Articles by Don Melanson
Pebble Time Smartwatch Starts To Hit Retail Stores
The Pebble Time is available at Best Buy now, and will be at Target the week of August 17th. It's been nearly five months since Pebble started accepting pre-orders for its Pebble Time smartwatch on Kickstarter (bringing in $20 million in orders in the process), and a month since it opened up orders to anyone on its website, and it's now finally moving on to retail availability.
Spotify Tries To Make Your Playlists Even More Personalized With 'Discover Weekly' Recommendations
Spotify's latest feature automatically generates playlists based on your listening habits and others with similar tastes.
Canada's HitchBOT Begins Its Trek Across The United States, One Ride At A Time
The hitchhiking robot hopes to make it from Boston to San Francisco in one piece. It's already managed to make it safely across Canada and around Germany and the Netherlands based solely on the kindness of strangers, but the Canadian-made HitchBOT is now starting its most ambitious road trip yet.
Google Adds Some Smarter Snooze Options To Inbox
Inbox by Gmail now lets you snooze certain emails and be reminded of them at an appropriate time. Google's separate "Inbox by Gmail" email service already had a snooze feature to help distinguish it from Gmail proper, but the company's now beefed up that feature a bit more to try to lure some more folks away from their regular old lowercase inbox.
Moov's Latest Wearable Promises Better Fitness Tracking and Smarter Training
The Moov Now looks to distinguish itself from other wearables with a unique approach to fitness tracking.
NASA Reveals New Images Of Pluto's Surface And Its Moons
The latest images from New Horizons reveal icy mountains on Pluto and new details of Charon and Hydra.
Apple Refreshes iPod Lineup With New Colors, Upgraded iPod Touch
Apple's iPod touch gets a better camera and upgraded specs, while other iPods get some new colors.
Samsung Debuts Its Thinnest Phone Yet In China: The Galaxy A8
Samsung's thinnest smartphone to date measures just 5.9mm and still packs some decent specs. Samsung doesn't have many suprises to offer after the phone made an appearance in a number of leaks, but the company has now offiically debuted its new Galaxy A8 smartphone in China -- which, as of now, is the only place it's available.
Smart Wine Bottle Aims To Curb Counterfeits By Connecting To Your Phone
Thinfilm says its new smart bottle could help stop the spread of counterfeit wine. Printed electronics maker Thinfilm has already partnered with beverage conglomerate Diageo to develop a prototype "smart bottle" of Johnnie Walker whisky, which could send customized messages to people's smartphones, and it's now turned its attention to wine — albeit for a slightly different purpose.
NASA's New Horizons Spacecraft Makes Historic Pluto Flyby, Captures Most Detailed Image Yet
NASA has released the most detailed image of Pluto yet as New Horizons speeds past the dwarf planet.
Spotify Looks To Broaden Your Playlists With New Musical Map Of The World
Spotify's latest experiment lets you find the most "distinctively popular" music in cities around the world.
Break In Lone Undersea Cable Cuts Northern Mariana Islands Off From Internet
Recent damage to the fiber optic link has disrupted communication service on the island for days. A broken cable can sometimes have some pretty far ranging implications -- at least, when it's the main fiber optic cable providing almost all communication services to an island home to more than 50,000 people.
Swiss Post Is Testing Deliveries By Drone This Month
Switzerland's postal service is partnering with Matternet to test the feasiblity of drone deliveries.
BBC Shows Off Finalized Micro Bit Computer That 1 Million Students Will Get For Free
The BBC has revealed the final design for its programmable, customizable Micro Bit computer. More than 30 years ago, the BBC introduced the BBC Micro computer, built with the help of Acorn Computers, as part of an effort to increase computer literacy in the UK.
The US Army Is Testing An Arm Exoskeleton To Improve Soldiers' Aim
The Army's latest experiment with exoskeletons aims to train soldiers to shoot better, faster. It's no secret that the U. S. Army (among others) has been doing plenty of experimenation with exoskeletons, which could one day let soldiers lift heavier objects or even run faster.
