Google’s latest venture fund will back AI startups

There’s no question that Google believes artificial intelligence is the future, but it doesn’t feel like it needs to all the hard work by itself. It’s willing to give others a helping hand. To that end, Google has launched a venture capital firm, Gradient Ventures, that will offer financial backing and “technical mentorship” to AI startups. They’ll have access to experts from Google itself, including futurist Ray Kurzweil, design mastermind Matias Duarte and X lab leader Astro Teller.

Gradient already has four teams under its wing. Algorithmia is a community creating a marketplace for AI-related algorithms and models. Aurima, meanwhile, is producing both an alternative sensing approach and AI modeling. Cape is virtualizing drone hardware to help people fly the vehicles remotely, and Cogniac is writing software that helps you build convolutional neural networks.

It’s not hard to see why Google would pour resources into sAI tartups it doesn’t control directly. The larger the industry gets, the more solutions emerge for problems that might otherwise go unsolved. And of course, Google could use this VC fund to snap up interesting AI companies before anyone else. Whatever money it invests now could easily pay dividends down the road, especially if it thwarts rivals like Facebook.

Via: 9to5Google

Source: Google

Researchers make a surprisingly smooth artificial video of Obama

Translating audio into realistic looking video of a person speaking is quite a challenge. Often, the resulting video just looks off — a problem called the uncanny valley, which states that human replicas appearing almost but not quite real come off as eerie or creepy. However, researchers at the University of Washington have made some serious headway in overcoming this issue and they did it using audio and video of Barack Obama.

The researchers used 14 hours of Obama’s weekly address videos to train a neural network. Once trained, their system was then able to take an audio clip from the former president, create mouth shapes that synced with the audio and then synthesize a realistic looking mouth that matched Obama’s. The mouth synced to the audio was then superimposed and blended onto a video of Obama that was different from the audio source. To make it look more natural, the system corrected for head placement and movement, timing and details like how the jaw looked. The whole process is automated save for one manual step that requires a person to select two frames in the video where the subject’s upper and lower teeth are front-facing and highly visible. Those images are then used by the system to make the resulting video’s teeth look more realistic.

The program isn’t perfect yet, but in the video below you can see how much better it gets after three minutes, one hour, seven hours and 14 hours of training data. Some limitations the team has pointed out include occasional mistakes in mouth and facial alignment — sometimes it gave Obama two chins — an inability to match emotion and issues arising with sounds that require a particular placement of the tongue, like “th,” which isn’t currently covered by their program.

But, overall this artificial lip-syncing program creates a much more realistic image than others have. The work will be published in ACM Transactions on Graphics and you can see the researchers’ process in the video below.

Via: University of Washington

Source: ACM Transactions on Graphics

Immigration chat bot now helps you apply for a green card

Visabot, the Facebook Messenger-based AI that helps users navigate the complex visa application process while skipping unnecessary fees, is expanding its assistance portfolio. For a $150 fee, it will walk users through filing for a green card and schedule appointments with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

Like its previous system helping users through the visa process, Visabot’s green card service walks people through a questionnaire and plugs the answers into appropriate forms.

“We created our own immigration AI so our success rate grows as the bot learns,” Visabot COO Andrey Zinoviev announced at VentureBeat’s MB 2017 show. “What you need to do is answer ‘are you a us citizen’ [and] other things you should know, and the bot will use this info to generate the whole package for you. All you have to do is file it with the US immigration services.”

Via: VentureBeat

Source: Visabot

Persistent Software Problems With iPhone 8 Wireless Charging and 3D Sensor Causing ‘Panic’ at Apple

As the prospective September launch date of the iPhone 8 fast approaches, designers and engineers at Apple are said to be working “feverishly” to fix software problems in the device that could lead to production delays, reports Fast Company.

Citing a source “knowledge of the situation,” the site says there’s a “sense of panic” in the air because should the problems not be resolved, the device might ship without major features enabled.

One feature that might be delayed is wireless charging. Apple is said to be planning to implement inductive wireless charging in the iPhone 8, but rumors suggest it will be enabled through a standalone charger purchased separately. As previously shared by Apple blogger John Gruber, Apple may not ship the inductive wireless charging accessory until later in the year alongside an iOS 11.1 update.

iPhone 8 renders from iDrop News
While Gruber didn’t offer an explanation, Fast Company says software issues, not components, are the problem. If the software isn’t ready, wireless charging could be unavailable when the phone first begins shipping.

Apple is also said to be struggling with the 3D sensor expected to be built into the front-facing camera, which is rumored to enable a facial scanning system that could replace Touch ID.

