Did Trump pilot a TV service during the debate?

Just ahead of last night’s debate, Donald Trump launched his own Facebook Live video stream featuring coverage and analysis before, during and after the event. The feed, which featured analysis and slick graphics, could be a preview of a Trump TV network rumored to be in the works. “If you’re tired of biased, mainstream media reporting (otherwise known as Crooked Hillary’s super PAC), tune into my Facebook Live broadcast,” Trump said in a Facebook post

The idea that Trump was using his presidential bid as a way to drum up interest in a new media empire was first floated by Vanity Fair, which based the report on sources “briefed on the discussions.” More recent reports pointed to an online channel that could be a cable TV launchpad. He reportedly consulted New York Observer owner Jared Kushner, along with his own media-savvy daughter, Ivanka, on the project. Trump has denied the rumors, however.

There’s a a little issue of advertising [on Trump TV]. Most big brand advertisers would avoid it like the plague. The last thing anyone is looking for is controversy for fear of being boycotted.

The livestream featured Ivanka , Eric and Lara Trump, along with Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn. It ran under the “TrumpTV” section and had anti-Clinton ads interspersed throughout. While the production looked reasonably professional, there was the odd stumble and “hot mic” glitch. Around 200,000 viewers tuned into the broadcast at its peak during the debate, trailing only the ABC News feed on Facebook. By contrast, 124 million folks around the world watched the second tete-a-tete between the candidates on YouTube, dwarfing Facebook’s numbers.

While the ratings were decent, former Fox TV CEO Sandy Grushow told CNBC that the idea of a Trump TV network is implausible. “There’s a a little issue of advertising,” he said. “Most big brand advertisers would avoid it like the plague. The last thing anyone is looking for is controversy for fear of being boycotted.”

Via: Buzzfeed

Source: Donald Trump (Facebook)

The first Cybathlon pushed the limits of bionic technology

Andre van Rüschen slowly climbed a five-step ramp at the end of his race. With a black processor strapped to his back and leg supports on either side of his lower limbs, he stayed focused on the body-machine coordination that was keeping him upright. He had walked over a wooden slope, criss-crossed bright yellow bars and tried to step on gray discs that were placed irregularly on the floor. Now, standing atop the last obstacle in the exoskeleton race, he took a moment to pause and look up at his opponent on the adjacent track. They were both on the ramp, going head-to-head at the world’s first Cybathlon, a sporting competition designed for people with severe disabilities.

The crowd inside the Swiss Arena in Zürich cheered them on. Van Rüschen, the German pilot who was using a ReWalk exoskeleton, quickly regained his focus and prepared to walk down the next five steps to complete the race. He hit a button on the remote around his wrist to change the settings from “walk” to “climb” and quickly adjusted his upper body to balance his weight on the crutches in his hands. With his competitor, Mark Daniel, right on his heels, he leaned forward to pick up the pace.

Moments later, the crowd roared as van Rüschen walked over the finish line, seconds ahead of Daniel. He became the first pilot in a powered-exoskeleton suit to win the gold medal at the Cybathlon. Daniel, who presented the exoskeleton technology from Florida-based Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, went home with the silver.

Mark Daniel competing in the powered exoskeleton race. Photo: Arnd Wiegmann, Reuters

Through the day, on Oct. 8th, there were many moments of triumph and tears. Of the 66 competing teams, most machines carried the pilots through the obstacles without a glitch, while some struggled to get past the first leg of the race. Spectators in the soldout stadium leapt out of their seats to support the pilots who won and cheered for those who failed to conquer their obstacles.

“It showed that it’s possible to use technology at an event to bring people without disabilities closer [to] people with disabilities,” said Robert Riener, the principal organizer of the competition. “It was about starting a conversation, to have awareness about disabilities, to include all people.”

The Cybathlon created a space for people to support each other irrespective of their abilities. But the impact went beyond the ambiance in the arena. The purpose of the competition was to push the field of bionic-assistive technology to do more for the people who need it. Each obstacle was carefully planned not only to put existing technologies to the test, but to encourage novel ideas.

Powered-wheelchair prototypes were built to roll up a flight of stairs or move across uneven surfaces without getting stuck. Arm prosthetics that can rotate and grip were tested for smaller gestures, such as screwing in a lightbulb or spreading jam on a slice of bread. And a unique brain-computer interface race had teams engineer a way for paraplegic pilots to control an avatar in a computer game through their thoughts alone.

