Google's Radical Wireless Network Is Now Open to All U.S. Customers

Here’s how you can get it.

After months of an invite-only system, Google’s mobile network, Project Fi, is now letting anyone in the U.S. sign up.

The service, which Google  debuted last April, lets customers only pay for the Internet data they use instead of a bulk plan. It also comes with useful features like Wi-Fi assistant, which automatically connects the device to available Wi-Fi when possible, a tracker for how much data has been used, SIM cards for using the service’s data plan with other devices like tablets, 24/7 customer support, and the ability to use the service even when traveling abroad for the same price.

“We launched Project Fi as an invitation-only Early Access program to make sure we could deliver the best quality of service to our first customers,” said Project Fi product manager Simon Arscott in a blog post. “Today, we’re excited to be exiting our invitation-only mode and opening up Project Fi so that people across the U.S. can now sign up for service without having to wait in-line for an invite.”

The only catch is that Project Fi still only works with Google’s Nexus devices (the Nexus 6, 6P, and 5X). Conveniently, Google is now discounting the Nexus 5X to $199 to let more people get on Project Fi. The company also currently works with Sprint  S 3.93%  and T-Mobile  TMUS 0.42%  to offer dual coverage, switching between the carrier and Project Fi to offer the best coverage at any moment.

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Source : fortune.com

Twitter Will Offer Selected Tweets to Keep Users Coming Back

Twitter is trying to solve the information overload issue that some newcomers to its social media service say dissuades them from becoming regulars.

The company, based in San Francisco, announced on Wednesday that it would start showing a selection of tweets that a user who has been away from the service might want to see.

“There are lots of people on Twitter who follow hundreds or even thousands of accounts,” Jeff Seibert, Twitter’s senior director of product, said in an interview. “When they come back to Twitter, there’s actually too much for them to catch up on.”

Tweets in this update can come from any time, from minutes to hours ago. The idea is to put important tweets up top so the user does not have to wade through less interesting information.

It is a change from Twitter’s classic method of presenting tweets in reverse chronological order and could make it easier for people to find interesting conversations faster, which in turn may keep them coming back to the service more often.
“This is really about helping all these people get caught up,” Mr. Seibert said.

Later on Wednesday, Twitter is scheduled to report its fourth-quarter earnings. Investors will scrutinize its user numbers to see if they meet growth expectations. Adding more users and getting newcomers to keep coming back have been consistent Achilles’ heels for the company.

The idea of tweaking Twitter’s main timeline has been bandied about internally for years, and tackled in different ways. Twitter introduced “while you were away” about a year ago, which similarly brought back older tweets that could help users see conversations on the service that they had missed. Twitter also devoted an entirely different section of its app to discovering unearthed tweets and conversations that may be difficult to find for casual users.

But over the past few years, some inside Twitter have been reluctant to make any major changes, for fear of alienating the service’s most dedicated users or disturbing ad sales. Since even before Twitter’s initial public offering in 2013, the company’s revenue has grown at a healthy pace even as its user growth numbers have stalled.

Mr. Seibert said that Jack Dorsey, who returned as Twitter’s chief executive last summer, has given his product chiefs free rein to question products that have typically been off limits, a stance he described as empowering.
“There’s no taboo topic,” Mr. Seibert said.

Not all of the company’s concerns are unfounded. Last week, when news of potential changes to the product were reported by BuzzFeed News, Twitter users complained. A trending topic with the hashtag #RIPTwitter signaled what many believed to be the death of the Twitter service they had come to know.
To avoid another panic among its more loyal users, Twitter is carrying out the latest change slowly. Users will initially have the option to switch on the new feature in the settings menu before it becomes a default setting. Everyone who doesn’t like it will be able to turn it off.

“What we want to do is give everyone the opportunity to play with it on their own terms,” Mr. Seibert said.