Without confirming that’s what the front-facing 3D sensor is for, my source says Apple has been struggling to get the sensor to work reliably. Again, the sensor hardware is not the problem, but rather the accompanying software.

The source believes Apple will likely have the 3D software working in time. But if not, the company could include the sensor in the phone anyway, and turn it on later on with a software update.

On the subject of Touch ID, Fast Company’s source believes Apple could still be working to add it under the display. Yesterday, a report from KeyBanc Capital Markets suggested Apple was continuing to struggle to put the fingerprint sensor under the glass of the device, and that the company had “just a couple of weeks” to solve the problem.

Though this sounds unlikely because new device designs are often finalized months ahead of production, Fast Company’s source calls the report “plausible” and says “in all likelihood, the fingerprint sensor will be embedded under the display.” The source also says iPhone features “can remain fluid until deep in the summer” ahead of an iPhone launch.

With multiple reputable sources (Bloomberg and KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo) reporting Apple has adopted a superior facial recognition system to replace Touch ID, it’s not clear how accurate Fast Company’s information is, but given the number of conflicting rumors we’ve heard over the course of the iPhone 8’s development, it’s still difficult to predict exactly what we’re going to see when the device debuts in September.

We’ve previously heard of problems with the display, the 3D sensor, and Touch ID, all of which have led to multiple rumors pointing towards serious supply issues. The iPhone 8, which will be sold alongside an “iPhone 7s” and an “iPhone 7s Plus,” may not be widely available until late in 2017 or early in 2018 due to a later production ramp-up schedule, according to the latest rumor.

Related Roundup: iPhone 8
Tag: fastcompany.com
Discuss this article in our forums

Louis Vuitton’s Tambour Horizon is a $2,450 Android Wear smartwatch

Why it matters to you

Is $2,450 too much for a smartwatch? Louis Vuitton doesn’t think so, and that could mean pricier wearables to come.

Louis Vuitton, the fashion brand known more for its handbags than its luxury watches, is dipping its toes into the luxury smartwatch market with the Tambour Horizon, a 42mm Android Wear-powered timepiece that starts at an eye-popping $2,450.

You’d expect spectacular craftsmanship for an asking price that costs more than some used cars, and you’d be right — Louis Vuitton hasn’t taken any shortcuts. The Tambour Horizon’s case, which is made in Switzerland, features a convex design that maximizes its diameter while minimizing its weight. It comes in three styles — stainless steel, brushed steel, and black — with 60 strap options, including 30 for men and 30 for women.

But the Tambour Horizon’s real draw are Vuitton-inspired touches like City Guide, which recommends restaurants and places of interest based on your location, and Flight, which alerts you to changes in your flights and itinerary. The watch will also be available in China, albeit without Google services — Louis Vuitton has partnered with local platforms like Weibo so that corresponding platforms in the West automatically switch for usage when appropriate, according to the New York Times. We’re unclear how this really works, and we have reached out to Louis Vuitton for clarification.

Under the hood, the Tambour Horizon is a little more like its Android Wear siblings than Louis Vuitton would probably care to admit. It has a 1.3-inch 390×390 AMOLED screen that’s about the same resolution as the Huawei Watch 2, along with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 2100 smartwatch processor. The Tambour Horizon omits a heart rate-tracking sensor and skimps on RAM a tad, opting for 512MB instead of its rivals’ 1GB (the Fossil Q Founder) and 768MB (LG Watch Style). It packs 4GB of storage, or about enough to hold about 800 songs.

Then there’s the price. At $2,450 (or $2,900 for the black version), the Tambour Horizon is far and away one of the most expensive Android Wear watches on the market. Unlike luxury brands like Tag Heuer, which put the purchase of smartwatches toward analog watches, the Tambour Horizon comes with no trade-up or incentives. But the Tambour Horizon is less about function and more about form.

“For us, the aesthetic is nonnegotiable,” Michael Burke, chief executive of Louis Vuitton, told the New York Times in an interview. “There’s a lot of ugliness out there, [and we] want to participate in the future.”

In any case, Louis Vuitton has high hopes for the Tambour Horizon, which it thinks can double sales. “In the early 20th century we built helicopters,” Burke said. “It didn’t mean we were going to turn into Boeing or Airbus. But it meant we were part of the conversation.”

Possible Hydrogen One patent suggests Red is imagining a camera built from mods

Why it matters to you

The patent might not be for the upcoming Red smartphone but the possibilities are pretty intriguing, regardless.

