New Radio Programme: JACKED IN Goes On Air!

Starting from mid October, JACKED IN will go on air as part of Valentina Bergonzi‘s science radio programme “Laika – A spasso per la scienza”. Laika is all about how science is intertwined with society – which ties in nicely with JACKED IN’s theme: how technology runs and influences our lives. Laika airs every two weeks on national broadcaster RAI‘s...

May 2015

DeepFace Algorithm Matches Faces Like Humans

Facebook’s AI research group has just developed a new piece of software that can tell whether photographs of human faces are the same. The so-called DeepFace algorithm matches faces like humans. The paper with the telling title ‘DeepFace: Closing the Gap to Human-Level Performance in Face Verification’ will be presented at the Conference on Computer...

May 2015

3 Reasons Why We Will Not Abolish E-mails

E-mails are THE single most important piece of technology that has shaped the way we communicate. And yet, everybody hates it and tries to get rid of it. Some companies are championing the use of social networks instead of e-mails for internal communications. Others are more extreme and try to completely abolish them, prohibiting their employees to...

May 2015

Tech-Jack: Will Robocop Ever Become Reality?

A new rubric is born! Got a couple of minutes to spare? ‘Tech-Jack’ here on JACKED IN is a new podcast series that will review current & upcoming sci-fi movies and briefly explain how realistically science & tech are depicted in these movies. Today, it’s Robocop that we will have a look at: Drones Prosthetic limbs Big data Enough said! Listen...

May 2015

Obituary: the Personal Computer is Dead (1971-2014)

The Personal Computer (his friends tenderly called him PC) who has died today aged 43 , made an unparalleled impact on people’s lives and world economy. Even though he became a celebrity, in his heart, PC always remained a humble servant who would solve even the most complicated calculations of his masters. His celebrity status came at a high cost,...

May 2015

The 3 Hottest Apps For Anonymous Messaging (Including Sexting)

Buzzzzzword alert! EPHEMERAL is the answer to the NSA’s attempts of snooping into our SMSs, emails and IM messages. Messaging apps that auto-destroy text messages after they have been read, that is. That’s right. Self-destructing text messages are our spy tools of choice to fight off the governmental spies and a natural consequence of . Ephemeral messages...

May 2015

A Case for Renaming the Internet of Things

The Internet of Things Sounds Just Stupid. Let’s rename it! #letsrenametheIOT This post is a storify of tweets, images and quotes that support the idea that the term “Internet of Things” is nothing but antiquated. View the story “”Internet of Things”? That sounds just stupid. #letsrenametheIOT” on Storify claimtoken-52f4ae09e61d2 TweetThe post A Case...

May 2015

Welcome to JACKED IN!

Why “JACKED IN”? Remember the movie The Matrix (1999)? In The Matrix (check out this review by Roger Ebert!), human beings are connected to a virtual world by jacking a probe into a data port located at the base of their skull – the headjack. In a way, we are all jacked in, because We live parts of our lives on the Internet Technology affects the way...

May 2015