Source : http://www.nytimes.com

Russian Flying Fortresses

In 1930s Russian army was ... by the idea of creating huge planes. At that times they were proposed to have as much propellers as possible to help carrying those huge flying fortresses into the air, jet propulsion has not been implemented at those times yet.
Not much photos were saved since that times, because of the high secrecy levels of such projects and because a lot of time passed already. Still on the photo below you can see one of such planes - a heavy bomber K-7.
Now modern history lovers in Russia try to reconstruct according the plans left in once to be top-secret Russian army archives their look in full color. This is one example based on ideas of Russian aviation engineers of that time


Source : http://englishrussia.com

Google Glass goes dark on social media accounts

Google Glass
Ole Spata | AFP| Getty Images
Google Glass
Four years after unveiling its wearable glass headset, Alphabet's Google shut down several social media accounts linked to the Glass gadget, ending its push to popularize the pricey eyeglasses with consumers.

On Tuesday, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts for Google Glass were no longer active, a development first reported on the website 9to5Google.

A statement on the Google Plus page said: "Hi Explorers, we've had a blast hanging out with you on G+ throughout the Explorer Program." It went on to instruct users to get in touch with questions on the support page for Glass.
The company declined to comment on the decision.

Google stopped selling Glass to consumers last year noting that it was time for a strategy reset, and the head of the Google X research lab has since then said that the hype surrounding the $1,500 device became overblown considering it was merely a prototype and not a finished product.

Glass was greeted with enthusiasm among tech aficionados when it was first unveiled in 2012. But the device, which allows users to access e-mail messages on its eye-level screen and to record video with a tiny camera, quickly ran into problems. Some mocked its awkward appearance, while others expressed concern it could be used to make video recordings surreptitiously.
On Twitter, many interpreted the disappearance of Glass's social accounts on Tuesday to mean a final end to efforts to market the product to consumers


Source : http://www.cnbc.com

Apple sees first sales dip in more than a decade as super-growth era falters

SAN FRANCISCO - Apple Inc forecast its first revenue drop in 13 years and reported the slowest-ever increase in iPhone shipments as the critical Chinese market showed signs of weakening, suggesting the technology company's period of exponential growth may be ending.
The slowdown comes as Wall Street analysts worry the company does not have another blockbuster product to replace the iPhone. Apple does not report Watch sales, but it does not appear to have the makings of being a hit on the same level as the iPhone a year after launch.

And while the company is reportedly working on a car, what it plans to do in that area and when are still unclear.
The company's shares, which have fallen 5 percent this year, bounced around in after-hours trading and were down more than 2.6 percent.

"It's disappointing to see them miss on an already downward adjusted sales number and the fact is that with their iPhone growth slowing what was needed was a product to be excited about," said J.J. Kinahan, chief strategist at TD Ameritrade. "Pressure on the shares will continue without a well-defined plan to grow sales or a new product."

The company said on Tuesday it sold 74.8 million iPhones in its fiscal first quarter, ended Dec. 26, the first full quarter of sales of the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus. The 0.4 percent growth in shipments was the lowest since the product was launched in 2007.

IPhone sales were expected to fall for the current quarter compared with the same quarter last year, Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said on a conference call with analysts.

But suggesting there is still room for growth, 60 percent of people who had an iPhone prior to the launch of the iPhone 6 have yet to upgrade to an iPhone 6 or 6S, Cook said.

And iPhones remain popular with American consumers. According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll, 86 percent of iPhone owners were somewhat or very likely to buy another iPhone.

Of those likely to buy a phone, 15 percent are currently looking to upgrade and 17 percent will when the next iPhone is released. The January poll had a credibility interval of 2.0 percentage points.

Source : http://www.todayonline.com

Apple’s Latest Virtual Reality Hire Hints At A Future Of Cars With 3D Interfaces And Gesture Control

Apple hires one of the leading virtual reality researchers in the United States in an effort to make a prominent presence in the scene, hinting at cars with 3D interfaces and gesture control in the future.

To keep up the pace with rival companies such as Alphabet, Facebook, Microsoft and Samsung, the Cupertino brand employed Doug Bowman, who is a computer science professor and director of the Center for Human-Computer Interaction at Virginia Tech with five years of experience under his belt.

According to the Financial Times, Bowman joined Apple after a "sabbatical from his post." His studies mainly involve the design of 3D user interface and the advantages of immersing in virtual environments. To further lay out his credentials, he is part of the 3D Interaction Group of the aforementioned state university, where he takes on the role of primary investigator.
"We participate in a worldwide community of scholars and researchers in VR, AR, and 3D UIs," the association says.

