The world has been hard at work, trying to find solutions to store the 100 zettabytes of data that are expected to hit the cloud by 2023. 

Microsoft and Warner Bros, for their parts, have just demonstrated why they think they are ahead of the game – in both protecting past archives, and in storing those to come.

At Microsoft's Ignite conference, CEO Satya Nadella showed off a piece of quartz glass the size of a drink coaster. Within the glass was stored a 143-minute Warner Bros movie – fittingly, the film was Superman. 

The technology is the result of Microsoft Research's Project Silica, which was set up to design new storage systems for the cloud. 

Project Silica's researchers have been working on developing ultrafast laser optics, which they used to encode the entire film in glass.

Using an ultrafast pulse laser, they wrote 'voxels' inside the glass – that is, the three-dimensional equivalent of the pixels that make up an image. Each voxel, therefore, has its own orientation, depth, and size, making it a unique encoder for the movie. 

Because voxels are engraved at the nano-scale level, they can be written in multiple layers throughout the glass. A two-millimeter piece, for example, can contain more than 100 layers of voxels, making for high-density storage. 

According to Microsoft, the glass and the data it contains can resist being boiled in water, baked in an oven, microwaved, flooded, scoured, and demagnetized. By permanently changing the structure of the glass, the laser ensures that the information is securely printed for potentially thousands of years.

Ant Rowstron, deputy lab director at Microsoft Research - Cambridge, said: "One big thing we wanted to eliminate is this expensive cycle of moving and rewriting data to the next generation."

"We really wanted something you can put on the shelf for 50 or 100 or 1,000 years and forget about until you need it." 

To carry out Project Silica, Microsoft partnered with the University of Southampton in the UK, where scientists had already developed a laser-writing technology to record data back in 2016, which they claimed could have "a virtually unlimited lifetime at room temperature."

Peter Kazansky, who worked on the project, said at the time that this would open a new era of data archiving. "This technology can secure the last evidence of our civilization: all we've learned will not be forgotten," he said.

For a media company like Warner Bros, this could have huge implications. Storing its 100-year film and television archives is indeed currently causing it some headaches. 

The company keeps three copies of each asset stored in various locations around the world. It has plans in place in case an earthquake, a hurricane or a fire struck one of its storage locations. And every three to five years, it migrates its digital content to stay ahead of degradation issues.

The company's chief technology officer, Vicky Colf, said: "Imagine if a title like The Wizard of Oz or a show like Friends wasn't available for generation after generation to enjoy… That's why we take the job of preserving and archiving our content extremely seriously."

As intriguing as storing data on glass may seem, though, the technology is not made for users to be able to play films at home on a specially made quartz glass DVD player. 

The voxels encoded by the laser in the glass can only be read by a computer-controlled microscope that uses machine learning to decode and reconstruct the patterns that come out when polarized light is shone through the glass. 

So, the data stored in the new technology won't be information that needs to be accessed regularly. Instead, Microsoft spoke of it as 'cold data,' or archival data that companies are required to maintain but don't need to see for months or years. 

Cold data includes media archives like those held by Warner Bros, but also medical data, or legal contracts, or even urban building plans that cities have to retain.

"We are not trying to build things that you put in your house or play movies from," said Rowstron. "We are building storage that operates at the cloud scale."

In other words, Microsoft is interested in technology that exists exclusively for the cloud – something that it previously outlined in its mission statement for Project Silica, in which it said that its research was not concerned with the deployment of information outside the cloud, such as offices, homes, mobile phones or enterprise data centers. 

Microsoft cautions that there is much work ahead before physical quartz-glass archives can be used at scale. To do so, Microsoft engineers would need to speed up data encoding, as well as increase the data density.

You can now bring your old whiteboards into the 21stcentury with Rocketbook Beacons. These four restickable, reusable Beacons convert your writing surface into a smartboard by integrating with popular cloud services in the free Rocketbook app. 

