Drones are coming to America – the Federal Aviation Administration announced on Monday the six states chosen to develop test sites for unmanned aerial vehicles.
Alaska, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Texas and Virginia were chosen by the FAA as the agency moves towards integrating commercial drones into American skies.
The goal is to have drones operated by businesses, farmers and government agencies sharing the same space as commercial airplanes by the year 2015, though it’s possible it may take longer to draft the proper rules and regulations.
If you're shopping for a new iPhone this holiday season, Apple has two new handsets to choose from. The iPhone 5s is the higher-end model, but are its upgrades worth the extra US$100? Or do you thumb your nose at its "forward-thinking" features and go with some fun new colors instead? Let Gizmag try to help, as we go hands-on to help you decide whether you're better off with the iPhone 5s or iPhone 5c.
with the same tablet in two different sizes. That isn't the case with the iPhone 5s and 5c.
The 5s has a faster processor, an extra motion-tracking processor, a better camera with some new features, and a fingerprint sensor. It's the more advanced iPhone
The iPhone 5c, meanwhile, is basically an iPhone 5 (Apple's 2012 flagship) in a colorful plastic shell. In fact, the 5c replaced the iPhone 5 in Apple's lineup, sending it to an early grave after just one year. So if you take appearances out of the equation, we're pretty much comparing "this year's iPhone" to "last year's iPhone."
BlackBerry Ltd Gets into Partnership Deal with Foxconn to Develop New Devices for Emerging Markets
BlackBerry Ltd recently posted disappointing quarterly results that translated to a whopping $4.4 billion of losses. However, the Canadian smartphone manufacturer still strives harder to attempt to obtain a much needed turnaround.
The company has entered into an agreement to a manufacturing partnership with Taiwan’s Foxconn. Together, the two smartphone makers would develop and manufacture a main consumer handset, which would primarily target Indonesia, one of the few countries where demand for BlackBerry devices remains strong. This partnership would also eventually cover several other fast-growing mobile market
Google has bought another robotics firm – the eighth robotics firm it has purchased recently – making it a leader in the robotics industry.
The latest acquisition is Boston Dynamics, maker of robots for the U.S. military, including Cheetah, the world's fastest-running robot as well as other animal-like machines.
Google has been coy about the type of robots it’s looking to develop, but the company has put Andy Rubin in charge of the effort. He was in charge of Google’s popular Android operating system.
In a statement on his Google+ page, Google co-founder Larry Page wrote of the Boston Dynamics purchase, “I am excited about Andy Rubin's next project. His last big bet, Android, started off as a crazy idea that ended up putting a supercomputer in hundreds of millions of pockets. It is still very early days for this, but I can't wait to see the progress.”
The price of the purchase has yet to be made public.
Boston Dynamics was founded in 1992 and largely develops robots for the U.S. military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA. Many of those robots such as BigDog and WildCat, are well-known because of YouTube videos showing them in action.
Some analysts say Google’s foray into robotics means it’s trying to develop a robot that could potentially deliver goods to people at home and at work. Amazon recently proposed developing robotic drones that could do that, but analysts say Google’s robots would likely make the deliveries in self-driving vehicles – a technology that Google is actively developing at its headquarters in California.
Google has already begun to experimenting with a grocery delivery service in the San Francisco Bay area called Google Shopping Express.
Google’s robotics team will be headquartered in Palo Alto, California, with an office in Japan, a leader in the robotics industry.
"I feel with robotics it's a green field," Rubin told the New York Times. "We're building hardware, we're building software. We're building systems, so one team will be able to understand the whole stack."
is the process of creating a video game. Development is undertaken by a game developer, which may range from a single person to a large business. Traditional commercial PC and console games are normally funded by a publisher and take several years to develop. Indie gamescan take less time and can be produced cheaply by individuals and small developers. The indie game industry has seen a rise in recent years with the growth of new online distribution systems and the mobile game market.
Kiva's technology is another way to improve productivity by bringing the products directly to employees to pick, pack and stow," said Dave Clark, Amazon's vice president of global customer fulfillment. Kiva's robots bring the product shelves to a warehouse worker, rather than a worker walking to the shelves. The robots locate the items in a customer's order, move the products around warehouses and help get packed boxes to a final loading dock.