He has also won numerous industry awards (PDF) and a Microsoft HoloLens academic research grant back in Nov. 2015, where he along with Associate Professor Joseph Gabbard earned $100,000 and two Development Edition units of the untethered holographic computer.

With a rich experience in the fields of both virtual and augmented realities, Bowman is definitely an asset to Apple. However, both the virtual reality expert and the company haven't given out an official statement yet.

The technology in question is widely sought after in the automobile industry, where several top carmakers have started to implement controls and user interfaces based on gestures. More to the point, Apple has been displaying a strong interest in vehicles, including the much-rumored Project Titan.
To put two and two together, this recent development indicates that there's more or less a chance that the Cupertino brand is looking into producing a smart vehicle fitted with 3D interfaces and gesture controls.

One of the latest projects Bowman had a hand in is titled "Designing Effective Travel Techniques with the Leap," giving a glimpse of what he can bring to the table.

Now, Apple comes across as a secretive firm when it comes to adopting new technologies, revealing little or no public initiatives, but analysts thought it was unlikely for the company to not take part in the growing virtual reality sector.

"I'd wager that there is a substantial team within Apple figuring out how the company will play a role in this technology," Ben Wood, an analyst at CSS Insight, says.

To serve as more evidence to the fact, Apple purchased PrimeSense, a company that's known to have played a part in Microsoft's Kinect motion device, back in 2013 and acquired the German augmented reality startup Metaio last year. To top them off, the company also bought Faceshift, the motion capture team team behind the animated avatars of "Star Wars: The Force Awakens."

It appears that Apple has set its eye on yet another field of technology, integrating 3D and gesture-based interfaces with automobiles. It's safe to assume that with Bowman, the company will be able to catch up – assuming that its research is left behind – or take a position in the frontlines of the industry.


Source : http://www.techtimes.com

APPLE INC. HIRED DOUG BOWMAN TO SUPERVISE VR-ORIENTED RESEARCH

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL), in its life-long quest towards innovation, has recently announced a new change of plans. According to its official declarations, in order to increase the company’s market shares, the board wants to enter the VR and AR market. Thus, Apple Inc. hired Doug Bowman to supervise VR-oriented research.
This can be only construed as a daring move from Apple, because, over the last 3 years, the tech giant did everything in its power in order to promote its own VR-ready products. In 2013, Apple Inc. took its first steps into the VR reality market. The tech giant managed to buy PrimeSense, the same company which developed the first visual depth sensor. Currently, this sensor is employed by the Kinect 3D camera.
Taking one step at the time, Apple Inc. manages to build a little VR enterprise. Purchasing the visual depth sensor was the next step, closely followed by the events which took place in May 2015. Last year, Apple managed to purchase the augmented reality technology from Metaio.

Apple’s last step in completing this intricate VR puzzle was to seek the help of someone who really knows his way around computers. And who can better help them develop new technologies based on the VR and AR concepts than the foremost expert on the matter.
In a recent press conference, Apple Inc. acknowledge the fact that the firm has begun a collaboration with Doug Bowman, a computer scientist and formerly a professor working for Virginia Tech. Bowman’s research into VR and AR technologies was crucial in the development of popular products such as the Oculus Rift, Samsung Headgear VR or Microsoft’s HoloLens.

But Apple Inc. isn’t only interested in pushing forward the boundaries science. First of all, the tech giant in engaged in an avid VR race and its competitors seemed to have hard a head start. With competitors such as Facebook with Oculus Rift or Microsoft with HoloLens, the tech giant is in for a hard battle.

Lately, we’ve heard that Apple Inc. hired Doug Bowman to supervise VR-oriented research. Moreover, Apple Inc., as well as other economic analysts, believes that the VR and AR technologies are two gold mines, ready to be exploited.

And according to a recent report published by Digi-Cap, the VR and AR technologies should return a total revenue of over 120 billion dollars by 2020.

Apart from enlisting the help of Doug Bowman and buying VR and AR capable technologies, the tech giant is also keeping close tabs on the recently released VR-compatible applications such as VRSE or DinoTrek VR experience.