Brainstorm the next great mission with your crew, capture and share your ideas, and then take your Beacons with you to your next adventure. The Beacons Go-Pack is $15.
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• Set of 4 Beacons
• 2.5-inch triangles
• Fluorescent orange
• Restickable Yupo adhesive 
• Wash with soap and water
• Free Go-Pack carry case

Rocketbook Beacons allow you to capture, organize, and broadcast important notes, diagrams, and big ideas on any whiteboard or wall surface in real-time. Just four restickable "beacons" for any sized surface and one smartphone app that connects with many of the popular cloud services you already use.
Using Beacons involves four easy steps:

1. Place the four Beacon quadra-triangles in each corner of a whiteboard or your preferred writing area. Do your best to make it straight, but it doesn’t have to be perfect. Now document your ideas and discussions on the whiteboard the way you usually would.
2. Got an iPhone or Android? Use the free Rocketbook app to configure popular cloud services as your scan destinations. Rocketbook has partnered with some of your favorite services, such as Evernote, One Note, Dropbox, and Google Drive. You can also use regular email if you wish.
3. For crucial missions with scattered participants, you can stream your whiteboard in real-time. Switch to “Snapcast” mode, share the unique URL, and collaborate with your team anywhere in the world. Your private, real-time page is updated every time you scan your whiteboard. Or prop your phone facing your whiteboard and set the app to auto-scan every 5 seconds. 
4. Is your next mission destined for a different whiteboard? No problem. Peel the Beacons off of the board and prepare for your next voyage. Beacons have a space-aged micro-suction surface that can not only be reused over and over but even cleaned with soap and water.

Whether you love paper and pen or prefer to live paper-free, you still probably need to take notes, read PDFs, or maybe even illustrate an idea with a sketch. Smart notebooks help bring ideas typically captured on paper into a digital format. Some smart notebooks also involve real paper.

Smart notebooks don’t really conform to a firm definition. There’s still a lot of interpretation as to what a smart notebook is. That said, they are different from tablets: Tablets usually have color screens, like the Retina display on any recent iPad. Smart notebooks use some other kind of technology for the interface.

Some smart notebooks work best as digital tablets for writing and sketching. Others are paper-based notebooks with either a pressure-sensitive pad behind them to capture what you write or a companion app you use to scan pages.

Also included is one unique product that is something of an “honorary” smart notebook even though it’s a pen. It’s so smart, however, that it turns any notebook into a smart notebook.

Here are five of the best options listed in alphabetical order:

LiveScribe Echo 2GB ($179). It’s not a smart notebook per se, but the LiveScribe Echo pen turns any notebook into a smart one. This special pen has the unique ability to remember what you write or draw, the order in which you did so, and any audio that played while you wrote. That means you can take lecture notes while also recording the speaker. Or you can write your notes and dictate additional thoughts. When you’re done with your work, you can sync the memory from the LiveScribe Echo pen to a macOS or Windows computer and see all your notes reappear in the order that you took them on screen in a digital notebook.

Onyx Boox Max 3 ($859). It may seem like you need a money-is-no-object attitude to buy the Onyx Boox Max 3, and maybe you do. But the key thing to know about this smart notebook is just how much it’s capable of. It’s a big, 13.3-inch e-reader with E-Ink Mobius (making reading easy on the eyes) running Android 9 that’s Wi-Fi-capable, so you can also use it to surf the web or connect to digital libraries. About the only thing it can’t do is display color since it’s grayscale only. The Onyx Boox Max 3 is especially useful for anyone who spends hours a day pouring over PDFs and needs to make notes on the pages, mark them up, highlight passages, or even translate text. It ships with 4GB of RAM, a stylus, charging cable, HDMI cable, and protective sleeve.

reMarkable ($499). ReMarkable is billed as the digital notebook for people who don’t want to give up paper. It’s designed to feel like paper as you read, draw, and write on it. This 10.3-inch smart notebook not only feels like paper but also sounds like it when you write or draw on it with the included marker. The pressure-sensitive marker never requires charging or pairing. This notebook doubles an e-reader. The surface contains the company’s own Canvas technology, which uses black ink particles to reflect natural light. When you buy a reMarkable tablet, it ships with not only the marker but also with eight replacement tips and a cable for recharging.