A pilot from South Korea in the brain-computer interface race. Photo: Arnd Wiegmann, Reuters

The event, organized by ETH Zurich, was the first of its kind to invite engineers and developers to bring their technologies to a global stage. In order to host an accident-free competition, the Swiss university planned for thorough tech checks and medical evaluations. While most teams made it past preliminary testing, a few machines failed to meet the technical safety requirements and were disqualified. A handful of pilots also had to be turned away for medical discrepancies.

Michael McClellan, the American pilot slated to represent Team Cleveland’s unique implanted-sensor technology in the Functional Electrical Stimulation bike race, had spent the last year training for the Cybathlon. Paralyzed from the waist down, he was eager to compete for the clinical-research team that had enabled him to get back on his feet and ride a bike again. But the medical check in Zurich revealed that he still had some muscle activity in his leg. Minimal as the movement was, it kept him out of the race. Mark Muhn, the team’s reserve pilot and McClellan’s close friend, who showed no signs of voluntary muscle activity in his lower body during the test was asked to get in the bike for the final race.

The moment was as unexpected for Muhn as it was bittersweet. He had to take his friend’s spot, but he had also spent months training for the remote possibility of racing. The next day at the arena, two rounds and 20 laps later, Muhn went on to the win the gold, with his wife and McClellan cheering in the crowd. None of the other 10 teams came close to his time in the race.

“It was about starting a conversation, to have awareness about disabilities, to include all people.” – Robert Riener

Throughout the day, unexpected wins rolled in with predictable results. The group from Ossur, a leading Icelandic company that manufactures lower-limb prostheses, entered the leg race with four pilots who were favored to win. Three participants used a variation of the company’s commercially available knee technologies, while the fourth, Lukas Kalemba, piloted a prototype of a powered leg built specifically for the event.

Kalemba stumbled on his last obstacle as he carried a bunch of objects up the stairs on a ramp and didn’t make it to the finals. But the remaining three Ossur pilots outraced the competition to win all three medals in the powered-leg discipline.

The event showcased the power of commercially established devices, but it was some of the simpler technologies that took a surprising lead. In the arm-prosthetics race, 10 teams covered the spectrum of assistive devices available to amputees today. Powered arms from Touch Bionics, a leading Scottish company that manufactures upper-limb prostheses, and the more experimental implanted prosthesis from Swedish team OPRA were front-runners in the race. But the Dutch pilot from DIPO Power won the gold with a body-powered prostheses that harnesses the physical strength of the wearer instead of relying fully on a machine.

“What we saw is that it doesn’t need to be the most complex technology to do the best performance,” says Riener. “We had teams do extremely well with passive devices. It didn’t need to be high-tech. It can be more robust and reliable.”

The juxtaposition of experimental prototypes from research labs and commercially successful devices from large companies made the Cybathlon a showcase of what’s available and what’s possible in the field of bionic technologies. The event also pushed both sides to do more for people with disabilities. Exoskeleton companies adjusted their software to make stepping easier for paraplegics and novel sensors were implanted in some of the pilots to create direct communication between their bodies and the machines.

The differences between teams that dominated and those that struggled to make it through also sparked collaborative possibilities.

“A big take-away is that there will be opportunities to develop and create platforms or tools that can support universities in pursuing research in powered prosthetics,” said David Langlois, the technical lead from Ossur. “A lot of the other guys we saw don’t have corporate support, their resources are limited and development is slow. They’re spending a lot of time doing what we already do. I would like to consider how we can share resources so everyone can be more efficient at contributing and moving the field of prosthetics forward.”

The state of prosthetic devices already stood apart through the competition. While exoskeletons still looked too bulky and pilots in the FES bike race were visibly exhausted, most of the participants in the leg-prosthetics discipline ran over the obstacles in less than a couple of minutes. “It’s a much more mature technology,” says Langlois. “It’s been available for a long time, a lot of research has been dedicated to it. Other events are more about newer technologies that haven’t reached the same level of maturity. It leads to a very different execution of the challenge.”

Billy Costello, one of four pilots representing Icelandic team Ossur, competing in the powered leg prosthetics race. Photo: Michael Buholzer/AFP

The selection of obstacles also contributed to the pace of the leg race. The available prostheses, according to Langlois, already enable amputees to walk across different surfaces or carry out everyday tasks like carrying objects across a room. But it’s particularly challenging for them to get through a regular work day on the prosthetic leg. Long stretches create a lot of discomfort and even pain for most users.