Source : http://www.capitalwired.com

Microchip Technology to buy Atmel for $3.56 billion

Chandler-based Microchip Technology Inc. announced a deal Tuesday to acquire rival chipmaker Atmel Corp. of San Jose, Calif. for roughly $3.56 billion in cash and stock.

Atmel said it broke off its merger with Dialog Semiconductor from September. It called Microchip’s offer “superior.”

Microchip and Atmel say their agreement is worth $8.15 per share, or $3.4 billion, excluding $155 million in Atmel’s cash and investments.

The deal has been approved by each company’s board of directors and is expected to close in the second quarter. It still needs the backing of Atmel’s stockholders.

Microchip said the combined company is expected to generate $170 million in savings and increased revenue beginning in fiscal 2019.
Microchip makes semiconductors used in a variety of computers and electronic devices.
"The Atmel acquisition is the latest chapter of our growth strategy and will add further operational and customer scale to Microchip," Microchip President/CEO Steve Sanghi said in a prepared statement.

Atmel President/CEO Steven Laub said the board of directors determined the deal was superior to the deal with Dialog that was terminated.

"Under the Microchip transaction, Atmel stockholders will receive a much higher cash consideration per share compared to the Dialog deal, as well as the opportunity for further upside through the ownership of stock of Microchip," Laub said in a statement.


Source : http://www.azcentral.com

Apple iPad Pro is nothing more than a companion device: Microsoft

Microsoft was one of the initial partners during Apple’s giant iPad Pro launch. The company took to the stage alongside Apple’s Phil Schiller to demonstrate it’s Office productivity tool undermining the fact that iPad Pro is direct competitor to Surface Pro range of devices.
Now, Microsoft has now come out with a statement which calls the iPad Pro as little more than a companion device. Even the reviews for Apple’s iPad Pro were mixed. Critics called it great but not a must buy like original iPhone and original iPad.
According to Forbes, a CES executive has called Microsoft’s Surface Pro 4 as a more complete device than iPad Pro. While Surface Pro 4 can handle desktop class applications like Adobe Premiere, on the iPad Pro there is only a lite version called Adobe Fix.
Microsoft says Surface Pro is a full PC while iPad Pro isn’t a computer. Interestingly Apple even made a stylus called Pencil for iPad Pro but developers are yet to take great advantage of it. Even at the time of writing the best app to ever take advantage of stylus on digital canvas is StaffPad. Arguably the best music writing app is still a Microsoft Surface exclusive.

Apple started selling iPad Pro just this November so it’d be just too early to call it a failure or failed product. Like other Apple products, developers could write great and powerful apps for the device and make it a grand success. Of course, this is not the first time that we’ve seen Apple and Microsoft come together in the recent past. At the September launch of the new iPhones and the iPad Pro, Apple had sprung a surprise addition to its list of speakers with Microsoft’s Kirk Koenigsbauer making an appearance to talk about the productivity side of the iPad Pro.


Source : http://indianexpress.com

NASA Selects SpaceX, Sierra Nevada And Orbital ATK For Space Station Cargo Contracts

Yesterday, NASA announced that it has awarded three new contracts with American companies – SpaceX, Orbital ATK, and Sierra Nevada Corporation – to provide cargo resupplies to the International Space Station.

Each contract provides for a minimum of six flights for each company between the years 2016 through 2024. According to the space agency, the combined contracts are potentially worth up to $14 billion.

Both SpaceX and Orbital ATK have already been successful at delivering cargo to the space station. Orbital ATK has had four successful missions to the International Space Station and SpaceX has six. Both companies have also each suffered a launch failure in the performance of the previous contracts.

SpaceX delivers cargo to the space station using its Dragon capsule. It can carry 13,228 pounds of cargo up to the station and return 6,614 pounds. The company also has a contract with NASA to develop its Dragon spacecraft to carry astronauts to the space station as well.

Orbital ATK delivers cargo to the ISS using its Cygnus spacecraft. Cygnus is capable of delivering about 7,700 pounds of cargo to the ISS.

The Cygnus spacecraft can be delivered in one of two ways. First, it’s capable of being launched to the ISS via the company’s own upgraded Antares rocket, the first launch of which is targeted for the first half of 2016. It’s also capable of being delivered to the station via United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket.

The newcomer to NASA’s commercial resupply services is Sierra Nevada Corporation’s Dream Chaser spacecraft. Dream Chaser is unique from the other two spacecraft because it’s designed to be capable of a runway landing, rather than a splashdown in the ocean. It can deliver about 12,250 pounds to the station and its low-g, runway re-entries makes it more cost-effective for reuse – the company claims that each one can be reused a minimum of fifteen times.

For the commercial resupply missions, SNC will be using the uncrewed variant of its spacecraft. It’s also developing a crewed version and had applied for the contract to deliver astronauts to the station that was eventually awarded to SpaceX and Boeing. The cargo version has a folding wing design which allows it to be used with several different rockets to improve its versatility.

“SNC is honored to be selected by NASA for this critical U.S. program,” Sierra Nevada Corporation President Eren Ozmen said in a statement. “In such a major competition, we are truly humbled by the show of confidence in SNC and look forward to successfully demonstrating the extensive capabilities of the Dream Chaser spacecraft to the world.”


Source : http://www.forbes.com

Alton Towers to open virtual reality rollercoaster

Alton Towers has announced plans to open a rollercoaster ride on which passengers wear virtual-reality headsets.

The Staffordshire-based adventure park said Galactica would open in April, following two years of planning.
It is resort's first big new ride since one of its rollercoasters crashed in June, seriously injuring five people.
Visitor numbers have been down since the accident, which Alton Towers blamed on "human error".

It said 190 jobs remained at risk and the park would close on several mid-week "quieter days" this year.

Several virtual-reality recordings simulate rollercoaster rides, but Alton Towers said Galactica would combine the two experiences for the first time.
Over the course of the three-minute ride, the headsets will show passengers a journey across a series of different galaxies, timed to coincide with the ride's twists, turns and falls.
Lying facedown, they will experience a maximum g-force of 3.5gs, which the park says is more than astronauts typically experience during rocket launches.
Gill Riley, the park's marketing director, said it represented a "multi-million pound investment".

"Obviously the safety and welfare of our guests is our number one priority," she added.
"Following the incident last year, we immediately put into effect additional safety protocols on our multi-car rollercoasters, of which this is one.
"In addition, once this ride is installed, as with every other new ride and experience, it will be subject to comprehensive pre-opening assessment [by us] and by an accredited independent inspection body."

Galactica in numbers:
Each train will contain 28 passengers, and three trains will be set into motion at one time
The track length is 840m (2,755ft)
The height of the biggest drop is 20m (66ft)
The maximum speed is 75km/h (47mph)
The ride duration is 189 seconds
The capacity per hour is 1,500 passengers

Safety precautions
Two women had legs amputated after the rollercoaster carriage they were riding in collided with an empty carriage on 2 June.
Fourteen other people on the Smiler ride were also injured.
Alton Towers' owner, Merlin Entertainments, later said the accident had been caused by operator error rather than a mechanical fault.

"A ride shutdown message was misunderstood by staff at the ride," it said in November, adding workers had overridden the control system to manually restart Smiler.

Ms Riley said the park had learned from the mistake.

"We have enhanced our training and also included an extra level of authorisation when we have to stop and reset and restart a ride, which involves senior management," she said.

She confirmed that Smiler was still set to reopen in 2016, but was unable to provide a date.

Merlin Entertainments' share price sank by more than 20% following June's accident, but is currently trading at about 4% below its pre-accident level.

"Certainly, the accident at Alton Towers has been difficult for Merlin and been a drag on its performance, which is not surprising," said Keith Bowman, an equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.

"But other parts of the business - Legoland in particular - have been making progress and generally compensating for this."

Source : http://www.bbc.com

Fusar Mohawk Turns Any Helmet Into A Powerful Smart Helmet

Meet Fusar, a helmet kit. Instead of trying to reinvent helmets, the Fusar system works with any helmet. You just have to clip the main component, the Mohawk, to your existing helmet to turn it into a safe, smart helmet. The full kit will be available for $549, and early adopters can buy it for $349. The company is competing in our Hardware Battlefield competition at CES.

With only the Mohawk part, you can add an action camera, activity tracker, communication device, navigation unit, music player, black box and emergency alert system to your helmet. It uses a standard action camera mount and works on the side or at the top of your helmet.

