Robotaxi haters in San Francisco are disabling the AVs with traffic cones
A decentralized group of safe streets activists in San Francisco realized they can disable Cruise and Waymo robotaxis by placing a traffic cone on a vehicle’s hood, and they’re encouraging others to do it, too. The “Week of Cone,” as the group is calling the now-viral prank on Twitter and
Read moreTesla to provide more info on its driver alert system amid Autopilot probe
U.S. regulators have requested more information from Tesla to assist in their ongoing investigation into 830,000 Tesla vehicles that include Autopilot, the automaker’s advanced driver assistance system. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) sent Tesla a letter on July 3 seeking updated responses to questions it had asked in
Read moreLehman’s inequality, circuits, and LaTeX
Let A, B, C, and D be positive numbers. Then Lehman’s inequality says Proof by circuit This inequality can be proved analytically, but Lehman’s proof is interesting because he uses electrical circuits [1]. Let A, B, C, and D be the resistances of resistors arranges as in the circuit on
Read moreYou can’t post ass, Threads is doomed
Threads, the Meta-owned Twitter clone that launched this week, will always be hindered by its own content guidelines. The app is dry at best, and at worst, leeching your personal data. With 30 million downloads in less than a day of its launch, Threads is poised to compete with Twitter’s sheer
Read moreEV truck maker Nikola fails again to secure enough shareholder support to issue more shares
Nikola failed for the second time since June to get enough shareholders to vote on a proposal that would allow the EV truck maker to issue more shares in a bid to raise more capital. The company said Thursday it adjourned its annual meeting of shareholders until August 3 when
Read moreSony’s modular speaker system is a clever and portable take on the home theater
Here’s a dirty little secret: Consumer electronics can be boring sometimes. Hardware scaling is hard and people love the familiar, both things that have a tendency to disincentive adventurous product design. So it’s worth acknowledging when big companies try something a bit different. From a purely design perspective, there’s a
Read moreWhat is Instagram’s Threads app? All your questions answered
In the last few months, Twitter alternatives — new and old — have found an audience willing to try out a new text-based social network. Mastodon, Bluesky, Spill and T2 are some of the social media platforms people are trying out. Now, Meta has stepped into the game with a
Read moreContraharmonic mean quirk
A few weeks ago I wrote about the contraharmonic mean. Given two positive numbers a and b, their contraharmonic mean is This mean has the unusual property that increasing one of the two inputs could decrease the mean. If you take the partial derivative with respect to a you can
Read moreIn-space propulsion developer Benchmark Space Systems closes $33M in new funding
Benchmark Space Systems, a Vermont-based developer of in-space propulsion products, has raised $33.2 million in new funding, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Committee. The Series B capital will be used to help the company manufacture at-scale and deliver on the more than 220 propulsion systems
Read moreDeel under fire for alleged questionable hiring practices, advice to other companies
A California Senator is urging the state’s Labor and Workforce Development Agency to conduct an investigation into the business practices of fintech turned HR startup Deel. Last week, Senator Steve Padilla (D-San Diego) sent a letter to Stewart Knox, California Secretary of Labor, alleging that Deel has hired hundreds of
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