Intel buys self-driving tech firm MobilEye for $15.3 billion

Intel’s recent work with MobilEye on self-driving cars must have gone well, because the chip giant is buying its Jerusalem-based partner for $15.3 billion. The deal was first reported by Israeli business site The Marker but has now been confirmed by the two companies. MobilEye is one of the largest players in autonomous vehicle tech and was in the news recently over a spat with Tesla following a fatal Model S crash in Florida. However, it recently teamed with Intel on BMW’s iNext self-driving platform, which the automaker aims to put into service by 2021.

The technology they’re working on isn’t just for BMW vehicles, though. The idea is to build a “scalable architecture” that can be used by any automaker, especially if they don’t want to build their own tech from scratch. As such, it could become a huge business for MobilEye, which may help explain the huge acquisition price. The deal is one of the largest acquisitions of an Israeli-based tech company ever.

Despite a recent PC renaissance thanks to Microsoft’s Surface and other devices, desktops are still losing ground to mobile devices. That has affected Intel’s bottom line while benefiting companies like Qualcomm, which makes the chips used in many smartphones and tablets. The situation has forced Intel into other areas like wearables, connected homes and “internet of things” devices, none of which has exactly taken off yet.

BREAKING: Intel to acquire Mobileye for $63.54 per share in cash, or about $15.3 billion. $INTC $MBLY

— CNBC Now (@CNBCnow) March 13, 2017

Autonomous cars, on the other hand, are one of the hottest things in tech, with virtually every automaker, tech company and even peripheral firms like Uber and Lyft working on (and fighting about) them. Even if fully autonomous cars don’t work out as planned (some critics think it’s a distant pipe dream), autopilot tech that aids drivers and prevents accidents is available now on Tesla EVs and other cars. Ironically, MobilEye’s early success was due in large part to Tesla, and that partnership dissolved in a not-very-friendly way.

Via: The Marker

Source: Intel / Mobileye (.PDF)

Scientists make stretchy electronics using a soup ingredient

For smart clothing or skin-worn devices to improve, first we need electronics that won’t snap like a twig when you move. Using a soup thickener, of all things, scientists from Stanford’s Bao Lab created a flexible electrode with “uncompromised electrical performance and high stretchability,” said lab director Zhenan Bao. The material could one day be used in better brain-monitoring electronics and smart clothing embedded with heart sensors, LEDs and other tech.

Plastics are normally insulators, but using two different polymers, Bao and her team came up with one that conducted like a champ. However, it wasn’t flexible at all, so the team enlisted the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and its unique X-ray equipment to find just the right additive. That turned out to be a molecule similar to those used to thicken soups in industrial kitchens. It completely stopped the crystallization process, resulting in a stretchy material suitable for use in circuits or electrodes.

“We thought that if we add insulating material, we would get really poor conductivity, especially when we added so much,” said Bao. However, using their experience with flexible polymers, they created a thin, nearly transparent material that actually conducts electricity slightly better when stretched. In fact, the high conductivity and 96 percent light transmittance “is among the highest values reported for … transparent electrodes,” and best by far for a flexible material, the paper notes.

Using an inkjet printer, the researchers have already created electrodes and stretchable transistor arrays. That could soon yield “next-generation wearable and epidermal electronics and bioelectronics,” according to the paper. It also opens up “exciting possibilities down the road for brain interfaces and other implantable electronics,” said Bao. However, you may never look at boxed soup the same way again.

Source: Stanford, Science Advances

Pandora’s new on-demand music service is beautiful, but is that enough?

Rdio wasn’t the first streaming music service I used, but it remains the one that I used for the longest. A combination of excellent design (something most music services still can’t nail) and smart discovery and social features made it a great option, but it couldn’t attract subscribers like Spotify. Eventually, Rdio shut down — but at the same time, Pandora acquired its assets as the base upon which to build Pandora Premium, which the company is finally ready to launch.

As announced in December, Pandora Premium is a combo of traditional “radio” stations and a full on-demand competitor to Spotify and Apple Music (with the same $10 / month price point). Both of those rival services have been gaining subscribers lately at a rapid rate. The question Pandora has to answer is not just whether Premium can compete at this point — it’s whether there’s enough of an audience for it in an already crowded market.

