TLDR 2020-09-16

Opendoor is a platform that lets homeowners quickly sell their houses. The company will go public through a merger with Social Capital Hedosophia Holdings II, a shell company led by a venture capitalist and early Facebook executive. Opendoor generated $4.7 billion in revenue in 2019 with 18,000 home sales across 21 markets. It laid off a third of its employees in April. While the company is still operating at a loss, the deal values Opendoor at an enterprise value of $4.8 billion.

Apple has announced a new virtual fitness service, a subscription service called Apple One, and a new lineup of Apple Watches and iPads. The Apple Watch Series 6 can measure blood-oxygen saturation and features the new Apple S6 processor. At a lower price, the Apple Watch SE offers an S5 processor and has an accelerometer, gyroscope, altimeter, and fall detection. The new iPad Air features a 10.9-inch Liquid Retina display with 3.8M pixels, Touch ID on the power button, the Apple A14 Bionic, and USB-C. Apple also announced a new iPad which features an A12 Bionic, a Neural Engine, and support for Apple's Magic Keyboard. iOS 14 will launch today, with new features such as widgets, security enhancements, and more. New iPhones were not announced.

Some animals, such as sea turtles, birds, fish, and lobsters, can sense the Earth's magnetic field and use this ability as an impressive navigation tool. After 50 years of research, scientists have proposed that the mechanism works through a symbiotic relationship between the animals and magnetotactic bacteria. Magnetotactic bacteria are a special type of bacteria whose movement is influenced by magnetic fields. The researchers searched for the presence of magnetotactic bacteria DNA in animal samples and found that many animals carry the bacteria. It is still unknown where these bacteria live inside the animals, but it is likely they are associated with nervous tissue.

Scientists at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia have produced a device that can restore vision to the blind using a combination of smartphone-style electronics and brain-implanted microelectrodes. The researchers are now preparing for the first human clinical trials to take place after successful preclinical studies and trials on sheep. There are still many steps required before the device will be available for commercial use. The technology works by transmitting converted image data from a camera to neurons via microelectrodes that are thinner than a human hair.

OneFuzz is a self-hosted Fuzzing-As-A-Service platform that enables continuous developer-driven fuzzing to proactively harden software before release. Developers can launch fuzz jobs that use thousands of cores using just a single command, which can be baked into CICD.

This post follows cri's experiments with setting up a Raspberry Pi 4 as a local server for heavy tasks, such as time-lapse creation and other long-running tasks and services. It covers connecting the RPi to a Macbook Pro 13" 2010, connecting the RPi to Wi-Fi, benchmarking transfer speeds, and installation of applications.

Xiaomi has partnered with Lamborghini to produce the Ninebot GoKart Pro Lamborghini Edition, an electric go-kart built purely for the track. It is similar to an early Segway Ninebot design but with some serious performance upgrades. The go-kart reaches speeds of up to 25 mph using its detachable Xiaomi self-balancing scooter. It has drifting-friendly rear tires and high traction rubber on its front tires. The go-kart features true Ackermann steering, functional headlights, and a rear wing, which adds real aerodynamic and handling improvements. With a 432Wh battery, it can run for approximately 15.5 miles. The go-kart can carry a max passenger weight of 220 lb and is available for purchase for around $1,450.

A US academic has uncovered a database used by Shenzhen Zhenhua, a Chinese company known to work with intelligence, military, and security agencies. The database contains information that could be used to conduct influence operations against prominent and influential people outside China. It contains information on influential individuals and institutions across a variety of industries. The data allows Chinese analysts to track key influencers and how news and opinions move through social media platforms. Using the information, China can craft messages to target individuals to manipulate them.