Rocketbook Everlast ($32). The Rocketbook Everlast Notebook is a smart and reusable paper notebook. The predecessor version of the Rocketbook had users write with a special pen and then use a microwave oven to remove the writing. In the 2019 version, you write on special waterproof pages with a Pilot Frixion pen and wipe the pages clean with a damp microfiber cloth when you’re done. So, what makes it a smart notebook? Using a companion app, you scan your pages to turn them into digital notes. At the bottom of each page are a few icons. You assign each symbol to a destination in one of your cloud storage services, such as a particular folder in Google Drive or a notebook in Evernote. Whenever you write on a page, you put color in the corresponding icon, and the app files your pages accordingly when you scan them. The app works with Dropbox, Google Drive, Evernote, Microsoft OneNote, and email, with support for a few other services in the works. The book comes in four colors (black, red, midnight blue, and teal) and two sizes (8.5 X 11 inches with 32 pages or 6 X 8.8 inches with 36 pages).

Wacom Bamboo Folio ($199). The Wacom Bamboo Folio is for people who love to write on paper with a pen but also want the benefits of digitized notes. Wacom has long been a leader in digital tablets, especially those for drawing and sketching. The Bamboo Folio puts an exciting twist on the concept of a smart notebook, however. It’s a paper pad tucked into a little folio case, and the back of the case is a smart surface. When you write or draw on the paper, the smart surface records your marks. It stores them and later transfers them wirelessly to a companion app. You never have to scan your handwritten pages, but you get the same result as if you did.
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Wacom also sells a less expensive Bamboo Slate ($129.99). It works similarly, but it’s a slab rather than a folded folio.

You hear the warning every time you fly: Please set all devices to airplane mode. But what happens if you don't?

It’s not that long ago that airlines stopped telling passengers to keep their mobile phones, tablets, e-readers and other devices turned off throughout the flight. 

Why Airplane Mode. We’re asked to turn our devices off or to put them in Airplane Mode because of electromagnetic interference from phones, tablets, e-readers, electronic headsets, and more. Since some planes were built before these became a thing, it took a while for the industry to make sure it was entirely safe to use them.

These days, you’ll even see iPads and other tablets in the flight deck, which pilots use to store paperwork instead of lugging around big bags with actual paper in them. You’ll see flight attendants using tablets and big phones too, either instead of or in addition to those reams and reams of dot-matrix printed paperwork. All those devices have been tested extensively to make sure there’s no interference.  

That testing happened during the rigorous qualification process to enable airlines to offer inflight internet. Part of that testing process is creating enough electromagnetic interference to represent an entire cabin full of devices of a variety of sizes, including some that are malfunctioning. Pretty much every airliner-equipment combo operated by a major international airline has now been tested.

So, what happens if I don't put my phone on airplane mode? 

For years, safety regulators, airlines, aircraft manufacturers, and everyone else in the industry has known that there are dozens of devices left out of airplane mode on every flight. In a way, the fact that planes haven’t fallen out of the sky willy-nilly because someone left their Kindle on is the best demonstration that, for the most part, most devices don’t affect most planes.

But “most” isn’t good enough for aviation. Some folks don’t know that their Kindle even has 3G, or that the Bluetooth on their watch or headphones or other device counts as needing to be put into airplane mode. Some forget that they’ve packed one of those devices in the overhead bin. Some even blatantly ignore the rules, assuming that their vital email on that BlackBerry isn’t going to make their plane start to plummet. And it probably isn’t. 

The real reason to be sure your phone is put into Airplane Mode is to be sure that you don’t accidentally connect to the in-flight roaming network and get billed for time on that network. This is also true if you are in a foreign country. Airplane Mode keeps your cellular devices from roaming on a local network which could generate huge charges depending on how long you are in-country. That’s also true for cruises.
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The other big reason to use Airplane Mode while on aircraft is that the effort your cell phone goes through to keep scanning and tower hopping at fly-by speeds can drain your battery in a big way.

More than 400 police agencies across the United States are working with the Amazon-owned Ring home surveillance system, and now you can check if your local department is one of them.

Ring disclosed the number late month, and it’s double what reports had previously revealed. It also published an interactive map where anyone can check whether their hometown cops are part of the controversial effort through which police can see all the Ring cameras in a given neighborhood, can seamlessly request the footage and are encouraged to promote the device.

The map, where you can also check when each department started working with Ring, is available here, along with a blog post about the Ring-law enforcement partnership. The company will be updating the map as new departments are added, it says.