Pandora believes its massive user base (80 million a month) gives it a pretty big advantage. Currently only a small percentage of those pay for the $5 / month Pandora Plus service (which removes ads, lets you skip more tracks and repeat songs), but the company doesn’t see that as a problem. Instead, it views the Premium service as another option, but not necessarily the best option for all users. If you’re happy with the free, ad-supported tier, Pandora isn’t going to stress about converting you to a paid tier, as it thinks it has figured out how to monetize the free tier successfully — something it says other companies haven’t done.

For those of us who can’t stand ads and need an on-demand service, though, how does Pandora Premium stack up? Chris Becherer, Pandora’s VP of product who came over from Rdio, says that the company identified a few places where it has an advantage over the competition. To me, the most important among those are a simple and clean design language and more data about listening habits and how songs relate to each other.

These presumed advantages show themselves in a variety of ways throughout the app. I’ve been testing Premium for the last week or so, to see if they are enough to make the service a viable option. What I’ve found is that the spirit (or is it ghost?) of Rdio is very much alive in Pandora Premium — for better and worse.

Becherer said that nearly every single Rdio designer came over to Pandora to build the new service, and it shows. If you’ve ever used the Rdio mobile app, there’s a lot that feels familiar here. It’s clean and minimal while not lacking on the features you’d expect to see in an on-demand music app. The top of the home screen is a lovely carousel of everything you’ve recently played. Right below that is a list of everything in your collection, sorted by most recent additions. It’s a good design that quickly gets you into music that you’ve been listening to lately.

Browsing your full music collection isn’t quite as elegant, unfortunately. Tapping an arrow below the recently played carousel will pull up a menu to let you browse your music library by artist, album, playlist, song, or station. Usually I browse my collection by album, but there’s no way to re-sort by alphabetical order here — you’re stuck browsing by what you’ve added most recently. Fortunately, you can browse artists in alphabetical order; tapping one shows you all albums from that selection you’ve saved.

When you’re looking at a particular album or station, there’s a big old “play” button dead center along with options to add it to you library, download to your phone or share it. The now-ubiquitous three-dot “more” menu lets you add a full album to a playlist and go straight to the artist’s other works. Each song also has a similar overflow menu that also includes the option to start one of Pandora’s classic radio stations based on the song’s characteristics. Again, it’s everything you’d expect, but it’s clean and simple and refreshingly straightforward.

That extends to the now playing screen, as well. Large album art makes up the top half of the display, and the background color changes based on the dominant color found in that art. It’s not anything that changes how you use the app, but it’s fun to pop it open and always be greeted by something custom to the song or album you’re playing. If the song isn’t already in your library, there’s a “plus” button right next to the title so you can quickly add it.

Finally, swiping up from the bottom reveals what you might think is a queue, but instead it just shows everything playing from the current album or playlist, with no way to add or re-order things as you’re listening. (Radio stations don’t show upcoming songs, so swiping up instead shows details on the track and the station settings.) Unfortunately, there’s no queue in the app yet, so you can’t just start adding songs on the fly. And while Pandora said it Premium would include “keep listening,” one of Rdio’s best features that would automatically start playing music the app thinks you’d like, it’s not ready just yet.

For the most part, Pandora did a great job with designing the new service. But that’s only one part of the equation — the other side of things is discovery. The company believes it’s well-suited to doing that, thanks to everything it has learned about music listening habits and how songs relate to one another. Pandora notes that in its history, its users have hit the thumbs-up or down button a whopping 75 billion times — that’s a lot of data on what different users do and don’t like. Pandora combines that with data from the music genome project, which analyzes songs based on 450 different attributes to find sonic “matches.” Based on these two sources, the company believes it can better serve up users music they’ll want to hear at any given time.

In practice, this data gets used in Pandora Premium in a number of ways. One of the service’s most intriguing new features is the ability to have Pandora analyze a playlist you’ve created and automatically add more songs it thinks will match the vibe you’re after. Once you’ve added a handful of songs, a button pops up at the bottom of the playlist imploring you to “add similar songs.”

Tapping that will add between three and seven more tracks that have similar characteristics but are also personalized to your taste. Becherer said that two different users who had the same five songs on their playlist would get different results when tapping the “add similar songs” button, because it customizes those selections based on your entire listening history.

