It Only Takes About Five Seconds For AI To Mimic Speech Now

I’m not going to go through the whole lecture again, because if you don’t understand by now why this sort of technology is scary as hell and doesn’t bode well for the future, chances are you won’t until you find yourself a victim of it. This video is a couple years old, by the way. …

Wherever I Go, I’ve Got Beams In My Ears

I read about the idea of Sound Beaming technology and I couldn’t decide what my predominant initial reaction was. I had two extreme reactions: one of thinking this was the most awesome thing ever and one of the shivers. Imagine a world where you move around in your own personal sound bubble. You listen to …

The Dumbest Smart Laundry System Ever

Ten years ago, I wrote this frustrating rundown of trying to refill my laundry card. That was 10 years ago! And the sad thing is very little has changed. We have made some improvements, but the system still has some pretty big flaws in it, and the flaws are brain-snappingly stupid. Back in November, for …

Pepper Says Don’t Sneeze On Me

Looks like they’ve found another use for our pal Pepper the bank bot. She’s now tooling around a mall in France reminding people to wear masks. I sure hope nobody’s beaten her up. Some folks can get awful touchy about that. If you want to give her a knock or two for the bank stuff …

Project Guideline: Like Guidelines, It’s a Place to Start

I’m not sure what to think of this. I think it has potential, but I am glad it’s an early prototype. It’s called Project Guideline, and its aim is to let blind people run independently without needing a dog, a cane or a human guide. There are good things about it, like how the app …

I Get Rough And Tough In The Puff ‘n’ Fluff! Noooo!

That soundtrack has nothing to do with the subject matter, but it’s what enters my head whenever I think about this invention…along with the imagined distressed sounds of dogs. I feel like a jerk making fun of an invention dreamed up by a third-grader, and maybe I can’t judge until I’ve actually laid hands on …

Rapper’s Delight By Siri, Alexa And Google Assistant

My first thought listening to this was damn, how much time must it have taken to gather all these sound samples and get the timing right? Turns out the answer is about a month. Despite the amazing lyricism and irresistible disco-rhythms at play in the track, aspiring rappers shouldn’t fear that their efforts will soon …

People, People, People, People, People…

iPhone 12 Pro lets people who are blind ‘see’ others around them It’s probably going to be a very long time before I get to try this out unless I happen to hit a really good sale on Steve needs a new phone day, but it sounds like it has the potential to be quite …