New York votes to ban ads for whole apartments on Airbnb
New York already makes it illegal to offer your whole apartment for short-term rentals through services like Airbnb, but it’s giving that legislation some added bite. As part of a flurry of end-of-term approvals, the state’s assembly and senate have voted for a bill that would make it illegal just to advertise your entire place for a short (under 30 days) rental. You’ll face a $1,000 fine the first time you’re caught, $5,000 the second time and $7,500 the third. Governor Cuomo still has to sign the bill into law, but that’s likely to be a mere formality.
Assuming the measure becomes law, it’ll please some local residents as well as the hotel and real estate businesses. They’ve complained that services like Airbnb enable illegal hotels that both take away apartments for honest-to-goodness residents and drive up rental rates at the units that are left. In theory, this makes it too costly to even consider the tactic — unless the offending hosts lie about the nature of their rentals, it could be too costly to run these makeshift accommodations.
Not surprisingly, Airbnb isn’t happy. It portrays the bill’s approval as a conspiracy between the government and the hotel industry, and argues that it’ll increase the odds of “bankruptcy, eviction, or foreclosure” for 30,000 state residents who might otherwise struggle to make ends meet. Of course, the truth is mixed. While some of those people were earnestly trying to make money while away from home, it’s no secret that many others were snapping up properties solely to profit from Airbnb stays. The would-be law should limit short-term rentals to people who actually live in their homes.
Via: Gothamist
Source: New York State Senate
Google AI learns how to play soccer with a virtual ant
Google’s DeepMind has conquered some big artificial intelligence challenges in its day, such as defeating Go’s world champion and navigating mazes through virtual sight. However, one of its accomplishments is decidedly unusual: it learned how to play soccer (aka football) with a digital ant. It looks cute, but it’s really a profound test of DeepMind’s asynchronous, reinforcement-based learning process. The AI has to not only learn how to move the ant without any prior understanding of its mechanics, but to kick the ball into a goal. Imagine if you had to learn how to run while playing your first-ever match — that’s how complex this is.
Google doesn’t explain the significance in-depth, but it’s quick to mention that this could be very helpful for “robotic manipulation.” A legged robot could start walking (or adapt to unforgiving conditions) without receiving explicit instructions, and a robot arm could safely grab unfamiliar objects. Between this and Google’s other DeepMind research, the building blocks of AI-driven robotics are slowly coming into place.
Via: VentureBeat
Source: Google DeepMind
Inhabitat’s Week in Green: The world’s skinniest tower, and more!
Local Motors just unveiled the bus of the future, and it’s fully autonomous, made by a 3D printer and controlled by IBM’s flagship artificial intelligence system. In other transportation news, a German official declared that all new cars registered in the nation will need to be zero-emission by the year 2030. Tesla announced plans to sell its electric vehicles in a Nordstrom store in Los Angeles. And a solar-powered boat embarked on a historic journey across the Atlantic Ocean.
The world’s new tallest tower was just approved for Dubai — and it’ll dwarf the reigning Burj Khalifa by 100 meters. Meanwhile, Brighton, England unveiled the world’s skinniest tower: It’s topped with a space-age moving observation pod. Kazakhstan broke ground on a futuristic eco city that will host the World Expo 2017, while a gigantic green pyramid popped up in Paris. Elsewhere in the world, researchers used lasers to reveal lost cities hidden by jungle near Angkor Wat, and a gigantic “Gateway to the Underworld” opened up in Serbia — and it’s rapidly growing.
Hydrogen is a clean, renewable energy source that can be easily stored, but it tends to be expensive and difficult to produce. That’s why it’s exciting that California-based HyperSolar has developed a breakthrough technique for producing hydrogen fuel from water and sunlight. In other energy news, Australia smashed a wind power record last month by generating 1,299 gigawatt-hours of renewable electricity, and Scotland managed to reach its aggressive emissions goal a full six years ahead of schedule. We also spotted a self-sufficient mountain hut that generates all of its own electricity and a chic floating home that’s powered by the sun. Finally, we shared 10 classic science experiments sure to inspire kids of all ages.
