Germany Archivi - Blumudus

Yawn @ German elections

The obligatory comments on the 2017 German general election are pouring in, with pundits serving up large scoops of alarmed rhetoric over the unprecedented return of “the Nazis” to the Bundestag (German Parliament), for the first time since WWII. The reality is way more mundane and unimpressive. The new “populist” party AfD (Alternative für Deutschland = Alternative for Germany) this time was able to seize an impressive 13% of the vote, while in 2013 they fell short of the 5% barrier to entry in the parliament. But they’re far from being Nazi sympathizers. You may ask yourself, instead, since their political platform would have been deemed pretty reasonable for a…

A lonely Japanese drone got lost in Europe

UPDATE -11:50 am CET- the linked page is no longer available (See bottom of page) A sort of artificial tourist is wandering the skies A Osaka University autonomous drone, designed to explore urban environments and take photos of Google Maps landmarks, went missing during a test flight on March 18 while the developers were visiting the University of Hannover, in Germany. This machine is programmed to fly solo, without the need of human intervention. As reported on the webpage dedicated to this project, a malfunction occurred to the drone’s CNC (cellular network connection module) so that the robot couldn’t receive the “COME HOME” signal. As reported by the project manager Kazuo…