DoorDash is putting a small fleet of six-wheeled delivery robots into action for the first time in Redwood City, California following weeks of tests. The robots, built by a company called Starship Technologies, are about the size of a golden retriever and roll around sidewalks with relative ease. They’ll be used to lug food from restaurants to customers on short-distance orders, spanning anywhere from one to two miles.

This is starting on Thursday. I think it’s cool as hell—I’m going to give it a try for sure.

Since getting an Apple Watch last fall, I’ve been disappointed by the lack of content. To help address this, I made my own game a few months ago (a 3D RPG), but obviously it still didn’t address the bigger issue. An idea I had was to port an existing catalog, and emulation made perfect sense.

Very cool.

[Via MacRumors]

My thanks to Twocanoes Software for sponsoring The Loop with SD Clone 3 this week.

If you do any projects that use SD cards (like the Raspberry Pi), check out SD Clone. SD Clone makes an exact copy of your SD card right on your Mac and makes it easy to restore back to either a single SD card or multiple SD cards at once. You’ve spent a lot of time getting a Raspberry Pi project exactly right and want to make an image of your SD card to protect all that work. SD Clone makes creating an image simple. If you want to make multiple of copies of that SD card to start shipping your project, SD Clone restores up to 8 SD cards at once, making it super fast to do something that was slow and painful before. SD Clone can also check any SD card to make sure it is not failing or isn’t a counterfeit. Learn about these features and more here.

Get 50% off all editions of SD Clone 3 this week with coupon code SDCLONELOOP

I used to collect vinyl albums when I was younger because that’s all that was available, but they are making a huge comeback. I was amazed with how many new and old albums were available on vinyl.

Go to the main page, scroll down, click on the genre you want, and then on the right hand side click “vinyl” for the format. Lots of choices here.

On Sunday Uber president Jeff Jones quit the company because of the recent controversies, according to a story on Recode.

Are you frustrated by trying to figure out how to get started encrypting email with iOS Mail? It’s easy in macOS, but not so much so on the iPhone or iPad. I’ve dug into the process, consulted dozens of forum posts and support articles. Then I tested, retested, and tested my process again. As of iOS 10.2.1, the process I detail below should get you going with sending encrypted email under iOS, using Apple’s Mail app.

If you are interested in encrypted email in iOS, this is worth a read.

My thanks to Twocanoes Software for sponsoring The Loop with Winclone 6 this week.

Winclone is the award-winning Mac app used to backup, clone, restore, and migrate Windows installed on your Boot Camp partition. Winclone 6 adds in a bunch of new features, including full compatibility with the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros, ability to mount your Boot Camp partition as a writable volume, a fresh new look and much more.

Get 50% off all editions of Winclone 6 this week with coupon code THELOOP

This is definitely not safe for work, but damn it’s so funny.

I recently picked up a new Baby Bottle Mic from Blue Microphones. I wanted a great quality, versatile mic, but I didn’t want to spend thousands of dollars—this mic is perfect.

This is a great article by Jason Snell on some of the things that Apple may do in the future to help podcasting and those that make them. I honestly don’t think Apple will do anything to help the small podcaster, but they’ll do what they can to help the huge people in the business. In other words, exactly what they did with publications on Newsstand.

An homage to the lusted after, utterly mysterious Dumble Overdrive Special, the Fuchs Overdrive Supreme 50 Amplifier caught on with players nearly two decades ago, delivering smooth, complex overdrive, and deep, three-dimensional clean tones with endless headroom.

This new Brainworx amp plug-in made for Universal Audio sounds outstanding. I got it last night and will be giving it a go over the next few days. Watch the video and take a listen to the sound samples. Amazing.

When a group of Boston retirees learned that their feathered next-door neighbours were too cold to lay eggs, they busted out their needles and got to work.

I had to post this, I just had to. Much respect.

My thanks to Twocanoes Software for sponsoring The Loop with Winclone 6 this week.

Winclone is the award-winning Mac app used to backup, clone, restore, and migrate Windows installed on your Boot Camp partition. Winclone 6 adds in a bunch of new features, including full compatibility with the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros, ability to mount your Boot Camp partition as a writable volume, a fresh new look and much more.

Get 50% off all editions of Winclone 6 this week with coupon code THELOOP

Universal Audio updated its Apollo software and also released a number of new plug-ins including:

• SSL 4000 E Channel Strip Collection
• Moog Multimode Filter Collection
• OTO BISCUIT 8-bit Effects
• Fuchs Overdrive Supreme 50 Amplifier
• Brainworx bx_subsynth Subharmonic Synth

You can download the update from their Web site.

The accused men live in Russia and Canada, the source said, with the Canadian far more likely to face arrest. Russia has no extradition treaty with the United States.

Yahoo was awful in disclosing these hacks.

I’m pleased to announce that I’ve accepted a position with Apple’s Security Engineering and Architecture team, and am very excited to be working with a group of like minded individuals so passionate about protecting the security and privacy of others.

This decision marks the conclusion of what I feel has been a matter of conscience for me over time. Privacy is sacred; our digital lives can reveal so much about us – our interests, our deepest thoughts, and even who we love. I am thrilled to be working with such an exceptional group of people who share a passion to protect that.

There are just so many things to like about this new service from Pandora—first and foremost, they are focusing on the user.

Randy Rhoads was such an incredible guitarist. The guitar comes in at about 19 seconds.

My thanks to Marketcircle for sponsoring The Loop with Daylite this week.

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It’s the Digital Artist’s Dream Bundle: Corel Painter 2017, AfterShot 3, ParticleShop, & Over 10 Hours of Corel-Approved Training.

The bundle would cost $768 is bought separately, but it’s on for $248.

I found Stephen Hackett’s account, and notes, of his training to be interesting.

Online room renting service Airbnb Inc said on Thursday it had raised $1 billion in its latest round of funding, valuing the company at $31 billion.

Investors clearly believe the company will overcome all of the issues its having with cities putting restrictions on rentals.

Gary Marcus, a research scientist who joined Uber four months ago as director of its AI labs, is leaving the company, according to sources. Uber bought Marcus’ startup, Geometric Intelligence, in December, using its 15 employees to form a new artificial intelligence unit.

No word on where he’s going, but I wondered if he’s going to Didi with the others.

Imagine reading a woman’s story about being denied a team reward because she’s in the female minority, or a story about a sexual harassment complaint being dismissed by an HR manager, and thinking, “That sounds about right.” Or reading a follow-up story in The New York Times about inappropriate groping at work parties and saying to yourself, “That’s not surprising.”

We have to be better than this.

Respect.

Didi, China’s largest ride-hail player, is getting serious about self-driving cars. The company, which acquired Uber’s China assets in August 2016, today is opening an artificial intelligence lab right in the backyard of many of its self-driving competitors in Mountain View, Calif.

They poached some good people from their competitors too.

Lamborghini is open to an all-electric addition to its line-up of luxury sports cars, its chief executive said on Wednesday, evidence that German parent Volkswagen’s interest in producing zero-emission vehicles could extend to the very top end of its brands.

I think it’s safe to say that all manufacturers are working on electric models, especially those owned by Volkswagen.

Seriously, how could you not like this.

Amazon has abandoned its legal battle to protect its Alexa assistant with First Amendment rights — for now at least. The company filed a motion against a police search warrant in an Arkansas murder case earlier this month, but has now dropped the case after the defendant agreed to hand over the data contained on his Echo speaker to police.

Clearly, this will come up again.

Stephen Hackett put together some links celebrating the eMate’s birthday. I’ll be honest, I forgot all about this product.