Nest’s co-founder is releasing a smart kids’ go-kart
Nest co-creator Tony Fadell isn’t focused solely on making intelligent thermostats and smoke detectors. He recently unveiled Actev Motors, a company whose inaugural Arrow Smart-Kart promises to give kids a taste of what smart cars are like. The electric go-kart includes GPS, a and WiFi to keep junior drivers safe. Parents using a mobile app can geofence the kart’s driving area, limit the top speed or hit a stop button in an emergency. In other words, even younger kids (5- to 9-year-olds are the main targets) can motor around without getting in over their heads. There’s also a proximity sensor to automatically prevent accidents.
Older children can use the Arrow, too, and it’s customizable. You can slap on different body styles (there’s a Formula 1-style kit), install a higher-capacity battery or even get a drift kit to unleash your kid’s inner Ken Block. It’s not a trivial purchase — a starter kit costs $600 if you pre-order, and it’ll normally cost $1,000 — but it could easily beat your neighbor’s Power Wheels when it arrives in early summer.
For Fadell, this is as much about education as spoiling young ones. He explains to Forbes that he hopes to “teach the new generation” about electric cars. The tyke driving an Arrow this year could be driving their own EV a couple of decades down the line. And before you ask: yes, there’s the possibility of an adult version for grown-up racers.
Via: Forbes
Source: Actev Motors
Phonebloks creator isn’t entirely happy with Project Ara
Dave Hakkens, the brains behind the Phonebloks modular phone concept, thinks Google could do better when it comes to Project Ara. In a blog post, Hakkens said he wasn’t happy that the modular phone’s latest version puts its processor, battery, antenna, sensors and screen in a single skeleton and that only add-ons like the camera, speakers and projector are available as swappable modules. When Hakkens dreamed up Phonebloks, he envisioned each component as a module you can replace. The Dutch designer announced the concept in September 2013 not knowing that Motorola was cooking up a similar project. The two later collaborated on Project Ara.
Hakkens thought up his concept as a way to reduce e-waste, but if all the important components are in one skeleton, then users will still end up tossing their phones out after a while. Further, he believes that Google should work with other companies to create an ecosystem of modules instead of doing everything on its own.
The Dutch designer’s vision, as you can imagine, wouldn’t be easy to execute. Nevertheless, he thinks Google has the resources as one of the most powerful companies in the world to cook up a better modular device. He does seem to be happy with one aspect of the new model, though: its blocky design, which is reminiscent of the original concept’s looks.
Source: Dave Hakkens
Google Photos celebrates first birthday and 24 billion selfies
Happy birthday, Google Photos. In the year since its launch, the service has created 1.6 billion animations, collages and movies from your snapshots, according to a post on the Google blog. More than that, there’ve been some 2 trillion labels, with 24 billion of them categorizing selfies. All told, the search giant says that thanks to the cloud backup option, the app’s 200 million users have collectively cleared 13.7 petabytes of storage from their phones. If you’ll remember, opting for high quality photo uploads offers unlimited storage, but choosing original quality counts against your overall Google storage. That may change in the future if you own a Nexus device, though.
A teardown of the latest update for the app by Android Police reveals that Nexus folks could soon have another benefit other than speedy firmware updates: unlimited original-quality photo and video storage. More than that, it looks like the app could see internal adjustment tools for exposure and contrast.
Way down the road, we might see Google Assistant going a further than it currently does and delete duplicate photos or blurry shots, according to a Buzzfeed News interview with Photos lead Anil Sabharwal. Why? Because a lot of the people using the app live in developing countries and their phones don’t have a lot of storage. This would allow them to free up even more space. With the developing market in mind, Sabharwal goes on to say that improvements are coming to proximity sharing via Bluetooth (which doesn’t eat into mobile data) as well, which should boost the current 25 million photo transfers that take place per week.
Even if you’ve been using the app since day one, there’s a chance that you might not know a few of its ins and outs (like searching for photos via emoji). The source link below has more tips and tricks to take for a spin after you’ve spent the long weekend capturing summer memories.
Via: Google Photos (G+)
Source: Google blog, Buzzfeed News, Android Police
Google and Ray Kurzweil are making chatbots together
While we don’t often hear Ray Kurzweil’s name associated with Google products, Mountain View hired him back in 2012 to work on unspecified machine learning and language processing projects. Now, the famous futurist has finally revealed one of the projects his team has been working on: chatbots that can talk like humans do. He lifted the veil on the big G’s chatbot initiative at the latest Singularity conference — an annual conference on science, tech and the future.
Although Kurzweil didn’t spill a lot of details, he did say that one of those chatbots is named Danielle. Since it’s based on a character he wrote for one of his unpublished novels, we’re guessing they’re feeding it samples of his writing to give it the personality he envisions.
The futurist is known for his prediction that AIs will pass the Turing test in 2029, and developing these bots is a step in that direction. Kurzweil says they’re planning to release some of the chatbots they’ve been working on later this year. Hopefully, Google learned from Microsoft’s experience, so Danielle doesn’t turn out like Tay.
Via: The Verge
Source: Singularity Videos (YouTube)
Senator behind biometric privacy act tries to remove its teeth
The Illinois Biometric Privacy Act became law in 2008, making it illegal in the state to capture a person’s biometric identifiers — things like fingerprints, iris scans or faceprints — without explicit consent. This has led to three lawsuits against Facebook, Google and Snapchat, each over the companies’ use of face-scanning or -tagging technology. Now, Illinois State Senator Terry Link is attempting to add language to the bill that would make these practices legal in the state, effectively ending the lawsuits, The Verge reports. Note that Link is the senator who originally introduced the Illinois Biometric Privacy Act.
Link’s proposed changes alter the definition of a “scan” to be an in-person experience only. The new language defines a scan as “data resulting from an in-person process whereby a part of the body is traversed by a detector or an electronic beam.” The revision also adds “physical or digital” photographs to the list of items that are not biometric identifiers. The changes are attached to HB6074, a bill that tackles unclaimed property procedures. The alterations were proposed just before the legislature is set to recess for the long Memorial Day weekend, The Verge notes.
Christopher Dore is a partner with Edelson, the firm working on the lawsuit against Facebook, and he thinks the social network had something to do with the revisions.
“We believe that Facebook is a lobbyist that is a part of this,” Dore said, according to The Verge. “The changes that have been proposed certainly mirror the arguments that have been made in our case.”
Earlier this month, a judge denied Facebook’s motion to dismiss the Illinois case against its face-scanning technology.
Regarding this week’s proposed revisions, a Facebook spokesperson tells Engadget, “We appreciate Sen. Link’s effort to clarify the scope of the law he authored.”
Source: The Verge
Your phone probably won’t be Daydream VR-certified
If you can’t wait to get your hands on Daydream, Google’s new mobile VR platform, then there’s some bad news coming. The company’s Clay Bavor has conceded to RoadToVR that you’ll probably have to buy a new handset for it to work. He says that existing handsets, even high-spec flagships, won’t be marked as compatible with the new standard. While the firm has told developers to use the Nexus 6P as the platform to work for, it seems clear that not even the handset that’s used to build Daydream apps will be certified. Then again, we give it a week before someone finds that it’ll work on current devices anyway.
Google’s requirements for the new VR standard don’t seem to be particularly onerous, but we have a theory as to why existing handsets won’t qualify. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 820 will be arriving shortly with a huge emphasis on improving the mobile VR experience. In addition, the system will boast faster cellular and WiFi networking, as well as better augmented reality. That dovetails nicely, too, with the rumor about the Nexus 6P getting a refresh for 2016 with 4GB RAM and, uh… a Snapdragon 820. But it looks as if, even if your phone contract is up for renewal between now and the end of the year, you might wanna hold off buying anything new.
Source: RoadtoVR
Massachusetts, desert, pneumonia, diarrhea, gray, vacuum
To celebrate the culmination of Scripps’ National Spelling Bee, Google decided to find out what words most Americans struggle with. The search engine aggregated every query that began with “how to spell” and then identified which one was the most popular in each state. Surprisingly, diarrhea isn’t the word most people struggle with, which is Desert and / or Cancelled, depending on where you live. Other terms that have users stumped include Neighbor, Vacuum, Gray and Pneumonia — the latter of which is a preoccupation for the folks in Washington State, Missouri and North Carolina. We’re not sure that the results say anything meaningful except to make us wonder why Nevada and Arkansas are so preoccupied with Leprechauns. Oh, and people who live in Massachusetts don’t know how to spell Massachusetts — so here’s a tip, it’s spelled Massachusetts.
