Devin Coldewey
Writer & Photographer
The Latest from Devin Coldewey
These face-generating systems are getting rather too creepily good for my liking
Machine learning models are getting quite good at generating realistic human faces — so good that I may never trust a machine, or human, to be real ever again. The new approach, from researchers at
OffGridBox raises $1.6M to charge and hydrate rural Africa with its all-in-one installations
The simplest needs are often the most vital: power and clean water will get you a long way. But in rural areas of developing countries they can both be hard to come by. OffGridBox is attempting to pro
Virgin Galactic touches the edge of space with Mach 2.9 test flight of SpaceShipTwo
The fourth test flight of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo took its test pilots to the very edge of space this morning, reaching just over 52 miles of altitude and a maximum speed of Mach 2.9. It's anot
Watch Rocket Lab launch 10 cubesats into orbit tonight for NASA
It's been just over a month since Rocket Lab's inaugural (and long-delayed) commercial launch, "It's Business Time," and it's about to take another customer to space: NASA. Tonight's 8PM scheduled lau
Senators aim to give internet companies doctor-like duties to protect our data
Consumers are increasingly entrusting online services with all kinds of personal data — but that trust has been repeatedly abused or taken for granted. If a doctor or a lawyer did that, they’d
Bumblebees bearing high-tech backpacks act as a living data collection platform
There's lots of research going into tiny drones, but one of the many hard parts is keeping them in the air for any real amount of time. Why not hitch a ride on something that already flies all day? Th
Lift Aircraft’s Hexa may be your first multirotor drone ride
We were promised jetpacks, but let's be honest, they're just plain unsafe. So a nice drone ride is probably all we should reasonably expect. Lift Aircraft is the latest to make a play for the passenge
Puma reissues its nerdiest shoe ever, the RS-Computer
No one has any trouble tracking their steps today. But how can you make sure people know you're doing it? Ostentatiously checking your phone or watch every five minutes is a pain. What if I told you t
Doom is 25 and co-creator John Romero is putting out a giant expansion for it
25 years ago, anyone old enough to navigate DOS was likely playing Doom every spare minute, assuming their parents weren't around. A quarter century after its release, the game's legacy is unquestiona
Krisp reduces noise on calls using machine learning, and it’s coming to Windows soon
If your luck is anything like mine, as soon as you jump on an important call, someone decides it's a great time to blow some leaves off the sidewalk outside your window. 2Hz's Krisp is a new desktop a
Voyager 2 joins its twin in interstellar space
Voyager 2, the multi-planetary exploratory probe launched in 1977, has finally entered interstellar space, some six years after its twin, Voyager 1, did the same. It's now about 11 billion miles from
Listen to the soothing sounds of Martian wind collected by NASA’s InSight lander
The InSight Mars lander accomplished a perfect landing last week on the Elysium Planitia region of the planet, where it is hard at work preparing to drill into the surface (and taking selfies, of cour
AI desperately needs regulation and public accountability, experts say
Artificial intelligence systems and creators are in dire need of direct intervention by governments and human rights watchdogs. Surprisingly, it looks like the tech industry just isn't that good at re
Rolling, hopping robots explore Earthly analogs of distant planets
Before we send any planet-trotting robot to explore the landscape of Mars or Venus, we need to test it here on Earth. Two such robotic platforms being developed for future missions are undergoing test
Loro’s mounted wheelchair assistant puts high tech to work for people with disabilities
A person with physical disabilities can’t interact with the world the same way as the able, but there’s no reason we can’t use tech to close that gap. Loro is a device that mounts to
Spaceflight’s 64-satellite rideshare launch takes off tomorrow on a Falcon 9 (Update: Delayed)
(Update: High winds at high altitudes have delayed the launch until December 2nd. “Vehicle and payloads are healthy,” SpaceX announced.) Seattle-based launch coordinator Spaceflight is gea
Mars Lander InSight sends the first of many selfies after a successful touchdown
Last night’s 10 minutes of terror as the InSight Mars Lander descended to the Martian surface at 12,300 MPH were a nail-biter for sure, but now the robotic science platform is safe and sound —
That night, a forest flew
Wildfires are consuming our forests. The institutions and technologies to keep these environments healthy have suffered decades of neglect. DroneSeed is a Seattle-based startup that aims to combat thi
With no moving parts, this plane flies on the ionic wind
Since planes were invented, they've flown using moving parts to push air around. Sure, there are gliders and dirigibles, which float more than fly, but powered flight is all about propellers (that's w
They’re making a real HAL 9000, and it’s called CASE
Don't panic! Life imitates art, to be sure, but hopefully the researchers in charge of the Cognitive Architecture for Space Exploration, or CASE, have taken the right lessons from 2001: A Space Odysse