System helps spot bias in algorithms
There’s no question that algorithms can be biased, producing results that reflect the creator’s preconceived opinions. But how do you reliably detect signs of that bias? Carnegie Mellon researchers can help. They’ve developed a system that tests algorithms to see how much influence a given variable has over the outcome, giving you a sense of where bias exists. It could reveal when a credit score system is giving any weight to racial discrimination, or catch simple mistakes that put too much emphasis on a particular factor.
If the system finds its way into regular service, it could provide greater transparency all around. Companies and institutions could use it to conduct audits and spot flaws that would otherwise go unnoticed. There’s even a chance that you could use the system yourself — in a credit check, you could understand just how important it is to pay your bills on time. The system only works if the algorithm’s gatekeepers offer access in the first place, but it could make all the difference if it holds someone accountable when they try to rig data.
Via: The Verge
Source: Carnegie Mellon (PDF)
Skyscanner Launches Flight-Finding Facebook Messenger Bot
Holiday booking service Skyscanner has announced a chat bot that enables users to book their vacation and search for holiday inspiration from within Facebook Messenger.
The conversation bot’s main function is to search for flights on request and redirect users to the Skyscanner website to confirm their booking and complete payment.
Users can also ask the bot to search for holiday inspiration and find destinations they might be interested in based on their departure location.
The bot searches using current trends and cheap offers to offer up getaway inspiration, which can be activated by users in chat by tapping “Don’t know” when asked where they would like to go.
Users can find the bot by typing “Skyscanner” into Messenger’s search field. Users without the Facebook Messenger app can still converse with the bot by going to a browser redirect link that takes them to the web version of the social media company’s messaging platform.
Skyscanner follows the likes of Poncho, KLM, 1-800-Flowers, CNN, and Foursquare in launching a dedicated bot. Facebook brought the bot support to its Messenger platform last month, allowing approved developers direct access to toolkits and live chat APIs so they can build chat programs for companies that let them interface with customers. Botlist is just one dedicated store that has recently arisen where users can discover chat bots they can interact with through the app.
Facebook Messenger is free on the App Store for iPhone. [Direct Link]
Tags: Facebook Messenger, chat bots
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Apple Patent Details Smart Walkie-Talkie Lightning Headphones
An Apple patent was published today detailing a headset and communications platform that uses point-to-point network technology instead of cellular (via AppleInsider).
The application published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, called “Point-to-Point ad hoc voice communication”, describes a headset invention capable of connecting with similar devices over local wireless ad hoc networks, or peer-to-peer links.
The proposed headset comes with an assortment of audio hardware including the requisite microphone and speaker, and also features a communications module that enables it to interface with other headsets in close proximity.
In some versions, the device connects via Lightning or standard headphone jack to a mobile device, allowing for the possibility of special interfacing software. The use of Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or similar protocols are favored over typical cellular or satellite communications, allowing for extremely low latency communications and reduced delay between devices in close proximity.
The exhaustively detailed patent was drafted by a former Sennheiser engineer, and amounts to what could be described as an enhanced walkie-talkie system with touch-enabled, icon-based GUI for establishing connections between peers.
As with all patents, the invention may never see the light of day in any consumer product, but the device does hold interesting possibilities for use by Apple Store staff or between development teams in Apple headquarters.
Tag: Patent
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Pixelmator for Mac Gains New Selection Tools, Retouch Extension for Photos
Popular image editing app Pixelmator was today updated to version 3.5, adding two impressive new tools to improve selections and a new Pixelmator Retouch extension for the Photos app.
Pixelmator’s new Quick Selection Tool, which is smarter than the existing tool, makes it much easier to select large areas of an image with a single brushstroke. The tool is designed to analyze color, texture, contrast, shadows, and highlights in an image to automatically detect an object that’s being selected.
“With the Quick Selection Tool, we wanted to create a totally unique experience for selecting objects,” said Simonas Bastys, lead developer of the Pixelmator Team. “For more than 6 months, our team worked on developing a unique and incredibly smart algorithm, which used advanced machine-learning techniques to figure out for itself the best possible way to select objects. The results are stunning, and we’re really happy to introduce this next-generation selection tool to all of our users.”
Alongside the Quick Selection Tool, a new Magnetic Selection Tool is designed to automatically snap to the edges of an object being traced, so a detailed selection can be made much more quickly. According to Pixelmator’s developers, the algorithm behind Magnetic Selection is based on A* Pathfinding and ensures a perfect outline around nearly any object.
For the built-in Photos app on the Mac, there’s a Pixelmator Retouch extension that adds a number of retouching tools that can be used directly in Photos. With the extension, it’s possible to remove objects, clone areas, adjust lightness and saturation, sharpen details, and more. Pixelmator Retouch was built to take advantage of Metal, Apple’s graphics processing technology, so edits can be done speedily.
