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Google Maps is improving travel ETAs with DeepMind AI
Google Maps' traffic predictions are 50 percent more accurate in some cities thanks to DeepMind's AI.
Volocopter is researching the best air taxis routes in Southeast Asia
Volocopter is preparing for a feasibility study that will determine the best cities and routes for air taxis in Southeast Asia and evaluate different air taxi use cases. This next step is part of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) necessary for Volocopter to bring commercial air taxis to the region.
Hyperloop One is closer to deciding its first planned route
One of the ways that Hyperloop One is working out which routes it wants to build is through its "Global Challenge" program. It is, essentially, an X-Factor style competition in which candidate cities and states can audition for the prize of getting to buy their own high-speed travel systems. Now, the company has announced which regions are in the running to be the first to get their own Hyperloop route.
Dark Age of Camelot trims up paths, docks, and portals with a new patch
Are you looking to take a trip to scenic Agramon in Dark Age of Camelot? Then you'll definitely want to check out the latest patch notes. Agramon has been somewhat revamped with new docks and new paths into the center of the land, both from these new docks and from the milegates of each realm. And those aren't the only dock-based changes in the patch, at that; merchant docks have been moved further inland and renamed mainland docks, center keep docks are gone, and the rules for capturing mainland docks are different. Strength Relic Towns have also seen the addition of a new portal ceremony as well as various protections to keep the towns from being too easily captured. Players can also pick up new quests from the Agramon dockmasters involving killing players within Agramon... assuming, of course, that your realm controls one of the docks in Agramon. For the full details, read up on the official patch notes.
Waze makes plans to deal with LA's Carmageddon
Here in Los Angeles, there's a cataclysmic event about to happen. No, it's not the next earthquake (as far as we know) or an alien invasion. It's Carmageddon, which is what the locals have started calling a closure period over July 16 and 17 where the city will shut down the 405 highway from the 10 to the 101. That's a huge stretch of road in a city that depends on its cars, so people are expecting the fallout to be pretty monstrous -- while lots of folks (including me -- my apartment is about two blocks from the 405 on Santa Monica) are hoping to just stay home for the weekend, we've all got places to go and things to do, so we may end up navigating the traffic anyway. iPhone app Waze is helping to jump on this grenade -- the company has teamed up with Los Angeles' KABC 7 to bring real-time traffic updates to and from the iPhone all throughout Carmageddon weekend, both using its social mobile network of users (which just recently hit 4.5 million drivers around the world) to track movement on the road, but also to connect the TV station with volunteer users, who can report where reporters might not actually be. The company's set up an anti-Carmageddon website, and hopes to provide alternate routes and information to frustrated drivers all weekend long. I hope it helps -- this particular stretch of the 405 is about six lanes wide, and serves about 500,000 people on any given weekend, so presumably all of those people will be off the highway and looking for other streets to use. Fingers crossed that it's not quite as apocalyptic as it seems it might be.
Addon Spotlight: Gathering and trade skill helpers
Addon Spotlight focuses on the backbone of the WoW gameplay experience: the user interface. We'll look at everything from bags to bars, buttons to DPS meters and beyond -- your interface folder will never be the same! This week, Addon Spotlight lies to you, ditches Power Auras and shows you some resource gathering and trade skill addons instead. Hello, addon enthusiasts. I know that I promised some more Power Auras this week in the form of some more advanced techniques, but as I was writing it, I realized I wanted more time to flesh out some concepts. So, you'll have to cut me the tiniest bit of slack and give me until next week for some more excellent Power Auras selections and suggestions from the community, as well as some of my own tips and tricks. Instead, here are three addons that will greatly enhance your trade skill gathering and crafting. Who doesn't love addons that make things easier? I know I do. Trade skills used to be my favorite thing about World of Warcraft. Then they petered off in usefulness for a while, making a triumphant return in Wrath. I remember back when the game was announced and the Blizzard dev team said you couldn't fail on crafting! As long as you had the materials, you were good. Amazing! What other fun surprises await you? Click on, heroes.
GPS leads couple into Oregon wilderness, snow and lack of common sense keep them there 3 days
So you're cruising along, in your GPS-equipped SUV, taking your dear wife back home to Reno. The trusty onscreen guide instructs you to "turn right" and you follow its typically reliable instructions. At what point in the next three days of plowing deeper and deeper into snow-covered Oregon do you start suspecting that maybe something is amiss? Alright, so this isn't quite on par with others driving buses into low-clearance tunnels, dipping their cars into rivers, or jamming heavy load trucks into unsuitably tight farm lanes. But we don't discriminate here, all instances of idiotic GPS dependency deserve their moment in the sun, so here's to Mr. John Rhoads and his tastefully named wife, Mrs. Starry Bush-Rhoads, who are now safe and sound after their phone pinged out its coordinates to emergency services when it began losing signal.
