The open-back HiFiMan Sundara headphones feature planar magnetic drivers that deliver clear detail. They sit

Meta Platforms Inc. said it would end news content on Facebook and Instagram in Canada if lawmakers pass

Amazon is testing whether humanoid robots that walk around with glowing eyes could help staff its warehouses. The company has in recent years added a host of new technologies as part of its Amazon Robotics arm, primarily using it in its warehouses, including arms and small carts that are able to help pack orders. It now has 750,000 robots working alongside employees, it said. This week it unveiled more of hose robots, including a system named Sequoia that helps pack its itinerary at those warehouses. But the most dramatic new robot was a system named Digit that is now being tested for Amazon’s operations. Amazon calls Digit a “mobile manipulator solution”, and pointed to the fact that they are able to move around and grasp items in ways that other robots aren’t. It does so in an uncannily human form, with glowing eyes in the front of its head and arms and legs that allow it to walk around. The system was built by Agility Robotics, which has a partnership with Amazon. It is 175cm tall, can work for 16 hours out of a day and has the ability to perceive people and crouch and squat, for instance. “Its size and shape are well suited for buildings that are designed for humans, and we believe that there is a big opportunity to scale a mobile manipulator solution, such as Digit, which can work collaboratively with employees,” Amazon said in an announcement. “Our initial use for this technology will be to help employees with tote recycling, a highly repetitive process of picking up and moving empty totes once inventory has been completely picked out of them.” Tye Brady, chief technologist at Amazon Robotics, said that he was more interested in how the humanoid form could allow for new kinds of mobility, such as using legs to walk over varied terrain, rather than having it mimic the look of humans. He also suggested that if the robot’s shape came to be a barrier to adoption then Amazon “can change that”. The robot is still in testing for now, in an attempt to understand how it might be used, and is not deployed in any of Amazon's normal operations. It may never actually be used, it suggested, if the project finds that such robots are not helpful. Amazon also committed to ensure “robotics are collaborative and support employees”. In an apparent attempt to allay concerns about the robots taking jobs and leaving its staff redundant, it pointed to the growth in new jobs that has come even as its investment in robotics has increased, and said that there were 700 new job categories that didn’t exist before that expansion. “From the hardware to the artificial intelligence embedded in our robotics, we are passionate about technology that makes the work experience of our employees safer, easier, and less repetitive,” Amazon committed. It said that the extra time saved with robots would allow employees to “take a step back” and evaluate how orders were being fulfilled, for instance. Amazon is just one of a range of companies looking at humanoid robots for logistical work. Tesla, for instance, has a system called “Optimus” which Elon Musk has suggested could eventually become its biggest business, but which is yet to actually be rolled out. Read More Amazon to start dropping packages into people’s gardens using drones in the UK Tesla’s profits dip as Musk goes on rant about staff working from home Facebook has stopped working

Gigaclear Ltd., a startup building out fiber-optic connections in the UK, has attracted investment commitments for as much

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -Cisco Systems will begin manufacturing from India in a move to diversify its global supply chain, Chief

The Biden administration is continuing its push to bring internet connectivity to every home and business in the U.S. On Monday, the Biden administration announced a new investment of $667 million to build broadband infrastructure in rural areas of the country

Ford is recalling over 422,000 SUVs in the U.S. because the image from the rear camera may not be displayed

I’ve been a lover of books for as long as I can remember. Junie B.

Calling all gamers: Best Buy is hosting a sale on video games, consoles, controllers, TVs,

The five day week could soon be completely obsolete, if Bill Gates is to be believed. The Microsoft founder thinks that one of the results of AI will be the possibility of three day weeks becoming attainable for many people. While there are plenty of fears about the impact AI will have on the world economy and the potential dangers it poses to society, Gates believes it could mean humans ultimately have to do a lot less work to get by. Gates spoke on Trevor Noah’s What Now? podcast and the conversation turned to the possibilities that come hand in hand with AI. "If you eventually get a society where you only have to work three days a week, that's probably OK," he said. The billionaire also said that we could get to the stage where people can work fewer days to earn a living wage, as they co-exist in a world where "machines can make all the food and the stuff”. It’s not all positive, though. Gates previously warned about the dangers of AI in a blog over the summer. He wrote: "I don't think AI's impact will be as dramatic as the Industrial Revolution, but it certainly will be as big as the introduction of the PC. Word processing applications didn't do away with office work, but they changed it forever. Employers and employees had to adapt, and they did." Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter How to join the indy100's free WhatsApp channel Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings

By Mariko Katsumura, Sam Nussey and Miho Uranaka TOKYO (Reuters) -Chip equipment maker Kokusai Electric has raised $724.4 million after

ARLINGTON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 22, 2023--