The release coincided with an in-depth Washington Post story, which disclosed the full number of agencies for the first time.

The Ring system includes its surveillance cameras (most famously the motion-activated camera doorbells) as well as the Neighbors app (where people can share footage from their cameras and discuss crime in their areas) and the Neighborhood Portal (where police can see a map of Ring cameras and quickly submit a request for footage during an investigation). In recent months, Vice, CNET, and Gizmodo have reported on police’s close relationship with the company, which, for example, gives departments discounts or free cameras to distribute among residents. In some cases, police have used the giveaways as leverage to demand that people hand over their footage, although Ring says it is supposed to be voluntary.
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Critics worry about the privacy implications of such a built-out surveillance network, especially one that is controlled by a private company. What’s more, “neighborhood watch” apps like Neighbors or Nextdoor have had problems with racism and racial profiling, after users have raised the alarm after merely seeing people of color in their area.

We often take the quality of the water we drink for granted. Food is regularly tested for hygiene and safety, but that level of scrutiny doesn’t extend to water. With water, we usually take for granted that it’s clean if it looks, smells, and tastes okay. If only purity worked that way!

Lishtot TestDrop Prodoes what our senses cannot. Tests water for contaminants that we can’t see, smell, or taste. It scans water without needing to be immersed in it, and in a matter of 2 seconds, tells you if the water you’ve got is safe to drink or not.

In what outwardly seems like magic, the TestDrop Pro is capable of analyzing your water in seconds, without even being in contact with it. Water emits its own local electromagnetic field, which the TestDrop Pro reads. Using this electromagnetic reading, the TestDrop Pro can tell if your water is safe to drink or not. The device can test for lead, E. Coli, pesticides, chlorine, and more. The electromagnetic field emitted by the contaminants is different from that of pure water. So, using this electromagnetic reading, and a simple red and blue light, the TestDrop Pro can, within seconds, tell you whether your water is pure or not. It goes even a step further with Lishtot’s smartphone app (currently in beta testing), showing you the exact percentage of purity with remarkable accuracy!
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You can buy a TestDrop Pro at Amazonfor $50.

If you are planning any trips that are off the grid and yet still want access to phone and internet, then you need to become familiar with the Iridium satellite constellation. With satellites orbiting approximately 485 miles above the earth, this network offers global phone and data coverage, no cell towers or Wi-Fi hotspots required.

There are several kits that allow you access to the Iridium system, and one of the best is the Iridium GO! Package. The basic package comes with the Iridium GO! base station, carry case, and AC travel charger with international adapter and is suitable for those who have access to electricity. 

It's priced at $699 but remember that there are additional activation fees and a Iridium network subscription plan required (and this can be quite expensive).

The Iridium GO! Offers 15.5 hours of standby battery life, and up to 5.5 hours of talk time.

For those who genuinely want to go off-grid, there's also a special package that includes not only the Iridium GO! base station and AC travel charger with international adapter, but also comes with a solar charger, two batteries additional, and a desktop charger. This is priced at a heftier $1,095.

There are also marine and aviation equipment packages available.

Iridium GO! supports a full range of global communications using optimized apps:
                    •   Voice calls
                   •   Text messaging
                   •   Email access
                   •   Weather updates
                   •   Customized third-party apps
                   •   Emergency alerts (SOS)
                   •   Photo sharing
                   •   GPS tracking
                   •   Posting to Facebook/Twitter
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If you need to be in communication when off the grid, this is the perfect kit. Yes, it's expensive, and the subscriptions add a great deal more to the cost, but you are accessing a satellite network, not a router in the back of a café!

One of the highlights of MIT’s Emtech Next Conference in June was a debate on whether we should tax robots. We heavily tax human workers, so why not the machines that replace them? Then, goes the theory, that tax money could help provide training or benefits for workers who’ve lost their jobs to automation.

Ryan Abbott, a law professor at Surrey University, presented a convincing case for such a tax– or, more precisely, for removing the tax incentives that favor automation over human labor. Many business decisions to automate processes, argued Abbott, are driven by these tax advantages, not because the robots are more productive. If automation is more efficient, suggested Abbott, let that be the reason businesses decide to use it – not some tax break.

