Ken Garen, CPA, Co-Founder and President, UBCC

3D Printed Soft Robo-Hand Can Play Nintendo Super Mario Bros. And Win   BY TYLER DURDEN SATURDAY, JUL 31, 2021 - 10:30 PM What if Americans become too  obese  and lazy that they had robots play video games for them one day?  University of Maryland researchers  have 3D printed a soft robotic hand capable of playing Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The soft robotic hand is flexible and powered by air rather than electricity.  The breakthrough in soft robotics is led by University of Maryland assistant professor of mechanical engineering Ryan D. Sochol and his team, who 3D print a fully functional soft robotic hand with "integrated  fluidic  circuits" that allowed it to be programmed and play NES.  "Previously, each finger of a soft robotic hand would typically need its own control line, which can limit portability and usefulness," said co-first author Joshua Hubbard. "But by 3D printing the soft robotic ...

Autonomous Race Cars To Compete At Indianapolis Motor Speedway    BY TYLER DURDEN FRIDAY, JUL 30, 2021 - 10:40 PM   Race fans are in for a spectacle this fall as artificial intelligence-powered race cars are headed for Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) to compete.  University teams and companies worldwide are set to compete in the physical  Indy Autonomous Challenge  (IAC) race in October 2021. The difference in this race is that there's no driver, instead a highly specialized AI computer will navigate the race car around the track.  Each of the teams competing in the race will receive the same Dallara-produced AV-21 race car that has been retrofitted with radar, cameras, ultrasonic and infrared sensors, along with LiDAR. Dallara has produced race cars for the Indy series for the last two decades.  IAC showed off one of the autonomous race cars that are capable of high speeds.   IAC was organized by IMS and Energy Systems N...

Record Coral Cover Of Great Barrier Reef Shames Climate Alarmists, Media BY TYLER DURDEN MONDAY, JUL 26, 2021 - 09:15 PM Authored by Peter Ridd via ClimateChangeDispatch.com, The annual data on coral cover for the Great Barrier Reef,  produced by the Australian Institute of Marine Science , was released on Monday showing  the amount of coral on the reef is at record high levels. Record high, despite all the doom stories by our reef science and management institutions. Like all other data on the reef, this shows it is in robust health. For example,  coral growth rates have, if anything, increased  over the past 100 years, and measurements of farm pesticides reaching the reef show levels so low that they cannot be detected with the most ultra-sensitive equipment. This data is good news. It could hardly be better. But somehow, our science organizations have convinced the world that the reef is on its last legs. How has this happened? One reason is that o...

Florida's First 3D-Printed Home Under Construction Amid Housing Affordability Crisis   BY TYLER DURDEN FRIDAY, JUL 23, 2021 - 10:40 PM   While the federal government and Federal Reserve have been on a mission to inflate the debt away by boosting asset prices through unprecedented amounts of fiscal and monetary stimuli, housing affordability has become a significant issue for many Americans. To counter soaring costs of everything, from lumber to concrete to homes themselves, builders have begun to adopt 3D-printing technology to reduce costs.  Not too long ago, we  noted   "Screw Lumber, Just 3D-Print Your Next Home,"  which is precisely what one builder did in Florida.  Florida's first 3D printed house began construction last week in Tallahassee, according to  Tallahassee Democrat .  "I have to keep pinching myself," said Kyndra Light, the co-owner of the firm behind the project Precision Building and Renovating. "I can't believe it...

Dubai Makes Artificial Rain With Drones That Shock Clouds   BY TYLER DURDEN FRIDAY, JUL 23, 2021 - 07:20 PM   The United Arab Emirates (UAE) uses drones that fly into clouds and deliver an electric shock to "cajole them" into producing precipitation amid dangerous heat waves regularly well into triple digits.  According to  Daily Mail , UAE's National Center of Meteorology (NCM) is flying drones equipped with electric-charge emission instruments that deliver an electric charge to air molecules, which generally encourage precipitation.  NCM has produced "monsoon-like downpours across the country" with drones to deter sweltering 122F heat. Footage shows Dubai battered with torrential rain produced by cloud seeding technology. The country already uses cloud-seeding technology, such as dropping salt and other chemicals into clouds to stimulate precipitation.  The latest cloud seeding operations via drones is part of a $15 million program that is a...

Indiana To Build Wireless In-Motion Charging For Electric Vehicles On Highway  BY TYLER DURDEN SUNDAY, JUL 18, 2021 - 10:00 PM The Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) has begun the first phase of a project to transform a segment of the state's highway into wireless charging pavement for electric vehicles, according to local news  WRTV .  INDOT partnered with Advancing Sustainability through Power Infrastructure for Road Electrification (ASPIRE) Initiative, in a three-phase project that will use magnetizable concrete, developed by a German startup Magment GmbH, to allow seamless wireless charging of electric vehicles while in motion.  "We're quite eager to see this first of its kind project unfold in Indiana," David Christensen, the ASPIRE Innovation Director, said. "This partnership that includes Magment, INDOT, Purdue University, and the larger ASPIRE consortium has great promise to really move the needle on technology development, which will,...

