How Star Wars’ BB-8 Droid Works

While Star Wars might take place in a galaxy far, far away, the technology behind one of its breakout stars, the adorable rolling BB-8 droid, is actually available right here on Earth. Instead of relying on CGI to animate the droid in the upcoming “Force Awakens” film, director JJ Abrams decided to build out an actual, working model and enlisted the help of start-up Sphero. …

Link About It: This Week’s Picks

The meaning of Serena Williams, affordable prosthetics and more in this week's look around the web

1.10 Years After Hurricane Katrina Before the catastrophic Hurricane Katrina hit 10 years ago, New Orleans was a dramatically different city. There are now 100,000 fewer black residents living there and property prices are increasing, but new businesses are also popping up. While each area is recovering and changing in different ways, there is no doubt that the city was changed forever—not just because of …

Force Touch Technology for Any Device

When Apple announced its newest Macbook, arguably its most talked about feature was the Force Touch trackpad, which can alter its function depending on how hard you push. This same technology may soon be available to the world outside of Apple thanks to a young company called Sensel Morph. The start-up has developed a tablet-sized pad that pairs Force Touch with any PC or Mac …