Consumer & Gadgets news

Consumer & Gadgets

Wearable glove turns data into heat and touch for more personal insights

University of Adelaide researchers have developed a wearable glove that uses heat, touch and physical objects to transform data into a sensory experience. The prototype, called ThermoPhy, was developed as part of a remote ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Intelligent, but not conscious: A warning about AI chatbots

Have you ever said "thanks" to ChatGPT, or "please" to Claude? Maybe you're just being polite, showing some civility to a helpful and eloquent conversational partner. You may even consider politeness a safe choice, just in ...

Consumer & Gadgets

AR-assisted Japanese flower arrangement helps beginners learn at home while preserving mindfulness

Ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangement, is an important form of Japan's Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) that fosters creativity, mindfulness and aesthetic sensitivity. Also known as "Kado," or way of the flower, ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Love at first prompt? How AI-assisted courtship is rewriting the rules of online dating

In the famous French play Cyrano de Bergerac, the brilliant but insecure Cyrano lends his eloquence to the handsome, tongue-tied Christian to help him woo his lover. Today, a remarkably similar scene is playing out among ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Can Pepper the robot be a good playmate?

What's it like to play a physical game with or against a robot that both looks and behaves like a person? That's what NTNU researchers wanted to find out when they conducted a controlled laboratory experiment with Pepper, ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Rising costs and competition threaten GoPro

For nearly 25 years, GoPro cameras have gone underwater, glided with parachutes and slipped down ski slopes, allowing the adventurous to record images of their experiences.

Consumer & Gadgets

Entirely new way of making espresso shakes up the coffee world

Researchers at UNSW Sydney have harnessed the power of ultrasonic sound waves to make espresso-strength coffee with room-temperature water, cutting energy use by up to 75%. That morning coffee kick from a shot of espresso ...

Consumer & Gadgets

The consequences of relying on AI for accurate news

It's no secret that the last few years have seen a massive explosion in the use of artificial intelligence for general information-gathering. An even more recent trend, though, is how large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, ...

Consumer & Gadgets

How AI chatbots become better learning coaches

Many AI systems answer questions in a matter of seconds—and, in the process, often prevent people from doing exactly what learning is all about: thinking for themselves. Machine learning expert Jakub Mačina is therefore developing ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Apple tries again on AI, turns to Google for help

Apple unveiled an artificial intelligence overhaul for the iPhone on Monday, turning to Google for help two years after the company stumbled in its first attempt.

Consumer & Gadgets

New app lets anyone operate a robot from their phone

Someone with no computing experience may soon be able to remotely control a robot from anywhere on the planet using a smartphone, thanks to new technology developed by Georgia Tech. The new technology is also set to revolutionize ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Framework generates 'shadow art' from scan of any object

Some people have a gift for creating beautiful works of art. Others appreciate art but do not have the talent to create it. Researchers at Cornell Tech and the Cornell Bowers College of Computing and Information Science have ...

Consumer & Gadgets

How AI can become more transparent and reliable

When artificial intelligence is used to support or make important decisions in areas such as health care and public administration, it becomes crucial to understand how these systems arrive at their conclusions. A new doctoral ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Robots, supply strain: Five hot topics at Computex

From laptops designed for the artificial intelligence era to advances in robotics and sky-high tech shares, here are five hot topics at Taipei's huge Computex trade show:

Consumer & Gadgets

Reusable cups made easy: What consumers really want

A new study from Taiwan combines consumer behavior research and life cycle assessment to design reusable cup systems that people are more willing to use. The findings show that convenience and incentives strongly shape participation, ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Three ways to avoid being fooled by AI slop

Global society makes billions of images and uploads hundreds of thousands of hours of video on the internet every day. The problem is, some of this content is misleading or downright wrong. And when it's in visual form, it ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Research finds hotel booking chatbots can 'creep out' customers

Travelers who use AI-powered chatbots on hotel booking platforms often feel uneasy. That discomfort can cause them to disengage or delay booking decisions, according to new research from the Texas A&M College of Agriculture ...

Consumer & Gadgets

SIGN/e: Writing music with moving shapes and colors

How can electronic music best be scored, music that's made not from staves, clefs and notes on the page but by physical gestures like turning a dial on a console or sweeping a hand across a synthesizer? And if that music ...

Consumer & Gadgets

Google unveils smart glasses, taking on Meta

Google on Tuesday unveiled the design of new smart glasses, returning to a market the tech giant tried—and failed—to crack more than a decade ago.

Consumer & Gadgets

Humans are bad at making complex decisions. AI can call them out

When a list of pros and cons won't cut it, a new decision-making tool developed by Cornell researchers can use artificial intelligence to help make difficult decisions. But there's a twist: Instead of checking AI's result, ...