I don't get it. Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this in any way novel?

You can get a cheapish acoustic levitation kit from Tindie[1], and inductive power transmission is hardly a rare technology these days, so where's the innovation? It seems to me all they've done is made a tiny LED with a tiny coil attached to it, right?

And how the hell do they expect to achieve any of the ridiculously speculative things they talk about in the article anyway? Fleets of these things flying around drawing messages in the sky isn't particularly useful if you need to position a massive bank of ultrasonic speakers and a power coil underneath them.

It all smacks of the Hendo Hoverboard[2] bullshit which bad "science" "journalists" breathlessly obsessed over a few years ago, which was similarly just a rebadging of existing technology that was utterly impractical in any context except marketing, coupled with thoroughly nonsensical claims of future utility (levitating buildings during earthquakes, for instance.)

[1] https://www.tindie.com/products/Makerfabs/acoustic-levitator...

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMZ2cyNxPwg

"New study links widespread ultrasonic 'firefly' devices with disappearing insect populations and [other unintended ecological disaster]." - Headline from 2042

Although I haven't looked into the exact mechanism here, I think people who find this interesting may also be interested in optical tweezers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_tweezers

Reminds me of Navi from The Legend of Zelda, in a way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navi_(The_Legend_of_Zelda)

I'm confused. The article implies that it can hover around independently, but in the gallery, it's only seen levitating inside a fat loop of copper wire connected to a stationary structure.

Reminds me of Localizers from A Deepness in the Sky. That was a great book

That's exciting even if we are still far from a real product. There is a place for a new way of manipulating light and giving that to artists. For me, it can le be linked to the demo that Intel is going with drones and light, but on another scale...

"Japanese scientists invent floating 'firefly' light" followed by "Japanese engineering researchers say..." I'd guess it doesn't involve any new science and is purely an engineering project.

Five to ten years, eh?

https://www.xkcd.com/678/

If you had really perfect sound/airflow control you could maybe get what looks like a movie hologram I guess, if you really miniaturize each light

I assume they are pumping enough power to a single point to ionise the air and produce light.

Would that much ultrasonic power be enough to burn human skin?

The first image is a composite, the actual light is not microscopic.

I expected something more like Groot's free-flying fireflies:

https://youtu.be/SdZvguUeiB0?t=18s