The technology available to image light as it moves through space continues to advance. Recently, we saw a new high-speed camera capture a small pulse reflected from a mirror ; now, it’s possible to image the entire flight path of a laser as it bounces around a laboratory. Read more…
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Watch This Reflected Laser Pulse’s Entire Flight Path at 20bn FPS
Firefox: The last time we highlighted uBlock, a fast and lightweight alternative to AdBlock Plus , it was Chrome only. Now the add-on is available for Firefox as well, and it works well, even though it’s still in beta. Read more…
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uBlock, the Memory-Friendly Ad-Blocker, Is Now Available for Firefox
Add / Remove This is part of a series of articles that looks at entrepreneurs hoping to get their ideas off the ground through crowdfunding. At the time of writing, each of these innovations is currently seeking funding. For those who like to quickly check Facebook or catch a short Netflix episode on their tablet before they go to bed, doctors have some bad news — it’s messing with your sleep. Devices emitting blue light affect levels of melatonin, a key ingredient for a good night’s rest. Add in jetlag from business trips and constant city noise and that’s a lot of consumers yearning to doze off peacefully. Hoping to provide a solution is Sprayable Sleep , a skin spray that claims to send users into a slumber within an hour, without the side effects of typical sleeping pills. If the name sounds familiar, it may be because we’ve already written about Sprayable Energy , a product that performs the reverse task of giving users a caffeine boost with a couple of squirts. It’s the same team — San Francisco-based Sprayable — behind the new product, which aims to make it easier and healthier to fall asleep on demand. The product only has 3 ingredients — water, tyrosine (a natural amino acid), and melatonin. According to the company, melatonin pills can deliver an instant hit of the sleep-inducing chemical to the body, with the sometimes unwanted side effect of essentially being knocked out for several hours. Sprayable Sleep differs in its delivery method — by rubbing the spray into the skin, the body absorbs the chemical more slowly, mimicking the body’s naturally gradual release. Because of this, users need to spray about an hour before they intend to sleep. The company recommends 1 spray for a nap, 2 for a decent night’s sleep and 3 for a long-haul flight. Watch the video below for more details about how it works: Sprayable Sleep is available to pre-order from USD 15 a bottle through a current Indiegogo campaign, which ends on 1 March. As consumers seek ever more control over their productivity, could this easy, quick and organic application of drugs become more popular? Indiegogo: www.igg.me/at/sprayable-sleep Website: www.sprayable.co Contact: www.sprayable.co/pages/contact
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Two squirts of Sprayable Sleep will help insomniacs catch some zzzs
An anonymous reader writes Engadget takes a look at Ford’s new Research and Innovation Center located in Palo Alto. The company hopes to use the new facility to speed the development of projects such as autonomous cars and better natural voice recognition. From the article: “This isn’t Ford’s first dance with the Valley — it actually started its courtship several years ago when it opened its inaugural Silicon Valley office in 2012. The new center, however, is a much bigger effort, with someone new at the helm. That person is Dragos Maciuca, a former Apple engineer with significant experience in consumer electronics, semiconductors, aerospace and automotive tech. Ford also hopes to build a team of 125 professionals under Maciuca, which would make the company one of the largest dedicated automotive research teams in the Valley.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.
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Inside Ford’s New Silicon Valley Lab
Everyone knows Marconi was one of the world’s most disagreeable scientists. What they don’t know is he was surrounded by people nearly as disagreeable as himself. And that a famous demonstration of his “wireless” was taken over by a magician-turned-skeptic-turned-pirate. Read more…
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A Magician Used The First Pirate Radio Station To Troll A Scientist
In Old Havana’s last remaining internet cafe, an hour online costs about almost a quarter of an average monthly salary. But armed with some piecemeal networking equipment and rebellious sensibilities, some Cuban youths have taken connectivity into their own hands . Read more…
Most of our discussions of catfishing are limited to the catfishers and catfishees, but there’s a third category we often forget about: the unwitting catfish-complicit, whose pictures and deets make the catfishing possible, and whose lives also get crappy and complicated when sucked into the mix. Read more…
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Woman Discovers Her Photos Have Been Used to Catfish Others for Years
Free stuff is always great, especially if people actually want what’s on offer. Apple now has a special section called ” Free on iTunes ” where you can find TV shows and music freebies if you’ve already blown through your monthly entertainment budget. It features TV episodes from 12 Monkeys , Eye Candy and others, as well as music from bands like Purity Ring and Houndmouth. As 9to5 Mac points out, Apple offered a similar service before, but this time, the focus seems to be less on hits and more on material that’s still looking for an audience. Filed under: Software , HD , Apple Comments Via: 9to5 Mac Source: Apple
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Apple giving away TV shows and music with ‘Free on iTunes’
WikiLeaks is demanding explanations, after it’s come to light that Google gave the FBI emails and digital data belonging to three WikiLeaks staff members when warrants were served in March 2012. Read more…
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Google Handed Stacks of WikiLeaks Email Straight to the FBI in 2012
Virtual currency bitcoin is starting to get its act together. A startup funded with $106 million from the New York Stock Exchange as well as banks and venture capital firms, is set to launch the first licensed US bitcoin exchange. Coinbase reckons it’ll add increased security to traders as well as monitor real-time pricing of the world’s foremost cryptocurrency. If you’ve forgotten , unlike normal currencies, bitcoin is traded virtually and isn’t backed by a central government: reasons why the currency often fluctuates severely. The collapse of Mt. Gox last year stung investors, both professional and otherwise, for a total sum of around half a billion dollars. As the WSJ notes , the value of a bitcoin is currently around $240: it was stood at $1, 200 per ‘coin. The startup’s founders have managed to gain licenses from half of the states’ financial regulators, including (importantly) both New York and California. The exchange can only do business in the states in which it’s gained approval, taking 0.25 percent from most transactions, with the first two months charge-free. The exchange already has 2.2 million “wallets” on file, and plans to operate in 30 countries by the end of the year – it’s already set up in 19 of them. Meanwhile, Gemini ( backed by the Winklevoss twins ), has claimed support from an as-yet unnamed New York bank. The legitimacy of Bitcoin is on the increase, but for those of you hoping that the value of Bitcoins will evaporate into nothing and you’ll never have to read about them again — well, it’s not looking good. Filed under: Internet Comments Source: WSJ
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Bitcoin’s first licensed US exchange opens with approval from 25 states