Author: Brett Venter

If you’re anything like us, you use various messaging and mail platforms as note-taking systems. WhatsApp hopes to fulfil that function for you, at some point, via yet another upcoming feature. Called “Messages with yourself”, the feature is all about letting a user send a message to themselves. Why you’re choosing to do that doesn’t matter. It’s about having the capability, really. It’s about sending a message  Having the ability to send messages to yourself in WhatsApp isn’t new. It’s just a finicky operation that most people don’t bother trying to execute. The upcoming change, which has appeared for some…

Ask anyone at Stuff if they can review a printer and the answer is a worried ‘Yes’. That’s because while it’s perfectly possible to review one, it’s not terribly fun. Printers are always less sexy than just about any other tech. Still, some, like the Epson Ecotank L6270 we had in for review, have their moments. The Epson Ecotank L6270 is a multifunction printer. It’s the sort of thing you buy if you want to print, scan, or photocopy using a single machine. They used to build fax capability into these things, once upon a time, but that’s all in…

Spotify might not be having the greatest time on a business level but the streaming company is making up for it in other areas. The platform is investing a relatively small sum (if you’re American or Swedish) in a collection of African podcasts. Of the thirteen podcasts to grab funding from the Africa Podcast Fund, four are based in South Africa. The remaining nine podcasts are scattered around Cameroon, Ghana, Kenya, and Nigeria. But we’re, obviously, a little less interested in those (for the purposes of this article). Spotify for Africa The South African podcasts getting a cut of R1.8…

One day, everything will be Lego. Until that day comes, we’ll have to settle for just a few things being Lego. The newest item to be Lego-ified is the Polaroid OneStep SX-70. The upcoming Polaroid replica will launch at some point in 2023, after clearing the Lego Ideas approvals process. Lego Ideas is a program that takes user-generated ideas and turns them into actual products. Provided, that is, they’re able to secure 10,000 or more votes during the vetting process. That’s how the International Space Station was created, as was The Office set and van Gogh’s Starry Night. Getting a…

Driving is an occupation that could have various emotional effects. Drive in traffic and you’re bound to become stressed. If you’re a courier, speed is of the essence. Ditto if you’re a Formula One driver. And if you’ve got nowhere to be, driving can be rather relaxing. Slow Roads, a free browser-based game, is one of the latter experiences. Slow Roads to nowhere The concept behind the game is simple. You take a vehicle, whether it’s a car, bike, or bus, and traverse roads. Slowly, sure, but there’s also the option to clock up some serious speed. But the relaxing…

Industry partnerships are nothing new but Halo developer 343 Industries’ agreement with a company called Limbitless Solutions is something a little unusual. Limbitless develops and supplies custom 3D-printed prosthetics to kids that have experienced limb loss. So, of course, a Halo team-up makes perfect sense. The partnership isn’t new. 343 Industries has been working with the Florida-based company for four years now. What is new, is a set of designs based around Halo Infinite and Halo Reach. Reach for the stars https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wW51afwSk0E The two new prosthetic designs are based on Halo icon Master Chief’s armour from Infinite, as well as…

Humans experience all manner of things every day without noticing it. You walk through massive magnetic fields. You are bombarded by wireless transmissions (which you’re totally not allergic to. Find another way to feel special). You move at 107,208km/h, even when you’re standing still. The trick is perceiving any of this. It’s very hard to perceive Earth’s orbit. It’s easy to perceive wireless transmissions. That’s how WiFi, internet, radio, and TV signals work. Just open Spotify. Magnetic fields are also perceptible. You can do that thing with iron filings, a magnet, and a piece of paper but it’s difficult to…

Huawei has a new folding smartphone heading to market in the next couple of weeks. The Huawei Pocket S was originally known as the ‘Huawei P50 Pocket New’, before the Chinese company made the device — and its launch date — official. The official launch is on 2 November for the Chinese market. If the folding Huawei Pocket S follows the pattern set by the P50 Pocket’s launch in 2020, other markets (like South Africa) will see it around April 2023. For now, though, it’s confined to China. Pick a Pocket S Huawei Pocket S teaser pic.twitter.com/sIL8VfQB0Q — Deng Li…

We’re used to Meta copying everything new for its own purposes. That’s how we got Reels and more than a few other features besides. But Make-A-Video, a video-centric spinoff of the AI-generated images that are so hot right now, is a cloned technology we were not expecting to see. And yet, here we are. Meta head Mark Zuckerberg introduced the technology in a Facebook post earlier this week. It’s very similar to other AI-powered image generation in that it works off of a text prompt. But apparently, it’s harder to create videos than static images. Dall-E but make it video…

Surveillance capitalism is about to start tracking yet another aspect of your life. This time, it’s your breathing that’s up for grabs. Amazon last night announced the Halo Rise, a night-time gadget designed to keep an eye on your nocturnal habits. The sleeping ones, anyway. It’s not just a tracker, of course. That would be far harder to allow in a bedroom so it can watch you sleep. Amazon’s newest gizmo is a bedside lap but with smart features. A gradually increasing light when you wake up, to simulate a sunrise, is just the start. A game of Halo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHPWkhN60Lo&feature=emb_logo…