Mid 2023 Tech and Science round up

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I follow about all the tech/science news that I can… so long as the sources are palatable enough not to wear on me.

Not sure if this thread will sink or swim but I’d enjoy talking about the breakthroughs of the last few years.

I’ll list a few of what I remember as well as some projects out there I’m waiting on.

The apple VR headset is pretty cool. I dont think ill ever own or even use one but its definitely going to steer the course of VR moving forward… that full passthrough reprojection to pull off AR effects really surprised me. Completely bypasses the challenges of pure augmented reality overlay. Also apple is staged to bring a lot more productivity and device interoperability into VR. Steam and Meta are sort of lame ducks in comparison.

The fusion breakthrough… more power out than in for the first time… and thats exciting because that facility was built on 1990s hardware. They could rebuild that same system with significant reductions in complexity.

… theres actually a lot going on in fusion research. Over at iter they found a construction of a sort of plasma cool down/spill off loop which does a number of things to improve thr viability of toroidal reactors.

This sort of ties into Ai, which I don’t really care to get into as a topic at large, but there is a company attempting to re-integrate analog circuits into digital computing.

The general concept is volts*amps=watts… essentially its free multiplication. It ties into AI as the tech can greatly reduce the power consumption of running transforms.

…

Theres a lot more but I’ll leave it to you all to grow the list.

I can’t wait to see spacex’s starship doing orbital flights… actually starlink could have made it onto my preceding list. Lightspeed internet from outer space accessible from anywhere on the globe. Thats new… sounds like the foundation of the future.

The aptera solar car is another product I’m waiting on.

I bought an ebike about a month ago and i’m loving it. Its limited to 20mph but having the freedom to use sidewalks or roads… not needing insurance or even a license… also not burning gasoline to get around.

… it’s also small enough and simple enough I can fix anything that winds up wrong with it.

Ebikes have been around for years… but they’re getting cheap now.

Batteries are another area of interest I follow… lots of cool stuff happening there.

Anyone else here wind up geeking out on this sort of stuff?

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What eBike did you get ? @shutterbug has a scooter. That’s pretty nice. I’ve been thinking of getting a moped style electric bike.

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Disagreement. I use my Q2 for VR exercise and have zero interest in passthrough. All the announcements this spring were along the lines of:

Meta & Apple: We have improved passthrough!
VR users: How nice for you. When are we getting more song packs for Beat Saber?

I participate heavily in VR groups by virtue of having both the Sony VR for the PS4 (that my daughter bootlegged) and the OQ2. I’ll be buying the Q3 on release. The only people who want the overpriced Apple headset that is too heavy are the same Apple fanbois who overpay for their phones and watches.

I own a pair of eScooters for myself and my wife. We actually have three, one is being gifted to my daughter:

  • Synergy Storm
  • Circooter Raptor Pro
  • Circooter Mate

My Storm has a top speed of 49 mph but can be jailbroken to hit 70 mph. I don’t recommend riding over 25 mph as anything faster is asking for serious injury in the inevitable wipeout. The Raptor Pro can do 40 mph under ideal conditions. The mate tops out at 35 mph (it only has a single rear motor). The truth is that one of the nice things about riding an eScooter is that you can go slower, take things in, and still get there faster than walking.

They’re great for local commuting. I’m also thinking eBikes for my wife and me next year as well.

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Whoops. Meant to say the latter two can do 40 kph and 35 kph respectively - got scrambled as I’m not used to using mph. The Storm will do 49 mph from the factory and 70 mph if hacked.

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Its some cheapo one from amazon but I liked the style… its semi-moped style. I was looking at those moped style ones pretty cool

@shutterbug

To each their own regarding headsets. I have a quest 2 with the VR desktop app for wireless streaming… but I get annoyed with how often I have to take it off and make adjustments.

And to clarify no intent or desire for the apple headset, but i’d like a headset that allows me to make more use of my pc. The virtual computer in a VR space feels pretty wonky…

I’m really not a fan of how closed off the software environments for the devices are, both meta and even more so with apple keep it all locked down.

Never play ps4 VR… looks pretty legit though.

i gotta get moving and get to work.

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I’m only using mine for a handful of exercise games and to watch the occasional video in a mock theatre experience. I have no interest in mixed or augmented reality.

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