Wi-Fi

In the latest edition of "crowdfunding campaign: cool or crap?" comes Sound Heroes, a Bluetooth speaker in the shape of a humanoid robot. Apparently there are plenty who would place this one in the "cool" camp as the campaign reached its goal in only four minutes.

​We think of Wi-Fi as bathing us in a comfy, invisible blanket of data and internet access, but just as a blanket can take on the shapes of the bodies it covers, the microwave radiation sent out from a hotspot can be used to generate a three-dimensional image of the surrounding environment.

Although there are plenty of ways to avoid being distracted while driving, starting with a healthy dose of self control, Nissan has taken a no-holds barred approach to stopping smartphone communication on the move. Meet the Signal Shield concept, a Faraday Cage for the armrest of your car.

A few years ago, Sony released a business-focused e-paper tablet, and now the company has updated the device with higher resolution, bigger memory, NFC and Bluetooth connectivity, a new pen-friendly screen and a few bonus workflow features.

Wi-Fi works by sending information via radio waves, but systems that rely on light have the potential to achieve much faster speeds. A new system uses infrared rays beamed from antennas to reach data transfer rates of over 40 Gbps, regardless of how many devices are hooking into the network.

Blink’s security system is a sleek, basic camera that can stream a live video feed of your home to your smartphone, and now the company is expanding its offerings with an outdoor version of the camera, as well as a range of other sensors and add-ons.

The cumbersome, expensive process of motion capture might soon be a thing of the past. Danish startup Rokoko has developed the Smartsuit Pro, a mocap suit that works without wires or cameras, and instead relies on sensors and a Wi-Fi network to record or stream motion to a character in real time.

As cities look for ways to source renewable energy, cleanly charge electric vehicles and provide fast, ubiquitous communication networks, New York-based startup Totem has developed something called the Totem to deliver all three. What's more, it looks pretty good too.

Even though much of the world is being blanketed with internet signals through a variety of modalities, there are still places where getting a reliable high-speed broadband link is tough. AT&T has just announced a project that might help with that, called AirGig.

Transmitting data on wavelengths we can see might turn out to be more efficient and secure than radio waves. Researchers have developed a nanocrystal that helps boost data speeds transmitted through visible light up to 2 Gbps – while pleasantly lighting the room.

As Spotify, Tidal and Apple Music continue to grow in audience and influence, the way we listen to our music is becoming inextricably linked to our smartphones and computers. Como Audio, founded by Tivoli Audio founder Tom Devesto, is trying to change that with its Solo and Duetto music systems.

Much of the Australian Outback has no mobile signal, but it does have more than a few Toyota LandCruisers. A plan has now been hatched to take advantage of this fact, which would see vehicles kitted out with Wi-Fi, UHF and other technologies to form a roving network for emergency communications.​