Bits: daily tech news bulletin

Facebook reveals a neural wristband technology for AR


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Australia's online vaccination booking system has failed to launch this week with the government accused of rushing its rollout. Along with problems accessing the site, the system was also largely directing people to call local GPs instead of offering online bookings. The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners argued the government had given unrealistic expectations to people trying to get vaccination bookings. The contract to build the vaccination booking system was awarded to HealthEngine, a company that in August 2020 was ordered to pay $2.9M by the Federal Court after it was found to have shared patient information to health insurance brokers without due disclosure.The latest Google Chrome update has added a Live Caption feature to the software that can be unlocked via the application's accessibility controls. The feature, which has been on Android phones for some time, allows the software to overlay real-time captions for any audio playing through your browser. Relaunching Chrome should ensure you are on the latest version of the app, and then you'll find the Live Caption option under Settings > Advanced > Accessibility, and once enabled it offers a toggle in your Chrome toolbar.Intel has launched its 11th-generation Core desktop processors this week. The new 'Rocket Lake S' series of CPUs claim to be up to 19% faster than the previous generation. Intel has struggled to vs rival AMD, with its chips stuck at a 14nm scale, but this year's chips have reduced the number of cores from 10 to 8 while increasing speed across the remaining cores which Intel claims has also boosted on-board graphics performance by as much as 50%.In science, new research into organic solar cell technology has found transparent cells could be placed on greenhouses without reducing the light needed by the plants inside to grow. The North Carolina State University study found that lettuce continued to grow under the transparent cells as normal, and adjustments to the wavelengths being filtered made no impact on their growth. Testing is set to move to other crop types in future.Facebook has revealed it is working on a neural wristband technology that can interpret the signals from your brain to your hands to deliver a refined interface for augmented reality. The device allows for even the smallest hand gestures to trigger interface choices in an AR environment, as well as offering the utility of full keyboard typing anywhere, anytime. The technology came to Facebook through its acquisition of neural interface startup CTRL-Labs.From AR to VR, Sony has unveiled new virtual reality controllers for the PlayStation 5. Until now, PlayStation VR technology has used the ten year old PlayStation Move controller technology which uses large light balls on the ends of wands. The new controllers can track your finger movements and the whole controller and its triggers also give haptic feedback to the user. The PS5 VR 2.0 controller reveal is part of a slow boil of information as the company has not yet revealed the PS5 VR headset.Turning to Xbox, the EA Play service officially joins Xbox Game Pass for PC today. EA's library service was added to the console version of Xbox late last year and this new release brings 60 additional games to the PC version of Game Pass from across the EA range.And in esports, Melbourne esports organisation Order has joined Rainbow Six Siege ahead of the opening weekend of competition in the Oceanic Nationals. Order purchased the roster of existing Siege team Okami LFO to gain its slot in the competition. The team also gains a position in the Asia Pacific South tier of regional competition.That's your Bits bulletin for Friday, March 19, I'm Seamus Byrne from Byteside, thanks for joining me for this first week of the podcast. Please review the podcast and share it with your friends and colleagues if you think they'll find it valuable. We'll be back with more Bits on Monday.
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Bits: daily tech news bulletinBy Byteside