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Mapping out autonomous driving

I'm intrigued by the technology that will be deployed [in self-driving cars], so I was interested to see an article in Tech Times the other day on Civil Maps. They’re a Silicon Valley startup that does 3D-mapping. The company just announced an investment round of $6.6M. Ford is one of the investors.
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Robotic technology comes to the world of furniture

The MIT Media Lab spin-out that’s been getting some press lately is Orisystems, which describes itself as “the brawn and brain of the furniture and architecture of the future.” The systems that Ori designs – and the name, by the way, is taken from origami, the Japanese paper-folding art – are built for micro-living.
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The Internet of Tomatoes

As we’re nearing that great time of year when local farm stands (and neighbors’ backyard gardens) have local tomatoes, I couldn’t resist what appears to be an advertiorial by Analog Devices (a.k.a. ADI) that appeared in a recent Technology Review. I mean, how could I pass up a piece entitled "IoT: The Internet of Tomatoes"?
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UL and the IoT

Earlier in the year, the UL published a cybersecurity standard “for the testing and certification of connection devices.” UL 2900 aims to address what has been one of the more significant barriers to wider spread IoT adoption: security.
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Energy efficiency for commercial buildings

One reason why the IoT has gotten more traction commercially than with a consumer audience – at least in my opinion – is because they are more immediately useful and understandable, and provide real value. Lowering energy costs by 40% is something we can all appreciate.
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Pushback on the IoT

I guess it was inevitable. After all the hype. After all those forecasts of kabillions of connected devices. After all the cool videos showing smart everythings. There seems to be a bit of a backlash forming around the Internet of Things (IoT).
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What’s next for newspapers?

Patrick Soon-Shiong has invested $70.5 million in the Tribune Publishing Company, which – among other papers – owns the LA Times and the Chicago Trib. But he’s not just throwing good money after bad. Soon-Shiong wants to remake the newspaper reading experience. He recently said that: "…he wants to use “machine vision” technology he’s developed to transform the experience of reading a print newspaper..."
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Camping gear goes high tech

If you’re thinking that camping gear is still a nylon pup-tent, a damp and lumpy sleeping bag, and a flashlight, well, I guess you’re still living in the twentieth century. Or so I was reminded when I saw an article last week on Bloomberg about some of the very high technology camping products that are out there.
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“The Fantastic Voyage” may be coming true

At the recently-held International Conference on Robotics and Automation, researchers showed off a miniature “origami robot that can unfold itself from a swallowed capsule and, steered by external magnetic fields, crawl across the stomach wall to remove a swallowed button battery or patch a wound.”
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