Lyft launching in New York with a focus on serving outer boroughs
Lyft, the Uber alternative with a penchant for pink mustaches, will launch service in New York City at the end of the week. Initially, the ride-on-demand app will focus on boroughs beyond Manhattan, explaining that “Brooklyn and Queens are vastly underserved by public transit options compared to the rest of New York City.” This is good news for many city residents — not to mention Android Wear users eager to summon a car with their smartwatch — the downside is that Lyft will only pick up customers in Brooklyn or Queens, at least for the time being. In other words, if you’re trying to get back home from Manhattan, the app won’t help you out. That said, the service will come in handy for those looking to get around in Brooklyn or Queens, or travel from one borough to the other.
As Lyft sets up shop in the Big Apple, it will face stiff competition from ultra-successful Uber. The latter recently cut fares for its UberX service by 20 percent, and that’s just the latest example of the company waging war on competing services and local taxis. For its part, Lyft will lure new customers in New York City by offering two weeks of free rides. Beyond contending with rivals such as Uber and SideCar, Lyft, though, Lyft will also have to jump through the city’s regulatory hurdles — and the local taxi lobby didn’t exactly welcome Uber with open arms initially. In any case, Lyft hopes its strict vehicle safety policies — its insurance coverage is three times more than that of NYC taxis, for example — will give it a leg up in this new market.
Via: TechCrunch, The New York Times
Source: Lyft Blog
New blood test is an early warning system for Alzheimer’s disease
Of all the tragic things that come with Alzheimer’s disease, its tendency to sneak up on people is one of the toughest to deal with. That’s because by the time the condition is even detectable, there’s a good chance it’s already too late to turn back the tide. Earlier diagnoses could mean the difference between years of mental decline and a life of relative normalcy — that’s why a test developed by researchers at King’s College London and Oxford University could be such a game changer. According to The Telegraph, the scientists can predict whether or not Alzheimer’s will strike someone with existing memory loss problems by looking for 10 telltale proteins in their blood.
Their success rate is nothing to scoff at either: They’re right about 87 percent of the time. That’s right, a blood test may be able to unlock the (possibly disconcerting) secrets of your cognitive future. Here’s the rub, though: You won’t see this in your local GP’s office very soon. The first tests — which are expected to become available within about five years — will be used to ferret out those who are likely to be stricken with Alzheimer’s for inclusion in clinical trials. With any luck, some of the drugs that haven’t helped people in later stages of the disease will be able to do some real good when it’s caught early enough. Researchers hope that the right combination of testing and treatment could turn the degenerative disease into something that can be ultimately fended off. That’s not much consolation for the roughly 35 million people who already suffer from it, but for the rest of us? That’s hope where there was none before.
Source: The Telegraph
PulseOn early look: Making heart rate monitoring easier than ever
While smartwatches and fitness trackers are taking the tech world by storm, PulseOn aims to put a dent in the competition’s numbers.
Smartwatches and wearable fitness trackers are relatively new to us, though the idea has been around for quite some time. Something you can wear on your wrist that tracks your data while exercising is a great idea, especially if the price is right. We’ve seen watches that gravitate more towards notifications, telling time, being readily available in all weather conditions, or fitness and heart rate tracking.
The entire goal of PulseOn is to focus on heart rate monitoring, while offering fitness tracking functionality and the occasional telling of time. PulseOn was born out of Nokia back in 2012 with one main goal: to offer an easy way to check your heart rate. We got our hands on one a few weeks ago, and we have a pretty good idea as to whether or not you should buy one.
Overview
Before we give it a final score, we have some stuff to talk about. First and foremost, this isn’t a final copy. It’s a beta release, and it has a good amount of bugs in the hardware and software (most of which are being addressed before the final models are for sale). We’ll let you know which will be fixed later in the review.
PulseOn isn’t like other fitness trackers. Sure, you can track your run through the PulseOn app and check how many calories you’ve burned, but it aims to be the best at one thing: monitoring your heart rate. This isn’t a new idea, though. We’ve seen other fitness trackers monitor heart rate, but much of the time it’s inconvenient or inaccurate. We’ll take a look at a the performance and accuracy of PulseOn a bit later.
Hardware
The look and feel of the device is simple, no-frills, and light. It offers a small square display with metal hinges that attach to the strap. The left side houses a start/stop button, while the right side holds a scrolling button. Around back, you’ll see the heart rate monitor and two charging pins on the right.
