Teaching children how the value of money and budgets is hard. It is arguably getting even more difficult in our nearly cashless world. It can also be difficult for parents when their kids want some pocket money, but they do not have any cash on them. The AP had a good feature on this issue on Monday. It listed a variety of pre-paid debit cars and apps that can be downloaded and used as a virtual piggy bank.  They include apps such as gohenry, Nimbl and Osper in the UK, and Famzoo and Greenlight, which also works with Apple Pay, in the US. The aim is to offer both flexibility to kids and control for parents.

Wired has a nifty article about Blue Origin, the Jeff Bezos company that will soon take tourists into space. The rocket is called New Shepard. “Starting next year, Bezos plans to use New Shepard to send passengers on jaunts into space. Clad in cool Star Trek–style jumpsuits, customers will settle into a comfy capsule and shoot up over the atmosphere for a quick peek at their home planet through panoramic windows and a few moments of weightless ecstasy. Though Blue Origin hasn’t announced the fee, it’s been reported to be a couple hundred thousand dollars per head, and Bezos anticipates ramping up quickly to a few flights a week.” 

On Tuesday, Amazon announced that Crystal City in Virginia and New York City will house its second headquarters. You might imagine that the people in those areas would be excited by the prospect of new jobs and investment, not least the political leaders. Some, such as New York Governor Andrew Cuomo are. However, some serious concerns have been raised, not least Queens, where the New York City set up will be. The Financial Times took a look at what is causing this rather cold welcome for Amazon.

Yet while Andrew Cuomo, New York governor, and Mayor Bill de Blasio were toasting their success on Tuesday at luring the online retailer to the Long Island City section of Queens, Mr Gianaris could hardly have been less pleased. Along with a local member of the City Council, he issued a blistering statement accusing Amazon of “running a cynical game” in which it “duped” New York into offering $3bn in tax incentives and subsidies to woo one of the wealthiest companies on earth.

Google’s subsidiary DeepMind Health is restructuring and becoming part of the company. Now that its new app Streams is a Google product, people are concerned that Google will start linking patient health data to their respective Google accounts. My thought: You could just delete your Google account, but the health data will likely be added to an advertising profile of you instead. Update: A spokesperson from DeepMind reached out to me to make some clarifications. I’ve also changed the headline to make it more accurate.

Patient data is, and will continue to be, kept strictly separate from other Google projects/products, and subject to strict audit and access controls. Our contractual agreements with existing partners, and their restrictive rules on patient data, are still in force and unchanged. Patient data remains under our partners’ strict control, and all decisions about its use will continue to lie with them. The move to Google does not affect this.

Mozilla’s Privacy Not Included gift list helps you shop safe for the holidays. It shows all of the holiday presents and tech gear that can be easily hacked. Ashley Boyd, vice president of advocacy at Mozilla, told Wired:

We want to provide people information about how to make informed decisions when shopping for gifts that are connected to the internet. These products are becoming really popular. And in some cases, it’s easy to forget that they’re even connected to the internet.

I think this is a fantastic idea and it brings more awareness to the insecurity of many popular gadgets and gear.

A website called Orcasound lets you listen to orcas using hydrophones, which are underwater microphones. Scientists use these recordings to find and study whales, especially at night or in bad weather.

The team behind Orcasound hope that non-expert listeners will help quickly alert researchers to the presence of orcas, so they can send out boats to test fecal matter and leftover bits of prey, thereby getting a better sense of what the whales are eating.

If you like whales and you’re interested in citizen science, check out Orcasound.