Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
This week, we tackle a thorny issue: the use of robots on the battlefield. Now, you already know that drones are flying over Afghanistan, and robots are disarming IEDs in Iraq. But what about sending robots into the field to do actual combat? What is they were armed? How could you program them to make life-and-death decisions? All interesting questions that we try to get a handle on in WTP 278. Also, the newspaper YOU make, and an update on Global Pecha Kucha Night for Haiti.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
This is no ordinary soccer ball. It’s called sOccket, and it’s got some tech inside that allows it to store up energy while it’s being kicked around. After 15 minutes, the ball’s stored up enough juice to power an LED light, or even charge up something else. Too cool. In this week’s podcast, we’ll talk to one of the people behind the sOccket. We’ll also hear about a high-tech treadmill for training Swedish skiers, and we’ll “embed” with some folks looking to keep information flowing into and out of Iran. We end with a segment on listeners Mark Dytham and Astrid Klein in Tokyo. They are architects who are trying to crowdsource new design and building ideas for post-earthquake Haiti. Wow.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
We’ve got a great mix of stories on this week’s podcast. We take you inside a Crisis Camp for Haiti meeting in Montreal, to hear how concerned people thousands of miles away are helping the relief effort. Also, two great stories about design and technology: one concerns an ancient footbridge across the Nile, and the other the humble, but dangerous, British pint glass. And we end with some research into potential links between Internet addiction and depression.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Tons of fun in this week’s podcast. The highlight is the return of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Eoin Colfer, who you may know as author of the Artemis Fowl series, has taken on the task of writing Book Six of Three in the H2G2 universe. It’s called And Another Thing… and we’ve got an interview with Colfer on this week’s podcast! We also hear about expert windmill builder, William Kamkwamba.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
This week, we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the birth of the Internet. We hear from UCLA’s Leonard Kleinrock (pictured), and others who worked to send that first message between two computers, hundreds of miles apart. We get the international perspective from Chinese blogger and activist Isaac Mao. And we also hear about the ‘Net’s next step, Internationalized Domain Names.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
The highlight of our technology podcast this week is an interview with author Viktor Mayer-Schönberger about his new book, called Delete: The Virtue of Forgetting in The Digital Age. It’s a fascinating look at how digital technologies, and especially the growing capacity for storage, has made us forget how to forget. Listen in, and then weigh in with your comments. Download MP3Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
A listener-centered episode this week. Tech Podcast listener and inventor Eric Zimmerman shares his low-tech solution to a high-tech problem; namely, how do manage to answer your cell phone when you’re eating buffalo wings and your fingers are covered in sauce? Trongs. Also, NASA crashes into the moon (on purpose), and Peru tries to harvest water with fog nets. And, we have a technological nod to the winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Meet Winston, the 11 month old carrier pigeon who is faster than broadband Internet in South Africa. At least, that’s what one company in South Africa set out to prove. You can hear more about that in this week’s podcast. You can also take a ride on the Battambang Bamboo Railway in Cambodia, and follow along with Briton Andy Pag as he tries to circumnavigate the globe in a tricked out bio-truck. We ask you: where else can you find this kind of podcast? Wow.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
You want zombies? Well, we’ve got them this week. Some researchers at the University of Ottawa are using a (theoretical, mind you) zombie attack to study disease vectors. Also, botnets, the Russia and Georgia cyber-spat, and a steam powered car. Plus, a deliciously free concoction of flamenco, hip-hop and creative commons.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
On this week’s show, castle builders in France use medieval technologies and techniques to build a castle…from scratch. Also, we have an interview with Bertrand Piccard, who wants to one day fly a solar-powered plane, non-stop, around the world. And we end with one podcast listener’s amazing art project. He and his buddies use GPS and their bikes to make geo-spatial art!
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
This week’s podcast features a geek’s audio tribute to John Hughes, the late director of “Weird Science.” Also, we talk about a project to make thousand mile sand dunes with the help of bacteria. And we hear about the solar suitcase, a toolbox designed to greatly improve maternal care in the developing world.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
On this week’s podcast, one of the world’s oldest bibles finds a new home online. Also, technology updates on the post-election violence in Iran, and the violence in western China. And we’ll end with a story of global online musical cooperation. Rock on.
On this week’s Tech Podcast, we have an in-depth discussion with Ken Banks of Kiwanja and FrontlineSMS. Ken’s helping folks around the world use cell phones for all sorts of amazing things. Also, updates on Twitter in Iran and Green Dam, Youth Escort software in China. Listen
It’s all Iran this week, folks. Violence and protests have flaired in Iran following last week’s disputed elections. The government moved quickly to shut down the flow of information out of, and into, the country. But Twitter and other social media tools are keeping that flow of information going. In fact, it’s not merely a flow, but a flood. For this week’s Technology Podcast,we’ll take an in-depth look at how vital social media tools have become in Iran in the wake of the elections. Listen
Chinese officials will now require that every PC sold in the country have Internet filtering software installed on it. The software is called Green Dam Youth Escort, and cyber-security experts are already noting it may be open to hacking. Meanwhile, rights groups are calling foul. Listen