The counter-arguments from Ryan Avent, economics columnist at the Economist, were that taxes (or ending tax breaks) would slow innovation, and, in any case, there is little economic evidence that robots are taking over jobs. While these points appear to be less convincing, a robot tax alone won’t solve the lack of good jobs. But removing the financial incentives that favor automation over humans will at least create a level playing field.

Even more erroneous is the argument that a robot tax is a slippery slope: are they going to tax my Roomba or smart toaster next? Somehow, we manage to tax labor, and yet you can still mow your lawn and clean your house without paying the government.

Alas, the Emtech Next attendees disagreed, with 70% voting against the robot tax after hearing the debate.
One of the recurring themes at the conference was that businesses could better exploit automation and AI not just for their own efficiency, but to improve productivity and grow the economy as a whole. How? A pair of engineers, Meera Sampath at the State University of New York and Pramod P. Khargonekar at the University of California, Irvine, presented their plan for “socially responsible automation,” which starts with getting technologists to think harder about how their creations will actually be used and how those uses can benefit workers and society.

A shout-out to workers: Too often in these discussions of how automation and AI are affecting jobs, the voices of workers themselves are absent. MIT’s Thomas Kochan, speaking at the conference, at least provided a reminder to listen to such views, even in the early stages of product designs, and to involve them more in automation decisions. And, he argued, companies need to take the time to give their existing workforce the skills and training necessary to integrate them with changes in automation better.

Let’s admit it, every time we hear the word “co-bot” we cringe. Yes, there have been remarkable advances in robotics over the last decade that allow these machines to more safely and comfortably work alongside people and do more human-like tasks. And, yes, we know the promise is that, by taking over mundane tasks, these robots will free people up to do more interesting and, hopefully, productive ones.

But that’s a business decision that too often companies are not taking; instead, many are simply replacing their workers. If robots do 20% of the tasks that a worker was doing, then you need 20% fewer people to get the job done.

It’s become increasingly clear to economists that this one reason we’re facing a crisis: wages are flat, and job opportunities are limited for many workers.

MIT economist Daron Acemoglu blames this on what he calls “so-so” automation and technologies. Advances like automation should be a boon to productivity, but productivity growth has been sluggish for more than a decade. That, says Acemoglu, is because too often companies are automating jobs even when the machines are not more productive, because of the tax mentioned above distortions and a general enthusiasm for robots. So, you have a double whammy; not only are robots replacing workers, they’re not particularly adept at growing the economy.

The way out is to create new, productive tasks for the workers replaced by the automation. (That’s what happened in the past). And that’s where AI could be useful. Examples are not that hard to imagine. For instance, if you free up healthcare workers, such as radiologists and nurses, from routine tasks, they could use AI systems to collect and analyze far more patient data, expanding their capabilities and giving them new ways to advise and treat patients. Acemoglu cites similar examples existing in education and manufacturing.
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But, and this is key, Acemoglu warns that this won’t necessarily happen on its own. You can’t leave this up to the markets or the technologists. We need to pursue this goal deliberately.

Following its release of a pocket-sized handheld camera late last year, DJI – the Shenzhen-based tech company best known for its drones – has recently launched its first action camera, the Osmo Action. While the new camera is a latecomer to the game, it should compete well with similar products, such as the GoPro.

Design and Hardware.The Osmo Action doesn’t stray too far from conventional action camera design – it is small, rectangular-shaped and made of rugged composite material that combines plastic and rubber.
It is waterproof, shockproof and, at 124g, can be easily mounted on top of helmets, skateboards or bicycle handlebars.

There’s a 12-megapixel fisheye lens with a wide 145-degree field of vision. All of this is standard fare for action cameras and is neither better nor worse than GoPro’s Hero 7 Black in any meaningful way.

There is, however, one stand-out feature: in addition to the main screen on the backside of the camera, there is a secondary front-facing display, which has never been offered before on an action camera.

Having a front-facing screen improves shooting selfie videos significantly as it allows the user to see precisely what they’re recording. It makes so much sense in today’s selfie-centric vlogger generation that, in hindsight, it’s baffling why GoPro has never thought of this before.

The camera has three hardware buttons – power, shutter, and mode switch – and a responsive main screen that supports swiping and tapping. The bright, 2.3-inch main screen is large enough to let the user easily tweak shooting modes and settings.

