Creator of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg has announced the project that his Internet.org effort has been working on for a year. It is an unmanned solar powered aircraft that has the wingspan of a Boeing 737 and weighs less than a car. The name of the aircraft is “ Aquila,” and it will be equipped with lasers that can send internet access to communities below the aircraft. As Zuckerberg explains on his Facebook page, “This effort is important because 10% of the world’s population lives in areas without existing internet infrastructure. To affordably connect everyone, we need to build completely new technologies.” Do you think that Aquila is the next big thing for technology?
Boyan Slat has an idea to clean up the oceans. Is this the next big thing for the environment?
Engineering student Boyan Slat has come up with a way to clean up the oceans. Specifically, he is trying to clean up the eight million tons of non-biodegradable plastic that ends up in the ocean every year (The New York Times). Slat is aware that this trash circulates in five systems of rotating water currents (otherwise known as gyres). He has come up with the idea of taking advantage of the gyres by creating a shipless system that allows floating borders (anchored in place in attachments to the bottom of the ocean) to catch any trash pushed in by the currents. This system would also allow sea life to pass safely below. Slat’s Ocean Clean Up Foundation raised over $2 million by June 2014, but the first of Slat’s floating structures will not be released until 2016. Do you think Slat is onto something?
Google is trying to develop a tool that records your life experiences. Cool or creepy?
Google has acquired the patent for developing a “method and apparatus for enabling a searchable history of real-world user experiences.” The tool could be anything from an invention similar to Google Glass to an implanted contact lens. It would document the user’s life events through recording photos, videos, and perhaps audio. This information would then be uploaded to a drive, which would have searching capabilities. Meaning, we would be able to replay our past as often as we like. Does this interest or frighten you?
Are wearables that track the effectiveness of politicians #TheNextBigThing?
Fiona Zublin from Ozy recently proposed an idea to keep politicians honest: have them put on wearables. These wearables would be “something between a Fitbit and an ankle bracelet, whose data would be available to the public. It would provide instant info on everyone from your city council members to the president of the United States, offering up an effectiveness rating the way your sleep-tracking app. Talking about the effectiveness of the instantaneous data access, she envisions the wearable giving the public a rundown, “Your politician’s effectiveness was 35 percent [last night] - and it looks like he just checked into the penthouse at the Four Seasons on the taxpayers’ dime.” Do you think that this is an idea that should actually be carried out?