In my testing, this feature worked, but it wasn’t quite the magical experience I was hoping for. Too often, I’d see more songs from the three or four artists that I initially added to the playlist start popping up, which isn’t great for discovering new music or diversifying the track list. The quality of this feature will probably depend on how obscure the songs you add to your playlist are — stuff that’s played more often seems like it’ll naturally have more “links” to other music. Additionally, it’s the kind of thing that should get smarter the more you use Pandora. Historically, I have used the service sporadically, so it just doesn’t know that much about my tastes yet. After a few weeks or months, it might get better at finding things I want to hear.

Pandora uses all of your thumbs-up and thumbs-down votes over the years in a few other interesting ways (provided you’ve used the service before, of course). For starters, there’s an auto-generated “thumbs-up” playlist that pulls in every song you’ve approved of on Pandora Radio over the years. I had 66 songs in mine, which is a nice collection to start with — heavy Pandora users could have many more. And if you’re kicking back, listening to a Pandora station and give more than four songs on it a thumbs-up, the app auto generates a new playlist for you specifically grouping together all the songs you’ve liked from that station. It’s a good way to keep track of new things you hear that you want to quickly get back to.

The “browse” section of the app, which pulls together new releases, genre stations, recommended artists and so forth, is also customized to your listening history. Instead of just showing a generic new releases panel, you’ll see four albums each week tailored to your tastes. Tapping into that shows more recommendations, and you can just keep scrolling down to get a more comprehensive list. This is an area where the app’s relentless drive for simplicity removes some of the options you’ll find in other services, as you can’t just pick a certain genre and dive into all the new releases.

The browse area also recommends specific artists and genres based on your history, and then you can scroll down to find all stations across genres or moods and activities (like working out, driving, winding down and so forth). It’s worth noting that Pandora doesn’t curate playlists — just about everything in “browse” aside from new releases points you to stations. That makes sense, given Pandora’s history, but if you’re looking for playlists that you can scan through like on Spotify and Apple Music, you’re out of luck. These stations are more like what Google Play Music did when it purchased Songza, giving you a bunch of options based on genre or activity.

All told, Pandora Premium seems to be a pretty strong first attempt at on-demand streaming, but that doesn’t mean it’s without some issues. As good as the app’s design is, there are some UI quirks. Swiping right doesn’t go back, like almost every other app does. Instead, it pulls out a left-side menu with some lesser-used features like your profile. One of those menu items brings you right back home to the “my music” screen, but if you just want to move back a step or two, you need to hit the back arrow in the top right of the screen.

Becherer said this was because Pandora wanted users to have immediate access to the menu option to return to “my music” rather than having to hit the back arrow repeatedly, which makes sense at least. When you open search, the last term you put in is still in the box, so you have to clear it out before typing. These aren’t deal-breakers, just some quirks that bugged me as I used the app.

More concerning is the lack of gapless playback. That’s right: If you’re listening to a live album or a recording that seamlessly moves from one track to the next, there are extremely brief breaks between tracks. It’s been years since this is something I’ve had to think about, and I’m inclined to call it a deal-breaker for me right now.

Pandora’s history as a radio streaming service also means there are some music licensing issues that crop up. Some albums and songs aren’t available for on-demand play; they can only be used to start a radio station. Nearly as frustrating are the albums you can listen to in full but can’t download for offline playback. The albums I ran into with these problems were generally pretty mainstream, popular selections that are fully available on other streaming services. I’m hoping that Pandora gets this sorted out quickly, but given the complexities of music licensing agreements I’m not holding my breath.

Lastly, there’s no web or desktop app at launch. Becherer says that 85 percent of all Pandora listening is in its iOS and Android apps, so the company can get away with not having one right away. But it’s still something I’d like to see before long. As for how launch will work, the Premium service will roll out slowly over the next month to existing Pandora users — and Pandora Plus subscribers will be able to try the Premium experience for free for six months.

Pandora Premium may have some version one issues, but I still had a lot of fun trying it out. There’s a lot to like, particularly if you’ve used Pandora extensively in the past or are a fan of Rdio’s design sense, which is largely intact here. The problem is that most of us Rdio fans moved on long ago, and at this point I don’t think it’s worth it to uproot from whatever app you’re using to move back. That said, I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on Premium to see how it improves over time — with a little work, Rdio’s spiritual successor may win me back.

