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Exoskeleton
The U.S. military and the private sector have been developing super-strength-enabling exoskeletons for soldiers for decades now. In 2014, they became a reality. They were developed in a top-secret program called the Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit (TALOS). The goal of the program was to enhance a soldier’s speed, strength and stamina in the battlefield.
As Apple products continue to dominate the tech consumer market, many users are discovering bugs and issues with their iOS operating systems.
If users send a text message via their new iPhone containing a certain string of non-Latin characters, the phone will reboot itself and eventually come to a stop. This bug can affect Apple Watches, iPads, and Macs from working.
According to writer Samuel Gibbs for The Guardian, “the crash is caused by a bug within a core system common to all of Apple’s devices that handle text. When presented with non-Latin characters in a specific sequence – including those from Arabic, Chinese and Marathi – the CoreText system chokes, causing it to fail and bring the entire operating system to a halt.”
The text is not easily duplicated and takes knowledge of what characters can trigger the products’ response. This text message bug was discover by redditors at the subreddit “explain like i’m five”.
Mathew Hickey, principal security consultant at MDSec, told Forbes that “as the issue also affects OS X applications, a malicious party could set the triggering text as a server message of the day or welcome message, causing a user’s terminal to crash when authenticating to network services.”
This looks like one more bug that Apple has to fix. The problem may be addressed in the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus.
Advanced High-Performance Reconnaissance Light Aircraft
The AHRLAC is Africa’s first home-grown military aircraft, and it first took off on Aug 13, 2014, in Pretoria, South Africa. What makes this plane special is that it took three years to develop and is used for anti-poaching missions, border patrols, anti-trafficking, anti-piracy, anti-insurgent, as well as anti-terror operations. This is a major milestone in the continent’s aviation history.
There are very few Black characters featured as stars of animated films. Most of the protagonists tell elaborate stories from the same point-of-view that we have seen before. If you are looking for something new, here are five animated productions with African characters and Black voice actors front and center.
‘Mark of Uru’
Mark of Uru is an animated television series inspired by African folklore and mythology. There are many thematic elements revolving around humans, animals and elemental beings from African folklore.
New York City-based companies Etsy and DigitalUndivided are focused on diversifying technology by supporting women and people of color in the industry.
The two have partnered up to create a space where the topic of race and gender can be discussed. The reality is that this industry is in need of attracting different types of people because everyone uses technology.
In an interview with the New York Business Journal, Etsy’s recruiting manager Jason Greenhouse said “that if tech companies really want to understand their user bases and build for the long term in large scale, they need to think that way internally. They need to bring people from various backgrounds and all different walks of life, give them a seat at the table and have them lend their ideas to what’s being built.”
June will be a big month for the two companies. Starting June 1, DigitalUndivided will launch a $50,000 Kickstarter for diversity research.
“We’ve built a pipeline of people who can immediately enter the market and lead companies,” says Kathryn Finney, founder of DigitalUndivided.
According to Michael del Castillo for New York Business Journal, the company will research the “racial makeup of a 60,000-person ‘startup genome’ to create a comprehensive gender and racial map of the global start-up community.”
On June 25 and July 23, there will be a second and third race and gender talk at the Etsy company headquarters in New York City. The times for these events are 6 to 8 p.m., and each costs $20.
On May 30, the organization Deep Lab will host a hacking event to figure out how to keep money circulating in Black communities for a longer period of time.
According to the group, “on NYC’s Upper East Side, a dollar circulates for an average of 17 days inside the community. Jog 20 blocks north to Harlem, and spend a dollar there; it only circulates in the community for 6 hours.”
Deep Lab is an organization of cyber-feminists featuring researchers who explore privacy, security, surveillance, anonymity and large-scale data aggregation within the arts, culture and society.
The event will feature digital security trainer for Freedom of the Press Foundation and Deep Lab Harlo Holmes, Calena Jamieson, Mutale Nkonde and Sacha Thompson.
“Online retail gives a chance to keep more money in the hands of the Black community,” Holmes said.
“Once this money starts circulating, we can use it to stimulate employment, build institutions and increase the tax base of traditionally underserved communities,” Holmes explains in an interview with Mutale Nkonde for The Brooklyn Reader.
The goal of the event is to create solutions for poverty, inform attendees about managing finances and creating wealth and finally creating a sense of autonomy and power in the vain of Black Wall Street in the early 1920s.
The event is currently sold out, but there is a strong chance that the event could return. For more information, check out Deep Lab.
Kasi Lemmons
Notable Works: Black Nativity (2013), Eve’s Bayou (1997), Talk to Me (2007)
Impact: She has been an actress and director working in the industry since the 1990s. She has only directed five titles to date, but her film Eve’s Bayou helped launch the career of actress Jurnee Smollett. Her films have won awards on the independent film circuit.
Sanaa Hamri
Notable Works: Elementary (2013-present), Shameless (2011-present)
Impact: Hamri is a native of Morocco who has created an impressive career as a TV and film director. She has directed the hit films Just Wright (2010), The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (2008) and Something New (2006).
Nano technology is becoming more useful every day. The tech has been used in medicine, construction and even fashion. There is an increasing demand for nano-materials that will help produce new tech that could change people’s lives for the better. According to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, “nano-sized particles exist in nature and can be created from a variety of products, such as carbon or minerals like silver, but nano-materials by definition must have at least one dimension that is less than approximately 100 nanometers. Most nano-scale materials are too small to be seen with the naked eye — even with conventional lab microscopes.” These materials can help improve other organisms in the long run.
Nano-Needles
In recent years, researchers have created nano-needles that act the same way larger needles do on lab mice. The tiny needles stay inside the body and then over a short period, they began to bio-degrade. This type of tech will be used to help burn victims with skin treatment, organ transplants and cell regeneration.
Rakia Finley
Finley is the founder and CEO of Surge Assembly. The technology firm’s goal is to promote growth in terms of racial and gender diversity. Her business started in 2003-04. At that time, she was helping nonprofits in the Washington, D.C., area expand into the thriving tech world. She and her brother help these organizations with their websites and email marketing.
Kimberly Bryant
In 2011, Bryant founded San Francisco-based nonprofit Black Girls Code. Her organization has been responsible for inspiring 1,500 girls to work in technology fields such as robotics, video game design, mobile phone application development and computer programming. In 2014, she received the White House Champions of Change for Tech Inclusion award for work to diversify the tech industry.
A secret drone, a Boeing-built X37B, has a mission to deliver materials to the International Space Station.
The drone first launched in 2010. It has no pilot, crew or any onboard person monitoring the ship’s control. This is a drone by the purest definition. The “secret” drone launches May 20, making it the fourth time it’s launched.
Engadget.com reporter Mariella Moon writes, “it won’t only be testing a new type of Hall effect thruster for the Air Force, it will also be carrying a collection of 100 different materials that can potentially be used for future spacecraft, rovers, rockets and other space hardware.” Hall Effect thrusters use electricity as an energy rather than chemical combustion. This makes them more efficient for small velocity changes during lengthy missions.
Project METIS stands for Materials Exposure and Technology Innovation in Space. Goals for the drone and the project is are to gather data, incorporate new materials and possibly deliver samples for on-board missions.
“Lips were sealed for the previous X-37B missions, and there is a simple and plausible explanation for this. The Hall Effect thruster was not carried on these flights. The other payloads were more secretive, and were probably not connected to any U.S. Air Force program,” according to Morris Jones for SpaceDaily.com.
Only time will tell if NASA discloses more information.