Walmart Brings Automation To Regional Distribution Centers   BY TYLER DURDEN SUNDAY, JUL 18, 2021 - 09:00 PM The progressive press had a field day with "woke" Walmart highly  publicized February decision  to hikes wages for 425,000 workers to an average above $15 an hour. We doubt the obvious follow up - the ongoing stealthy replacement of many of its minimum wage workers with machines - will get the same amount of airtime. As  Chain Store Age reports , Walmart is applying artificial intelligence to the palletizing of products in its regional distribution centers. I.e., it is replacing thousands of workers with robots. Since 2017, the discount giant has worked with Symbotic to  optimize an automated technology solution to sort, store, retrieve and pack freight onto pallets in its Brooksville, Fla., distribution center.  Under Walmart’s existing system, product arrives at one of its RDCs and is either cross-docked or warehoused, while being moved or ...

Xiaomi Dethrones Apple As The World's #2 Smartphone Maker BY TYLER DURDEN  SUNDAY, JUL 18, 2021 - 06:00 PM Could the bedrock of the smartphone market be moving before our very eyes?   A new report from market research firm Canalys last week suggests that could be the case. The report revealed that Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi had surpassed Apple in the second quarter of 2021 to become the world's number two smartphone maker,  according to Reuters . The report measures the number of handsets that manufacturers sell to distributors.  It was the first time Xiaomi took the second place spot, with the company getting 17% of worldwide smartphone shipments, up from 3% the previous quarter. The market for global smartphone shipments was up 12% in the second quarter, with Samsung leading the charge at 19% per share and Apple in third place at 14% per share. Chinese smartphone makers Oppo and Vivo had 10% each.  Xiaomi phones are about 40% tp 75% ch...

U.S.-Backed Tech Restores Internet To More Than 1 Million Cubans Amid Uprisings Against Gov't    BY TYLER DURDEN SATURDAY, JUL 17, 2021 - 05:00 PM Readers may recall after Arab Spring a decade ago. There was intense debate over the role social media platforms had on the uprisings. With summer uprisings in Cuba, the communist government has discovered ways to cut the internet off to millions of residents, so organized protesting on social media is near impossible.  Let's take a step back to early last week when  reports  of the Cuban regime used China-made technology systems to block internet and cell phone service to prevent pictures and videos of what was happening on the ground published online near impossible for the outside world to see. The regime also blocked popular social media channels that would make organized protesting impossible.  Remember, a decade ago, during Arab Spring, Facebook and Twitter were critical for organizers to orc...

Facebook Responds With Facts After Biden Proclaims Big Tech Is "Killing People" By Not Censoring Speech   BY TYLER DURDEN SATURDAY, JUL 17, 2021 - 03:30 PM   Update (1530ET):  Facebook responded to President Joe Biden's claim that the technology giant is “killing people.” “ We will not be distracted by accusations which aren’t supported by the facts.  The fact is that more than 2 billion people have viewed authoritative information about COVID-19 and vaccines on Facebook, which is more than any other place on the internet,” Facebook spokesman Kevin McAlister told news outlets. “More than 3.3 million Americans have also used our vaccine finder tool to find out where and how to get a vaccine.  The facts show that Facebook is helping save lives. Period, ” he added. Google and Twitter have not responded to requests for comment. *  *  * As Jonathan Turley detailed earlier ,  President Joe Biden slammed Big Tech companies this week ...

Amazon Wins FCC Approval For Radar Device To Monitor Sleep   BY TYLER DURDEN FRIDAY, JUL 16, 2021 - 10:40 PM   Amazon.com Inc. has been granted a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) waiver to use radar to monitor people's sleep.  The FCC approval  document , published last Friday, described a device to include a "radar sensor" for "contactless sleep tracing." The federal agency that regulates communications across the country wrote that Google made a similar request for its Pixel smartphone in 2018. "As with Google, Amazon describes how it plans to use its Radar Sensors to enable touchless control of device features and functions."  The capability of the new device "can aid persons with disabilities, as well as to provide sleep-related health and wellness applications," the FCC continued.  "The use of Radar Sensors in sleep tracking could improve awareness and management of sleep hygiene, which in turn could produce sig...

How Google And Wikipedia Brainwash You   BY TYLER DURDEN TUESDAY, JUL 13, 2021 - 12:00 AM Authored by Ryan Matters via Off-Guardian.org,   Internet giants cover-up for Big Pharma, suppress alternative medicine and bury inconvenient facts... According to  research  done by We Are Social,  the average internet user spends over 6 and half hours online every day. The internet is both a blessing as a curse. On the one hand, it gives us access to knowledge and technology that improves our lives, but on the other hand, it’s an addictive and dangerous mind-control tool that can be exploited to influence your choices and manipulate your thinking. The COVID  pseudopandemic  has seen internet censorship rise to an unprecedented level.  The controllers and their minions are scrambling to silence anyone who dares to question the efficacy of vaccines or the existence of Sars-Cov-2. Let’s recap: In the space of a few months, thousands of YouTube ...