Author: Brett Venter

Earlier this year, Sony took the wraps off a mixed reality headset it calls its “spatial content creation system”. The XR headset is intended to help folks making content for VR and AR systems by giving them an interface that jibes well with said systems. Following the announcement, Sony went fairly quiet about the system. It was waiting for the Augmented World Expo (AWE), currently running in California, to take the hardware out for a spin. Sony’s alternate reality https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNMH3TNnH-c Potential users have to be in attendance (like the folks in the video above) in order to experience the tech.…

There’s a debate on which is more emotionally draining — working in retail (or hospitality) or working in a call centre. The answer is obvious, however. It’s the call centre. At least dealing with the worst of humanity in person offers the possibility of smacking your dimwitted tormentor upside the head. Call centre agents just have to take the abuse. Yes, mute buttons exist but all calls are recorded and it’s easy to get fired for mouthing off in a moment of weakness. Japan’s Softbank reckons it might have the answer and it involves AI. Specifically, AI designed to ‘cancel…

Apple’s Vision Pro is a tremendous experience but it’s also one that you have to pay through the nose for. We’re not the only ones who seem to think so — The Information has a report claiming that Apple has opted to suspend development of the Vision Pro’s successor in favour of something more folks can afford. The report, if true, isn’t all that surprising. Apple scaled back production of its augmented reality hardware soon after it was announced, perhaps because it’s hard to convince even iPhone fans to part with $3,500 for something experimental. Even if it is awesome.…

We want to love all of the Denon PerL Pro earbuds. We do. But two aspects of these excellent-sounding in-ears prevent a complete love affair. One of these is purely aesthetic and you might find you’ve got a different opinion to us. The other… that one’s pretty universal. But these do sound great. As well they should for roughly R7,500. It’s possible to find them for less than R6k and you should consider picking a set up at that price, but you’ll have to make do with some less-than-stellar active noise cancelling. We’ve seen relatively affordable in-ears best Denon’s buds…

X, formerly Twitter, might have its issues but its doing enough that other companies are nicking its ideas. YouTube is testing a Community Notes-like features for videos on the platform, another stunning example of Google’s continued brilliance in the field of online services.* It’s not a done deal but the search giant is testing a feature that borrows heavily from X’s (mostly successful) Community Notes function. The United States is the initial rollout location, pending a successful test of the feature. YouTube taking Notes YouTube is at least starting small. A narrow subset of users and creators on the platform…

Samsung has been big on its Galaxy FE range of late but there was one thing missing: the Galaxy Watch FE. That’s no longer the case as the South Korean giant has revealed its first affordable wearable, predictably named the Galaxy Watch FE. It’s set to arrive, internationally at least, from 24 June, with an LTE version of the device launching later in the year. Local pricing isn’t confirmed yet but will probably come in at around half of the Galaxy Watch 6’s R7,500 launch price. Whether the FE can compete with that wearable’s current price remains to be seen.…

One of the most important — and lucrative — fields a young person can enter is the STEM discipline. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering, and math. These are not exactly the sexiest of career choices. It’s not like prospective entrants are warned about how often things blow up when choosing this career path. South Africa’s National Science and Technology Forum (NSTF) has launched an online tool designed to promote just how attractive a field the sciences can be. Called the STEMulator, it’s an interactive map of the various fields possible, from being a pilot to an electrical engineer.  STEM…

Personal robotics is one of the new frontiers of technology and Ex-Robots, a Chinese company, is looking to be at the forefront of human facial expressions. And a few other things, if what we’ve seen of the company is true, but mostly it’s about realistic non-verbal communication. The company primarily manufactures robots for display in museums but is looking to expand its offerings into the… let’s call it the ‘personal companion’ market, among others like healthcare and education. Robot teachers aren’t out of the question, it seems. We’re Ex-Robots now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g92mC_3ZqqY Ex-Robots isn’t operating in a vacuum, though the brief…

Either Japanese photographic specialists Canon are believers or Apple has given them a metric boatload of money but the camera maker is launching a custom lens specifically for shooting Vision Pro video. The lens turned up during Apple’s WWDC presentation last night. It’s intended to shoot ‘spatial video’, which is the Apple term for 360° video as seen on the Apple Vision Pro. So it’s Canon now? Technically, yes, this is an official product, though neither Apple nor Canon have revealed any real specifics yet. The lens is intended to work with the EOS R7 camera and will put spatial…

Statistics dictate that not every WhatsApp update will be a banger. This is one of those, though we’ve been expecting a move in this direction since Facebook acquired the messaging service. Following several false starts (notably in 2020, and a few times in 2021), Meta is bringing targeted advertising to WhatsApp. How, you ask? The company’s much-vaunted end-to-end encryption should make this impossible but there’s a reason your chat app has a little artificial intelligence icon in it now. Hint: it’s not really for your benefit. WhatsApp, Brazil? Having a good time? Meta announced, at an event in Brazil, that…