As reported on The Verge. By Chris Ziegler A notorious road rally drops by NYC on the way to Ibiza “Rev it!” screams a man in the crowd. He gets his wish: a McLaren MP4-12C, covered from nose to tail in fluorescent livery, blips its throttle to the delight of a few hundred people gathered in New York City’s historic South Street Seaport. I came here to get a glimpse of the Gumball 3000, an annual…
As reported on TechCrunch. by John Biggs On paper it looks like a win-win: in the past few days, Comcast is quietly turning on public hotspots in its customers’ routers, essentially turning private homes into public hotspots. Comcast customers get free Wi-Fi wherever there is a Comcast box and the company gets to build out a private network to compete with telecoms. Win-win. Fifty thousand users with Arris Touchstone Telephony Wireless Gateway Modems – essentially basic modems that cable…
As reported on TechCrunch. by Greg Kumparak Insane garage mad scientist Colin Furze promised three absurd X-Men themed projects by the end of the month — and man, has he delivered. First came his ridiculous, automatically extendable Wolverine claws. Then came his Magneto boots, which let him walk upside down across the ceiling. His last project, though, might be the most dangerous of the lot: wrist-mounted flame throwers. Built in homage to flame-tossing baddie Pyro, the system…
As reported on TechCrunch. by Ingrid Lunden The growth of tablets has been held up as one of the big, disruptive forces in personal computing, with the more portable, touchscreen devices eating into sales of laptops and other, larger PCs. But a report out today from IDC puts a little dampener on that line of thinking: the analysts there say that they are revising down their forecasts for 2014 tablet shipments (and subsequent sales), as people hold on…
As reported on Engadget. BY BILLY STEELE After the news broke yesterday of Apple officially acquiring Dr. Dre’s headphone and music streaming business, Beats isn’t putting the new product announcements on hold. The success of the brand is without question, and its most popular set of cans just got a refresh. This is the Beats Solo²: a redesigned on-ear model with re-tuned audio that does quite a bit to combat the “too much bass” argument. Beats Solo2 hands-on See all photos 19 Photos …
As reported on TechCrunch. by Natasha Lomas Fitness wearables are getting more specialized. There’s Sensoria’s smart running socks. TheKrack trick-tracker for skateboarders. And now Smash: a wearable bracelet for tennis players to quantify their technique.Or there will be if Smash’s Australian makers can convince Kickstarter backers to pledge a rather hefty $200,000 AUD in crowdfunding over the next 43 days. Smash founder Rob Crowder says that level of funding is required to take the current prototype to commercial product, with system architecture,…
As reported on The Verge. By Arielle Duhaime-Ross But only if it reaches the right people Michael Lucas has been taking Truvada, the HIV prevention pill, for about a year now. And the 42-year-old adult film director and gay porn performer readily admits that the decision wasn’t all that hard to make — especially when compared with the alternative. “It just seemed healthier to run the risk of experiencing side effects than to worry about HIV,”…
As reported on TechCrunch. by Greg Kumparak About.com CEO Darline Jean Joins Ad Tech Company PulsePoint If you’re a Comcast customer living in one of the many states where they’ve imposed no real limits on bandwidth usage for the last few years… enjoy it while it lasts. During an investor call today (link via Ars), Comcast executive VP David Cohen said that he predicts bandwidth caps (or, as ISPs prefer to put it, “usage-based billing”) to be rolled out…
As reported on Engadget. BY JON FINGAS Want proof that you don’t need big, specialized equipment to produce a mind-controlled robot arm? Just look at a recent University of Toronto student project. Ryan Mintz and crew have created an arm that you control using little more than a brainwave-sensing headset (which is no longer that rare) and a laptop. The team’s software is smart enough to steer the arm using subtle head movements, such as clenching your jaw or…
As reported on TechCrunch. by Josh Constine So what happened at Disrupt NY? With 25 panels, 27 startup demos, and a hackathon, TechCrunch’s annual gathering in New York produced plenty of news, insight, and controversy. Even if you were there in person it was a lot to process, so we’ve compiled a Cliff’s Notes for the conference.For starters, here’s a supercut of the best soundbites: Facebook LinkedIn Say What? The Quotable Disrupt NY Keynotes, Panels, And Fireside Chats Fred…