Self-driving Uber vehicle kills pedestrian in Arizona

A self-driving Uber vehicle has reportedly hit and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona. The vhicle, which was allegedly in autonomous mode had a driver, who was not driving, behind the wheel. Local news reports

 

say a woman was walking outside of a crosswalk when she was hit. She was taken to a hospital where she died.

Arizona has been a destination for autonomous driving pilot projects and has a rather relaxed mandate to allow testing. Uber has reportedly ceased all autonomous driving tests in the area while investigations are going on. Uber has also halted similar initiatives in Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Toronto and Phoenix. This is the first pedestrian casualty resulting from autonomous vehicles failing to sense a person and killing them.

An incident involving a Tesla and its autopilot feature (not autonomous driving) resulted in a crash that killed the driver last year.

Source: Mashable

Microsoft and BlackBerry team up to offer smartphone security and productivity in enterprise

Microsoft and BlackBerry announced a strategic partnership to offer enterprises a solution that integrates BlackBerry’s expertise in mobility and security with Microsoft’s unmatched cloud and productivity products. Both companies have deep roots in enterprise as well as in mobile. While neither BlackBerry nor Microsoft currently have a dog in the fight for smartphones, they are combining strengths to bolster efforts on Android and iOS.

Through this partnership, the companies have collaborated on a first-of-its-kind solution: BlackBerry Enterprise BRIDGE. This technology provides a highly-secure way for their joint customers – the world’s largest banks, healthcare providers, law firms, and central governments – to seamlessly use native Microsoft mobile apps from within BlackBerry Dynamics.

Click to read more ...

Samsung Galaxy Note8 gets Android 8.0 Oreo

Samsung first brought Android 8.0 Oreo to the Galaxy S8 and S8+ in early February. Now, there are reports that the latest Android update is coming to the Note8, starting out with users in France and possibly some other countries as well. The baseband version of the Note8’s Android 8.0 update (or Samsung Experience 9.0) is N950FXXU3CRC1 and it includes the March security patch. We don’t have the official Oreo update notes yet so we can’t say yet what new features you can expect to come to the Note8.

Source: Android Police

Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key will reunite for a stop-motion Netflix film

Academy Award-winner Jordan Peele commented earlier this year that he was done with acting and would rather focus on writing and directing. But it seems the appeal to work with his good friend Keegan-Michael Key was too much to resist as the two are working on a new stop-motion animated film called Wendell and Wild, which will be distributed on Netflix. Wendell and Wild features two mischievous demon brothers that will be played by Key and Peele and it will be directed by Coraline and The Nightmare Before Christmas director Henry Selick. The film will mark Netflix’s second stop-animation acquisition to date (the first one was a film about Michael Jackson’s chimpanzee called Bubbles).

Selick will be working with Argentinian artist Pablo Lobato to design the characters for the film. His style is described as Andy Warhol-esque, giving us an idea of what we might expect from the film. No release date yet has been specified but we’ll keep our eyes and ears peeled for any updates.

Source: Deadline