A maker named John Tse has built a flying umbrella that follows you like a loyal, slightly chaotic robot bird.

Using small propellers, sensors, and tracking software, the umbrella hovers above your head as you walk, shielding you from rain or harsh sunlight without you having to hold anything at all.

Of course, it is not especially practical. A buzzing drone hovering inches above you is louder, heavier, and far more complicated than a normal umbrella. But that is part of the charm.

It is much less about replacing rain gear and more about asking a fun, slightly ridiculous question: what happens when even the most ordinary objects learn how to move on their own?

Inventive, unnecessary, and oddly delightful, it feels like a glimpse into a future where usefulness and playfulness happily overlap.

Whether drones or umbrellas catch your eye, we have great additional content on both!

The post This Inventor Created a A Drone Umbrella That Follows Him Around in the Rain appeared first on Moss and Fog.

How can nature come up with so much amazing, endless geometry?

We used to find it impossible to believe that every single snowflake in the world was different. How could those billions of flakes end up distinct from one another?

Upon seeing Alexey Kljatov’s stunning collection of snowflakes in crystal clear detail, we’re beginning to understand how they all differ. 

The photographer’s collection shows such endless intricacy in the arms, angles, and geometric forms of the individual frozen flakes. 

All of Kljatov’s work is available for purchase as prints on his website.

Nature continues to amaze us. 

See more of Kljatov’s work on Flickr. 

Images by Alexey Kljatov.

The post Individual Snowflakes Showcase Beautifully Endless Geometry appeared first on Moss and Fog.

Bridger Beal-Cvetko and Daniel Woodruff, reporting for KSL News:

SB138, sponsored by Cullimore, R-Sandy, would make Android, the world’s most popular mobile device operating system, an official state symbol, joining the ranks of the official state cooking pot (the dutch oven), the official state crustacean (the brine shrimp), and the official state mushroom (the porcini).

“Someday, everybody with an iPhone will realize that the technology is better on Android,” Cullimore told reporters during a media availability on Wednesday, the second day of the legislative session.

But, he added, “I’m the only one in my family — all my kids, my wife, they all have iPhones — but I’m holding strong.” [...]

“I don’t expect this to really get out of committee,” he said.

(Via Joe Rossignol.)

Link: ksl.com/article/51436458/iphone-vs-android-this-lawmaker…

U.S. — In its ongoing effort to make watching football as difficult as possible, the National Football League announced today that each quarter of the playoff games will be exclusively streamed on a different streaming network.

It's not exactly clear the mechanisms that can be used to enact this policy, but at least it appears that Trump is aware of the crippling debt half the country is in.

A real thing that happened at Wroclaw Zoo in Poland: