The lighting, camera angles, wall-colour, acoustics and furniture are all designed to make two Halo systems feel like a single room when linked together, and to do away with the 15 minutes of messing around usually required to set up videoconferencing gear.

ECONOMIST: Videoconferencing

Despite the horror stories being pitched suggesting that people in hazmat gear will be required to clean up a busted light bulb, the truth is a broken CFL bulb will be swept up (not vacuumed) just as broken bulbs have always been swept up.

FORBES: The Hypocrisy And Stupidity Of The GOP's Hatred Of The EPA

With the help of a machinist, and using a formula he concocted for a stiff, self-lubricating plastic, Fenelon built a crude prototype of the gear and found that the torque required to push the window was half of what the old design required.

FORBES: Technology

The gadget does share a constraint common to all satellite-connected gear: Line of sight to the sky is required for connectivity.

WSJ: DeLorme inReach SE, a Satellite Gadget for the Civilian | Geek Chic

Substantially more complex than previous aircraft, the new plane required the pilot to attend to the four engines, a retractable landing gear, new wing flaps, electric trim tabs that needed adjustment to maintain control at different airspeeds, and constant-speed propellers whose pitch had to be regulated with hydraulic controls, among other features.

NEWYORKER: The Checklist

They were also required to carry all their equipment for the duration of the ultra-marathon -- from food and sleeping gear to an anti-venom pump and glow sticks -- as they battled with weariness and dehydration whilst snaking their way past rolling dunes, steep-sided uplands, dried-up lakes and abandoned settlements in the hostile heat.

CNN: Winners survive 'toughest race on Earth'