When others looked at Uber's aggressive expansion around the world and wondered if the super-unicorn wasn't going too fast or taking too little care, one imagines the founders of Otto looked on with much approval. Before January, this startup specializing in outfitting commercial trucks with self-driving technology did not exist. Its expert employees were toiling away on autonomous vehicle projects at places like Google, Apple and Tesla. They left to start this venture, says cofounder and former Google Maps head Lior Ron, because they wanted to bring something to market "sooner rather than later." And now, in a deal worth an estimated 680 million, the San Francisco-based Otto has become an independent division within Uber, another company "with that level of intensity and urgency and focus to start putting cars on a road, and not as an R&D exercise," as Ron puts it, referring to research and development.

Dozens of autonomous Uber vehicles are about to be roaming the streets of Pittsburg, but the company's chief executive says its human drivers have nothing to worry about. "I don't think the number of human drivers will go down anytime soon," Uber CEO Travis Kalanick told Business Insider. "In fact, I think in an autonomous world, it goes up." Many observers argue that autonomous cars pose a threat to professional drivers, who seemingly stand to be outmoded by the technology. Kalanick, however, claims that such vehicles will still require human labor for two reasons.

The Boy in the Ambulance Is a Stark Reminder of Aleppo's Pain What Twitter's Head of Safety Says About Rampant Abuse

Drones are already capable of capturing stunning aerial images and videos that wouldn't be possible with grounded cameras. But combining the abilities of these airborne vehicles with 360-degree cameras produces new perspectives that are even more immersive and breathtaking. SkyPixel recently held a competition to calling for artists to submit their most impressive 360-degree aerial images. It honored six standout candidates, which includes three main winners and three recipients of its "Brilliant" prize. Photographer Stanislav Sedov's panorama of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which is shown above, was named the third place winner.

Ride-hailing app Uber will introduce self-driving cars in Pittsburgh as soon as this month, the first part of a pilot program to explore the future of the technology. The company plans to test 100 Volvo XC90s outfitted to drive themselves. Still, the cars will be accompanied by two humans: an engineer who can take control of the vehicle when needed and a co-pilot who takes note. The news, first reported by Bloomberg, comes as the battle to deploy self-driving vehicles gains steam. Uber has made considerable investments on that front and has been testing cars for more than a year.

But HomeKit has a significant drawback: It lacks a central hub for users with lots of different kinds of that equipment. That will change when Apple releases iOS 10 this fall. Included in the new iPhone software will be an app called Home, which will function as a control center for smart home gear from lightbulbs to thermostats. This will be a welcome change from the current process of setting up HomeKit devices, which involves installing a new and often hard-to-use companion app for each individual product. It's a big step for Apple, and for smart home technology in general, which has been mostly the domain of tech-savvy early adopters. After a brief demo of the new Home app, it's clear that Apple wants the app to be dead simple to use, with drag-and-drop functionality reminiscent of rearranging apps on your iPhone or iPad's home screen. The Home app is broken down into three tabs: Home, Rooms, and Automation. The Home tab provides a general overview of your HomeKit setup. It offers a compilation of your most frequently used accessories and "scenes," a collection of settings you can pre-program for specific events.

Ford is developing a fully-autonomous vehicle without a steering wheel or gas and brake pedals, the auto industry giant announced on Tuesday. The car maker expects the vehicle to be ready by 2021, and says it will be made specifically for ride-hailing and ride-sharing services. Google's prototype self-driving cars don't have pedals or a steering wheel either, since the company says it "lets the software and sensors handle the driving." Ford will be doubling its Silicon Valley team and more than doubling its campus in Palo Alto, Calif. to help it reach this goal. The company has also acquired and invested in a few startups specializing in technologies that can help advance the development of its autonomous vehicle.

Have you ever talked to your computer or smartphone? Maybe you've seen a coworker, friend or relative do it. It was likely in the form of a question, asking for some basic information, like the location of the best nearby pizza place or the start time of tonight's sporting event. Soon, however, you may find yourself having entirely different interactions with your device – even learning its name, favorite color and what it thinks about while you are away. It is now possible to interact with computers in ways that seemed beyond our dreams a few decades ago.

I grew up with a blind grandmother, who lost her vision to glaucoma. The medicine of the 1930's and 1940's, unfortunately, couldn't prevent that fate. So from a very early age I was acquainted with someone with a serious disability.

A 7-Eleven customer's order for Slurpees, a chicken sandwich, donuts, hot coffee, and candy will forever go down in history. What makes it remarkable is that the convenience store chain used a drone to deliver the order to a family in Reno, Nev., 7-Eleven said on Friday. The company partnered with drone startup Flirtey for the delivery, which the companies said was the first time a drone has legally delivered a package to a U.S. resident who placed an order from a retailer. "This delivery required special flight planning, risk analysis, and detailed flight procedures ensuring residential safety and privacy were equally integrated," Chris Walach, the director of operations for the Nevada Institute for Autonomous Systems (NIAS), said in a statement. The NIAS is a Nevada government-backed non-profit autonomous vehicle advocacy group that helped oversee the delivery.