Light Painting With A 3D Printer Produces Expectedly Impressive Results
Ekaggrat Singh Kalsi takes light painting in a new direction with the help of a 3D printer. What happens when you put an LED on the end of a 3D printer instead of an extruder that spits out formable material? Not a lot -- at least, not a lot that's immediately visible to the naked eye.
EPFL's 'Pac-Man' Clean-Up Satellite Gets Closer To Orbit
A satellite set to launch in 2018 promises to help clean up space debris. There's certainly no shortage of junk in space, and scientists at Switzerland's Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (or EPFL) say that they're now a step closer to a solution that could help clean up some of it.
Design Team Finds A Use For 3D Printer Waste: Furniture
A design firm is using waste from 3D printers to make furniture and other objects. We've already seen 3D printers be used to create furniture, but the latest project from Seongil Choi and Fabio Hendry of the deisgn group Studio Ilio takes a decidedly different tack.
Mark Zuckerberg Says Facebook Will Use Lasers To Deliver Fast Internet To Remote Places
Facebook's Internet.org initiative plans to use lasers to bring high-speed internet to remote areas.
Drawn Wants To Print Furniture With Robotic Arms For Fun And Profit
A robotic arm that once assembled cars is now being used to 'print' furniture. If you're going to 3D-print furniture, you're going to need something bigger than your average 3D printer.
Sony Gives Its Employees A Crowdfunding Site Of Their Own
Sony's First Flight crowdfunding site launches with a customizable, e-paper remote control. Sony has already toyed a bit with crowfunding by quietly gauging interest for a couple of products before officially producing them, and it now looks like its ready to fully embrace it.
Apple Facing $450 Million Fine After E-Book Price Fixing Appeal Is Denied
Apple's ongoing legal battle over e-book price fixing charges draws another step closer to an end.
Shazam Promises A Glimpse Into Artists' Musical Tastes With Latest Feature
A new feature will let you see the music artists are using Shazam to find. Well, it looks like Shazam wasn't about to let the launch of Apple Music go by without an announcement of its own.
Researchers' 'Fairy Lights' Promise Floating, Touchable Laser Displays
Japanese researchers have developed a floating, laser-based display you can touch. It's not the first "floating" display that uses lasers to create a hologram-like image, but a team of Japanese researchers say their so-called Fairy Lights are a more practical solution than some of the alternatives.
iOS 9's Low Power Mode Will Trade Performance For A Boost In Battery Life
New details from iOS 9 show how Apple's delivering its promised boost in battery life. We've already seen how Apple is planning to better get around storage constraints in iOS 9 than it did in iOS 8, and folks toying around with the latest beta version of the operating system have now gotten a better understanding of how the OS improves battery life as well.
Researchers Have Developed A Simpler Way To Print Stretchable, Wearable Electronics
A new printing process for electronics could lead to stretchable clothing with built-in sensors. Printable electronics aren't exactly anything new at this point, but there's still some considerable limitations when it comes to using them in wearable devices.
FLIR's Thermal Imaging Camera For Smartphones Gets Smaller and Cheaper
FLIR's latest smartphone add-on will give you thermal imaging and accurate temperature measurements.
Lenovo Is Gauging Demand For A Retro ThinkPad Design
Lenovo's showed off a concept for a retro-inspired ThinkPad, and it's asking for feedback.
Facebook Messenger's Latest Feature: No Facebook Account Required
Facebook Messenger will now let users sign up with only a phone number, not a Facebook account. Facebook signaled its first big change for Messenger when it split the messaging service off into a separate app more than a year ago, and it's now gone another big step further in untying it from the main Facebook service.
Polaroid's New Cube+ Camera Uses Your Phone As A Viewfinder
Polaroid's tiny Cube action camera gets some new capabilities with the addition of built-in WiFi.