Blue Origin lands its reusable rocket a fourth time
Blue Origin’s reusable rocket is practically running like clockwork. The private spaceflight outfit has successfully landed its New Shepard rocket a fourth time (during its first-ever live stream), touching down with a seemingly effortless amount of grace. Jeff Bezos and company weren’t just showing off, though. They also successfully tested the redundancy of the crew capsule’s parachute system, showing that the capsule can survive even if one of the chutes fails. We’re still a long way from testing a manned capsule (the windows are still painted on in this version), but it’s an important step toward the goal of lower-cost space travel. You can watch the entire replay below — if you want to cut to the chase, the launch starts around the 1h 2m mark.
Source: Blue Origin (YouTube)
‘Batman Arkham VR’ put me inside the Batsuit
Telltale wasn’t the only developer that brought Batman to E3 this year: The folks at Rocksteady Games packed The Dark Knight into their suitcases as well. Batman Arkham VR was a surprise reveal at Sony’s keynote earlier this week and drew a huge round of applause when it appeared on stage. Once I strapped a PlayStation VR headset (it’s a timed-exclusive to the platform this October), I could tell why the team worked so hard to keep it a secret.
I started out the demo standing in the foyer of Wayne Manor, staring at a pair of beat-up disembodied hands floating in front of me. Each pantomimed in time with the PlayStation Move wands in my own hands. Bruce Wayne’s butler Alfred Pennyworth walked in, said a few words and handed me a key for the Bat Cave’s secret entrance. Putting it in the nearby piano’s keyboard cover exposed the ivories, and I instinctively dragged my finger from one end to the other.
The platform I was standing on slowly descended toward Wayne’s clandestine lair, and stopped a few seconds later, with me putting on bits of the Bat Suit piece by piece. First a pair of gloves, then strapping Batarangs, a grapnel gun and an environmental scanner to Bats’ trademark utility belt.
And then I donned the cowl that has struck fear into the hearts of Gotham City’s countless fictitious criminals. Paired with longtime Batman voice actor Kevin Conroy (who brought Bruce Wayne to life in Batman: The Animated Series and each previous Arkham game), the process of suiting up went a long way to making me feel like I actually was the Caped Crusader. Then the elevator descended further into the Bat Cave, which was beset on all sides with waterfalls.
The bust of a Tyrannosaurus was off to the left — a nod to a comic book storyline from the ’40s — and a colony of bats swirled off in the distance. Just as I was settling into my new role, gazing around in childlike wonder, because, there I was in the Bat Cave, I was whisked back to the demo’s main menu. Naturally, it was a perch on the Gotham City Police Department’s roof, with the Bat Signal at my back.
The other portion of the demo had me piecing together a murder by using Bats’ high-tech forensic tools — familiar stuff for anyone who played last year’s Arkham Knight. Like that game, Arkham VR isn’t afraid to go dark: The victim is Dick Grayson, better known as Nightwing. The scene takes place in a garbage-filled alley and implements the augmented-reality-style Detective Mode (perhaps the most natural fit for a Batman game in VR) to scour the crime scene for clues. Rotating my arm clockwise and counterclockwise to scrub through the fight’s holographic reconstruction was cool too.
At one point, the brawl was happening right in front of me and I instinctively stepped back, out of the way. I didn’t need to, but it felt like if I didn’t, I’d be bowled over. Movement in VR that doesn’t cause motion sickness is incredibly tricky to get right, so the team at Rocksteady Games avoided typical locomotion.
I was able to look around wherever I wanted, but moving from one location to the next in the alley was handled by looking at a holographic PlayStation Move controller and pressing a button on the real one in my hand. The screen briefly faded to black before warping me to the next vantage point. It breaks the immersion a bit, but I’d rather a brief interruption if it means I don’t feel queasy. After discovering that the Penguin was behind the murder, I fired my grapnel gun at a passing blimp and was transported back to the main menu.
Throughout the experience, I found myself smiling like an idiot. Each previous Arkham game has been jokingly referred to as a “Batman simulator” by fans, but it wasn’t until I donned the Batsuit and investigated a crime scene in VR that it felt like I was actually in the Caped Crusader’s boots.
A studio spokesperson at E3 said that the full experience would take around two to three hours, once the game launches this October, but when I asked about pricing, he said that hadn’t been finalized yet. Hopefully, publisher Warner Bros. Interactive will make this a free update for existing Arkham owners or season pass holders. Or for people who don’t care for the traditional Arkham games but want to role-play as The World’s Greatest Detective in VR, price it at $10 or under.