“Real life is not a one-minute race,” says Langlois. “It’s a 12-hour day for normal living. It was hard to see the daily life challenges of amputees [on the obstacle course],” he says. “Not that this track was easy or had no value but to level the field to have events that have the same level of difficulty, some adjustments would help bring out the challenges of being a lower leg amputee.”

The need for adjustments, however, is not lost on the organizers as they assess the impact of their event. Riener plans to make changes to the tasks — making some less intensive, others more challenging — for the next Cybathlon in four years.

“We’ll continue to speak with the community to improve the racetracks for daily life challenges,” he says. “It’s our responsibility to keep this movement going now. We can improve inclusion and have better technologies for people with disabilities. We have the momentum now.”

This is the final episode in a five-part video series called Superhumans, which follows the Cybathlon from start to finish.

UK ‘Turing Law’ will posthumously pardon convicted gay men

Under new legislation, thousands of gay and bisexual men will receive posthumous pardons from the UK government. Dubbed the “Alan Turing Law,” an amendment to the Policing and Crime Bill will rectify old convictions for consensual same-sex relationships, which were decriminalised in England and Wales in 1967. The policy builds on the case of Alan Turing, a brilliant cryptographer who helped Britain and the Allied Powers decode messages during World War II. Turing was prosecuted in 1952 for homosexual acts and died in 1954 from cyanide poisoning. In 2009, the British government officially apologised for his treatment, before a posthumous pardon was granted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2013.

The new amendment was first proposed by Liberal Democrat peer Lord Sharkey. He called the government’s decision today “a momentous day” for “thousands of families up and down the UK who have been campaigning on this issue for decades.” In addition to the posthumous pardons, the Home Office has announced a new statutory pardon for the living. It will affect individuals who have successfully applied to the Home Office to have their criminal record cleared through the disregard process.

“It is hugely important that we pardon people convicted of historical sexual offences who would be innocent of any crime today,” Justice Minister Sam Gyimah said. “Through pardons and the existing disregard process we will meet our manifesto commitment to put right these wrongs.” Not everyone is happy with the decision, however. George Montague, who was convicted in 1974 of gross indecency with another man, told the BBC he wants an apology, not a pardon. A pardon, he argues, would cement the idea that he was once guilty. “If I get an apology, I will not need a pardon,” he said.

Via: Ars Technica UK

Source: GOV.UK, BBC

ICYMI: Bot is my co-pilot

Today on In Case You Missed It: DARPA’s autopilot system for military planes is being tested, this time in a Cessna Caravan turboprop plane. It’s made up of a robotic arm and tablet with speech recognition, so communicating with the mechanical brain is supposed to be even easier. Meanwhile, ping-pong fans will want to know about new paddles that set the music based on the pace of the rally.

A new product designed for gamers with haptic actuators is here, while just for kicks, the Price is Right celebration is here. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.

Evidence in Trademark Filing Points to MacBook OLED Panel Officially Called ‘Magic Toolbar’

A week before Apple’s just-announced October 27 Mac-centric event, a newly discovered trademark filing has been unearthed online, suggesting a potential name for the OLED panel on the new MacBook Pro. According to information rounded up by Brian Conroy at The Trademark Ninja (via The Next Web), a trademark filed by a company called “Presto Apps America LLC” for a device dubbed the “Magic Toolbar” could be Apple’s name for the touch bar panel on its new MacBook Pro line.

Conroy lays out a line of evidence pointing to Apple’s involvement with this particular name, beginning with Presto Apps’ incorporation on January 22, 2016, and followed by its filing for the trademark just a few weeks later on February 5, 2016. The cost of the trademark application was furthermore estimated to be around €16,000.

The trademark’s cost, along with Apple’s stable of “Magic” products — Magic Keyboard, Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad — fuel Conroy’s main line of evidence. Given that Apple has a well-established reason to potentially do battle with any company in court who would file a trademark with “Magic” heavily featured in the title, Conroy says anyone would “have to be 100% certified insane” to spend so much money on something that a company like Apple could shut down with relative ease. He calls this “the main reason” he believes Presto Apps is Apple.

They would almost certainly be able to stop any other company applying for the trademark ‘Magic Toolbar’, on the basis it’s similar to their existing trademarks and likely to cause confusion.

