Cafe Technology

So we have all seen a quadrocopter before, but just look at the size and agility of this one. Needless to say that sound is quite scary when it just comes out of nowhere! Turn your volume up for a jumpy ride.

Google Maps is releasing panoramic imagery of one of the world's most spectacular national monuments: the Grand Canyon. These Street View images cover more than 75 miles of trails and surrounding roads, making our map of this area even more comprehensive, accurate and easy to use than ever before.

We know that it will get us our email faster or help us navigate smarter with GPS/Maps or apply special filters to our photos and send them and the world instantly.

Sure, your phone can take a decent picture, but it's not even in the same universe as the best camera the government's got. At 1.8 pixels, the DARPA-developed ARGUS-IS the highest resolution surveillance platform in the world, and, when mounted to a drone, can single-handedly do the work of an army of 100 predator drones watching the area of one medium-sized city.

Hanson Robotics collaborated with researchers at the University of California at San Diego to create this boy robot they've named Diego-San. The face was built by Hanson Robotics, and the body was built by Japan's Kokoro Co. Diego-San can see with HD cameras in his eyes, and uses artificial intelligence software "modeled on human babies" so that he learns.

A futuristic highway that can save energy and improve road safety is set to be installed in the Netherlands by mid-2013.

Some Australian dude upgraded his Surface table (which ran a special version of Windows 7) to regular Windows 8 -- and here's what it looks like. What's the matter with you, Microsoft? Are you going to wait until Apple has a giant touch desktop on the market for four years before you try to enter the market?

This is the streamlined, two-person watercraft that breaches and submerges just like the Orcinus orca after which it is designed. A pilot protected beneath its watertight 1/2"-thick acrylic canopy pushes and pulls twin control levers to articulate the whale's pectoral fins for rolls and stealthy dives. With a finger on the right lever's throttle trigger, steering is provided by dual foot pedals that control the vectored thrust of the craft's 255-hp supercharged Rotax axial flow engine, enabling realistic behaviors such as porpoising or skyhopping.

After flying to an altitude of 39,045 meters (128,100 feet) in a helium-filled balloon, Felix Baumgartner completed a record breaking jump for the ages from the edge of space, exactly 65 years after Chuck Yeager first broke the sound barrier flying in an experimental rocket-powered airplane.

We've added the very first underwater panoramic images to Google Maps, the next step in our quest to provide people with the most comprehensive, accurate and usable map of the world. With these vibrant and stunning photos you don't have to be a scuba diver-or even know how to swim-to explore and experience six of the ocean's most incredible living coral reefs. Now, anyone can become the next virtual Jacques Cousteau and dive with sea turtles, fish and manta rays in Australia and Hawaii. Check it out

Ultra-resolution, smooth-motion, detail-enhanced, color-corrected, interpolated from the original 4 frames per second to 30 frames per second. This video plays real-time at the speed that Curiosity descended to the surface of Mars on August 6, 2012. I think it's wonderful that everyone on Earth has a chance to see this amazing footage from Mars :)

Uruguay has joined the small number of nations providing a laptop for every child attending state primary school. President Tabare Vazquez presented the final XO model laptops to pupils at a school in Montevideo on 13 October. Over the last two years 362,000 pupils and 18,000 teachers have been involved in the scheme. The "Plan Ceibal" (Education Connect) project has allowed many families access to the world of computers and the internet for the first time.

This is what happens when you sync your camera shutter to the speed of helicopter blades.

Now you can watch videos without fighting your crazy pile of headphones first.

Higher Quality Video "If people say it's impossible we have to prove them wrong." Design students Anna and Terese took on a giant challenge as an exam project. Something no one had done before. If they could swing it, it would for sure be revolutionary. The bicycle is a tool to change the world. If we use bikes AND travel safe: Life will be better for all.

These flying quadrotors are completely autonomous, meaning humans are not controlling them; rather they are controlled by a computer programed with instructions to play the instruments.

TED Talks Ramesh Raskar presents femto-photography, a new type of imaging so fast it shows the world one trillion frames per second, so detailed it shows light itself in motion.