Category Archives: Technology

Amazon Union Vote in Alabama Gathers 3,215 Ballots

The union seeking to represent workers at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama said late Wednesday that there were 3,215 ballots cast — or about 55 percent of the roughly 5,800 workers who were eligible to vote. The ballots are expected to be counted by hand starting either Thursday afternoon or Friday morning in the National […]

As Locusts Swarmed East Africa, This Tech Helped Squash Them

“Saying ‘Oh, there’s locusts in northern Kenya’ doesn’t help at all,” Mr. Cressman said. “We need longitude and latitude coordinates in real time.” Rather than try to rewrite the locust-tracking software for newer tablets, Mr. Cressman thought it would be more efficient to create a simple smartphone app that would allow anyone to collect data […]

Taiwan’s Drought Pits Chip Makers Against Farmers

HSINCHU, Taiwan — Chuang Cheng-deng’s modest rice farm is a stone’s throw from the nerve center of Taiwan’s computer chip industry, whose products power a huge share of the world’s iPhones and other gadgets. This year, Mr. Chuang is paying the price for his high-tech neighbors’ economic importance. Gripped by drought and scrambling to save […]

Western University PhD student creates missing persons research hub

A Western University sociology PhD student noticed a lack of national data and information-sharing when it comes to missing persons cases and decided to address it herself. Launched in January, Lorna Ferguson says the reaction to the Missing Persons Research Hub has been overwhelmingly positive. Read more: Tori Stafford killer accused by family of […]

5 Tips for Smartphone Voice Tools

It has been a decade since Apple integrated Siri right into its iPhone software and mainstreamed the voice-activated assistant. But the assistant is just one of the voice-powered tools in your smartphone’s ever-growing audio toolbox. Your device can also be a digital recorder, a dictation machine, a podcast production studio and more. Here’s how to […]

Is ‘Femtech’ the Next Big Thing in Health Care?

Clue allows women to do exactly that with a few taps on their smartphone. Today, the company has a lot of competition in the period- and fertility-tracking area. And plenty of other women-specific tools have come onto the market. Elvie, a London-based company, has marketed a wearable breast pump and a pelvic exercise trainer and […]

YouTube Discloses Percentage of Views That Go to Videos That Break its Rules

It is the never-ending battle for YouTube. Every minute, YouTube is bombarded with videos that run afoul of its many guidelines, whether pornography or copyrighted material or violent extremism or dangerous misinformation. The company has refined its artificially intelligent computer systems in recent years to prevent most of these so-called violative videos from being uploaded […]

Electric Aircraft Start-Up Accuses Rival of Stealing Its Secrets

Intellectual property lawsuits are not uncommon in quickly developing and promising industries — as Mr. Page knows well. In one recent case, Waymo, a company owned by Google’s parent, Alphabet, accused one of its former employees and Uber of stealing trade secrets to gain an advantage in the race to develop autonomous cars. The companies […]