Google Translate is an amazing thing. You can take a chunk of text in just about any language, paste it into Google Translate, and it is instantaneously (if imperfectly) translated. Since I ...
https://freakonomics.com/2014/05/testing-the-limits-of-google-translate/
On a visit to the London Science Museum, my oldest grandson explained to me how 3D printing works. I expressed doubt about its economic value, but he pointed out this sign. "Aha," I said, "h...
https://freakonomics.com/2014/03/the-economic-value-of-3d-printing/
Due to popular demand , we are working on a podcast about Bitcoin. Last night, I interviewed MARC ANDREESSEN on the subject. His v.c. firm has invested roughly $50 million in Bitcoin-related c...
https://freakonomics.com/2014/02/what-does-the-mt-gox-meltdown-mean-for-bitcoin-maybe-not-much/
Our podcast called "Where Have All the Hitchhikers Gone ?" got a listener named JENNY O'BRIEN thinking. Here's what she wrote us: > Here's the back story: I live in a rural area in ...
We've blogged before about the potential of 3D food printers , but at the moment such printers seem out of reach for the average consumer. Perhaps not for long -- a new paper by B.T. WITTBRO...
The standard narrative around technology in the developing world usually focuses on the positive: cell phones make it easier to check crop prices, transfer money , and understand violence . But...
In our podcast "Waiter, There’s a Physicist in My Soup! ," we talked to PABLOS HOLMAN at Intellectual Ventures about food printers (we've also blogged about organ printers and meat pri...
https://freakonomics.com/2013/05/nasa-to-print-pizzas-free-delivery-unlikely/
E-mail has been around long enough for most of us to fall in love and hate and love with it at least a few times. Problems arise and are quashed, or dealt with. Innovations come along; customs ev...
https://freakonomics.com/2013/05/how-to-solve-the-reply-all-problem/
MAGGIE KOERTH-BAKER of BoingBoing interviews BROUGH TURNER , a phone system expert, about why it's hard to make cell phone calls during an emergency. Turner addresses the mechanics and limitati...
https://freakonomics.com/2013/04/why-cell-phone-networks-crash-during-an-emergency/
Here's a fascinating article in the Yale Journal of International Affairs, by PAUL REXTON KAN of the U.S. Army War College, about cyberwar between non-state agents -- in this case, Anonymous ve...
https://freakonomics.com/2013/04/when-hacking-is-the-smaller-crime/
Last week, the governing bodies of golf announced a ban on anchored putters. Historically, when golfers putt (i.e. roll the ball along the green to try to get it into the hole), they swing th...
Reader NOAH DENTZEL claims that crowdfunding has overlooked virtues, and that it is giving rise to products that may never have happened via the traditional business model: > Most companies ...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/12/the-hidden-upside-of-crowdfunding/
My good friend MASSIMO YOUNG recently moved to Kenya, where he is seeing what happens when you mix a little American ingenuity into a thriving but chaotic developing economy. In what I hope is ...
Today's smartphone, it is often said, has more computing power than an Apollo rocket . So it should not be surprising that is it disrupting daily life left and right. Every day or two I seem to...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/10/what-will-the-smartphone-kill/
There’s a revolution underway in economics. It’s not due to the financial crisis, but rather something more mundane: Data, and computing power. At least that’s the claim that BETSEY STEVENS...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/08/the-economics-revolution-will-be-televised/
I’ve got a lot of smart friends, and they come up with some pretty good ideas. (I even have an idea myself once in a while!) Occasionally, these ideas take the form of potential internet bu...
As a country, we are often at war. If it's not against Germany, England, terrorism, or Grenada, it's the war on poverty (that's gone so well), the war on cancer (ditto), and, of particular intere...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/07/ending-the-math-wars-in-a-treaty-of-qama/
"It is conventional wisdom that it is possible to reduce exposure to indoor air pollution, improve health outcomes, and decrease greenhouse gas emissions in the rural areas of developing countrie...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/05/the-ongoing-battle-between-technology-and-human-behavior/
Almost a year ago, we posted here about patent trolling – when individuals and firms use patents as a tool to extract settlements out of defendants who wish to avoid expensive patent litigatio...
We recently solicited your questions for PETER DIAMANDIS, founder and CEO of the X Prize Foundation , and journalist STEVEN KOTLER. They are co-authors of the new book Abundance: The Futur...
https://freakonomics.com/2012/04/abundance-authors-diamandis-and-kotler-answer-your-questions/