The October MCM Comic Con kicked off in London over the weekend and I was fortunate enough to attend. While I wasn't there in any sort of ‘official' capacity, I did take a few pictures of what I saw there on Saturday to share with our readers today. As …
Read More »Germany continues to champion encryption as others decry it
Along with a push for legislation like TTIP and TPP, British and American governments have all but declared a brand new ‘war' against encryption. They've both made efforts to paint the technology as a tool for terrorists and a serious security threat to all nations, as well as pushing for …
Read More »$150 million Hyperloop test track construction could begin next month
Not content with turning our transportation electric and making space travel more affordable, Tesla and Space X CEO Elon Musk also has another pet project: the Hyperloop. A near-vacuum sealed tube-train design that could carry passengers across entire countries faster than airplane travel. The concept is still a long way …
Read More »Pirate Party storms to success in Icelandic polls
It looks like the Pirate Party may be set to take more than a few seats in the Icelandic parliament when the next general election rolls around, as it has surged to the head of the most recent polls in the country, securing some 34.2 per cent of all voter …
Read More »With Intel at Shoreditch Studios, London
KitGuru were invited to spend some time with Intel on 21st October at Shoreditch Studios, London. Intel used a photographic studio in a converted railway arch in Shoreditch to display a show case of new laptops from a selection of its partners. KitGuru saw models from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, …
Read More »Acer launches new Predator gaming range in London
Traditionally, Acer's reputation was built on cramming as many cool-sounding technologies as possible into a simple chassis with a low price. The global downturn in 2008 caused a rethink at this $11 billion corporation and, since then, there has been a much greater focus on design aesthetics. Last night's launch …
Read More »Popcorn Time for the web removed, then brought back instantly
Popcorn Time for the web brought the torrent streaming service to web browsers, removing the need to download and use the app. However, following legal threats, the service went down. Then 24 hours later, new developers picked up the project and brought the service straight back to life. The original …
Read More »Bitcoin purchases exempt from VAT taxes, EU court rules
If you're buying Bitcoin on a regular basis for illicit or legitimate reasons, you can breathe a sigh of relief – at least in one sense – as you won't be forced to pay an extra 20 per cent on those purchases in the future, as a European court has …
Read More »Nike’s self-lacing BTTF trainers are coming in 2016
As if yesterday's cafuffle with the double muscle dog/cow wasn't enough, today's edition of off-beat technology sees us looking at Nike's self-lacing shoes from Back to the Future II. While many of us may have watched the films – or at least been subjected to endless Facebook posts about them …
Read More »Pewdiepie is getting a reality show on Youtube Red
With the launch of Youtube's subscription service, Youtube Red taking place next week, it's no surprise that the streaming firm is pulling out all of the stops to promote it. Indeed, it's even easier to understand why the site's most subscribed content creator, Felix “Pewdiepie” Kjellberg is being pushed front and …
Read More »Google launches YouTube Red paid subscription service
We have been hearing about it for many months but now it has finally happened, Google has officially launched YouTube Red, the paid, ad-free subscription service for the world's most popular video on demand platform. YouTube Red will offer everything on the site right now with no adverts, the subscription …
Read More »UK tech retailers suffering from a series of DDOS attacks
Over the last 24 hours it would seem that several prominent UK tech retailers have been targeted by DDOS attacks, which may also turn out to be linked to a group demanding large Bitcoin ransoms. Affected sites include Overclockers UK, Novatech, SCAN and Aria. All of these websites have been …
Read More »Kerbalnaut Scott Manley discusses alien potential at distant star
One of the more eye catching stories in the world of science in the past week involved one researcher's suggestion that the dimming of a distant star known as KIC 8462852 in a strange pattern, could suggest giant “alien megastructures,” were orbiting it. The scientific study that prompted this idea didn't …
Read More »Yahoo inks deal with Google to prop up earnings slip
Yahoo announced late yesterday that it had signed a search advertising deal with Google, further enhancing an already existing deal with Microsoft, so that now Yahoo will earn a portion of revenue from adverts displayed in the trio of search engines from all companies. It's hoped that this will help …
Read More »Genetically engineered ‘double muscle’ dogs born in China
Of all of the ways humans have attempted to alter the muscle mass of themselves and animals over the past hundred or so years, from exercise, to steroids to growth hormones, nothing has quite had the same effect as myostatin inhibitors. Removing that particular protein from an animal increases their …