The camera runs on a relatively small 1,300mAh battery, which offers about 90 minutes of recording time, but it is removable, and thus, interchangeable. The footage is stored on a micro-SD card, which is not included with the camera.

Software.The Osmo Action can connect to DJI’s Mimo app, available on both iOS and Android, and once linked; the camera can be controlled remotely with a mobile device. However, the device’s touch screen interface is so intuitive that most reviewers found little need to sync up the app.

The camera can capture videos at a wide range of resolutions, from 720p up to 4K/60fps. Shooting in lower resolution, such as 1080p, allows the camera to bump the framerate up to 240fps, ideal for capturing fast-moving moments.

Performance.Electronic image stabilization (EIS) is crucial for action cameras as they’re meant to shoot on the move, so it’s just as well DJI has years of experience writing EIS algorithms for its high-flying drone cameras.

The camera’s EIS mode is called “Rock Steady,” and it can be activated with a couple of taps. The reason DJI gives the option to toggle EIS on or off is that there are trade-offs.

Footage with “Rock Steady” on have a slightly smaller field of vision (digital cropping is essential for EIS) and dynamic range suffers due to lack of HDR (high dynamic range). You should turn the mode off to get the best video quality and colors if you’re shooting with the device in a stationary position, but anytime you’re moving, turn it on as the difference in fluidity and stability is drastic.

Conclusion.
At $380, the Osmo Action initially seemed expensive for someone who might not participate in extreme sports and who has tested fully capable smartphones for around that same price range.
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Extreme sport participants who like to document their adventures used to have their options dominated by GoPros. At $349, DJI’s Osmo Action is offering a cheaper alternative to the GoPro’s Hero 7 Black at $420, and you get the front-facing second screen. Not surprisingly, GoPro has now reduced the price of the Hero 7 to $349! The Osmo Action may have just taken GoPro’s throne.

Cars will soon be able to recognize you by your eyes, skin, gait and even your heartbeat, enabling a host of personalized experiences but raising troubling privacy questions, as well.

Why it Matters. New biometric technologies being developed by automakers will authenticate your identity and help keep you safe by also monitoring your health and wellbeing. But unless carefully guarded, that personal data can also be easily exploited by cybercriminals.

What's Happening. Automakers and their suppliers are working on a variety of driver-identification technologies such as facial and iris scans, as well as voice and fingerprint tracking.

• They would enable a driver to start the engine without a key and the car would automatically adjust the seats, mirrors, climate and audio settings.
• The car could then also communicate with home automation systems, turning on lights or opening the garage, for example, and automatically pay for tolls, parking or gas.
• For autonomous vehicles and car-sharing apps, ID verification is important to ensure passengers get into the right vehicle and are who they say they are.

What's Next. Such ID features are coming in the next year or so, followed by a second wave of more advanced biometric technologies. Goode Intelligence says the market for automotive-related biometric content may reach nearly $1 billion by 2023.

• An alcohol detection system that could be available as early as next year would know whether a motorist is drunk by gathering a whiff of their ambient breath. The system is being developed by a public-private partnership.

• B-Secur is marketing its Heartkey technology that can identify a driver by the unique rhythm of their heartbeat, and measure their level of stress or fatigue or even detect early signs of a stroke or heart attack, CEO Alan Foreman tells Axios.

• Aerendir Mobile's sensors capture micro-vibrations – tiny muscle twitches from cells in the human nervous system – to identify individuals and monitor their well-being by creating a neurological signature that's akin to a million-character-long password, founder Martin Zizi tells Axios.

Yes, But. Just as facial recognition systems are sounding alarms about privacy and human rights, biometric technologies in vehicles raise privacy concerns, experts say.

• Biometric information can be particularly revealing and immutable, Lauren Smith, senior counsel for the Future of Privacy Forum, says. Unlike a password or account number, you can't change your biological makeup.
• Without federal laws on bioprivacy, carmakers need to abide by state data-protection laws, many of which require notice before biometric data is collected, and the ability to opt out.

• Carmakers that signed the Automotive Privacy Principles created a higher, opt-in threshold for biometric information, requiring consent before data can be used for marketing or shared with others.