VR headsets can be bulky beings with some of them going up to 900 grams in weight — that’s more than some motorcycle helmets. Earlier this month, a German man even broke his neck playing a VR game, and while a heavy headset wasn’t directly blamed, that sort of weight on one’s noggin likely was at fault in his injury. Motorola has a new solution to take some weight off your head: the company has developed a 5G smartphone that you could wear around your neck, which will host all the processing har
The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is becoming a leading destination for fast-growing tech startups. In 2020, the region reached a record $1 billion in startup investments, signaling a voracious investor appetite in the technology sector. The maturing digital economy coupled with region-wide innovation initiatives make MENA an attractive place to launch or scale a startup for an increasing number of global entrepreneurs. Heavy hitters like Microsoft, Google, and Amazon are also investing in
DeepMind has been connected to artificial general intelligence since birth. The lab was launched with a mission to develop AGI, was cofounded by a researcher who coined the term, and has made some compelling advances in the field. It also recently produced a provocative paper on the subject: “Reward is Enough” The study hypothesizes that AGI could be achieved through a single approach: reinforcement learning. This technique provides feedback in the form of a “reward” — a positive number that tel
This is something you might not know: almost all EVs are automatic. You’ll be hard pressed to find one with a gear stick. Why, you ask? Because EVs simply don’t need more than a single gear. I know, a stick shift car feels empowering, so why haven’t automakers thought about a “best-of-both-words” solution and put one in an EV? Oh wait, they have. Kinda. Toyota’s idea Yep, the carmaker is flirting with manual transmission and a clutch for… EVs?! At least that’s the info we got from a series of
When I first sat behind the wheel of an EV, I noticed something missing: the clutch and the gear stick. The reason behind this is simple. EVs don’t have a gearbox. They’re automatic. So instead of a stick, you’ll find a lever, switch, or button that allows you to select “drive”, “park,” and “reverse.” Take a look at Polestar 2’s “gear” shifter. Image: Polestar Why don’t EVs have multiple gears? Unlike petrol or diesel cars, they don’t need them. The internal combustion engine of conventional ve
Just over 12 months ago, we were sitting at Woomera, in the Australian outback, waiting for a streak of light in the sky to testify that the Hayabusa2 spacecraft had returned from its voyage to collect a little piece of a near-Earth asteroid called Ryugu. Unfortunately for us, it was cloudy in Woomera that day and we didn’t see the spacecraft come in. But that was the only imperfection we saw in the return. We found and retrieved Hayabusa2, brought it back to Woomera, cleaned and examined it. Sc
This Sunday saw Super Bowl LVI, an event where the half-time entertainment and TV commercials are as much a part of the occasion as the game itself. And in the year of our lord 2022? EV makers went all in, spending a sizable chunk of their marketing budgets on advertising. So, how do they stack up? And who were the winners and losers? Let’s take a look: BMW BMW’s effort brings an update and electrification to Greek mythology. Gods Zeus (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and Hera (Salma Hayek Pinault) re
It’s not often Apple launches an entirely new operating system, but this year (or potentially the next) the company will do just that. Why? Because that’s when its long-awaited mixed reality headset is slated to be released. Until recently, the name of this operating system (or OS) was but a rumor. No longer! As reported by 9to5Mac, several developers found reference to something called “realityOS” in App Store logs. Comrades, the cat’s out the bag: we now know what Apple is (probably) going to
Our jobs—what we do—hover heavily over our very existence. Before the pandemic, a lot of job advice was about pursuing your passion, as though our purpose in life must be defined by our job or hustling till we drop from exhaustion. Now, all I hear about is burnout and The Great Resignation. Either way, the conversation about our lives is always a conversation about our work. Why do our jobs have to dominate so much of our life? What if there’s another way to look at work? Maybe your job is just
When it comes to ethnicity and gender nonbinary diversity, Europe has a massive problem: the data doesn’t exist. In the startup space, the vast majority of diversity data is about gender diversity, mostly binary. said Matteo Renoldi, Impact Specialist at Dealroom, a Dutch data provider on startups, investment activities and overall tech ecosystems in Europe and around the globe. “Of course, there are many more elements to diversity than just gender. Ethnicity is a very important one.” This data