Cinema camera brand Red’s upcoming holographic display smartphone, the Hydrogen One, leaves much up to the imagination with few details announced outside of the price and display of the new device expected to be released in 2018. But a recent patent application suggests the company’s first smartphone could get even crazier than that holographic display. While it is unclear just how much of the tech will be included — or even if the tech will be for the company’s first smartphone — the possible Hydrogen One patent introduces some pretty peculiar possibilities.

Red mentioned some sort of modularity as part of the official announcement but the patent, which is currently pending in the U.S., expands on the idea of a modular system to the point of turning a smartphone into a DSLR-like camera or even a shoulder-mounted cinema camera like Red’s normal slew of products, The Verge suggests.

While modular smartphones are not a new idea (just look at the Moto Z), the patent stacks modulars that are all a similar size and shape onto the back of the smartphone — like thin Legos or perhaps rectangular pancakes. Need more battery life? Just snap a battery mod on the back. Better audio? Snap on the speaker module. The patent even suggests a projector add-on.

The patent also details a camera module that unlike the popular iPhone add-on lenses, adds both a larger sensor and the ability to swap lenses. Or at least does so theoretically, anyways, since Red has not announced the actual camera specs for the Hydrogen One. Add viewfinders, grips, and lenses to the stack of mods and the smartphone starts looking more like the bulk of a DSLR and even a wildly modified cinema camera built with a smartphone as a starting point.

US Patent US20170171371A1

Patent drawings don’t always become real products and it is unclear if the patent is for the Hydrogen One or another future smartphone. While the patent does not offer a set-in-stone list of details for the upcoming Hydrogen One, it does show what the company is dreaming up and possibly experimenting with. Based on the drawings, it is unclear what the benefit of a cinema camera built from a smartphone would be, since it seems with so many pieces it might take a few minutes to actually disassemble all the mods back to a phone you can actually make a call on without looking very awkward — not to mention whether or not the system would even be smaller or more affordable than an actual camera with so many pieces.

For now, Red fans will have to wait for more concrete details about the upcoming smartphone, since not every patent comes to life. But the impatient can speculate on just what Red might have up its sleeve by digging through the possible Hydrogen One patent application — though that may still leave more questions than answers.

Online harassment is widespread, study says, and concern is growing

Why it matters to you

If you’ve been a victim of online harassment, you’re not alone, according to a recent study.

From creating intensely local communities to fostering interactions that span the globe, the internet is one of the most remarkable human achievements in terms of bringing people together. Unfortunately, online harassment can tarnish the experience — and some new research indicates it happens way too often.

Pew Research recently completed a study that looked at many forms of harassment to ascertain exactly how often it occurs. According to the data, harassment is so common that a clear majority of American internet users have witnessed it, while a significant percentage have experienced it themselves.

The research organization looked at a variety of different types of harassment. It considered everything from simple name-calling to sexual harassment and stalking to actual physical threats. Harassment was further defined according to severity, from “less severe” to “more severe,” and the study considered the impact on victims.

The study’s major conclusions are that different demographic groups are subject to different kinds of harassment — and to varying degrees. For example, young adults ages 18-29 are the most likely overall to experience online harassment, with 67 percent being targeted by at least one element.

Young women ages 18-24 are the most likely to be sexually harassed online, at 20 percent, compared to men at six percent. This demographic is also subject to the same levels of physical threats and sustained harassment as other demographics. Overall, however, all groups have seen an increase in harassment and when considering all types, both men and women have suffered similar rates.

In terms of the reasons why harassment occurs, different personal identity traits form the basis of a significant amount of harassment. Political views rank at the top at 14 percent of Americans reporting that they’ve been targeted with harassment for that reason, followed by physical appearance at nine percent. Gender and race are tied for third place at eight percent, while religion, sexual orientation, occupation, and identity round things out.

By far, social networking sites and apps are where harassment is most likely to occur, with 58 percent of respondents saying they had experienced harassment when engaging in social media such as Twitter. Website comment sections were the next most common at 23 percent, followed by online gaming, personal email, discussion sites like Reddit, and online dating sites and apps.

In an apparent change from an earlier Pew Research study conducted in 2014, online harassment appears to be having more of an impact on internet users. Today, online harassment is considered by 54 percent of men and 70 percent of women to be a “major problem,” and 45 percent who have suffered from severe harassment indicate that it has caused them mental/emotional stress. Women are more likely than men to call for stronger laws against online harassment (36 percent versus 24 percent) and to think that law enforcement does not take online harassment seriously enough (46 percent versus 39 percent).