So, another company would have to be 100% certified insane to spend €16,000 in outlay for a trademark application that someone with the clout of Apple was almost certain to be able to object to and defeat. And that’s the main reason that I’m putting my neck on the line and saying that ‘Presto Apps America LLC’ is actually Apple.

To top it all off, when investigating Presto Apps’ trademark applications in Canada, Indonesia, and Malaysia, it was discovered that the “Magic Toolbar” application was filed by the same lawyers who applied for the “AirPods” trademark. As Conroy concluded, “either Presto Apps America is Apple and the Magic Toolbar is going to be part of the MacBook announced on 27 October or else it’s the strangest set of coincidences and unlikely events I’ve ever seen.”

Rumors that began earlier in the year suggested that the OLED panel on the MacBook Pro will dynamically change for specific apps that are open on the computer, as well as integrate Touch ID into Apple’s MacBook line. Internally, Apple reportedly named the OLED panel the “Dynamic Function Row.” Refreshed versions of the MacBook Air, iMac, Mac Pro, and Mac mini are also believed to be part of the October 27 event.

Related Roundup: MacBook Pro
Buyer’s Guide: Retina MacBook Pro (Don’t Buy)
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Nougat soak test underway for the Moto G4 Plus in Brazil

Motorola published the list of devices that will be updated to Nougat earlier this month, stating that the Moto G4 and the Moto Z would receive the update first. The company is now kicking off the Nougat soak test for the Moto G4 Plus in Brazil, with the update coming in at 953MB.

The screenshots show the phone making the switch to Android 7.0 along with the October security patch. Nougat introduces several interesting features, including a multi-window mode, improvements to Doze, quick replies to notifications, improved security, built-in Data Saver mode, and even more emoji.

With the soak test underway, it shouldn’t be too long before the update starts becoming widely available. As always, we’ll let you know once the OTA update commences its rollout.

Leaked slide deck reveals Xiaomi Mi Note 2 specs

We’re less than a week out from Xiaomi’s Mi Note 2 event, and ahead of the official unveil, the purported slide deck for the phone has leaked on Weibo, giving us a look at the specs on offer.

As spotted by PhoneArena, the deck reveals that the phone will feature a 5.7-inch Super AMOLED QHD display, Snapdragon 821 SoC, Adreno 530 GPU, up to 6GB of RAM and 128GB UFS 2.0 storage, 4G+, dual camera setup at the back with a 23MP Sony IMX318 sensor comlemented by a 12MP Sony IMX378 sensor. At the front, the phone will offer an 8MP shooter.

The Mi Note 2 — like the Mi 5s — features Qualcomm’s ultrasonic fingerprint scanner, which is embedded underneath the display. Other specs include a 4100mAh battery with Quick Charge 3.0, NFC, and USB-C. Based on the presentation deck, it looks like the Mi Note 2 with 4GB of RAM and 64GB storage will retail for ¥2,799 ($415), while the high-end version with 6GB of RAM and 128GB storage will be available for ¥2,999 ($445). Not bad at all considering the sheer hardware on offer.

We’ll have more details on October 25. It’s unlikely that the Mi Note 2 will be catered to a Western audience, but the phone is turning out to be yet another stellar offering from Xiaomi for Asian markets.

How to enable Google Hangouts on the Pixel

Get your Hangouts back!

The Pixel ships with Android 7.1, Google’s latest version of Nougat that includes a number of improvements. But some Pixel owners may find a surprising omission when they load up the Pixel for the first time: a lack of Google Hangouts.

Some versions of the Pixel are shipping with Hangouts installed on the device but disabled, as Google tries to push people towards its new chat app, Allo. But if you, like me, are one of the remaining Hangouts diehards, here’s how to re-enable it and get back to your old habits.

How to enable Hangouts on the Pixel

On the home screen, swipe down from the notification shade.
Tap on the Settings cog.

Scroll down and tap on Apps.

Scroll down and tap on Hangouts.

Tap Enable.

After that, you can head to the Play Store and update the app to the latest version.

That’s it! Now you can get back to using Hangouts and ignoring Allo, like the good ol’ days.

Google Pixel + Pixel XL

• Google Pixel and Pixel XL review
• Google Pixel XL review: A U.S. perspective
• Google Pixel FAQ: Should you upgrade?
• Pixel + Pixel XL specs
• Understanding Android 7.1 Nougat
• Join the discussion in the forums!

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