And that’s it. Once it’s on your helmet, you control everything through Fusar’s app on your phone. For instance, you can start recording videos from the mobile app.

The Mohawk camera shoots 1080p videos or 12MP photos. But the best part is that you can use the HotShot feature to shoot a quick 15-second video and send directly to your social media accounts.

In other words, the Mohawk also competes directly with a GoPro. You have to take this into consideration when looking at the retail price as you won’t have to buy a GoPro in addition to the Fusar Mohawk. And as you can see from the pictures, the Mohawk looks much better than mounting a GoPro on your helmet. You can leave the Mohawk on your helmet.

Now, there are other components on the Fusar kit as well. For example, if you don’t want to use your phone when riding a bike. Fusar also provides a button with LED indications for your handlebar or wrist. There’s also a communication headset so that you can chat with your buddies in walkie-talkie style.

Finally, the Fusar system tracks your activity with an accelerometer, magnetometer, gyroscope and GPS. You’ll not only get all your stats once you’re done with your ride, but it could also prove to be an essential tool thanks to the built-in crash detection system.

If something goes wrong, the Fusar Mohawk will alert emergency contacts with a map and the local phone numbers of the three nearest EMS dispatchers. The Mohawk is expected to ship in Q3 2016 and the company has already done a successful Indiegogo campaign


Source : http://techcrunch.com

The EHang 184 Is A Human-Sized Drone Taking Off At CES

We’ve seen some pretty cool stuff on day 1 of CES 2016, but probably nothing more eye-catching than the EHang 184, a human-sized drone built by the Chinese UAV company EHang.

Yes you heard right — a giant autonomous drone that fits a human.

It’s basically what you would expect to see if someone shrunk you down to the size of a LEGO and stuck you next to a DJI Inspire. Except no one was shrunk, and the giant flying machine was sitting smack in the middle of the CES drone section.

EHang, which was founded in 2014 and has raised about $50M in venture funding to date, was pretty gung-ho about telling everyone at CES that the 184 was the future of personal transport. And for the most part, people were too in awe to question them.

But the reality is that the company probably was using the 184 as more of a marketing tool for their standard-sized drones like the Ghost. Not that we’re saying that the 184 will never be a real thing, just that it probably isn’t coming to a Best Buy near you anytime soon.

None of their employees were in tune with the drone’s technical specifications, let alone an MSRP or release date. But we did snag a press kit from the company, which actually provided some worthwhile information.

The drone is about four-and-a-half feet tall, weighs 440 pounds, and will be able to carry a single passenger for 23 minutes at a speed of 60 MPH. The 184 also has gull-wing doors and arms that fold up.

EHang said that the drone will be totally automated, meaning passengers will input a destination and have no control during the flight. The company says this will make the machine safer by eliminating “the most dangerous part of standard modes of transportation, human error.”

This also means that passengers are basically helpless in case anything goes wrong, but the company notes that their fail-safe systems include multiple backups for each flight system, as well as a feature where the aircraft will immediately land if a passenger’s life is at risk.

Ultimately, it’s probably going to be a few years before we ever see the EHang 184 flying in anything more than a demo video. Plus, we can’t imagine what the FAA would say about the thing.

That being said, it’s nice to see a company thinking ahead and inspiring the drone community.

Source : http://techcrunch.com

Snap, The 4K Flying Camera With Auto-Tracking, Is Ready For The Spotlight

Snap, a flying camera we first wrote about in September, is ready for the spotlight as it takes the stage today to compete in the TechCrunch Hardware Battlefield at CES. The device, made by Vantage Robotics, provides an alternative for those who want professional aerial shots but don’t want the hassle of controlling a cumbersome (and expensive) drone like the DJI Inspire.

We now have specs for Snap (which will ship this spring), and they look pretty great. Snap will weigh just 1.1 pounds, and have 20 minutes of flying time per charge.

The camera itself will be a 4K-capable Sony Exmor sensor, mounted on a mini mechanical smooth-lock gimbal, which the company says is about 6 times lighter than standard drone gimbals.

