It’s Wednesday, and while we wish we had some big new Star Wars story for you, we don’t, so we’ll just say May the Fourth be with you. And with that, we turn to minivans. But not just any minivan: no, we’re talking about self-driving minivans from the future, or at least that seems like the plan following news that Google is teaming up with Chrysler/Fiat to develop just such a mythical creature.
And really, if you think about it, there’s really no car out there that could better benefit from self-driving tech than the lowly minivan, a vehicle typically crammed with driver distractions. Details are thin on when the drone-vans will hit the streets, and word is that 100 test mules may be based on the popular family truckster known as the Chrysler Pacifica.
Given the current speed of A.I. development and new vehicle tech, we’ll wager it’ll be about 5 years before you can buy one and go VR shopping while rolling your crew to soccer practice without a care in the world.
_________
Apple’s big World Wide Developers Conference is coming right up in June, and word is Apple Music will get a big 2.0 makeover, or a reboot, or even some sort of Spotification.
Bloomberg says there’s been a shuffle in management following the Beats buyout and Cupertino is going to release a new user interface that better integrates streaming and downloading options. Nine Inch Nails frontman Trent Reznor is among the head honchos overseeing content, while Apple design chief Jony Ive has been tweaking the interface. Apple’s subscriber base is stalled at 13 million while Spotify continues to grow, according to Bloomberg, so some sort of action is clearly needed.
We’ll know more come June about how Apple, who helped kickstart the digital music revolution with iTunes all those years ago, will once again try to dominate the online music industry.
__________
Ever wonder what’s really under the sea? So does the NOAA, the federal agency now exploring the deepest parts of Earth’s oceans with unmanned submersibles. And the best part: you can go along for the ride.
The good ship Okeanos Explorer is positioned over the Marianas Trench, or Trough, a little gully that dives down to over seven miles in depth. They send down unmanned submersibles to look around and all the while, feed the HD footage to three livestream YouTube channels so you can see the sights live.
Expect the usual collection of alien-ish deep sea dwellers, but NOAA is also interested in so-called mud volcanoes, sea mounts and other odd goings-on that take place where fewer people have visited than have walked on the moon. Go here, and hook that PC up to your TV as soon as possible.
