Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin wonders how exciting the NBC show based around Wordle will be. There's a beer station with surge pricing in China and satirical video games machines have appeared in Washington. Audible have opened a bookshop in New York with no books, just audiobooks. You can now buy the Adidas shoes that broke the two-hour Marathon record. There is uproar at the Chelsea Flower Show because a gardener has launched an AI garden design app. Universities in Rome and Belgium have come up with a performance exoskeleton to train violinists. There's a crowdfunded egg-shaped mouse. Car rental companies lost all their records because of a destructive AI bot. And Colossal Biosciences have decided, after trying to resurrect woolly mammoths and direwolves, to bring back the bluebuck antelope.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin is impressed by the Sabicap, a beanie hat which enables you to type merely by thinking. For the deaf, a vibrating pillow sleeve will alert them in the case of fire or burglar alarms. A study shows that friendly AI chatbots are much less accurate. Richard Dawkins believes that chatbots are conscious. Tokyo Airport is using humanoid robots as baggage handlers. Those wanting hard-to-keep Arowana fish can now get a robot version. There's a robot chess tutor. And Steve has bought a mini icemaker, which he recommends.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin majors on robots. A robot won a half marathon against human runners, another beat elite players at table tennis while one in Poland chased away wild boars in a town. Heartwarmingly, a controlled robot in Ukraine rescued a 77-year-old woman escaping Russian shelling. A 23-year-old Polish influencer hoping to raise £100,000 for a cancer charity ended up with over £50 million. NASA will let you spell out your name using features on Earth. Mark Zuckerberg is going to beam solar power from space, but to power AI rather than homes. And Steve admires the world's narrowest car and a shopping bag that can increase in size and grow wheels.
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Simon Rose re-visits one of his early episodes, recorded on 25th April 2016 with Share Radio's technology editor Steve Caplin. With the show opening with some very weird sounds, and continues to describe an online Thesaurus: years before the emergence of Artificial Intelligence! Then, the world's first smart clothes peg — you'll soon find out how far things have travelled over the past decade ..
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin warns holidaymakers to check their data allowance abroad, having saved a small fortune by using the Roamless app in Morocco. He loves some of the public's names for autonomous cleaning robots. American scientists are experimenting with robot seeing-eye dogs. Skoda, who made bikes before cars, have come up with a bell that works even if pedestrians are wearing noise-cancelling headphones. The singer Eddie Dalton, topping UK music charts, turns out to be AI-generated. There's a crowdfunded gadget that lets you use your vintage camera lenses digitally, while Steve admires a cheap multi-function pen. And he is impressed that Jeff Bezos's company Blue Origin has found a way to make oxygen from moon dust.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin is impressed by hydrogen fuel cells for trucks, but disappointed there are so few hydrogen stations to fuel them. There's a device for perfectly matching colour for hair dyeing. VR headsets will soon have added aromas to heighten realism. There's a robot that can keep functioning even if it loses all its legs. Cassette-manufacturer Maxell have a new portable cassette players for those who are into retro gadgets. A clever device being crowdfunded lets you pair your devices with TVs while away, as well as a smart night light Steve strongly recommends. But beware of economising on bike or scooter batteries as eBike fires are up 38% in just one year.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin is surprised to find that Amazon can amend or even delete Kindle books you supposedly own. He is less surprised at how ChapGPT assesses good literature. He is very impressed with a drone that captures everything in 8K without you having to pay much attention to what's in view. There's a gizmo that turns an ordinary watch into a slightly smarter watch. The new iPhone OS can zoom in on audio as well as video. Yamaha have a 3-wheel motor scooter, but Sony have given up on their much-heralded e-car. There's a crowd-funded digital camera designed to look like the old disposable Kodaks, a folding kayak and a spork with lots of attachments. And, in Shenzen, they now have a games arcade where you can control everything with your mind.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin discusses some of the features of Apple's updated operating sstem, including having the ability to talk to chatbots while driving although, worryingly, there will also be a curated "sleep" playlist. He craves a gorgeous red electric submarine. There's a cargo ebike with some interesting features. Be careful about telling the Gemini chatbot that it's wrong; apparently this causes it "emotional distress". A YouTuber has powered an electric car with thrown-away vape batteries. There's a crowd-funded robotic wasp which, suspects Steve, may not be all it is claimed. He finds himself able to resist a beer-filled transparent jacket, despite the two methods of extracting beer from it. And he discusses the world's first quantum battery.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin tells Simon Rose that AI agents can now rent human beings to carry out tasks they can't manage themselves. Brain cells in a petri dish have been taught to play the 90s shooter game Doom. BYD's Dena Z9GT can charge from 10% to 70% in just 5 minutes; unfortunately the UK doesn't have any of the required chargers. Tesco is experimenting with replacing bar codes with QR codes; Steve isn't convinced it will work. Pager sales have leapt in Russia after the internet was turned off. There's a collapsible cool box, a laundry chair with arms and a computer mouse that splits into half to become a game controller for your phone. And scientists in Edinburgh have genetically engineered bacteria to break down plastic bottles into a medicine for Parkinson's Disease.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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Original Broadcast: Gadgets and Gizmos
Steve Caplin celebrates 50 years of Apple, a company which he claims has changed our lives in many ways. A man in Gibraltar has had his prostate removed by a surgeon in London using remote control. Some of the AI bots on Moltbook – thinking of founding a religion – are not happy it has been bought by Mega. The Society of Authors wants books to say if they have been written by humans or AI. There's a new mop that could be handy for murderers. Steve salivates over a solar-powered EV which probably wouldn't do too well in the British climate. He feels scientists who are trying to find a way to keep batteries cool might not have thought through their latest idea which brings water and electronics together. And scientists in Texas may have found a way to grow chickpeas – and thus make hummus – on the moon.
Guests: Steve Caplin
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