Technology is many things, but it’s rarely dull. Take this week, for example. Microsoft may have just shown us the future of the PC, we’ve seen smartphones covered in cows and we’ve discovered how chickens can cause chaos in virtual cities. Not only that, but we’ve seen a whole tech sector die and a watch hurt somebody’s shoulder. It’s another weird and wonderful week in tech! Microsoft: Build and they
Apple and IBM are working together on a piece of software that has the potential to revolutionise the lives of elderly people worldwide. First reported by the Wall Street Journal, the two companies are working with Japan Post to develop Post Office Watch service software for the iPad that will assist in the care of elderly people. Post Office Watch was launched at the end of 2013 and allows Japanese
A few weeks back, Nasa’s Messenger spacecraft ran out of fuel. Since then, the first and only probe we have orbiting Mercury has been on a doomed spiral towards an inevitable crash landing on the surface of the planet closest to the Sun. On April 30, at 7.26pm UTC, Messenger hit the ground at 3.91 kilometres per second – leaving a crater about 16 metres wide. Just beforehand, however, it
Introduction It’s hard to believe that it’s almost been a year since Microsoft launched the Surface Pro 3. A tough act to follow, it remains one of the best 2-in-1 devices around and sets the bar high for the Surface 3, the newest member of Microsoft’s Surface family, to follow. If the mood leading up to the launch of the Surface Pro 3 was quietly cautious following several Windows RT-shaped
Shares of LinkedIn Corp, operator of the most popular social network for professionals, fell 20 percent in early trading on Friday, wiping out more than $6 billion of market value, after the company slashed its full-year forecast. LinkedIn reported on Thursday its slowest quarterly revenue growth since it went public four years ago. The surprisingly weak results followed Twitter Inc’s on Tuesday. Twitter’s stock fell by as much as 24
A bill to end spy agencies’ bulk collection of Americans’ telephone data advanced in the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday, setting up a potential showdown over the program, which expires on June 1. The House Judiciary Committee voted 25-2 to approve the “USA Freedom Act,” seeking to tighten control of a program publicly exposed two years ago by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The bill would bar
Rocket Internet, a tech investor focused on emerging market ventures, has reduced its stakes in two of its Europe-focused financial services start-ups after facing setbacks there, Germany’s Spiegel magazine said. Lending site Lendico had all but retreated from three of the six countries where it had been operating, while corporate lending site Zencap made fewer than 200 loans to small firms with a total value of 14 million euros ($16
By Alex Dobuzinskis LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A California civil liberties group launched a mobile application on Thursday that will let bystanders record cell phone videos of possible cases of police misconduct and then quickly save the footage to the organization’s computer servers. The California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union said the app will send the video to the organization and preserve it even if a phone is
By Nivedita Bhattacharjee MUMBAI (Reuters) – After losing top engineering talent for years to America’s tech heartland of Silicon Valley, India is luring them back as an e-commerce boom sparks a thriving start-up culture, unprecedented pay, and perks including free healthcare for in-laws. India’s IT industry has long been seen as a back-office backwater, even by its own engineers who started moving abroad in their droves in the 1970s. The
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