To charge the device, you’ll need to plug in the charging clip that’s included in the box. It’s a bit difficult to find the connectors, but once it’s secured, it’s pretty sturdy.
The strap is made from a stretchy cloth material that allows for easy removal. It’s comfortable, doesn’t irritate the skin, and is a whole lot better than a runner band. The one main downside to the strap, however, is that we’ve had to re-tighten the strap multiple times while exercising. The band comes a bit loose, pretty often – something we’d never see with a more conventional fitness tracker band.
Other than the quick look at the hardware features, we’d say the overall design could use a bit of work. It’s certainly not the most attractive device, but it’s far from the worst. It works well, and I suppose that’s all that matters.
Software
Let’s begin the software section by talking about the application. It looks really great from a design standpoint. The functionality, not so much. At least not yet. This is one of those problems that PulseOn is working on to be improved by launch date. It’s extremely slow, jittery, and just not that fun to use.
When you boot up the app, you’re whisked into a tutorial on how to use PulseOn and the app together. Once you complete the tutorial, you’ll see three main screens: one to show your latest event, the next to show your recovery time and fitness level, and the last to show your complete history. If the app ran smoothly, I wouldn’t have any complaints, whatsoever. And I’m pretty certain this will be completely ready for everyday use on launch date, especially because I’ve already gotten an update about once a week. But the app is where you’ll spend the least amount of time.
Once strapped on, the PulseOn has two main modes: standard and sport. Hit the right button to scroll through time, current heart rate, and a few statistics that have been previously recorded. There’s no shake to wake the device, so if you’re wearing it as a watch, be prepared to press a button every time you’d like to see the time.
Sport mode is activated by pressing the left button to begin recording your workout. This is where you can check out the timer, heart rate, distance, time, and training effect. These are all pretty useful while you’re exercising, given that you’re in a low-light situation. More on that later.
Overall, PulseOn works the way you’d want it to. It’s extremely easy to begin a workout, though a little annoying to do something as simple as check the time.
Performance
Most importantly, we need to talk about the screen. It’s small, and offers all of its useful information in a light-orange color. It’s great to look at while indoors, but if you try to look at anything while outdoors (where you’ll be using it most), it’s barely there. Text is faded to the point where I needed to put the watch up directly to my face to read anything. Especially while working out, I couldn’t check the correct time I was at during my run. This is mostly due to the poor screen and the small seconds counter in the timer. Unfortunately, there’s no way around that. You’ll need to squint to read anything outdoors, which isn’t really ideal at all.
The heart rate works absolutely great. It doesn’t stutter or give any false information. We tested it against a traditional chest heart rate monitor, and the results were spot-on.
Let’s move on to battery life. PulseOn is quoting up to ten hours of sport mode use before the battery goes completely dead. In my experience, I couldn’t make it an entire day without needing to throw it on the charger while in standard mode. Since this is a pre-production model, though, I’m withholding my reservations for now. We’ll have to see when the final units ship.
One great thing about PulseOn is the ability to record data without a phone. If you go for a run, just enter sport mode and go. Once you pair your device after the run, the info will sync straight to your PulseOn app. This is especially handy when you don’t feel like taking your phone with you for a super long run. Of course, it won’t track any distance information without a paired device, but it can give you the other vital information you’re looking for.
Overall, PulseOn works great for fitness tracking, and the ability to store data temporarily without a paired device is a huge plus. However, the screen and strap could use a bit of work.
Should I buy?
This is a difficult question. Since this isn’t a finished model, I can’t really say. But what I can say is that PulseOn is headed in the right direction. They’re working hard to get some hardware and software features ironed out before launch date, which is quite respectable.
It’s available as an IndieGoGo campaign, though the product is completely funded. This is essentially a way to manage preorders, something that many startup companies struggle with. If you’d like your own PulseOn, you can preorder one for $169, while waiting for launch date will cost you $200.
Though this isn’t completely finished software/hardware, what do you think? It’s certainly difficult to pick this over something like Samsung’s Gear 2, which also offers a heart rate monitor. PulseOn is most likely more accurate, so that’s also something to take into consideration.
If you’d like one of your own, head to the IndieGoGo page to pledge!
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Prince of Persia Shadow & Flame on Sale for a Buck
Ubisoft has put out a summer sale on the Prince of Persia Shadow & Flame. The side scrolling recreation of a classic generally would set you back $2.99. For a limited time, Ubisoft dropped that price to just $0.99.
