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Topic: Science Fiction

  
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Microsoft's Marc Whitten on ESPN Coming to Xbox, and Using Kinect for Interactive TV

With Microsoft's new Kinect camera, new kinds of interactivity will be coming to living rooms. Marc Whitten, the General Manager of Xbox Live, tells about speech recognition, about natural control, and how Kinect will change the living room.READ»

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Today in Robots: Fabulous Farm Droids, Scary Stick-on Spy Planes

Robots, robots everywhere, with barely time to think (about the coming robocalypse.) Mechanoids are a fact of life folks, and if you need proof then learn about Chinese farmer Wu Yulu and his list of robo pals, and Stanford's freaky ...READ»

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Head of Microsoft Research Building Star Trek Future

Rick Rashid, head of Microsoft's Research labs, is a major Star Trek fan, and we talk about that along with a ton of what Microsoft's R&D labs are developing.READ»

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Futures Thinking: Mapping the Possibilities (Part 2)

Expected. Better. Worse. Weirder. What kind of world will we live in?READ»

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Will Google's Translator Phone Lead Us to Babylon or Babble On?

Google's revealed it's working on extensions to its smartphone voice-control powers, debuted in the Nexus One, that'll automatically translate between languages. It's the stuff of pure utopian science fiction. But is it a good idea? ...READ»

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Middle School Seattle Trip

Spend an exciting weekend in Seattle. Play all afternoon at Wild Waves Water Park where you can zoom down water-tubes and slides, splash in the waterfall lagoon, tube the lazy river, or cool off in the wave pool. Visit Seattle's ...READ»

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Good Work! FBI Cracks Down on One of Last Spring's 'Wolverine' Uploaders

Uh oh. The Whenever-We-Feel-Like-It Internet Police are back on the job. The FBI arrested 47-year-old Bronx resident Gilberto Sanchez earlier this morning and accused him of copyright infringement for allegedly uploading a copy of ...READ»

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CPR Can Fix Android Phones like Science Fiction

Androids like Data, a Star Trek character, have recently been recycled into devices less humanoid but more functional – like Motorola’s new Android phone.READ»

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Science Fiction Books

Science fiction is one of the 20th century's most characteristic and dominant literary forms. Despite serious criticism and misunderstanding, it has millions of readers worldwide and has established itself at the heart of popular ...READ»

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Navy's Future Command Center Looks Just Like the Star Trek Enterprise

A research lab inside the U.S. Navy tasked with dreaming up the future of the armed force has been busy working on a new command center design. It's suitably high tech--and is undeniably influenced by Star Trek.READ»

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Microsoft's Courier And Norhtec's Tablet: The Impossible And The Possible?

"Forget Apple's Tablet!" That's what gearheads are shouting from the rooftops after Gizmodo's leak of a new Microsoft product--"The Courier"--appeared last night during the opening of the Gizmodo Gallery. READ»

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Take That, Toy Story! Mattel's 'Avatar' Action Figures to Offer Augmented Reality [VIDEO]

Mattel's new line of characters, creatures, and vehicles licensed from James Cameron's highly awaited 3-D opus will come to life on-screen--your screen.READ»

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Watch: Harry Potter 6

Accio ticket sales! The Hogwarts crew returns with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on July 15. So far, the films' grosses have been stunningly consistent. Here's how other major franchises compare.READ»

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Dear SyFy, Imagine Greater - Please!

The Sci Fi channel announced that it was changing its name to SyFy a few months ago, and the switch happens tomorrow. Unfortunately Bruce Willis is not going to rescue us from this colossal attack of bad branding and phonetic foolishness.READ»

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Researchers Invent Eye-Tracking Eyeglass Display, Star Trek-Style

It may not be quite up to the spec of Geordi La Forge's visor on Star Trek TNG, but researchers in Germany have come up with an eyeglass-mounted display that's so freakily high-tech you may need only to move your eyes to control a PC.READ»

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Could Real-Life Tricorder Inventions Combat the Next Pandemic?

Swine flu still rumbles on in the background, and it is still dangerous--but could two new inventions revealed this week give us Star Trek-like medical technology to help us combat future pandemics? Claims that scientists have ...READ»

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12 Leadership Lessons From the Bridge of the Starship Enterprise

Between liaisons with Pantone hued alien females, conflicts with empire-building cyborg killing machines, and encounters on new planets that always results in the death of a red shirted security officer, koans of management ...READ»

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'Kingon' Invasion: Burger King and Paramount Ink Blockbuster Marketing Deal

After going three-for-three in drawing public criticism for its Whopper Virgins, Texican and Square Butts campaigns, Crispin Porter + Bogusky has scored another trifecta: a three-picture Burger King marketing tie-in with Viacom's Paramount Pictures, starting with Friday's release of Star Trek.READ»

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Paul Krugman, Nobelist

"Economics is as close to psychohistory as you can get."     -- Paul Krugman "Incidents from My Career" This year's winner of the Nobel prize in economics is one of the finest scholars in the field, ...READ»

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BMW Gina: Shape-Shifting Car

This car is like something out of a sci-fi flick: a BMW prototype with a flexible textile skin that reflects the carmaker's new design philosophy. READ»

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The Web Supremacy

About the web's supremacy against machines and tools: " There is an endless list of technologies with us today that forty years ago only science fiction writers, and professors at MIT, could have imagined imagined. But ...READ»

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Rebel Alliance

How a small band of sci-fi geeks is leading Hollywood into a new era.READ»

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The Legacy of Arthur C. Clarke

Another great bringer of inspiration has passed. Arthur C. Clarke was the author of several famous science fiction works, from 2001 to Rendezvous with Rama. I have written that Gary Gygax inspired others to creativity. Clarke did ...READ»

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The Nuts and Bolts of Business

The MIT Artificial Intelligence Lab is building the future of business -- literally. Think C-3P0 with degrees in astrophysics, marine biology, and home economics.READ»

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Flying Cars

Sitting in Samuel Schweighart's garage in Watertown, Massachusetts, is the stuff of science fiction--and soon reality. Schweighart, an engineer with Boston-based Terrafugia, is part of the team leading the charge to get a ...READ»