Author: Brett Venter

On the list of products Samsung could choose to jam artificial intelligence into next, we wouldn’t have expected a water purifier to be right at the top. And yet, the South Korean company has launched its new Bespoke AI Water Purifier Countertop in its native country. The water purifier isn’t set to be cheap, either. It’ll be priced in South Korea at approximately R18,500. Similar tabletop products here at home will run you less than a third of that. They’re lacking 2025’s AI buzzword and, Samsung says, can’t perform as well as its new Bespoke unit can. Samsung’s purity test…

The eventual entry of SpaceX’s Starlink in South Africa has been the subject of much speculation, with the country’s regulatory requirements being the major sticking point. Despite offering free internet access to SA schools and asking the public to motivate for its arrival, the satellite internet service remains fairly absent. But that’s not all Elon Musk’s company has been trying. There’s only really one hurdle SpaceX isn’t willing to leap over — the 30% ownership requirement for companies entering the country. A submission to South Africa’s Department of Communications and Digital Technologies, seen by Stuff, makes this much apparent. The…

Flying taxis are the next market for folks looking to make money out of moving people from here to there. Joby is one of the companies getting in on the future mobility action, having previously conducted lengthy test flights, some with NASA’s assistance. The most recent development for the company is a first — the first public airport to public airport trip for a flying taxi. That’s a bigger deal than it sounds like — taking off from an airport is fraught with all sorts of regulations. Unless you’re doomed hero Richard Russell, who never bothered to ask for permission.…

Any time you get more tech than you’re paying for is a good time. Acer South Africa, ostensibly to help shift users from the outgoing Windows 10 operating system to Windows 11, will offer some new buyers a free Iconia A10-11 tablet. Just to sweeten the deal. The marketing stunt free offer isn’t a shabby one, at least. The Acer Iconia A10-11 currently retails for R3,000 in most locations, offering basic Android performance in a 10.1in display that would prove more than adequate for a comic book library. Acer your deal ‘Free things’ are never that simple, however. There are…

Google won’t stop until it has forced artificial intelligence (AI) into everything under its umbrella. Flight Deals is the latest new AI venture from the search company, following its launch of preferred sources, a Finance overhaul, NotebookLM for kids, “ultrasound proximity detection”, and Web Guide. And that’s just this month. So far. Don’t miss these Flight Deals In case the name isn’t enough of a giveaway, Google hopes to convince users — in the US, Canada, and India initially — to book their next getaway using its AI. Instead of a travel agent or looking at what’s available yourself, “you…

Either someone at HTC has an interest in Roman history, or this is a massive coincidence. The former smartphone maker revealed its new Vive Eagle smart glasses, or, as the company calls them, “wearable AI glasses.” For folks who haven’t read Julius Caesar’s campaign diaries or heard the plaintive cry of “Quintilius Varus, give me back my legions!”, Vive in Latin translates roughly to ‘may he live!’, while the eagle was a noted bit of sacred iconography for the Roman legions. None of this explains what HTC intends with its new wearable tech, however. Vive Eagle, vive aquilifer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGBW1ztCAvs&t=1s According to…

Garmin’s Venu X1 wearable corrects the greatest — perhaps the only — drawback regular folks might feel when purchasing one of its beloved Fenix or even Forerunner wearables (besides the price). That would be their size. Regular folks, meaning people who aren’t in training for something physically demanding, tend to favour comfort over all the body insights Garmin’s wearables provide. But what if there was a way to have granular stats and a comparatively slim device on your wrist? Apple makes those — they’re called the Apple Watch Ultra. Garmin’s answer to that is the Venu X1, which addresses the…

Are you ready for more tech in your printed (or digital) issue of Stuff than ever? Who wouldn’t be? The August-September 2025 issue is packed with the very newest tech we could get our hands on, including new TVs that won’t destroy your bank account, fitness wearables to up your sports game (or any other game you care to name), and the newest smartphones from South African darling Huawei. Want more? Let’s see what we can do about that.  Headlining the August-September 2025 issue of Stuff is a monster feature that packs 101 different (and excellent) gadgets into a compact…

If Sam Altman and OpenAI can’t find enough training data on the internet, perhaps they can extract it directly from your brain. That’s not actually what’s going to happen (we think), but the OpenAI founder and the company under his thumb are looking to expand into the human brain. The Financial Times reports that Altman is looking to found and fund (via the ChatGPT company) Merge Labs, a new startup that takes aim at the work being done by Neuralink. You know, the folks who stick computer chips into people’s skulls? OpenAI your mind The move isn’t surprising. When Altman…

You wouldn’t trust a mechanic who struggled to identify a fuel injector, so why would you entrust your health to a doctor with similar difficulties? A new study conducted on doctors in Poland, and published by The Lancet, suggests that routine reliance on AI can diminish medical professionals’ skills when the crutch is removed. The outcome of the study, which “assessed how endoscopists who regularly used AI performed colonoscopy when AI was not in use”, was not great. Those medical professionals who regularly relied on AI became less capable over time than those who didn’t. AI capability The study assessed…