The game offers up 14 levels in 5 different environments. You can utilize gesture based gaming or a more classic on-screen joystick style of play. If you happen to have a Moga controller at your disposal, it also supports that as well. If you have been eyeballing this one you might as well snag it today. Maybe they will toss out a sale on Assassin’s Creed Pirates next.
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Battlefield 4 Commander app updates to support Dragon’s Teeth DLC and Xbox One VOIP
Late last night a patch update started rolling out for the PC, Xbox One, Xbox 360, Playstation 3 and Playstation 4 for Battlefield 4. Much of that update included a ton of various bug fixes that were needed. It is also the pre-curser patch update for the upcoming Dragon’s Teeth DLC that will launch for Premium members July 15th. While none of that really has anything to do with Android, the accompanying Battlefield 4 Commander companion app certainly does.
EA has also pushed an update to the Commander app to prep it for the Dragon’S Teeth DLC. This is important if you ever play Battlefield 4 as a commander. Without the update you can’t play the 4 new maps and help your team. Besides prepping it for the new DLC, the update also brings in VOIP communication between Commander app tablet players and Xbox One players. That is pretty awesome really. This feature was previously only available for PC players and the Commander app.
If you are still playing Battlefield 4 and are gearing up for the new Dragon’s Teeth expansion, you should probably be sure to update your Android tablets as well.
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Apple Hires Two Former Nike FuelBand Engineers, Possibly for iWatch Team
Earlier this year, Nike significantly downsized its FuelBand team, firing several members of the 80-person team that worked to create its well-known fitness tracker as part of a shift from hardware to software.
Apple snapped up two of the former FuelBand team members in June, Ryan Bailey and Jon Gale. As noted by 9to5Mac, Bailey, who served as a Senior Test and Validation Engineer at Nike is now listed as a Mechanical Design Engineer at Apple, while Gale, who was a Senior Firmware Engineer at Nike is now employed as a Sensing Systems Engineer at Apple.
According to his LinkedIn profile, Bailey specialized in wearable device and consumer electronic product development, focused on providing engineering recommendations to major engineering leads. Gale, meanwhile, developed hardware and firmware architectures for Nike Digital Sport products.
Primary responsibility is to define both the hardware and firmware architectures for Nike Digital Sport products. Additionally, I managed the development of product firmware through partner companies. Responsible for delivering firmware to validate the design in a manufacturing environment, define and implementation of custom protocols to interact with other components of the Nike ecosystem, and translate high-level product requirements into actionable, testable definitions. I personally owned the delivery of firmware for the Nike FuelBand product line.
It is unclear if Gale and Bailey have joined Apple’s wearables team to work on the iWatch, but it is a distinct possibility given their expertise on wearable devices. Apple offers many positions under the job titles of Mechanical Design Engineer and Sensing Systems Engineer, however, so it is unknown exactly what the two are working on.
Over the course of the past year, Apple has hired several experts in the health and fitness fields to join its iWatch team, including fitness guru Jay Blahnik, sleep expert Roy Raymann, pulse oximetry expert and former Chief Medical Officer Michael O’Reilly, and several other scientists and executives from notable sensor companies like AccuVein, C8 MediSensors, and Senseonics. Most recently, the company took on the former sales director of luxury watch brand TAG Heuer, Patrick Pruniaux, possibly to help market the iWatch.
According to a recent report from The Wall Street Journal, Apple’s upcoming wearable device will feature 10 different sensors to track various health and fitness metrics. It’s said to integrate heavily with the Health app in iOS 8, and it may come in both multiple sizes and multiple designs to satisfy a wide range of tastes. Apple is expected to introduce the iWatch at an October event.
This is what Samsung’s virtual reality headset, Gear VR, looks like
Wondering what Samsung’s virtual reality headset looks like? Well stop wondering, because when it’s announced at IFA 2014 later this year, it’ll look something like what you see above. That’s a render straight from Samsung, care of Sam Mobile. Our sources confirm that, while what they’ve seen isn’t exactly like what’s pictured above, it’s very similar; we’re guessing the render is a closer target to the retail model than the developer kits currently in the wild. Keep in mind Samsung still hasn’t even teased the headset we detailed last month across two reports.
The headset remains a peripheral: you’ll use it in conjunction with your phone, which plugs in via USB and acts as your screen. The hardware is built by Samsung, the software is built by Oculus VR — the folks behind the incredibly impressive Oculus Rift.
