Seven Must-Read Stories (Week ending September 19, 2015)

Another chance to catch the most interesting and important articles from the previous week on MIT Technology Review.

October 9, 2015

Take Free Online Classes, Get Course Credit at MIT
Passing a free online course isn’t as meaningful as taking the same class for credit on a college campus. But that could be changing.
Deep-Learning Robot Takes 10 Days to Teach Itself to Grasp
Leave a human baby with some toys and it’ll quickly learn to pick them up. Now a robot with deep-learning capabilities has done the same thing.
A High-End Camera in a Small Package
Startup Light says its L16 will replace a fancy camera and lenses for a third the cost and fit easily into your bag, too.
India’s Energy Crisis
Can India modernize its manufacturing economy and supply electricity to its growing population without relying heavily on coal—and quite possibly destroying the global climate?
Gadgets Could Get Longer Lives by Combining Batteries
Microsoft researchers show that batteries that can be more actively managed by software might make our devices last longer.
Facebook’s Internet Drone Team Is Collaborating with Google’s Stratospheric Balloons Project
Google and Facebook are lobbying to alter international law to make it easier to provide universal Internet access.
Y Combinator Opens Research Lab to Tackle Big Problems
The influential startup incubator is launching a research lab to work on problems too big for startups.

One insider says the company’s current staffing isn’t able to sustain the platform.

Digital clones of the people we love could forever change how we grieve.

I watched a bunch of crows on TikTok and now I'm trying to connect with some local birds.

Elon said no thanks to using his mega-constellation for navigation. Researchers went ahead anyway.

Illustration by Rose Wong

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