Follow all the news from E3 2016 here!
The After Math: FIRST!
Now that presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump has come right out and declared “America First”, a popular slogan among white nationalists throughout the country, here’s a look at some of the other precedent-setting events of the week. Microsoft announced that it’s getting into the legal weed game. Regulators have been presented with a proposal for the first US-based human CRISPR experiment. And Broadway announced that it will take the unprecedented step of livestream a musical. Numbers, because how else will we know how unpopular the presidential candidates are?
Driverless cars could be the future of racing
Translogic host Jonathon Buckley heads to Thunderhill Raceway for the first Autonomous Track Day. We caught up with Silicon Valley entrepreneur and event organizer Joshua Schachter to find out if driverless cars will ever race themselves.
“That would be fun,” said Schachter. “We have to make sure it’s interesting. If it’s just robots driving perfectly, that’s not exciting.”
“I think we’ll figure it out.”
We also check in with George Hotz, originally famous for unlocking the iPhone and now builder of driverless cars. Hotz shared his story of how he got involved with autonomous technology through a disagreement with Elon Musk.
“Elon Musk was originally going to give me money to build this for his Tesla,” said Hotz of his driverless car. “Elon changed the deal at the last minute, said no…[I] bought this car, made it drive itself.”
- Click here to find more episodes of Translogic
- Click here to learn more about our host, Jonathon Buckley
Waze will help you avoid difficult intersections
You know those intersections with no traffic lights and everyone’s trying to cross at the same time? Waze calls them “difficult intersections,” and the navigation app will help you avoid them altogether, so long as you’re in Los Angeles. The app now calculates the best possible route and ETA with as few of them as possible. It could bypass them entirely if there’s route that allows you to do that. But if avoiding them will make your commute unbearably long, then Waze could still send you through a few. As the app’s announcement post said “The goal of the feature is to reduce the amount of these intersections, not completely eliminate them.”
While the feature is only available in Los Angeles for now, it will soon roll out in New Orleans and will eventually be available around the world. Take note that if you’re in LA, Waze automatically switched on for you. In case it’s not working out, you can always switch it off under Settings.
Source: Waze
Cryptocurrency raider takes $60 million in digital cash
A cryptocurrency is only as reliable as the technology that keeps it running, and Ethereum is learning this the hard way. An attacker has taken an estimated $60 million in Ethereum’s digital money (Ether) by exploiting vulnerabilities in the Decentralized Autonomous Organization, an investment collective. The raider took advantage of a “recursive call” flaw in the DAO’s code-based smart contracts, which administer the funds, to scoop up Ether many times in a single pass.
Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin (pictured above) has revealed a planned software fork that would prevent the intruder from using the ill-gotten goods, but there are still plenty of headaches in store for both contract creators and investors. Contract makers will have to take extra care to avoid the flaw and limit the value of their contracts so that a bad actor doesn’t make off with a huge sum of cash. Buterin says that Ethereum itself is safe — miners can carry on, and users should “sit tight and remain calm” while they wait to trade again. Still, it’s easy to imagine everyone being nervous.
The kicker? People were convinced that the bug posed no risk to DAO funds just a few days prior. Clearly, that wasn’t true. While the invader didn’t get away scot-free, the breach has caused a lot of chaos. And while one person’s claims that they legitimately took the funds is sketchy, Bloomberg notes that the code defining the smart contracts may have explicitly allowed this attack even if that’s not what the DAO wanted. This may not be so much a hack as exploitation of poorly-defined terms, and there may not be a legal recourse. In short: basing an investment framework around code instead of human-made contracts may have been too optimistic.
Via: Coindesk, Bloomberg, The Verge
Source: Vitalik Buterin (Reddit), Etherscan, Ethereum
Six gadgets for a green camping trip
By Cat DiStasio
This week marks the start of summer, and campers across the nation are getting ready to explore the great outdoors. Fortunately, it’s easier than ever to go off-grid while keeping a light footprint. That means finding tents that don’t mar the land and cooking methods that don’t generate needless waste. It’s also easier than ever to keep electronic gadgets charged throughout your trip. And, of course, nobody wants to fumble with flashlight batteries in the dark, so rechargeable and solar-powered lanterns are a big win at any camp site. Whatever goals you set for your next trip, there’s a gadget out there to help you achieve it.