The Pew Research study goes into considerable detail regarding online harassment and represents an important measure of its significance. The bottom line, which might come as no surprise to the typical internet user, is that online harassment is an all-too-common occurrence that gives some Americans pause when considering whether or not to participate in various online communities.

Update: We inadvertently referenced an older Pew Research study in our original version of this story. We have revised to reflect the results of the most recent research.

Here’s what you can expect on the Net Neutrality Day of Action

On July 12, your web browsing experience might seem a bit off. Sites may behave strangely, you might see some bizarre-looking ads, but it’s for a good cause. That’s because July 12, 2017 is the “Net Neutrality Day of Action” a public-awareness campaign backed by some of the biggest and most influential businesses in the world.

Companies like Amazon, Netflix, Kickstarter, and dozens of others are planning to alter their websites in protest of the FCC’s plans to dramatically change net neutrality rules. So what’s this all about?

What is net neutrality, and why should you care?

Without getting too into the weeds, current net neutrality rules require internet service providers treat your internet access with neutrality. Every website and web service must be treated the same, ISPs can’t set up fast lanes for companies they have partnerships with, while relegating smaller sites to slow-lanes which would limit your access. Nope, they have to remain neutral in this regard, and treat your internet service more like a utility than a cable TV package.

But those are the current rules. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has been pushing for a change to those rules ever since he took office — famously telling the crowd at Mobile World Congress that net neutrality is bad for innovation. The proposed changes were put up for public comment earlier this year, and July 12 is the deadline. It’s the last chance to speak out against re-classifying internet service, and potentially dismantling the internet as we know it. That’s where you come in.

Who’s participating? Basically everyone

Sites which are participating in the internet-wide protest will display banners or alerts offering you a link to the FCC public comment form where you can voice your opinion. We don’t actually know what all the participating sites will be doing for the event — there’d be too many to count, even if they all laid their plans bare — but a few have let slip their plans.

Discord, for instance, plans to display an alert to everyone signing into the popular chat app, imploring them to show their support for Net Neutrality, and blog platform Medium will prominently display a banner explaining why Net Neutrality is important. Your web browsing won’t be disrupted by the protests, but you might see some sites get creative, so keep an eye out.

Here’s how you can help

The FCC doesn’t actually have to pay attention to these comments, but if the response is overwhelmingly against changing the Net Neutrality rules, there’s a chance your comments could play a role in any future litigation regarding the rule change.

Or maybe, just maybe, on seeing the internet rally around a common cause — unrelated to adorable animals — FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s heart will grow three sizes that day, and he’ll decide to keep the rules intact. If you like your web the way it is, be sure you make your voice heard.

Wiz Khalifa snags the YouTube crown from ‘Gangnam Style’

For a while, it looked as if Psy’s “Gangnam Style” would have an unassailable lead as the most-viewed YouTube video. After all, the catchy K-Pop tune was so popular that it broke YouTube’s view counter. However, it’s time to crown a new champion. As of 5:30PM Eastern on July 10th, the music video for Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s “See You Again” is the most played YouTube clip of all time — people had seen the sentimental tribute to Paul Walker 2,894,026,649 times at the moment of the official count. Psy had a good 5-year run, but it’s evident that he’s far from alone in the 2 billion club.

Boing Boing notes that the top 10 videos on YouTube all have over 2 billion plays, and some of them are within spitting distance of the lead. Justin Bieber’s “Sorry” has over 2.6 billion views, for instance, while Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars have more than 2.5 billion views for “Uptown Funk.” Blockbuster pop videos are still the only clips likely to reach these lofty heights, but YouTube has grown enough that these numbers are no longer limited to one or two outliers.

Via: Boing Boing

Source: Wiz Khalifa (YouTube)

Dating app Hinge is back on Android after nine-month break

Android fans haven’t been able to use the Hinge dating app for around nine months, but that’s all changing. The relationship-minded dating app is now available on Google’s mobile OS. Hinge says based on its previous Android user-base that it expects that to grow by 30 percent from current numbers. Which in turn means better chances at finding long-term love. What’s more, the company says that its amount of daily active users has grown by 50 percent in the last two months alone — more potential matches can only be a good thing for everyone involved regardless of what software their phone runs.

If you’re tired of swiping mindlessly through the bots on Tinder, getting spammed with lascivious messages, or matches not messaging you first on Bumble, maybe give Hinge a shot. Looking to the future, the app will open to more markets with Android-heavy presences, so, servicing developing countries doesn’t sound like a stretch of the imagination. If you don’t find the app at first by name, you might have to do a Cmnd/Crtl+F search for it on Google Play’s web store.

Source: Google Play