Month: March 2021

Microsoft won a nearly $22 billion contract to supply U.S. Army combat troops with its augmented reality headsets.     Microsoft and the Army separately announced the deal Wednesday.   The technology is based on Microsoft's HoloLens headsets, which were originally intended for the video game and entertainment industries.   Pentagon officials have described the futuristic technology — which the Army calls its Integrated Visual Augmentation System — as a way of boosting soldiers' awareness of their surroundings and their ability to spot targets and dangers.   Microsoft's head-mounted HoloLens displays let people see virtual imagery superimposed over the physical world in front of them — anything from holograms in virtual game worlds to repair instructions floating over a broken gadget. Users can control what they see using hand gestures…

Four Republican U.S. lawmakers requested on Tuesday that Facebook Inc., Twitter, and Alphabet Inc.'s Google turn over any studies they have done on how their services affect children's mental health.The request follows a joint hearing last week of two House Energy and Commerce subcommittees at which the companies' chief executives discussed their content moderation practices in the wake of the siege on the Capitol in January.Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the committee's ranking Republican, asked the CEOs at the hearing whether their companies had conducted internal research concerning children's mental health.Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg said he believed the company had, while Twitter’s Jack Dorsey said he did not believe so. Google’s Sundar Pichai said the company consulted with outside experts and invested "a lot of time and effort in these areas."In letters…

Elon Musk’s SpaceX suffered another setback Tuesday when one of its experimental rockets malfunctioned during a test flight at the company’s Texas facility.   The incident occurred as the Starship SN11 prototype was attempting to land after what the company called a normal ascent to roughly 12 kilometers in altitude.   Heavy fog obscured observers from seeing exactly what happened, but an explosion seems most likely, as there were reports of fire and debris.   "At least the crater is in the right place!" Musk tweeted.   This is the third time the experimental rocket has crash-landed or exploded.   John Insprucker, a SpaceX engineer, said all was going well when data feeds and the on-board cameras stopped working as the vehicle entered a thick layer of fog while trying…

A robot conceived to roll on planets is being used by firefighters in the U.S. to give them “situational awareness” before going into dangerous situations. It’s called Squishy, and Michelle Quinn found out more.Camera: Michelle Quinn Producer: Michelle Quinn   ...

After canceling plans for undersea cables connecting the United States with Hong Kong because of U.S. government pressure, Facebook and Google now say they will run similar cables to Singapore and Indonesia.   “Named Echo and Bifrost, those will be the first two cables to go through a new diverse route crossing the Java Sea, and they will increase overall subsea capacity in the trans-Pacific by about 70%,” Facebook’s vice president of network investments, Kevin Salvadori, told the Reuters news agency. Salvadori would not comment on the cost of the project. He said the Echo cable, which is being built in partnership with Google and Indonesian telecommunications company XL, would be completed by 2023. Bifrost, which is being done in partnership with Telin, a subsidiary of Indonesia’s Telkom, and Singapore’s…