Apple’s Carpool Karaoke Will Include Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams From Game of Thrones

Game of Thrones stars Sophie Turner and Maisie Williams have announced via Twitter that they are filming for Apple Music’s upcoming Carpool Karaoke: The Series. The two revealed their involvement with Apple’s new television series while they were at South by Southwest to discuss Game of Thrones.

Carpool Karaoke: The Series will feature 16 celebrity pairings “riding along in a car together as they sing tunes from their personal playlists” and “surprise fans who don’t expect to see big stars belting out tunes one lane over.” Other than the newly announced Game of Thrones stars, the show will include James Corden, Will Smith, Billy Eichner, Metallica, Alicia Keys, John Legend, Ariana Grande, Seth MacFarlane, Chelsea Handler, Blake Shelton, Michael Strahan, John Cena, Shaquille O’Neal, and more.

STARKpool Karaoke? Lane of Thrones?@SophieT and @Maisie_Williams from @GameOfThrones are shooting a #CarpoolKaraoke for @applemusic! 🚙🎤🎶 pic.twitter.com/hmJjRqBlnc

— Carpool Karaoke (@CarpoolKaraoke) March 12, 2017

Over the course of 16 half-hour episodes, Apple hopes that the show will drive interest and new subscribers to its Apple Music streaming service with original content they can’t find anywhere else. In addition, Apple is also working on Dr. Dre’s Vital Signs and the reality competition show Planet of the Apps, which recently launched its first trailer.

Tags: Apple Music, Carpool Karaoke
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Google’s New iOS App ‘Uptime’ Lets Users Watch YouTube Videos Together

Google has created a new app called “Uptime” [Direct Link] that allows users to watch YouTube videos in real time along with their friends (via The Verge). The iOS-only app is available in the United States and was created through Google’s internal incubator program known as Area 120, which continues the company’s famous workplace perk that encourages employees to take 20 percent of their week to focus on independent side projects.

With Uptime, the company has added live-watching features — similar to apps like Periscope — on top of video watching. When friends join in on the same video, they can comment, react, add stickers, and more. When users start a video, their avatar will move along a progress bar to note where they are in it, and they’ll be able to see their friends’ progress in the same way.

Uptime is a place to share and watch videos together with friends no matter where they are. Easily share your favorite YouTube video and bring friends together to watch, chat, and have fun in real time.

The app will also act as a sort of social hub for YouTube, with users able to follow one another to see their watch history, and share clips from YouTube without leaving the app. Given Uptime’s nascence, its makers at Google are encouraging users to provide feedback through email and on the app’s official twitter account so that any problems can be addressed in future updates.

Users who are interested and download Uptime on the iOS App Store [Direct Link] can gain access by using the invite code “PIZZA.”

Tag: Google
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Tommy Hilfiger, Hugo Boss and Movado Android Wear watches confirmed for 2017 launch

Movado Group – guardians of a number of fashion watch brands such as Tommy Hilfiger and Hugo Boss – has confirmed that it will be launching a family of Android Wear 2.0 watches.

There will be five styles of men’s watches unveiled by Movado at Baselworld 2017 in the Movado Connect portfolio. They will come with five customisable watch faces, with options for complications, to get unique and informative dial. 

As Android Wear 2.0 watches, they will support a full range of new functions, including Android Pay and Google Assistant. With greater independence in Android Wear 2.0, you’ll also be able to install a range of standalone apps, meaning a great experience with Apple iPhone, as well as full, seamless integration with Android phones.

• Android Wear 2.0: What’s new in the major software update for watches?

Movado hasn’t yet unveiled the design of the watches, but Efraim Grinberg, CEO, has mentioned a “proprietary edge-to-edge crystal design” suggesting that there won’t be a chunky bezel on the Movado models, perhaps offering a more classical design, like the existing Movado Bold Motion – a connected watch launched in 2015 in association with HP. Movado has also confirmed that the dial draws inspiration from the Museum dial (pictured) above.

The new models will be shown off a Baselworld 2017, so we’ll bring you a closer look at them from the Swiss show. Movado also makes Tommy Hilfiger and Hugo Boss branded watches and has confirmed they will both be offering Android Wear devices too.