Other improvements in the new Pixelmator update include a new Stroke effect that’s 15 times faster, improved Refine Selection performance, auto-adjusting brush size for the Distort extension, and content-aware outline smoothing for selections made via Color Selection, Paint Bucket, and Magic Eraser. A long list of bug fixes is also bundled into the release.
Pixelmator for Mac can be downloaded from the Mac App Store for $29.99, and today’s update is free for existing users. [Direct Link]
Tag: Pixelmator
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Apple to Ramp Up Original Content, Considered Buying Time Warner Last Year
iTunes and services chief Eddy Cue proposed the idea of Apple bidding on media conglomerate Time Warner at the end of last year, according to the FT.
The discussions reportedly never progressed beyond the preliminary stage, however, and did not involve Apple CEO Tim Cook or Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes.
The meetings had reportedly been arranged for the companies to discuss other partnerships, such as the inclusion of Time Warner assets in Apple’s much-rumored streaming TV service.
Time Warner and its subsidiaries own several iconic media properties, including CNN, HBO, TBS, and TNT, that would be appropriate for a Netflix-like service streamable on the Apple TV, Mac, iPhone, iPad, and other devices. The company also holds the broadcast rights for the NBA in the United States.
The report adds that Apple plans to ramp up spending on original content to “several hundred million dollars a year” in order to better compete with rivals like Amazon and Netflix, both of which offer a growing number of exclusive TV series.
Earlier this year, it was reported that Apple executives met with TV producers and Hollywood studios about developing original TV shows that it would offer exclusively to its iTunes customers. Those discussions were also reportedly led by Cue and Robert Kondrk, vice-president of iTunes content.
The original content could spearhead Apple’s plans to launch its streaming TV service, which has been delayed due to its difficulties in securing deals with media providers like CBS, ABC, Fox, Disney, Discovery, and Viacom.
Earlier reports claimed that Apple would offer a skinny bundle of channels for around $30 to $40 per month, while the original content would presumably be available to stream or purchase on the iTunes Store.
In April 2015, Time Warner CEO Bewkes said he was “pretty confident” that Apple will eventually launch a streaming TV service.
Tags: Eddy Cue, ft.com, Time Warner, streaming TV service
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New Data Suggests ‘Users Didn’t Really Get Miitomo,’ Leading to its Decline
After a few weeks of news surrounding Nintendo’s continued push into smartphone gaming, the company’s first app — Miitomo — slowly started to disappear from the conversation as users began to abandon the app. Nintendo celebrated an impressive 10 million user downloads a few weeks after Miitomo’s release, but since then little news or talk has been circling from Nintendo itself or the game’s original downloaders.
A new report by SurveyMonkey attempts to drill down to the reasoning behind Miitomo’s rise and fall, which occurred all in the span of about two months. To do so, the site compared Miitomo to King’s Candy Crush Saga and Supercell’s Clash of Clans, two games which not only debuted big, but kept players engaged frequently on a week-by-week basis. All three games had a similar huge download spike at launch, with Candy Crush Saga topping the charts, followed by a downturn in downloads in the subsequent weeks.
The difference between the games is that those belonging to King and Supercell saw continued user engagement by the gamers who originally downloaded them. According to SurveyMonkey’s numbers, Clash Royale is played on average 4.2 days per week by its users, while Candy Crush Saga is played 3.3 days each week. Miitomo, on the other hand, sees users returning just 2.3 days per week. The site’s leading theory on this low return rate statistic is a fanbase that “didn’t really get Miitomo.”
In Miitomo’s case, this lower-than-peers engagement translates into higher churn. The game’s weekly churn more than 50% means that over half of the users of Miitomo on a given week won’t come back and play it again the following week. For some apps that don’t need frequent use this isnt a problem, but for games like Miitomo that are designed for frequent use, churn at this level foreshadows a quick decline.
As others have described it, SurveyMonkey calls Miitomo a social game, whose main value lies in the interaction and presence of friends who can witness the customization of your Mii and the answers you give to the app’s questions. Since the only reason for return is content updates centered around avatar clothes and new “Miitomo Drop” levels, the game’s feedback loop dissatisfies gamers whose only reason for weekly revisiting is to dress up their Mii to be seen by seen by no one in particular, since they “end up living in a ghost town.”
After initial heavy interest in the app, most likely due to its status as Nintendo’s first original smartphone game, it appears that most users have decided to simply wait for the company’s promise of “pure game applications.” What that will take the form of isn’t exactly clear yet, but we do know it’ll be centered around the Animal Crossing and Fire Emblem franchises to start.
