Tech Tent Future Farmers Minecraft And Doom
Tech Tent Future farmers, Minecraft and Doom Rory Cellan-Jones Technology correspondent @BBCRoryCJon Twitter
22 January 2016
Every Friday we go through the week's technology news on Tech Tent on the BBC World Service. Here's what we're looking at this week.
Big Data on the farm
It's the oldest business in the world and one you might not have thought was so forward-looking - but farming is going through a massive data-driven revolution. From drones giving aerial surveys of crops to combine harvesters measuring precisely the output of every square metre, or sensors giving minute-by-minute updates on the health of livestock, farmers are navigating an ever growing flood of data. We'll hear from a farmer who is adapting to this new way of working. Our special guest is Rob Carter, the co-founder of Field Margin which aims to aid farmers in managing their data via an app on smartphones. By the way our colleagues from BBC Radio 4's Farming Today have been covering farming and technology all week and will have special reports on Saturday's On Your Farm.
Minecraft in the classroom
We've heard nothing about Microsoft's plans for Minecraft since it was acquired by Microsoft. Microsoft has announced a major move into education by launching an educational version of Minecraft. Jane Wakefield, Jane's correspondent went to BETT, the UK’s largest educational technology show in order to talk with Microsoft about the plan that will allow children to learn Minecraft at school and later play the game at home. Schools will need to have an Office 365 account to log in to the education edition - we'll be asking whether this is part of Microsoft's plan to compete with Google as the most popular software provider in the classroom.
Lessons learned from the experience of Kickstarter
Kickstarter received a lot criticism after the Zano mini-drone fell to earth in November. The crowdfunding platform employed an investigative reporter to examine what went wrong. Mark Harris' 13,000-word report was released this week. It is both an excruciating account on how to run a tech company and a warning to anyone who doesn't understand that crowdfunding isn't like purchasing products from Amazon. We talk to Mark Harris on the program about where he believes this leaves crowdfunding as an opportunity to get tech ideas off the ground. Mpservers
Doom moves up a level
Twenty-three years after the cult game Doom came out, it still has a dedicated group of players and they're celebrating this week. The first new level in the mid-1990s has been released by one of the original developers John Romero. He spoke with Zoe Kleinman, our reporter. He admitted that he was anxious about the reaction of the public, but most fans have been very positive.
Tune into the BBC World Service at 15:00 GMT for all of that and more, or listen to the podcast later.
