World’s first 3D building will be ready in 2014

3D printed house

3D printing can be fun and cute. Products like the Makerbot and Form 1 will most certainly disrupt manufacturing, even if it’s only on a small scale. But the possibilities of 3D printing stretch far beyond DIY at-home projects. In fact, it could entirely replace the construction industry. (Pics)

 

 

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France proposes to tax the internet

France proposes an internet tax on American companies collecting personal data.

France is seeking new ways to raise funds.  Because of frustration with American technology companies that dominate its digital economy which are largely beyond the reach of fiscal authorities, France has proposed a new levy.  They are proposing an internet tax on the collection of personal data.

 

 

 

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A chip that can turn body heat into electric energy

 Body-powered devices eliminate the toxic waste generated by the heavy metals used in the billions of batteries we currently use each year.

A startup in Corvallis, Oregon, has developed a small chip that can turn body heat into electric energy. The chip absorbs heat directly from the skin and then channels energy through a thermoelectric generator that converts it into electric power. In the  future, the chip will enable us to power and recharge our handheld and wearable electronic devices with our own bodies.

 

 

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New bricks fabricated out of junk we aren’t using

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4EeWdogyec[/youtube]

Millions of tons of waste from factories, building sites, and processing facilities are being turned into something besides landfill with a technology that has led researchers to fabricate bricks out of TVs, computers, paper waste, incinerator ash, rubble and other materials that were conventionally considered useless.

 

 

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Quantum physicists agree to disagree about the nature of reality

Quantum physicists are still very divided on how quantum mechanics is to be interpreted.

Quantum mechanics is real. We wouldn’t have superconductors, lasers, and many forms of computing and cryptography without its microscopically small probabilistic effects. But despite our laboratory certainty, what’s less clear is the role it plays in the fundamental nature of reality. And as a recent survey published by Anton Zeilinger at the University of Vienna has revealed, quantum physicists are still very divided on how it’s to be interpreted.

 

 

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David Heinemeier Hansson’s thoughts on “Your life’s work”

David Heinemeier Hansson – Creator of Ruby on Rails

David Heinemeier Hansson:  I’d be happy if 37signals is the last place I work. In an industry so focused on the booms and busts, I find myself a kindred spirit with the firms of old. Places where people happily reported to work for 40 years, picking up a snazzy gold watch at the end as a token of life-long loyalty.

 

 

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Lego’s Mindstorms EV3 – a robot kit that is iPhone-controlled

Lego Mindstorms EV3

Lego Mindstorms EV3 is Lego’s first major update of the Mindstorms line since 2006.  Mindstorms are Lego’s programmable robotic parts–a brain, motors, and sensors–that interface with their Technic line.  And since social networks, smartphones and apps all rule today it’s only natural that each of these ideas worked themselves into the Lego Mindstorm EV3.

 

 

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The hidden costs of the ‘free’ app ecosystem

“Paid apps work because they provide the great experience people deserve as customers.”

Time is money, and apps don’t last forever. All the weeks you spent on your apps and you’re never going get back all those hours you spent on them.  And all of the free apps are dangerous, yet free is the dominant business model most mobile apps are taking these days.  The idea is to grow as quickly as possible then insert ads of some kind or get acquired.  For consumers it offers a crummy set of choices: either losing the countless hours you put into the app or have your private data sold to marketers — since as well all know, when the product is free, you are the product.

 

 

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