything software designers could conceive, from watching movies to taking pictures to leafing through a virtual book. 

Ipad

He was listed in March as 109th on the Forbes list of the world's billionaires, with a net worth of about $8.3 billion. After selling Pixar animation studios to The Walt Disney Company in 2006, he became a Disney board member and the company's largest shareholder. Disney is the parent company of ABC News. MadOne

Tanks test infra-red invisibility cloak

 

Tanks could soon get night time invisibility thanks to a cloaking device that masks their infra-red signature. Developed by BAE Systems, the Adaptiv technology allows vehicles to mimic the temperature of their surroundings. It can also make a tank look like other objects, such as a cow or car, when seen through heat-sensitive ‘scopes. Researchers are looking at ways to make it work with other wavelengths of light to confer true invisibility.

Hiding out
The hi-tech camouflage uses hexagonal panels or pixels made of a material that can change temperature very quickly. About 1,000 pixel panels, each of which is 14cm across, are needed to cover a small tank. The panels are driven by on-board thermal cameras that constantly image the ambient temperature of the tank’s surroundings. This is projected on to the panels to make it harder to spot. The cameras can also work when the tank is moving. InfoWars

Apple iMac for Students Less Than $1,000

Apple has announced a new version of its iMac desktop that is aimed at students. What's more, it actually costs less than $1,000. Lengthy arguments about the existence of an "Apple tax" aside, Apple's computers are generally more expensive than the competition, so a sub-$1,000 iMac with decent specs is still remarkable. The new iMac sports a 3.1GHz Intel i3 dual-core processor, 2GB of RAM, 250GB of storage and an AMD Radeon HD 6750 graphics processor. All that comes inside a 21.5-inch display.


Pricing starts at $999, but keep in mind that this is a desktop. Many students prefer portability over screen size, so the new MacBook Air, also starting at $999, might be a more attractive option for students. Regardless, the education-oriented iMac is available to students now on Apple's website. Technews Daily

Acer 7-Inch Tablet Launched, Starts at $330

If you've been waiting for an Android Honeycomb tablet that's significantly cheaper than the iPad, your moment may have come. The Acer Iconia Tab A100 Android tablet launches today for $330. The Iconia Tab A100's 7-inch display is much smaller than other Android Honeycomb tablets, but it's the first Honeycomb tablet to ship with version 3.2 of Honeycomb. Android 3.2 brings improvements to the system's speed and interface, but it also makes it possible for Honeycomb to run on screens smaller than 10 inches.


Outside, the Iconia Tab has mini-HDMI, micro-USB, micro-SD card and headphone ports, but strangely it also includes a separate charging port because it won't charge via the dock connector or a USB cable like most tablets. Inside is an NVIDIA Tegra 2 dual core processor with an integrated graphics processor and 1GB of RAM. The Acer Iconia Tab A100 is available today. The 8GB version starts at $330 while the 16GB version costs $350. Technews Daily

Text, Photo, Video can be sent to 911

Federal Communications Commission chairman Julius Genachowski has announced plans to update the nationwide 911 emergency service, which will make it possible for people in emergencies to send photos, video and even texts to early responders. The ubiquity of cellphones with cameras and users who text have made it clear that emergency responders can gain valuable information in new ways. However, Genachowski said that this will require a complete overhaul of the 911 phone system because it uses an older technology that is incompatible with new forms of communication. The benefits are worth the effort, though. Pictures and video can greatly improve response to emergencies, and the system will provide more options for people with disabilities. There is even the potential to add location-based services that could make it easier to send responders to the emergency. Technews Daily