Rad Power Bikes Has 4 New Models—and Safer Batteries

The Seattle ebike firm Rad Energy Bikes has announced four new ebike models, all of which have the essential distinction of being unlikely to have their batteries abruptly burst into flames.

The corporate says its new Secure Defend Batteries—which come normal on all 4 new bikes—have been licensed at UL-2271, an trade normal rating for battery security. Meaning the batteries on these fashions of Rad Power’s bikes won’t be practically as inclined to the sorts of battery fires which were plaguing low-end ebikes and scooters and have led to injuries and nearly 20 deaths within the US.

Rad Energy had 30,000 of its RadWagon 4 ebikes recalled in 2022 because of misaligned tires, a problem the corporate has apologized for and says it has fastened. There’s been one reported case of a Rad Energy bike catching fireplace, however aside from that the corporate hasn’t contributed to the wave of low cost ebike battery fires. We have a tendency to love Rad Power’s bikes fairly a bit right here at WIRED, so this enhance in battery security is welcome information, particularly due to the added emphasis on the entire “not exploding” factor.

Rad Power’s new bikes are available just a few varieties. There’s its Radster commuter bike, which is available in Road and Trail fashions for various terrains. Each begin at $1,999. The corporate additionally introduced the RadExpand 5 Plus, an $1,899 folding bike, and its new iteration of the cargo-oriented RadWagon 5, which begins at $2,199.

Here’s another shopper tech information from this week.

Ask Wendy’s Something

Reddit is attempting to make itself friendlier to entrepreneurs. This week, the corporate introduced a brand new suite of instruments, known as Reddit Pro, that can be out there to companies totally free.

Reddit Professional provides manufacturers a wide range of methods to interact with the platform’s customers, in service of serving to advertisers higher pour themselves into each eyeball remotely potential. For example, Reddit will supply “AI-powered insights” that the corporate says will sift by the site’s 17 billion posts to seek out related threads and subjects that firms can then use to “be part of or begin conversations” (aka deploying their deeply cringe advertising and marketing techniques). Meaning if you write a remark about, say, Wendy’s, in a thread means down on a tiny subreddit, the brand’s social media staff can have a better time discovering it and spouting off some sassy model banter within the replies.

It’s the newest transfer in Reddit’s sluggish, controversial quest for profitability (and presumably enshittification). Reddit filed to take the company public in February, which can allow it to promote inventory to shareholders. The corporate, which has never proven profitable, is keen to make its platform extra interesting to advertisers who can spend cash in its boards. That is seemingly why Reddit has made strikes like charging an exorbitant sum of money for the instruments builders use to entry the platform’s information, successfully killing third-party apps. This transfer of giving manufacturers and advertisers a better portal into each section of the location is one other stab at these ambitions.

Dodge This

There’s a brand new Dodge chargin’ onto the scene. Sure, it’s a Charger, the beefy, grotesquely fuel-inefficient muscle automotive that’s been roaring throughout roads for the higher a part of the previous century. In 2021, Dodge introduced it will ditch its gas-powered Chargers in favor of electrical variants. This week, the primary stage of that rollout has formally begun.

Billed—considerably arguably—as “the world’s first and solely electrical muscle automotive,” the Dodge Charger Daytona Scat Pack EV is a completely juiced-up road-rage machine that’s certain to be the closest factor you may get to driving a Transformer. It boasts as much as 670 horsepower and has a quoted zero-to-60 time of three.3 seconds. The automotive additionally comes with an array of options meant to make it simpler to mainline high-octane driving adrenaline. There are devoted efficiency modes for rubber-burnin’ excursions like Drag, Monitor, Drift, and Donut modes. One other setting, known as PowerShot, will increase horsepower by 40 hp for 15 seconds. It’s like injecting your automotive with nitrous oxide however preserving it road authorized.

Nikon Takes a Purple Eye

Digicam producer Nikon introduced this week that it’s scooping up the cinematic digital camera firm Purple. Red’s skilled digital cameras have an extended popularity in cinematography circles for pushing the boundaries of what digital camera sensors and optics can do. They’re traditionally expensive, beefy gadgets geared toward professionals producing cinema-quality content material. Should you watch any big-budget reveals or films on community tv or the streamers, you’ve certainly seen one thing shot on Red.

This transfer by Nikon factors to the company’s video ambitions. Nikon makes excellent pictures cameras however has struggled to compete with the likes of Canon in terms of video. Shopping for a premium video-camera firm might definitely give the model a leg up.

Hey Google, U OK?

There’s all the time heaps occurring at Google. As one of many greatest tech companies on the earth, the corporate typically attracts quite a lot of scrutiny and criticism, a lot of it warranted. However Google’s been on a roll recently, with issues stemming from its rush to push out AI products, its latest rounds of layoffs, and inner discrimination against its own employees. All of this makes for a really chaotic time for the corporate, which raises the last word query: Is Google OK?

This week on WIRED’s Gadget Lab podcast, we discuss concerning the on-line uproar about Google’s Gemini AI going “woke” and all the inner turmoil roiling the massive Silicon Valley firm.