Hope you weren’t too attached to your OneDrive – here are some incoming changes
Did you enjoy your Unlimited OneDrive subscription? Good, it’s going away. Because of some individuals who were also Office 365 subscribers used up to 75TB of cloud storage – which is kinda under the ‘unlimited’ banner but we won’t get into that. Microsoft is canning Unlimited subs for Office 365 users, giving them 1TB of space instead. They’re also canning their 100GB and 200GB monthly subs early next year, with a 50GB storage option replacing it. Lastly, free OneDrive storage is dropping from 15GB to 5GB – though you get some leeway if you’re currently using more than 5GB of the free stuff. You’ll have 12 months to make a plan before Microsoft will take away that delicious cloud storage or make you pay for it. Take up any complaints with Redmond.
You’ve heard of a smartwatch, which is a little watch-shaped computer thingy that sits on your wrist. So what is the Rufus Cuff? The closest comparison we can make is that it’s like the PipBoy from the Fallout games – an arm-mounted tablet. Being able to play games, check Facebook and generally waste time thanks to an arm-based, waterproof, tablet thing sounds like just the futuristic tech we’ve been expecting since… forever. The Rufus Cuff was crowdfunded last year and it’s now available for pre-order. You can snag one for $250 (R3,450), a significant discount on the usual $400 (R5,500) price. And if we don’t see a PipBoy modification within days of it shipping to excited new owners, we’re going to be very sad indeed.
Tesla’s going to be making Autopilot slightly more dumbass-proof as a result of all those hands-free videos
A short while ago Tesla rollout out an update to some of their vehicles which included Autopilot, a beta feature that makes Tesla cars a lot smarter. You’ll stay in your lane, maintain a following distance, that sort of thing. And the computer is helping to keep watch. But… a whole bunch of users have been filming themselves letting the car drive itself, something that Autopilot isn’t ready for yet. So Elon Musk has announced “additional constraints” on Autopilot which will hopefully dumbass-proof driving on American roads. In a Tesla, anyway. He hasn’t said what these measures will be but since he wants to “minimize the possibility of people doing crazy things with [Autopilot]”, we’d imagine it will be altered so that it won’t work unless you’ve got your hands on the wheel. You know, the way you’re supposed to act in traffic?
Twitter just turns your Favourites into hearts. Or likes. Or something. Do you really care?
Twitter has made some changes to your favourites, in case you didn’t check your mails this morning (but then, how are you reading this?). Instead of Favourites, that little star at the base of tweets in your timeline, you’ve now got a heart. And even as the icon has changed, so has the name. Favourites have become likes, because “You might like a lot of things, but not everything can be your favorite.” And we’ve noticed a bunch of people freaking out about losing that little star but we’re in the majority camp. An ‘I am pleased with this content’ button is the same as any other. Though if you really miss that star there are ways of getting it back… for now.
BAE has a new rocket engine design that could change space travel
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British defence and aerospace contractor BAE (not that horrible relationship contraction that’s doing the rounds like online herpes – bae indeed…) are funding a new rocket design that could function both in the atmosphere, as a conventional jet engine (capable of Mach 6) in normal air as well as a pure, liquid-oxygen consuming rocket in outer space – meaning that an actual space plane might be a thing. BAE Systems are going to be investing nearly R500 million in the SABRE (Synergistic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine) rocket design, the creation of Reaction Engines’ smarts. Expect ground tests by around 2020, and unmanned flight tests around 2025. And then? To infinity and beyond, we hope.