Tags: Nintendo, Miitomo
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HP Omen (15-inch) Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
HP is streamlining its PC gaming offerings, putting new and revamped products under the Omen brand umbrella. New 15-inch and 17-inch laptops are joining a rebranded VR-ready desktop formerly known as the Envy Phoenix, and future gaming products will also be part of the Omen brand.
Sarah Tew/CNET
A pair of new laptops
The Omen line has, since its 2014 launch, consisted of a single high-end 15-inch gaming laptop. That system has remained one of our favorites for slim, attractive PC gaming rigs, and it’s being joined by two new systems, with similar or better specs, but lower prices.
The company calls these both simply Omen laptops, and the 15-inch and 17-inch versions have nearly all-black bodies with red accents. There’s a subtle pattern, which HP calls “shadow mesh,” and the keyboard is backlit not in simple red, but in “Dragon Red” (lest you think “Game of Thrones” has a lock on all things dragon-related at the moment).
The available graphics options run from the Nvidia GeForce 950M to the newer 965M, which is a couple of steps down from the current top of the line, but still good enough for any contemporary game at mid-to-high detail levels. Both 1080 and 4K display options will be available, along with an option for Intel’s depth-sensing RealSense camera.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Like most other current HP systems, the audio carries a Bang & Olufsen logo, which means the famed audio company tuned and signed off on the sound, although it didn’t actually design or make the speakers.
The 15-inch model is under 25mm thick, while the 17-inch model is less than 30mm thick. To help keep heat under control in these relatively slim (for a gaming laptop) bodies, the internal battery has been pushed toward the front, allowing the dual fans to push hot air out from the rear more efficiently.
Both new laptops are coming to HP.com and Best Buy on July 10, starting at $899 for the 15-inch and $979 for the 17-inch in the US. International price and availability details were not yet available.
Sarah Tew/CNET
A desktop built for virtual reality
If this gaming desktop looks familiar, that’s because it’s a revamped version of the HP Envy Phoenix. That system was built with VR in mind, and designed in collaboration with HTC for use with the HTC Vive virtual-reality headset.
This new version, simply called the Omen by HP desktop, keeps the vertical light-up strip that runs down the front of the chassis. That light can be set to reflect system performance or temperature, using multiple colors and patterns.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Again, the main focus is the HTC Vive, and HP says the Omen is specifically tuned for a great out-of-the-box experience with that VR headset, but there’s nothing stopping it from working with the Oculus Rift or just playing standard 2D PC games.
CPUs go up to the overclockable Intel Core i7-6700K, and the graphics cards will include the just-announced Nvidia 1080 series of desktop GPUs, as well as AMD R9 Fury X options. Liquid cooling is also an available option. As VR headsets require a lot of ports and connections to operate, the Omen has plenty, including six USB ports (two 3.0, four 3.0), USB-C and dual HDMI outputs.
HP is also offering a new 32-inch monitor as a perfect pairing with this desktop. The Omen by HP display has two HDMI inputs, plus DisplayPort and a built-in USB hub, and it supports AMD’s FreeSync technology, which (with the right hardware) can sync GPU output with the display’s refresh rate for smoother gameplay. The resolution on the display is 2,560×1,440.
The Omen desktop and monitor are coming in August, but we don’t yet have precise dates, outlets or prices.
Linksys EA9500 AC5400 Tri-Band Wi-Fi Router with MU-MIMO router review – CNET
The Good The Linksys EA9500 has a whopping eight Gigabit LAN ports and stellar Wi-Fi performance and supports seamless roaming, which is useful if you need to extend your network The router’s Parental Control feature can block https websites.
The Bad The router is expensive and extremely bulky and its specs are overkill for most homes.
The Bottom Line If you have an extremely fast broadband connection and want an all-powerful home network, the Linksys EA9500 fits the bill. But a different router with more modest specs will satisfy most.
Visit manufacturer site for details.
I often receive questions from CNET readers asking “What’s the best router on the market if money is not an issue?” This is a hard question to answer. For most, money is an issue and how good a router is depends on what your needs are.
However, if you have $400 to burn, the Linksys EA9500 Max-Stream AC5400 Tri-Band MU-MIMO is one of the fastest consumer routers on the planet, rivaling the speed champions Asus RT-AC5300 and Netgear R8500. That is if you have a large enough space to host it. Yes, this new router takes up that much room.
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The Linksys EA9500 is a very large and powerful router that has eight LAN ports.
