Lifeboat Foundation

Apple just announced onstage at its Worldwide Developer’s Conference that Apple Pay is getting person-to-person payments. The feature will come in iOS 11, which was announced onstage, and will be available later this year.

It’s an obvious swipe at the part of the payments market that apps like Venmo, PayPal, and Square Cash have cornered. But there’s a catch — P2P payments with Apple Pay will live inside iMessage, and it’s unclear if Apple will let users perform them outside of its messaging app. Also, the money will be transferred to something called an “Apple Pay Cash Card,” which can then be sent to your bank account. That means Apple is not only coming for the Venmos of the world, but maybe the banks themselves.

Base jump safely in virtual reality!

Exceptionally creative people and your average Joe see different things when they look around.

By Jessica Stillman

Continue reading “Creative People Literally See the World Differently, Mind-Blowing Research Shows” »

Apple live streamed their Worldwide Developers Conference keynote this afternoon. During the talk, they unveiled a new kind of AI system, HopePod.

Today, Apple is holding its Worldwide Developers Conference. So far, they have announced a host of updates. For example, during the presentation, the company noted that their watchOS 4 is going to include advanced AI and be far more personalized.

Let’s be honest: while planting your garden can be fun, weeding it usually isn’t. Not unless you enjoy crouching down for long stretches, anyway. You might not have to endure the drudgery for too much longer, though. Roomba co-creator Joe Jones and Franklin Robotics are launching Tertill, a robot that weeds your garden all by itself. The machine automatically roams the soil, using sensors to identify small plants (you use collars to protect young crops) and chop them down. It’s solar-powered, so you don’t have to dock it — you can even leave it out in the rain.

In addition to pairing with your phone through Bluetooth, the machine has a USB port to charge during particularly gloomy weeks.

The design does require some careful planning to work properly. You need to space your crops loosely so that the robot can kill weeds in between, and you’ll want to avoid any steep inclines so Tertill doesn’t stuck. There will have to be some kind of basic barrier to prevent the vehicle from wandering away, too. You may also have to rethink how you kill weeds. While you’re probably used to pulling weeds out by the roots, Franklin is counting on its bot repeatedly cutting down weeds until they wither and die.

Continue reading “Roomba creator wants to do for gardens what he did for your floors” »

Scientists might have found a cure for allergies.

This new space plane can launch three satellites at a time.

You can zipline down the Eiffel Tower at nearly 100 km/h and 115 meters above the ground.

IBM, in partnership with Samsung and GlobalFoundries (which manufactures chips for Qualcomm and AMD, among others), has developed a process for building 5nm chips. Two years ago IBM unveiled a 7nm process, and Samsung will likely ship 7nm chips next year, but today’s announcement sounds like an even more important breakthrough in chip design.