It’s the #spellingbee finals! These are the top “how to spell” searches for words by state, mapped #dataviz pic.twitter.com/rjXllJfOoE
— GoogleTrends (@GoogleTrends) May 26, 2016
Via: Washington Post
Source: Google Trends (Twitter)
HTC has stopped producing the Nexus 9
As has often been the case with larger Android tablets, the Nexus 9 never quite lived up to its potential. And, it’s relatively long in the tooth, first launching back in October of 2014. Google stopped selling the device about a month ago, and now HTC has confirmed that its days are numbered. While you can still buy most models of the tablet on HTC’s site, the company says that it is no longer manufacturing the tablet. Once the stock on HTC’s site and across various other random retailers runs out, that’ll be the end of the line.
That leaves the Pixel C as the only Android tablet Google itself is selling directly. Despite some flaws, that’s probably still your best bet for a large-screen Android experience right now — and Android N should fix many of the issues we had with the tablet. And, of course, Samsung still sells a dizzying array of Android tablets, from large to, well, larger.
Given the Nexus 9’s lifespan, it’s not at all surprising that HTC has stopped manufacturing the device. HTC did confirm that it’ll continue selling and supporting the device for the near future, but if you for some reason had your eye on it and never pulled the trigger, don’t wait too long.
Via: CNET
Android doesn’t infringe on Oracle copyrights, jury finds
Google emerged victorious in court this afternoon, after a jury found that its use of Java APIs in Android doesn’t infringe on Oracle’s copyrights. The two companies have been battling it out over the past few years: Oracle originally sued Google back in 2010 because of how Java was integrated into Android. Oracle had a point though, as Google basically lifted entire portions of Sun Microsystem’s original Java code for Android. Google, meanwhile, argued that it was free to use the Java code since it was open to developers for many years. Another jury also ruled in Google’s favor back in 2012, but a federal court reversed that decision in 2014.
Basically, Oracle believes it deserves a slice of the mobile operating system’s profits. Had the trial gone the other way, Oracle could have asked for as much as $9 billion in damages, Ars Technica reports. The key with today’s decision is that the jury found Google’s implementation of Java to be “fair use,” which is good news to other developers working with open platforms.
Oracle didn’t waste any time commenting on the ruling, and it also says it’ll be appealing the decision:
“We strongly believe that Google developed Android by illegally copying core Java technology to rush into the mobile device market. Oracle brought this lawsuit to put a stop to Google’s illegal behavior. We believe there are numerous grounds for appeal and we plan to bring this case back to the Federal Circuit on appeal.”
And here’s Google’s take:
“Today’s verdict that Android makes fair use of Java APIs represents a win for the Android ecosystem, for the Java programming community, and for software developers who rely on open and free programming languages to build innovative consumer products
Google might name and shame slow-to-update Android vendors
Google has tried a few (mostly unsuccessful) strategies to get Android device makers updating their software in a timely fashion. Remember the short-lived Android Update Alliance? However, it might be trying something different: embarrassing those vendors into doing something. Bloomberg tipsters claim that Google has created lists that rank Android manufacturers based on the timeliness of their updates. They’re private right now, but the company is considering making them public to shame vendors that drag their heels — it’s hoping those brands too sluggish to make the lists will strive to do better.
Other work has been going on behind the scenes, too. Google has been asking carriers to shorten their notoriously long update testing cycles (Sprint has confirmed it, but Verizon reportedly has too), and it’s even pressing carriers to skip tests entirely for security updates. Google isn’t commenting on the leak.
It’s far from guaranteed that the lists will work, assuming they’re ever made public. The Update Alliance fizzled out as commercial realities (the cost of maintaining phones, and the desire to sell you a new phone instead) took over. What’s to say that a list with no direct consequences will do any better? However, there isn’t as much pressure to update as there was in the past. Google Play Services delivers many updates without having to go through makers or carriers, and numerous official apps get updates through the Play Store. This is more about going the last mile to both improve security and reduce the chances that hardware creators leave you high and dry.
Source: Bloomberg
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