Josh Miller/CNET
Powerful hardware, stellar performance
The EA9500 is a tri-band, quad-stream router with a combined Wi-Fi bandwidth of up to 5,333Mbps. Specifically, it has two 5GHz bands, each with a top on-paper Wi-Fi speed of 2,166.67Mbps and its 2.4GHz band tops out at 1,000Mbps. (Read more about Wi-Fi standards here.) The reality however is that you won’t experience speeds of this magnitude with the EA9500, at least not today. That’s because the fastest Wi-Fi clients (such as tablets, smartphones or laptops) top out at just 1,300Mbps. But the powerful specs don’t hurt and they also put you in a good position for when clients can reach those ungodly levels of performance.
The router supports Multi-User Multiple Input Multiple Output (MU-MIMO), which is a technology designed to efficiently handle Wi-Fi bandwidth in homes with clients of different speed grades. Each client can connect to the router at its highest speed without adversely affecting the speeds of others.
CNET Labs AC5300/5400 5GHz Wi-Fi throughputs
Linksys EA9500
685.2
496
Asus RT-AC5300
643.6
345.2
Netgear R8500
632
329.6
Legend:
Close range
Long range
Note:
Measured in megabits per second. Longer bars mean better performance.
If all that background info bores you, here’s an important take-away: the EA9500 blew away the competition in real-word testing, topping the charts with a sustained Wi-Fi speed of nearly 700Mbps at a close range of 15 feet. Even more impressive, from 100 feet away, with one wall in between the router and the testing client, the router delivered a sustained speed of some 500Mbps. The router’s maximum range was around 150 feet in a residential setting (with walls and other obstacles.) And it passed our stress test of operating for 48 hours with no disconnections.
CNET Labs AC5300/5400 2.4GHz Wi-Fi throughputs.
Linksys EA9500
243.6
120
Asus RT-AC5300
228.6
101.7
Netgear R8500
179.4
66.6
Legend:
Close range
Long range
Note:
Measured in megabits per second. Longer bars mean better performance.
Eight Gigabit LAN ports, ‘Seamless Roaming’
Eight Gigabit LAN ports is a lot (most routers top out at four; the Asus RT-AC88U is currently the only other router with as many.
While four LAN ports are sufficient for most households, it’s always nice to have extra ports in case you want to plug more wired devices ino your network and the truth is wired network connections are always faster and more reliable than Wi-Fi.
Batman special edition Samsung Galaxy S7 edge comes out of the shadows
Just when you thought Samsung’s superhero love peaked with the Iron Man special edition Galaxy S6 edge, Batman swoops in. A Batman special edition Samsung Galaxy S7 edge smartphone looks like it’ll be officially released soon.
The official Samsung Mobile account has tweet a photo, above, and a GIF, below, of a Galaxy S7 with a Batman logo. The words read, “Coming soon: A new device for the battle against the Gods Among Us.” This makes it pretty clear this is hardware we can look forward to and the GIF image teases an engraved Batman symbol on the phone’s rear.
The Gods Among Us line is likely a tie-in for this launch to help push the Injustice game. This game has been out since 2013 so it’s likely there is also a major update or even a new version of that game due out soon that this phone can help promote.
While Samsung previously teamed up with Marvel to release the Iron Man phone, it looks like it has no favourites with this DC partnership. Here’s hoping Samsung also offers Superman and Wonder Woman handset options in the near future too.
The actual release date and pricing have not been announced but we’ve contacted Samsung and will update this article when we know more.
Samsung Mobile
READ: Guess how much an Iron Man Samsung Galaxy S6 edge just sold for?
OnePlus 3 makes official appearance with full metal body and specs
The highly anticipated OnePlus 3 smartphone has popped up in an official certification showing off the device’s squared-off metallic build. There are plenty of specs confirmed too.
The OnePlus 3 has been the source of plenty of rumours as we near its virtual reality release event expected on 14 June. Now the Chinese telecommunication equipment certification center, or TENAA, has leaked the details early.
The photos, shown above, clearly fit with rumours so far showing us a metallic build and an angular finish. Otherwise it looks very similar to a certain HTC smartphone, perhaps only thinner and with minimal side bezels.
The listing also has specs to go with the photos, which are in line with leaks from other sources so far. The OnePlus 3 is expected to come with a 5.5-inch 1080p display, Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 CPU, 4GB of RAM and 64GB storage.
On the rear should be a 16-megapixel camera while the selfie snapper is listed as 8-megapixels. Everything should run on Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow and be powered by a 3000mAh battery.
While the expected 14 June VR launch event date seems solid, pricing has not been announced or leaked, yet. The OnePlus was £230, while the OnePlus 2 was £239 and £289 for larger storage capacity. So the OnePlus 3 hitting the £300 mark would not be a shock.
READ: OnePlus 3: What’s the story so far?
AIVAnet 