All the new models will be available in autumn 2017, with prices starting at $495. They will be available in US, Caribbean, Canada and the UK.

The Morning After: Monday, March 13th 2017

Welcome back. While our team out in Texas continues to struggle against wave upon wave of BBQ and beers at SXSW, they’re also finding time to bring us all the cool stuff worth talking about. SXSW is a weird one, and we’ve already seen specialized VR chairs, sound-based motion capture and a Levi- and Google-made smart jacket. Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, Fukushima might be safe enough for people to return.

Shh. I’m playing ‘Fruit Ninja’.This company can track motion with sound instead of light

When it comes to tracking physical objects in virtual spaces, pretty much every company relies on light: Oculus and HTC have light mapping sensors, while Sony’s PlayStation VR relies on infrared for its motion tracking camera. However, Hauoli, a young Austin-based startup demoing at SXSW, has something different in mind. It’s developed a way to track virtual objects with sound. It’s entirely software based and works with just about any speaker.

Fingerprints everywhere.

AirBar adds a few more touchscreen tricks to the MacBook Air

Your MacBook Air needed pinch-to-zoom, right?

The latest ‘Zelda’ game offers multiple solutions to puzzles.‘Breath of the Wild’ once existed as a pseudo 2D prototype

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild isn’t just the series’ best game in years, it’s also unlike any title in the series — it’s an open-world experience where you’re free to find your own solutions to challenges. But just how did Nintendo manage to pull off such a radical change in direction? Don’t worry — it’s happy to explain. The Game Developers Conference has posted a talk from the team behind it that describes how they broke from the highly linear experiences of past Zelda games.

As if denim wasn’t cool enough already.The Levi’s Commuter smart jacket has a ton of promise

Google’s Project Jacquard, which can turn objects into interactive, gesture-controlled surfaces, has finally landed inside a Levi’s Commuter jacket. The technology comes to life through conductive fabric and a Bluetooth device that attaches to the garment. The connected area consists of 15 threads on the left sleeve, just visible enough for you to know where to touch to trigger actions from a paired smartphone. To start, you can brush your fingers on the jacket to find out what time it is, or swipe to play, pause or skip a track while you’re listening to music.

But wait, there’s more…

• Samsung now owns Harman Kardon
• Building your own chatbot is a lot easier than you’d expect
• Study says Fukushima region is safe enough for people to return
• ‘The Mummy’ in VR was shallow, but the seats were not

Facebook to expand live-stream sports coverage with Major League Soccer deal

Why it matters to you

The social networking giant provides further evidence of its determination to expand its live video offerings with a Major League Soccer streaming deal.

Facebook is doubling down on its efforts to deliver more live sports events to users, announcing a new streaming deal for coverage of Major League Soccer (MLS) games.

Partnering with Univision, Facebook will offer soccer fans live-streams of at least 22 games this season, kicking off at 4 p.m. ET on March 18 with the clash between Atlanta United and Chicago Fire.

The live coverage — available on Univision’s Facebook page — will be tailored for mobile devices and feature Facebook-specific commentators, interactive graphics, and fan Q&A and polling features so viewers can engage directly with commentators throughout the games, MLS said in a release.

In addition, soccer fans can hit the MLS Facebook page for 40 “Matchday Live” shows made exclusively for Facebook. These will include not only MLS highlights and analysis from across the league, but also previews of the day’s matches.

Commenting on the deal, Facebook’s Dan Reed said the social networking giant was excited to offer an “innovative, community-first spirit to the Facebook Live broadcasts of league matches this season, [offering] fans … an entirely new way to experience a live soccer broadcast that is optimized for mobile screens and social viewing.”

Gary Stevenson of MLS said his team was working to ensure “our games, and additional content, get to our fans anytime, anywhere, and on any device.”

Univision, meanwhile, noted that the deal was a chance for it to build on its English-language audience of some 18 million soccer fans who’ve already watched games on its service.

More: Twitter strikes a deal to live-stream action from the PGA tour

This latest deal marks a deepening of ties between Facebook and Univision, with the pair inking an agreement just last month for the live-streaming of 46 games from Mexico’s top-tier soccer league, Liga MX.

