Michael and Michael welcome back Andy Piper to make this week’s episode an intercontinental extravaganza of insight.  Everyone had so much fun, we plan do do it again next week.

Tagging onto the ventilator stories from last week, the team begins with an MIT project plan to build emergency ventilators from readily available parts, such as an Ambu bag for $100. 

Friend of the podcast Ian Hughes shared a new report on the use of AR and VR, which is of course ultra timely as so many people have been thrust into working remotely.  Simulating the serendipitous connections people make with one another at conferences provides a tremendous opportunity to leverage VR capabilities.  Video conferencing has taken off, of course, and with the rapid growth, there have been some growing pains — with security and griefing issues noted in the referenced articles.  Zoom and other video conferencing platforms are useful to bring people together, to play games and to connect.  

Some enterprising pubs have gotten creative in the social and physical distancing world we live in.  London’s Signature Brew has crafted a “Pub in a Box” to deliver the pub experience to your home, replete with crisps, a curated Spotify playlist and even a pub quiz.  In Chapel Hill, Pittsboro and Durham, local brewers Carolina Brewery and Fullsteam are two that are also finding ways to bring their wares to their clients.  Michael M spent an hour Saturday night on a virtual wine tasting over Facebook.

Moving from crisps to Krisp, the team discusses the benefits of audio noise cancellation technology to make all those virtual conferences better (or at least a little less distracting), and then touches on several interesting pieces — Apple’s acquisition of the weather app Dark Sky, ideas for Apple Watch activities, a man who ran a virtual marathon on his balcony, and with these three, it wouldn’t be a full show without at least one LEGO mention.

Hope that you enjoy listening to the episode as much as we did making it.  Be safe and be well!

Selected Links

SciTechDaily article: MIT Will Post Free Plans Online for an Emergency Ventilator That Can Be Built for $100 — https://scitechdaily.com/mit-posts-free-plans-online-for-an-emergency-ventilator-that-can-be-built-for-100/ 

https://t.co/bgzVB15bQm a report on the use of virtual worlds #vr and #ar that we have published open to all.— Ian Hughes/epredator (@epredator) April 3, 2020