5 Apps for the cyclist
Apple products and the bike go together well. They seem to appeal to the same sort of folks: evangelistic, committed aficionados willing to pay any premium, to be brutally honest about it. Oh, and let's not forget, they love to talk at length about these objects of their affection at parties. You know who you are. You've got a copy of Colorado Cyclist in your bathroom. So it seems like getting the iPhone working for you on the bike would be a no-brainer. And it pretty much is. Here are five apps that I've found I like, most centered around the fact that the iPhone's built-in GPS gives cyclists the kind of on-bike information they want, and the après vélo experience they crave until the next fix, I mean "ride." From the outset, you'll need a bike mount, if you want to take advantage of these apps' functions en route. Otherwise, the iPhone slips just fine into a jersey pocket, and will hold a GPS lock even though a ziploc sandwich baggie. Mount-wise, pickings are slim, but there are a few out there that are relatively low-profile. Plus, battery life can be a problem. Most endurance athletes are out there for hours at a time, and GPS tracking can quickly drain an iPhone battery. if you take care to turn off everything non-essential, you may be able to get that whole ride in. Or, you can do what this guy is doing; he's building an iPhone bike mount with power. Maybe now the iPhone can make its RAAM debut. On to the apps! 1) Ascent Mobile. I have a warm place in my heart for Montebello Software's Ascent. If I harken back to the old days, Garmin could barely be bothered to come out with a Mac version of its then-popular TrainingCenter software and had shunted all its Mac users to MotionBased. Ascent came through with elegant desktop software that tapped into the data side of the bike geek. Finally, a place to really churn through the routes and elevation, while watching your heart rate, speed and cadence throughout that quad-shredding ride. You can zoom right into your loop post-ride and slice and dice the data to see any element of it you like. What's more, Ascent really made it look good. By the time Garmin came out with its watered-down and feature-hobbled Mac version of TrainingCenter I was so over Garmin software. I used it strictly for the route-upload function and kept everything else on Ascent, with an online version stored on MotionBased for route sharing (though I've since moved from MotionBased to RunningAhead now that RA has GPS upload.) So I was thrilled to hear that Ascent was coming out with Ascent Mobile, $9.99US. Ascent Mobile gives you all the relevant data you could want on a ride, plus lots of ways to check out your ride right on the iPhone afterward. Best of all, it naturally syncs with the desktop version of Ascent, sold separately. Can I let go of my trusty Garmin Edge 705? Quite possibly. We'll see where this little relationship goes. (Oh, and yes, Erica, it gives your max speed.) 2) B.iCycle. Ok, maybe you're more of a "just the facts, ma'am" kind of rider. We've got one for you, too. B.iCycle, $9.99US, is a simple, GPS-based tracker that gives you some easy stats during your ride. It saves your tracks for later viewing on a map, and gives you all of the essential features you might want, without too much feature clutter. It has a nice map view for on-bike routing, and a way to email your route to yourself afterward. Think of it as a very inspired bike computer. 3) Bicycle Gear Calculator. Ok, grease monkeys, this one is for you. It's obviously not intended for on-bike use, but half the fun of the sport is the tinkering you get to do with your bike while you're not on it, talking about it at parties, or relentlessly reloading chainlove.com for the next steal. Now you can talk gear ratios with ease. Input chainring size, sprocket size, and crank length and all the relevant math is done for you. Plan ahead for a big hill ride and get your bike properly geared so you look like Laurent, Stefano, or Marco (may he rest in peace) on those hills. $4.99US at the iTunes store. 4) iMapMyRide. iMapMyRide is another GPS tracker, but is borne out of the website mapmyride.com, which is the sister site to mapmyrun.com, a favorite of mine, pre-Garmin Forerunner. The nice thing about this app -- other than the fact that it's free -- is that it is built to work well with the website, which is a great place to discover new routes and make connections with other like-sported people. I can't say the app itself is revolutionary in any way, but if you're already multi-sport and have been taking advantage of the MapMyFitness community-based functions, iMapMyRide may be a useful way to go for you. 5) TrailGuru. I didn't want to leave the mountain bikers completely out of the loop, so here's something for you singletrackers. I'm not entirely sure how this differs from some of the other GPS-based tracking software, but the community associated with it seems to be more interested in off-road use, so you may find that you discover new and interesting ways to tear up the trails near you. It seems to be a fave around TUAW, so I'd be remiss not to mention it. If you have experience with this app, let us know in the comments. I'm still working on integrating the iPhone into my fitness endeavors. I admit I love my Garmins (yes, I have both the Edge and the Forerunner.) And I can't imagine I'd be brave enough to do with my iPhone what I did with my Forerunner 305: put it under my swim cap at the start of a triathlon. But you never know. If you ever see a fellow race participant with what seems to be a very oddly-shaped head under that swim cap, come and introduce yourself to me.
Insider Trader: Zapping in the North
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.Engineers have plenty of fun tricks up their sleeves, and that includes a hip, quirky means of gathering. Specifically, they ride around on fancy machines zapping clouds into Crystallized elements, at least in the far North. Such elements are used in crafting, or combined in stacks of ten to form Eternal elements, which are also a common reagent in patterns and schematics. Both forms of these elements sell for handsome sums on the Auction House, and can be stockpiled for one's own needs, such as updating item enchants. This week's Insider Trader is devoted to helping you find those clouds and zap them with a vengeance!
