Technology

If you liked Mercedes-Benz’s flagship electric sedan, the EQS, but grimaced at its six-figure price tag (or don’t feel you need its sundry bells and whistles), the German automaker has a new vehicle on the way that may be of interest. On Sunday, Mercedes-Benz revealed the EQE, a slightly smaller sedan built on the same technical platform that will undoubtedly be a few bucks cheaper when it launches next year — though the company did not share pricing. The EQE was revealed at the 2021 IAA Mobility conference alongside a few other electrics that are coming out of Stuttgart: the EQB compact SUV, AMG performance and Maybach versions of the EQS, and an electric G-Wagen concept. While the EQE is 3.5 inches shorter than the EQS, it will share a lot of the same traits as the company’s leading elec...

Segway has introduced its first robot mower, the Navimow, that uses GPS to stay on your lawn and keep it neatly trimmed. So unlike other robot mowers, you won’t have to install a boundary wire to keep the robot on the right patch of grass. Segway says its Exact Fusion Locating System keeps the Navimow to “precise positions and systematic mowing patterns,” keeping its position accurate to within two centimeters. If its GPS signal is temporarily weak, the Navimow has sensors that will keep it mowing. Users define the boundaries of the area to be mowed for the Navimow using its smartphone app, including giving it directions for which areas to avoid. Segway says the Navimow’s algorithm “determines a systemic mowing path,” and doesn’t have to criss-cross already-mowed areas. [embedded content] ...

Premium vacuum company Dyson has patented designs for robots that look like they could climb and clean stairs, and open drawers, new filings show. It’s not clear whether the designs are for forthcoming products or ideas that are on hold, but Bloomberg reports that Dyson’s robotic unit has been working on a robot to interact with other home appliances. Whether it’s the robot hand or the stair-climbing robot, or another product entirely also isn’t clear at this point. The patents published in the UK on September 1st show the two designs; a “robotic device with tri-star wheels and actuated arm” that would be able to climb steps and clean them (a stair-climbing vacuum sounds like an excellent idea), and a “robot hand” which is shown in drawings with the patent application holding a mug (and wh...

NFT collectors are now spending thousands of dollars worth of Ethereum cryptocurrency on virtual game items that don’t actually belong to any game, feature any artwork, or have any stats to them. The project — known as Loot — was launched by American entrepreneur and programmer Dom Hofmann, who created a system where NFT collectors can spend money to create loot bags of unique items, with just 8,000 loot bags to ever be made. Despite not having any artwork or real game tied to it, a market began to form around its scarcity and prices quickly soared. In one case, a user is even selling a “Divine Robe of Power” for 300 ETH, which is equivalent to more than $1 million USD. Despite owning these lists, the “NFTs” remained to be just names of items, and so people began creating visuals for them,...

Sony is now planning to offer a free Horizon Forbidden West upgrade from PS4 to PS5. The U-turn follows widespread criticism after the company announced there would be no upgrade path for Horizon Forbidden West PS4 players, despite an original promise of a free upgrade to the PS5 version. “It’s abundantly clear that the offerings we confirmed in our pre-order kickoff missed the mark,” admits Jim Ryan, president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment. “While the pandemic’s profound impact pushed Forbidden West out of the launch window we initially envisioned, we will stand by our offer: Players who purchase Horizon Forbidden West on PlayStation 4 will be able to upgrade to the PlayStation 5 version for free.” Sony had originally planned to force PS4 players of Horizon Forbidden West to p...

Home Depot has launched a smart home app meant to be an all-in-one for smart appliances and accessories the big box store sells, but it’s debatable why anyone would need it when Google Home and Amazon’s Alexa already exist. Called Hubspace, the free app is available in Android and iOS app stores, and “enables light bulbs, smart plugs and ceiling fans to be controlled from anywhere,” according to a press release from Home Depot. It’s compatible with Google Home and Amazon Alexa devices, and works with a short list of products that Home Depot sells, from its proprietary brands such as Hampton Bay and EcoSmart. “There’s no need for a hub or extra equipment, and the platform already works with more than 20 products,” the press release explains. OK, so there’s no hub required and you can contro...

On Thursday, Sony announced that its Horizon Forbidden West game, sequel to Horizon Zero Dawn, would be available for pre-order ahead of its February 2022 release date. But contrary to what Sony said last year (h/t Forbes), there’s no upgrade path for the game from PlayStation 4 to PlayStation 5. In a September 2020 blog post, Sony said Horizon Forbidden West would be among the games to have a free upgrade from PS4 versions to the PS5 version: “Additionally, we know that the PS4 community will transition to PS5 at different times, and we’re happy to announce PS4 versions of some of our exclusives. Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Sackboy A Big Adventure, and Horizon Forbidden West will also launch on PS4. While these three games were designed to take advantage of PS5 and its unique next...

Facebook is apologizing for an incident where its AI mislabeled a video of Black men with a “primates” label, calling it an “unacceptable error” that it was examining to prevent it from happening again. As reported by the New York Times, users who watched a June 27th video posted by the UK tabloid Daily Mail received an auto-prompt asking whether they wanted to “keep seeing videos about Primates.” Facebook disabled the entire topic recommendation feature as soon as it realized what was happening, a spokesperson said in an email to The Verge on Saturday. “This was clearly an unacceptable error,” the spokesperson said. The company is investigating the cause to prevent the behavior from happening again, the spokesperson added. “As we have said, while we have made improvements to our AI we kno...

It has long been common knowledge that there is water ice on the surface of the Moon due to the pioneering efforts of the many lunar expeditions in the past three decades. In order to truly explore and entertain the idea of humans taking up a potential permanent residence on the Moon, NASA scientists have devised a plant to land the world’s first autonomous lunar rover on the Moon to search for dihydrogen-monoxide deposits. The upcoming Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) mission will help scientists get a stronger understanding of how the frozen molecules are distributed and the best way for them to be extracted from the lunar soil. The machine itself is the size of a golf cart and is set to be land on the Moon’s South Pole in late 2023. The mission will be 100-days an...

BMW’s Motorrad division has been pumping out some wild concepts over the last few years as the larger company turns its attention towards electric vehicles. It’s latest is also the to date, but still looks extremely cool: the CE 02 mini-bike. Debuted this week ahead of the IAA Mobility conference in Germany, the CE 02 is a tiny two-wheeler that borrows some of the futuristic vibes BMW has been honing for its larger concept bikes — including the CE 04, which is actually going into production. Clad in silver and black and “technoid typography,” the minimalist design looks like it came right off the set of a sci-fi movie. The CE 02 has an 11kW belt-drive motor, which can help the bike reach a top speed of around 90 kilometers per hour (about 56 miles per hour). BMW isn’t sharing the battery c...