Facebook has also hosted other sports live-streams on its service, including, for example, Team USA’s Olympic basketball exhibition games and Wayne Rooney’s 2016 testimonial fixture between Manchester United and Everton. And with the company continuing to invest heavily in live video, we can expect to see more such deals coming soon — including, perhaps, one with Major League Baseball (MLB).

Its drive to offer more live sports coverage mirrors similar efforts by Twitter, which has been inking various deals to bring sports content to its own users. In addition, both companies recently launched video apps for Apple TV and other platforms in a bid to keep users entertained, as well as boost video views and ultimately ramp up revenue.

Ed Sheeran has taken over the U.K. singles chart with 9 songs in the top 10

Why it matters to you

While Sheeran’s chart takeover clearly reflects his phenomenal popularity, it also demonstrates the increasing uptake of music streaming services like Spotify.

There was a time, namely in the days before music streaming service Spotify, when getting a track — just one — in the top 10 was deemed a major career achievement.

On Friday, British singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran learned that he has not one, not even two, but a record-breaking nine songs in the U.K.’s official top 10 singles chart. And if that wasn’t enough, he has 16 in the top 20.

They’re all off his new album, ÷ (pronounced Divide), which released earlier this month. And yes, it has 16 tracks on it, otherwise he’d have even more songs in the top 20.

Speaking to BBC Radio 1’s Greg James about his remarkable chart takeover that sees Shape of You in the number 1 slot, 26-year-old Sheeran said, “I never expected to have nine songs in the top 10 ever in my life. I don’t know if something has gone wrong, but I’m definitely very happy about it.”

Nothing has technically gone wrong, but some chart-watchers have been criticizing the way they’re compiled ever since the system was changed in 2014 to take into account not just record sales but also streams on services like Spotify.

Click to enlarge.

Three years ago, 100 streams counted as one sale, but as streaming sites grew in popularity some claimed it skewed the results against emerging artists. With that in mind, the Official Charts Company, which operates the chart, recently upped its “one sale” figure to 150 streams, though with Sheeran’s domination of the chart this week, some may want to see further changes.

However, Martin Talbot of the Official Charts Company said he was reluctant to alter the setup without careful analysis, telling the BBC, “We will review chart methodologies to see if there is something we could or should change … We shouldn’t, and won’t, rush to any knee-jerk actions.”

More: Spotify vs. Apple Music — which service is the streaming king?

The Brit also set a new record for the most concurrently charting songs on Billboard + Twitter Top Tracks  (a weekly ranking of the most shared and/or mentioned songs on Twitter in the U.S.) with 13 songs in the top 50, while Shape of You currently sits atop Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.

Sheeran’s ÷ album sold 672,000 copies in the U.K in its first week, making it the fastest-selling album by a male artist there. Only Adele’s 25 and Be Here Now by Oasis sold more in their first seven days of release.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering who ruined Sheeran’s chance of a clean sweep of the top 10, it was The Chainsmokers and Coldplay with Something Just Like This at number 7. But hey, there’s always this Friday’s chart …

Google’s Uptime app is a more social way to watch YouTube videos

… and for the moment, only available on iPhone.

Google’s Area 120 startup incubator, set up last year to allow Googlers to play startup pioneer in their “20% time,” has just birthed its first product — a social video app called Uptime.

The idea behind uptime, which right now is only available for the iPhone, is relatively simple: First, sign in with your Google account and connect with your friends. Then you can watch YouTube videos together in real time, with your avatars journeying their way around the outside of the frame to show your progress. You can add Facebook Live-style reaction emoji as you go, along with written comments similar to Soundcloud and other platforms.

This could be how we’ll share the video-watching experience in the future.

The app has a goofy, whimsical look to it not unlike Snapchat, and it’s clear there’s much potential here beyond merely offering a more social way to enjoy stuff on YouTube — live streaming for instance, or a way to share the experience of watching a full-length movie.

The premise is an interesting one — sharing the experience of watching together, even if your friends aren’t gathered around the same TV, or huddled over the same phone. And while Uptime is very much separate from the rest of Google and YouTube, it’s easy to see how some of these features might eventually find their way into the core YouTube experience.

There’s no Android or web version of Uptime at present, nor is there any guarantee Uptime will stick around in the long term. Nevertheless, if you have an iPhone handy to test it out, it’s worth a look.