Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Gone but not forgotten! Robots offer a way to keep our minds around for future generations. 

Bina48's hardware was made by robot designer David Hanson over the course of three years for a cool $125,000 at the behest of the Terasem Movement Foundation's president and Bina's partner, Martine Rothblatt.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2175721/Rise-Machines-Meet-Bina48-robot-tell-jokes-recite-poetry-mimics-mankind-startling-ease.html#ixzz2rkDspuCf

http://www.kurzweilai.net/bina48-is-first-humanoid-robot-to-address-a-conference

Reported by James O. Thomas III

Saturday, January 11, 2014

Lost Inside a Mall or Large Building?  Beacons are coming!


Beacons are poised to allow your mobile phone GPS systems to navigate indoors.  Basically, they are low cost bluetooth devices that will be placed throughout buildings.  These devices will communicate with your GPS.  A company called Estimote is already marketing the devices, which are sure to hit the mainstream.  There will be many uses for this technology aside from navigation. The figure below shows likely locations for beacons.









Here are other links:

http://www.businessinsider.com/beacons-and-ibeacons-create-a-new-market-2013-12

http://cs.umaine.edu/~chaw/pubs/bpil.pdf

Reported by James O. Thomas III