I Can Haz Automatic Cheezeburger? Facial-Recognition Cat Feeder In The Works

For all of you cat owners, your overlords are now more easily appeased. A new type of facial recognition software allows your feline to get food just by imaging its face at a sensor.

According to ibtimes.co.uk, a Taiwanese-based company has "racked up more than $25,000 in funding from crowdsourcing sites" to create an automatic cat-food dispenser that will save you all the usual trouble of getting mewled at or punched in the nose with a clawed paw at an ungodly hour of the morning.

The device, called the Bistro, is initiated by the cat sticking its head into a clear sensor box, which scans your critter's furry face, verifies that it is not an impostor cat, and deposits food directly into a bowl.

The Bistro also sends alerts to the owner's smartphone if Garfield goes on a bender and empties his entire kibble supply.

NSA: Naked Snaps Agency

The famous Edward Snowden NSA leaks provided a shocking amount of disclosure to a nation that is still trying to chalk up the agency's egregious misconduct to "national security." Now, in a new interview, Snowden admits the dirt they were digging up on people is a little more lascivious than previously thought.

In an interview with The Guardian as reported by Ars Technica, Snowden said in no uncertain terms that NSA agents commonly obtained and distributed nude and sexually illicit private photos from the people they are sworn to protect. Snowden described the chain of events where young agents would find an appealing photo during the course of their work, then share and compare it with pornographic pics found by their coworkers.

In Snowden's own words, he said, "It's never reported. Nobody ever knows about it because the auditing of these systems is incredibly weak. The fact that your private images, records of your private lives, records of your intimate moments have been taken from your private communications stream from the intended recipient and given to the government without any specific authorization without any specific need is itself a violation of your rights. Why is that in a government database?”

The interview also included Snowden categorically denying attacks that he is a Russian spy, calling such allegations, "Bullshit." Just because he's trying to shut off the NSA's abundant amateur porn supply doesn't mean he hates America.

Drone Riders In The Sky: New Aerial Highway In The Works

The futuristic visions of flying cars or at least drone-delivery burritos need a place to begin. That place, claims scientist Dr. Parimal Kopardekar, is a well-defined aerial highway for drone traffic, aka the UTM (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Traffic Management System.)

Dr. Kopardekar, a rocket scientist who was NASA Ames Engineer of the Year 2003, is the principal investigator for this project, where low-level Class G airspace (anything up to 1,200 feet about ground level) will be organized to suit our little flying robot friends. As Dr. Kopardekar told www.dronelife.com, "We are basically creating this UAS traffic management system that allows you to accommodate the number of vehicles that will operate in the low altitude airspace. The analogy is ‘just because we have a car, whether it’s an autonomous car or someone is driving, does not negate the need for a road or stop signs or rules of the road.’ The same thing happens in the airspace. We need to have a structure."

Using GPS and geofencing, the drones will be hopefully be kept in line despite whatever their mission may be. Aerial photography, delivery services, weather reporting, and other elements will be made easier with this technology. The program is intended to be operational within five years.

Pizza's here!

Apollo 11 Adventurers' Anniversary: Launch Time

Today marks the 45th anniversary of the launch of the Apollo 11 mission, man's first journey to the moon. In celebration of this event, here is the original footage from the launch at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

The mission, comprised of astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins, was fraught with danger (an eerie speech in possibility of their failure had already been drafted for President Richard Nixon) but the promise of a new era for mankind was too strong to deny.

The technical elements involved in the mission were massive. According to onegiantleap.com, the Saturn V rocket itself stood 364 feet tall (over twice the height of the Statue of Liberty) and weighed 6,100,000 lbs when filled with fuel. That fuel was 4,325,132 lbs liquid oxygen, 1,432,662 lbs jet fuel (kerosene), and 202,851 lbs liquid hydrogen. This allowed the massive craft to eventually attain the required speed to enter orbit (a.k.a "escape velocity"), ultimately thrusting at 7 miles per second (or Mach 32.4.)

The liftoff shown in the video was successful thanks to a comprehensive 7.5 million pounds of thrust, or more than that of forty 747 planes.

More Apollo 11 facts to follow this week in celebration of the 45th anniversary!

You Keep It, They Peep It: No Fourth Amendment For Foreign Data Storage?

The United States government is actively opposing Microsoft's endeavors to protect users' electronic information. Contesting a ruling from earlier this year that demanded warrants for online data, the government cited the Stored Communications Act to attempt to retrieve data from a server in Ireland, saying,"Overseas records must be disclosed domestically when a valid subpoena, order, or warrant compels their production. The disclosure of records under such circumstances has never been considered tantamount to a physical search under Fourth Amendment principles, and Microsoft is mistaken to argue that the SCA provides for an overseas search here. As there is no overseas search or seizure, Microsoft’s reliance on principles of extra-territoriality and comity falls wide of the mark."

According to petapixel.com, the case was in regards to information stored by drug traffickers and was a target for extensive search, but the principle remains the same. Better get your own external hard drive to store those terabytes of homemade furry videos, because if they're stored offshore, the government can enjoy them to their hearts' content.

Just assume your data's not safe anywhere.

Old McDonald Had A Robot: New Machines Pick Plants; Prune

If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, how many pickled peppers did his robot counterpart pick?  Soon enough, science may have the answer.

Automated farm machinery is using technological developments to expand mechanizing the farm industry in many interesting ways.  As singularityhub.com reports, pepper-picking, plant-pruning, soil-testing, and crop-health-monitoring robotics are now entering the farming field.  Much as industrialization occurred in factories last century, now difficult and dangerous farm jobs can soon be outsourced to mechanical farmhands.

Thanks to telepresence aided by affordable sensors and computerized vision, machines like the pepper-picking WP5 robot can autonomously select and harvest ripe pepper plants.  Other tools like ground-based transponders and radar (with a bit of pre-programming by driving the perimeter) can allow for self-driving tractors to tend to fields.  Yet another bot, the Wall-Ye, is capable of caring for vineyards by pruning vines and testing soil.  Even drones are in on the action, monitoring large fields from above for irrigation problems and threats to plant health.

The farms of the future may just allow humans to sit back and enjoy the fruits of the earth...as long as the robot workers haven't risen up to usurp it from us by then.

Wall-Ye the wine-bot does everything except bartend.  Maybe that'll be in Model 2.0.

A Mule With Fuel: New Cargo Robot Aids Marine Missions

The United States Marines now have a whole new definition for the term "hauling ass." Their tests on a sturdy, cargo-toting robotic mule have been moving along successfully.

As reported by the BBC, the USMC is currently testing the new robo-creature during the Rim Of The Pacific (RIMPAC) international joint exercises in Oahu, Hawaii. The motorized mule is known as the "Legged Squad Support System (LS3)" but has been nicknamed "Cujo."  It operates by following a sensor strapped to a human operator's foot.

Created by Boston Dynamics as a corollary to their projects creating robotic dog-type critters, Cujo can carry 400 pounds of gear for missions up to 20 miles. According to kpbs.org, its attendant humans were impressed with its skills.

Marine Lance Cpl. Brandon Dieckmann said, "I was surprised how well it works. I thought it was going to be stumbling around and lose its footing, but it’s actually proven to be pretty reliable and pretty rugged...

"There are times when it is going to fall over, but most of the time it can self-right and get back up on its own. Even if it doesn’t, it can take one person to roll it back over. The way it is designed is that you can easily roll it back over.”

While Cujo is impressive, one wonders if they're trying to work their way up to full-sized mechanical battle elephants, like a futuristic Alexander The Great.

Kick ass!  The majestic LS3 mules romp in a pasture.