While users will be able to use their phone or tablet to control Snap, Vantage Robotics has included a ton of software-based features that will let users capture professional quality camera shots without even having to control the drone.

Some of these features are air tripod, which lets the camera stay in place while automatically turning to keep the subject in frame; virtual wire, which allows the camera to follow a subject along a predefined wire (while avoiding any obstacles); and free-form following.


Source:http://techcrunch.com

Mark Zuckerberg Is Building A Real-Life Version Of Iron Man’s Digital Assistant ‘Jarvis’

Mark Zuckerberg is known for setting himself tough challenges — whether that’s learning Mandarin, promoting equality, or (controversially) trying to solve global Internet access — but this year the Facebook founder just took things to another level. His personal project for 2016 is to bring Jarvis, Iron Man’s trusty digital assistant, to life.

That isn’t exactly true. Zuck wants to build his own AI (artificial intelligence) bot to help him run his life more efficiently — but he references Jarvis, probably the best example, to explain his lofty ambition.

Here’s what Zuckerberg said:

My personal challenge for 2016 is to build a simple AI to run my home and help me with my work. You can think of it kind of like Jarvis in Iron Man.

I’m going to start by exploring what technology is already out there. Then I’ll start teaching it to understand my voice to control everything in our home — music, lights, temperature and so on. I’ll teach it to let friends in by looking at their faces when they ring the doorbell. I’ll teach it to let me know if anything is going on in Max’s room that I need to check on when I’m not with her. On the work side, it’ll help me visualize data in VR to help me build better services and lead my organizations more effectively.

This is hardly a small side project, by any means. It’ll be interesting to see how much time and what resources that Zuckerberg dedicates to this project, and how it turns out. Maybe he can develop Iron Man’s suit in 2017?


Source:http://techcrunch.com

Nvidia Announces New Drive PX 2 ‘Supercomputer In A Lunchbox’ For Self-Driving Cars

Following last year’s Drive CX, Nvidia just announced an updated version of its computing platform for self-driving cars, the Drive PX 2. Compared to last year’s model, this is a much more powerful beast, able to process data from 12 video cameras and other sensors in real time to make educated driving decisions. The company calls it a supercomputer, and it’s the size of a lunchbox.

Behind the scene, the Drive PX 2 features 12 different cores representing 8 teraflops of calculation power, 24 deep learning tera operations per second. The company is using a 16nm architecture, and it’s a hungry beast as it requires 250W of power. Finally, Nvidia is using a liquid-cooling system. Because the PX 2 will be used in cars, that’s not too much of a problem and Nvidia argues that car manufacturers will just plug the device into their existing cooling solutions.

Nvidia co-founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang said that the PX 2 was as powerful as 150 MacBook Pros. The company is certainly comparing GPU power with the 13-inch MacBook Pro, which currently sports an Intel Iris Graphics 6100 chip. The PX 2 features two next-gen Tegra processors, as well as a Pascal-based GPU. In total, the system can push up to 8 teraflops and recognize up to 2,800 images per second using the AlexNet neural network-based deep learning algorithm.

The company also announced Nvidia Drivenet, its own deep neural network. It has the equivalent of 37 million neurons and was trained 120 million objects so far. Like other deep neural networks, it gets better over time.

Companies will be able to leverage this network, but Nvidia also insisted in saying that car makers would want to control their own neural network.

The company is promoting a platform approach, meaning that it wants to work with as many car makers as possible to kickstart their self-driving efforts. Volvo is going to be the first partner shipping Drive PX 2 in about 100 upcoming test cars. Nvidia has also partnered with Audi, Daimler, BMW and Ford to develop and test the PX 2.

As Huang showed during today’s keynote, all of this power is needed to enable self-driving cars to know enough about their environment — and interpret it — to safely drive in traffic. In one demo, Nvidia showed a new dashboard that can use this data to show drivers whether there are other cars around them at any given time. Thanks to this, “we soon won’t need rear-view mirrors anymore,” Huang joked.

As Nvidia clearly noted, though, identifying objects and planning basic paths is only the beginning. Looking ahead, making self-driving cars work in the real world also means that cars can recognize circumstances as well. Not every truck is the same, after all — some are ambulances, for example, and you better make space for those.

Source : techcrunch.com