Beyond Infinity

Josiah Zayner live streamed injecting himself with gene editing compound CRISR at a biotech conference. He sells DIY CRISPR and other biohacking paraphernalia on his website The Odin. Now he's being investigated by Consumer Affairs in California for practicing medicine without a license.

Researchers at Washington State University have invented an environmentally-friendly foam made from nanocrystals of cellulose that is a better insulator than polystyrene.

Despite assurances it's secure and your privacy is protected, sources claim that in addition to software and AI responding to your Alexa voice commands, there are humans listening back at Amazon.

If it passes a final vote in the Senate, California's AB5 bill will force companies like Uber, Lyft, Instacart and Postmates to classify workers as employees, not independent contractors. This fundamental challenge to a beloved business model of Silicon Valley could seriously effect bottom line profitability.

After concluding a national drone noise review, the Australian Federal Government has come under fire from Google-linked Wing, a delivery drone operator. The Feds want to hand responsibility for drone noise to the states, which may result in an uncertain and inconsistent regulatory environment.

Coinciding with Safer Internet Day which aims to create a better internet for young people, Google releases a new Chrome feature that warns about compromised logins.

Smart home devices like the Amazon Echo and Google Nest are super handy but do come with some security risks. There are now 50 million in use in America, with 21% of adults owning them and sales are booming. Representative Seth Moulton (D-MA) is calling for a new generation of digital privacy laws to protect people's private conversations at home from being recorded without permission.

Billions of CCTV cameras now monitor cities across the world but don't necessarily result in big reductions in crime or improvements in public safety. What they do provide is a data bonanza for governments, anxious to keep ever closer tabs on 'their' people.

A new music streaming service from TikTok's parent company Bytedance could challenge Spotify's market dominance. It aims to capitalise on the massive and growing popularity of TikTok to encourage sharing and virality among music lovers, with emphasis on video and interactivity.

At long last, the world's search giant is taking steps to favour the originators of true journalism in its search result rankings over aggregators, plagiarists and retweeting parrots. This is a potential win for dedicated investigative reporters, smaller publishers and all those resisting the tide of fake news and misinformation poisoning real debate and open, constructive discussion.

Production costs are falling dramatically and the day may come when a fast food burger is made by a machine, instead of a cow. There will also be massive environmental benefits of such ethical eating.

Newly developed at the Institute of Technology in Madras, iron-ion batteries are safe, clean and stable. They can't be recharged as many times as lithium-ion batteries, but for specific uses they offer advantages.

From The Vault: The Best Of Beyond Infinity.The first time one spacecraft orbited two separate objects in our solar system was NASA's pioneering DAWN mission to Vesta and Ceres.PLUS: Planet X - the hunt for the elusive 9th planet; and the JUNO spacecraft's hairy encounter with the gas giant Jupiter.

The Air Force has completed an upgrade to its Strategic Automated Command and Control System whereby its 1960s era 8-inch floppy disk system was replaced with a solid state digital storage solution. Yet America's ICBMs may wind up being less secure from hackers.

An expensive new treatment promises gradually to protect allergic children from accidental exposure to small amounts of peanuts.

San Diego start-up BlueNalu has found a way to make a plant-based fillet of yellowfish. Crucially, the lab-made seafood can be cooked by direct heat without disintegrating. Scaling up to commercial quantities will be a big challenge.

Software experts, including our own John Young, are urging Windows users to upgrade to Windows 10 as a decade of support for 7 winds up. It's estimated well over 20% of all PC users are still running the aging operating system, leaving them exposed to risks of hacking, ransomware and data loss.

In an important opinion on privacy at borders, US District Court Judge Denise Casper ruled that device searches without probable cause are in violation of the 4th Amendment. She held that people have significant privacy interests in their digital data and that device searches require reasonable suspicion from border officials.

The US Department of Justice accused San Francisco startup Practice Fusion of creating software to increase pain med prescriptions by medical practitioners. The company, which provided software to thousands of doctors' offices, settled for US$145 million.

The bushfire emergency has killed over a billion animals and decimated national parks and old growth forests. Now seems a good time to listen again to our in-depth interview on anthropogenic climate change with Professor David Karoly, recorded in 2016. We discuss global warming, its impacts and implications for the planet. The podcast includes an update on the enormous and tragic losses of native flora and fauna in Australia, plus how to donate and support recovery efforts.