Read More »Tesla Autopilot gets its first speed warning from police
When Elon Musk said that the Autopilot feature that was rolled out to all Model S and Model X owners was probably safe for people, he was mainly thinking about pedestrians that may make the inadvisable move to step out in front of them. He didn't mention anything about the Autopilot …
Read More »Asus might make its own version of Microsoft’s Hololens
It seems that Microsoft might not be the sole supplier of the Hololens as Asus is apparently in talks with the company to build its own version. This would make Asus the first third-party company to build a version of Microsoft's augmented reality headset if a deal can be made. …
Read More »Amazon designs pair of augmented reality glasses
Amazon has designed its own pair of augmented reality glasses, judging by a recent patent filing from the company. While many other device makers are currently focussed on virtual reality, there aren't as many big names currently working on augmented reality, aside from Microsoft with the Hololens and Google with …
Read More »Samsung to build robots for South Korean factories
Samsung and South Korea are aiming to cut down on manufacturing costs for electronics by building robots to replace factory workers. The idea is to replace human employees with cheap to run robots, to deal with plenty of tasks, including those that currently require a more delicate touch. The South …
Read More »Google registers two new delivery drone designs with FAA
It looks like Google wants to take on Amazon in the delivery drone race, as the company has just submitted two new designs to the Federal Aviation Administration. These are being tested by the Google X branch, which is Google's experimental division. The drones are named M2 and B3 at …
Read More »Popcorn Time users are settling their lawsuits
The release of Popcorn Time was a watershed moment for piracy. Just as Bittottent made it easier than the early days of file sharing, Popcorn Time changed the game once again and made torrenting just as simple as streaming content from Netflix. As much as this could have been a …
Read More »Amazon targets fake reviewers with legal action
Although there are likely a number of people that have left joking or satirical reviews of products on Amazon for the purposes of humour rather than actually influencing the product's sales, those that do it maliciously or for financial gain may be at risk of legal action, as Amazon has …
Read More »Lenovo didn’t want to sell Microsoft’s Surface due to competition
Microsoft has been pushing its Surface pretty hard recently, striking deals with Dell and HP to get the tablet in to businesses. It turns out that at one point, Microsoft's plans also involved getting Lenovo on-board to help sell the Windows tablet but the company got turned down. Lenovo didn't …
Read More »Palmer Luckey explains why the Oculus Rift will be fairly expensive
Virtual Reality is brand new technology to the consumer market and the Oculus Rift headset has a lot of support behind it. However, as is the case with most brand new devices, there will be a cost premium associated with being an early adopter. We recently learned that the first consumer …
Read More »University beats Apple in patent court, should it be paid?
The smartphone industry is one that is as rife with innovation as it is with patent lawsuits. Apple, Samsung, Qualcomm and many others have dragged one another in and out of court rooms for the past decade or so, attempting to wrestle money and bans on sales from and against …
Read More »SK Hynix to make 36-layer 3D NAND by the end of 2015, 48-layer next year
SK Hynix has announced plans to bring 36-layer 3D NAND flash chips to the market later this year, with plans to produce 48-layer 3D NAND Flash in place for some time next year. The South Korean based company also recently started mass producing 20nm class DRAM, though it is still …
Read More »Tobii eye-tracking tech is making its way in to more devices
Eye-tracking company, Tobii announced today that its software and hardware is at the point where it is ready to be implemented with consumer devices, like laptops, or possibly even virtual reality or augmented reality products in the future. Tobii has been well-known in this space for quite some time and …
Read More »UK government denies Julian Assange hospital visit
The case of Julian Assange is a strange one. The Wikileaks founder has been holed up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London for over three years now, hiding out from police that want to deport him to Sweden for an alleged sexual assault; though it is suspected he would then …
Read More »Astronomers spot potential ‘alien megastructures’ around distant star
The search for alien life around the world has been ongoing for much of the past century, with various individuals and organisations pointing listening devices to the sky in the hopes of hearing a message from another people on another world. We also look for them too, with high powered …
Read More »Tesla updates cars with ‘autopilot,’ first test videos appear online
Although fully automated cars aren't expected to hit our roads until sometime in the 2020s, we're well on our way with a combination of features and safety measures that are now available to Tesla drivers as part of its ‘autopilot' scheme. The update was rolled out to Tesla Model S and …
Read More »