Beyond the image seen above, Sam Mobile also says the headset will be showcased at IFA 2014 in early September. Moreover, it’s named — fittingly — “Gear VR,” like Samsung’s other wearable line. The image highlights another feature we’re first hearing about today: a touchpad along the right side. Presumably his will help solve the issue of interaction within the headset’s Oculus VR-built software, which was handled by nodding last we heard.
The report also states that Samsung will make the headset’s software development kit available shortly after it’s announced, just ahead of Oculus VR’s first ever dev conference. Imagine that! We wouldn’t be shocked to hear that every developer at Oculus Connect walks away with a free Gear VR headset, fresh for development.
For now, however, Samsung’s Gear VR is both known about widely and officially unconfirmed by Samsung itself. If it weren’t clear enough, this thing is happening, and it’s happening soon.
Wall Street wants more government help to combat cyber attacks
Wall Street is worried. Not about government regulation or investigations by law enforcement agencies. No, the countries financial institutions are concerned about cyber attacks. The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, or SIFMA, has proposed that it and the government join forces in an effort to combat the 21st century threat. As Wall Street’s biggest trade group, the organization already wields plenty of influence, but to help convince the American government it has hired former NSA director Keith Alexander.
According to a document obtained by Bloomberg the banks are not confident in their ability to fend off or cope with increasingly destructive and sophisticated digital weapons aimed at them.
“We are concerned that the industry may not have the capabilities that we would like to effectively defend against this newer form of potential attack, the capability that we would like to stop such an attack once commenced from spreading to other financial institutions, or the capability we would like of effectively recovering if an initial attack is followed by waves of follow-on attacks.”
There is even concern that unaffected banks could be the victims of runs as consumers lose confidence. And to make matters worse, the industry is almost completely reliant on the nation’s power grid to function, which is vulnerable not only to cyber attacks, but physical ones as well.
The solution SIFMA has come up with involves creating a council of financial executives and deputy-level representatives from eight government agencies including the Treasury, NSA, Homeland Security and the White House. The hope is that this group would not only prove more powerful in combating hacks of banks, but also more efficient in disseminating information to appropriate parties and the public. The collaboration could ensure a more coherent and effective response to an impending or ongoing cyber attack, but some in congress (like Florida Democrat Alan Grayson) are concerned tactics to turn to pre-emptive strikes. If private industry leaders were sitting on a council that launched even a digital offensive against a group or nation it could set a very bad precedent.
Filed under: Internet
Source: Bloomberg
Out of stock Play Store devices get yanked, except for One
We have all been impatiently watching the Play Store every day or so to see what is going to happen to the Google Play Edition devices that have been out of stock since June 20th. Seems Google is cleaning house on the Play Store device page and has removed the listing for most of them, but curiously enough left the Samsung Galaxy S4.
There have been a few leaks and tips that a Samsung galaxy S5 GPE device is on the way, so it would make sense that the Galaxy S4 variant hasn’t totally been removed yet. However, we wonder if GPE variants could be falling off by the wayside entirely. They were never really meant to be HUGE sellers. More so options for consumers who wanted the flagship device look and feel but with a straight Google experience. I personally wouldn’t lose any sleep if they did move away entirely. I would like to see the manufacturers offer up the ability to have the stock Google OS or their bloated OS somehow. The first manufacturer/carrier to bring that to consumers will do pretty well I think.
If you have been hesitant to grab a GPE device, you might want to consider pulling the trigger sooner rather than later. Who knows, they might disappear entirely.
Via AndroidPolice
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“No, I Said…” lets you fix a wrong word in Google Search, beats cursing at It
How many times have you done a voice search with Google Search and the interpretations of what you said was WAY off? I would have to say more than a few times. It happens. We speak to fast, to slow, don’t enunciate, have background sounds and any other number of potential problems. Rather than cursing up a storm and calling Google a stupid….. I know you have done that a few times too, I know I have. Instead simply say “No, I said..” and say the word you meant and Google ‘should’ replace it with the correct word for you.
I will use 9to5Googles example, if you were searching for the nearest bars and Google for some reason picked up cars. Simply say, “Ok Google, No I said bars” and it will change the word. Pretty cool little command. Give it a shot the next time Google makes a mistake and see if it fixes it correctly. This small addition doesn’t need any updating from you and is available on iOS and Android right now.
Source: 9to5Google
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AIVAnet 