Whether you are a small business owner, a college student, or simply a gadget geek, there are dozens of technological goodies out on the market now available for personal use. There are smartphones and tablets. And as soon as you purchase the latest gadget, the technology companies come out with newer, more modern and improved versions. It can be difficult to keep up. Some people are determined to stay up to date by waiting for days in advance outside the stores of these techno gadget companies in anticipation of their new products. But you are busy—you do not have the time to camp out, waiting for the latest cool gadget. You have a business to run, or schoolwork to do. So, how do you know which techno gadgets are worth your time and money? The truth is that the “best techno gadgets” vary from person to person because we all have different hobbies and there are different tools for each of them. For instance, a pedometer is great for measuring your walking distance, but it would be ineffective for measuring your skiing distance. With each of us having different needs, the best techno gadget for one person will not be the same for another. That is not to say, however, that there are no techno gadgets that we would not all benefit from. Heck, there are some darn fine inventions out there—here are the top five best gadgets on the market for your personal use: 1.  iDock—You have an iPhone, […]

Google has recently come out with a new version of its mapping software, Google Maps. This version brings its strong capabilities to more than just the iPhone but also to the iPad, Android phones and Android tablets. Androidians can rejoice as the smooth and elegant new design is being offered to not just the iPhone crowd. So let’s get into exactly what the Google engineers added to make this great app become even greater. Features that have been added include: Speed- How can a new version of Google Maps become slower to get better? The new Google maps is faster on every platform it exists on. Information Placement- Google Maps serves not only as a GPS but the worlds best Yellow Pages. The app allows the user to easily find restaurants, movie theaters, or any landmark you are looking for. When a user starts to type in a destination, the app quickly fills in the rest, giving it an almost mind reading affect. Traffic incidents and Auto-rerouting- If your expecting just the bland colored line that shows slow or normal moving traffic than guess again. Google Maps shows details of traffic accidents including lane closures and construction updates. Not only will it show you traffic on your route, it prompts a dialogue box to appear that offers a reroute option with less traffic, on its own. Offline Maps- Traveling in a foreign country can be rough on your wallet if you are using data roaming; Google Maps has fixed this […]

The future of driverless automobile production may not be as far around the corner as many anticipated. In Jeruselum, Mobileye Vision Technologies has been test driving a driverless vehicle with the help of their camera-only autonomous driving technology. An Audi A7 equipped with their technology took a cruise to the Dead Sea while a video camera on the windshield drove the car at speeds up to 65 miles an hour.  The technology that Mobileye Vision Technologies is harnessing is much less expensive than that of the widely publicized Google autonomously driving vehicle. However the Mobileye car does not offer the exact same autonomy achieved by Google’s engineers. The Google car has been tested to merge onto freeways, drive safely through intersections and even pass slower vehicles. Compared to the Mobileye vehicle, which is only capable of driving in a single lane at freeway speeds as well as identifying traffic light and automatically slowing down. But by blending advanced computer vision techniques with the low-cost video cameras, Mobileye is demonstrating how quickly autonomous driving can be commercialized.

Technology has put a twist to the Holidays. The site www.EmailSanta.com allows more than 1 million kids to email Santa letters with their wish lists. Plus, guess what? Santa actually writes back with a customized letter! The site also allows kids to watch Santa checking out his map via a 24/7 Webcam and can be followed on the Twitter account. On the night before Christmas, kids can see in what part of the world Santa is delivering gifts at by looking at the live delivery world map. Kids go crazy with this site, during the Pre-Thanksgiving season, it received a letter every 30 seconds and the number of letters increases as it gets closer to Christmas day. The site has received a number of wish lists through PowerPoints presentations, videos of children, digital photos, and lists from Target’s gift registry. Kids don’t always send letters with wish lists, sometimes they just confess their problems to Santa, hoping he will solve their problems. These kids wait anxiously for Santa’s response letter, hoping he will respond with words of ease and that is exactly what the site does. This site is perfect for today’s tech savvy kids. What tech advancement do you think is next for Santa’s digital world?

With the threat of depleting natural resources looming large, the chemical industry is in overdrive to develop renewable chemicals from food crops. Considerable progress has been made on a global scale, which promises to usher in a new era in chemicals and biofuels. In this century, the mega-economies in the Eastern hemisphere are moving relentlessly toward the demands and standards established in the West. One of the biggest challenges of the new century is to convert from consumerism governed by market forces and demand, to being oriented towards natural resources and sustainability. Society currently displays a destructive and wasteful attitude toward the environment. This approach has to change to one which respects the earth as possessing only limited resources. This calls for a dramatic revaluation of our association with the planet, due to the rampant rate of growth and the increased demand on resources that comes with it. The chemical industry, which has been remarkably effective during the 20th century, has now risen to these challenges with new and innovative approaches. One of the prime areas of focus is creating Renewable Chemicals from food crops. This is to address the problem where the whole supply chain is  impacted by a lack of continued and sustained availability of chemicals. With a diminishing supply of polymer feedstocks and fossil fuels, the chemical industry is looking to food crops as a source for sustainable chemicals. Agricultural sources like grains, sugar and oilseeds are being studied more intensely to exploit their potential. Already cassava, corn […]