Here are 10 tech news that I found interesting.
Wearable numbers get a bump, as consumers shift focus to smarter devices – The wearable space seems to still be figuring itself out — though in spite of some reports about the death of the category, overall growth remains one of the few constants. According to the latest numbers from IDC, the global bump was pretty modest for Q3 of this year, at about 7.3-percent, year over year. Techcrunch
Elon Musk’s giant battery is now delivering power to South Australia – The world’s largest lithium-ion battery is now live in South Australia after being delivered a few weeks ago, easily beating the promise Elon Musk made of “100 days or it’s free.” The South Australian Government notes that for the first time, clean wind energy can be siphoned to the grid 24/7 improving the system’s reliability, whether the wind is blowing or not. The 100MW battery farm has enough storage capacity to power more than 30,000 homes. The Verge
This new FDA-approved Apple Watch band measures the electricity in your heart – The Federal Drug Administration just cleared a new band for the Apple Watch that monitors the electrical rhythms in your heart. Mashable
Dell’s latest XPS 13 is fast, nimble, and kind of stale – When Dell first introduced its redesigned XPS 13 laptop nearly three years ago, it kicked off a renaissance in laptop design. Dell proved that you could have a full-size, 13-inch display in a computer that’s as compact and portable as an 11-inch model. Nearly every other laptop maker has followed down this path, and now there are a lot of laptop options with trim bezels and small footprints. The Verge
$3 billion in EA stock value wiped out in less than 30 days – Electronic Arts’ shareholders are biting their nails as they watch the company’s stock value plummet. For November, EA shares have dropped 8.5 percent. That equates to $3.1 billion in valuation wiped out in only one month. Industry analysts are blaming the plunging stock price on the debacle over Star Wars Battlefront II and its money-grubbing loot box / microtransaction system. Techspot
Top-secret US Army intelligence accidentally posted to public AWS bucket – Security is hard but you’d at least expect some level of protection to be made when dealing with top-secret military intelligence. Unfortunately, it appears that this wasn’t exactly the case for some data shared between the US Army and the NSA. Security firm UpGuard has discovered a publicly accessible AWS S3 bucket that contains classified information on the Distributed Common Ground System – Army as well as details of communications with federal IT environments. Techspot
Microsoft is adding tabs to apps in Windows 10 – Microsoft on Tuesday shared details on a new feature that’ll (eventually) make its way to Windows 10. It’s called “Sets” and, according to Microsoft’s Terry Myerson, it’s designed to help organize your workflow and mitigate time lost to interruptions.
Apple is reportedly looking into designing its own power management chips – A new report from Nikkei Asian Review says that Apple is planning to move design of power management chips – the ones responsible for battery life management and energy consumption – in-house. BusinessInsider
NASA and HPE Push the Envelope on HPC in Space – Technology is rapidly transforming the way we think and understand the universe. In the realm of space science, technological advancements have enabled man to study Earth, explore new worlds, and even walk on the moon. Today, high performance computing (HPC) is accelerating space research and scientific discovery like never before. Organizations like NASA are using the most cutting-edge HPC solutions to analyze troves of complex data, conduct experiments, advance the Mission to Mars, and much more. HPCWire
Automation threatens 800 million jobs, but technology could still save us, says report – A new report predicts that by 2030, as many as 800 million jobs could be lost worldwide to automation. The study, compiled by the McKinsey Global Institute, says that advances in AI and robotics will have a drastic effect on everyday working lives, comparable to the shift away from agricultural societies during the Industrial Revolution. In the US alone, between 39 and 73 million jobs stand to be automated — making up around a third of the total workforce. The Verge
Bran's World 