This Week in Tech

MIT Will Post Free Plans Online for an Emergency Ventilator That Can Be Built for $100 – This Week in Tech

MIT Will Post Free Plans Online for an Emergency Ventilator That Can Be Built for $100

One of the most pressing shortages facing hospitals during the Covid-19 emergency is a lack of ventilators. These machines can keep patients breathing when they no longer can on their own, and they can cost around $30,000 each. Now, a rapidly assembled volunteer team of engineers, physicians, computer scientists, and others, centered at MIT, is working to implement a safe, inexpensive alternative for emergency use, which could be built quickly around the world…


UPS Partners With Wingcopter to Develop New Multipurpose Drone Delivery Fleet

UPS is working with German startup Wingcopter to develop a new type of delivery drone, to be used for the logistics company’s growing commercial drone delivery efforts both in the U.S. and globally. Wingcopter has already designed an electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft that has a range of up to 75 miles and can achieve speeds as high as 150 miles per hour in conditions that include wind speeds of up to 45 miles per hour…


Apple Reportedly Working on an AR Headset With Vive-Like Controllers

Apple has made its interest in augmented reality (AR) very clear in recent years, and rumors that the company is working on an AR headset have been making the rounds for a long time. Now, new evidence suggests Apple is closer than ever to finalizing these plans…


Researchers Develop Faster Way to Replace Bad Data With Accurate Information

Researchers from North Carolina State University and the Army Research Office have demonstrated a new model of how competing pieces of information spread in online social networks and the Internet of Things (IoT). The findings could be used to disseminate accurate information more quickly, displacing false information about anything from computer security to public health…


Polaroid’s New $99 Instant Camera Uses Autofocus to Change Modes

More than a year after Polaroid Originals gave us the OneStep+, it’s ready to share another old-school, analogy camera: the Polaroid Now. This time around, Polaroid Originals has traded the dual lenses for a new autofocus lens, and it has stripped away some of the connectivity features, like those that made remote selfies possible…


Rumor: Apple Developing Touch ID Fingerprint Biometrics for Apple Watch, Series 2 Will Not Support watchOS 7

Following on from the Apple TV report from earlier this week, iUpdate and The Verifier are reporting on possible upcoming changes to watchOS 7 and the Apple Watch…


Internet Archive Offers 1.4 Million Copyrighted Books for Free Online

One of the casualties of coronavirus-related social distancing measures has been public libraries, which are shut down in many communities around the world. This week, the Internet Archive, an online library best known for running the Internet’s Wayback Machine, announced a new initiative to expand access to digital books during the pandemic…