Tech news – Tomorrow's World

Ok, I know it’s been a while – a lot has been going on, however – I knew for a fact, that you’d be thinking, hope Bal writes something about Elon buying Twitter! And yes, here it is… a quick blog post about Elon and Twitter.

For those who don’t know what Twitter is – Twitter is an American microblogging and social networking service on which users post and interact with messages known as “tweets”. Registered users can post, like, and retweet tweets, but unregistered users can only read those that are publicly available.

There’s millions, if not billions of people who use Twitter. And if you’re on there and not following me… I am @balbansal

Now, to the story in hand. Elon, who we all know from SpaceX, Tesla, etc… has gone and bought it for a cool $44bn.

Elon (who is worth $273bn) said…

“Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,”.

“I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans,” he added.

“Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.”

The move comes as Twitter faces growing pressure from politicians and regulators over the content that appears on its platform. It has drawn critics from left and right over its efforts to mediate misinformation on the platform.

In one of its most high-profile moves, last year it banned former US President Donald Trump, perhaps its most powerful user, citing the risk of “incitement of violence” – remember that?

At the time Mr Musk observed: “A lot of people are going to be super unhappy with West Coast high tech as the de facto arbiter of free speech.”

So there you go… Elon has bought Twitter, will enable a number of changes and as he loves ‘free speech’, it will be very interesting to see how the platform develops. Obviously he’ll be looking for a return on his investment but moreso… what is interesting is, he’d promised the World Health Organization, that if that could show a detailed plan on how to solve world hunger, he’d donate $6bn to the cause… they showed him the plan, but I’ve not heard about the $6bn being donated. Maybe he’ll tweet it soon….

So, what features do you think he should introduce first?

Looks like the weather is finally picking up! With that, many in the UK enjoyed a beer or two, as the pubs and bars opened and this brought about some sense of ‘normality’… we still need to be careful, as I’m reading of a new variant in India of Covid-19 that could spread very easily and might already be here in the UK!

As it’s not confirmed that it’s in the UK, I’ll share my Top Two Tech Stories of the week gone!

First up… Domino’s Pizza. Whilst I’ve had the debate if pineapple belongs on pizza or not (which I’ll save to resurrect another day), I’m sharing with you trials of Domino’s Pizza delivery via an autonomous vehicle!

Yes – we’ve seen and heard of these vehicles before. But like many companies – there’s always a fear of moving forward from an idea into a fully fledged pilot. However, Domino’s are not.

Nuro driverless cars in Houston this week as part of a pilot program, the company announced Monday, will deliver pizza’s! The company says “select customers” in Houston who make a prepaid delivery order from its store in the Woodland Heights neighborhood during certain dates and times can have their pizza brought to them by a Nuro R2 robot.

Here’s how the pizza deliveries will work: a customer places and pays for an order online from the Woodland Heights store and opts in to have the order brought by the R2. The customer receives a unique PIN via text alert along with updates on the vehicle’s location. When the robot car arrives, the customer enters the PIN on its touch screen, which opens the R2’s doors. Pizza ensues.

2. Next up – Apple and their Spring Event!

What’s in the Spring Loaded Event Bal?

Well… rumours are new iPads, new Apple Pencil and a few other bits. We don’t expect a new phone at this Event.

Refreshed ‌iPad Pro‌ models are expected to be the main event at Apple’s April event. Apple will overhaul the 11 and 12.9-inch ‌iPad Pro‌ models, but don’t look for major external changes — much of what’s new will be internal.

The third-generation ‌Apple Pencil‌ looks similar to the second-generation version, but with a glossy finish. It’s not clear what new features might be included if Apple does refresh the ‌Apple Pencil‌, but there have been rumors of a potential black model.

We haven’t heard particularly reliable rumors about a new ‌Apple Pencil‌, so it’s not really clear if we’re going to see one at the April event.

Oh… and we might finally see the AirTags which we’ve been promised for a while!

For those unfamiliar with ‌AirTags‌, they’re small trackers that are equipped with Bluetooth and are designed to attach to important but easily lost items like wallets, cameras, and keys. ‌AirTags‌ (and the items they’re attached to) can be tracked right inside the ‌Find My‌ app alongside iPhones, iPads, and Macs, so you can keep an eye on all of your important belongings in one place.

‌AirTags‌ details have been leaking since the release of iOS 13, but we’re still not sure what the ‌AirTags‌ will look like. Based on some simple images found in iOS, they could be small, circular tags with built-in Bluetooth and ultra-wideband support.

So there we go… everything from Pizza’s to Apple’s this Sunday for you. Have a great week ahead, enjoy the Apple event and if you decided for a takeaway and live in Houston… why not have a Pizza!

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