Employee using Kiva system
The robots—squat, orange cubes—zip around shipping centers loaded with inventory shelves stacked several feet into the air above them. The robots can be tailored to each particular client, with customized software
Kiva was founded in 2003 by its chief executive, Mick Mountz, who served as an executive at Apple Inc and Webvan, a grocery-shipping firm that was one of the highest-profile failures of the dot-com boom over a decade ago. Webvan raised over $400 million in funding before collapsing in 2001.
Having witnessed the need for rapid order fulfillment, Mr. Mountz started Kiva along with Peter Wurman, who had been an associate professor of computer science at North Carolina State, and Raffaello D'Andrea, a professor of engineering at ETH Zurich.
With Kiva, Amazon is now looking at a more automated approach. The robots are already used by two websites that Amazon has acquired: shoe-retailer Zappos.com and baby-products site Diapers.com.
Last night i was talking to a friend about new ideas about social networking . We were talking and decided that wouldn't it be cool if a social network user could chat with another user in the virtual world, almost like video chat but instead user will use their Avatars.This allow person to meet each other without revealing their identities.
Users will be able to choose their environment, which would be perfect for couples and even family members that haven't seen each other in a while. In think this idea if implemented will give users a greater level of intimates and sense of privacy. Really think about it what better way to communicate and participate in online than in the virtual world the sky is the limit with this idea.. The problem is now is the equipment Virtual reality equipment are relative expensive and may not be affordable to many user of a social network
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office just granted Apple a patent for a facial recognition feature that could unlock a mobile device as well as control how it works. That's right, Apple just got a patent so our iPhones and iPads can look at us all the time.
I just got used to the idea of using my fingerprint to unlock an iPhone 5s, but now my face? Will it recognize me after a hard night of drinking when I've got a throbbing hangover? Will I have to smile and patiently train it -- and then lock myself out of my iPhone after I start yelling at it for being stupid and not recognizing my delightful expression the first time, in poor light?
Those were my knee-jerk reactions as I read the news and rolled my eyes. The forward march of technology. The Xbox One wants to pay attention to the humans around it all the time. Android has had facial recognition unlocking capabilities for a couple years or so. Heck, every time I import new photos into iPhoto on my Mac, iPhoto starts analyzing the photos to identify new faces to catalog for me.
Yet I'm vaguely uneasy about all this. It's not that I fear a rising horde of machines will take over the world. I'm uneasy about the potential for dark uses this sort of technology opens up -- and you don't have to be an Edward Snowden working deep inside the NSA to know it.
To me, it represents another step toward ubiquitous surveillance, and that, my friends, is an evil thing for creativity. Who does their best work while someone is peering over their shoulder? Thoughts and ideas are moderated before they can escape, lest someone see something stupid, nasty or simply silly. Surveillance impinges on freedom -- the sense of freedom -- and to me, that stifles the human spirit, sucks human energy, and modulates joy.
Citizens in developed nations now rely on the Internet more than any other medium for news coverage. This trend*first became apparent in the early 2000s, when radio was overtaken by Internet usage. The rapid shift towards web-based information then began to affect print media, with newspaper sales being heavily impacted. By 2014, the trend has continued, with even television now having less reach when it comes to news reporting. Television and the Internet are in fact converging together as one. Social media, mobile technologies and exponential bandwidth improvements have driven much of this change.
AMAZON SHOWS US HOW THEY’LL SOON DELIVER YOUR PACKAGES VIA DRONES!
No joke: Amazon has been working on delivery drones and CEO Jeff Bezos believes they could be zipping goods through the air to customers less than 5 years from now as part of its “Prime Air” service. The “Octocopter” unmanned aerial vehicles in development are capable of flying packages from Amazon warehouses to customers’ doorsteps in as little as 30 minutes from the time the customer hits the “Buy” button, Bezos told CBS’ 60 Minutes.
Before the big surprise, Bezos told producers, “If you can guess what it is, then … I will give you half my fortune and send you to Vegas with it.”
He says the drones can carry packages up to 5 pounds, which accounts for around 86% of the items Amazon sells, notes TechCrunch. In its FAQ, Amazon predicts that one day seeing Prime Air vehicles in the sky “will be as normal as seeing mail trucks on the road today”—and it will be ready to go whenever the FAA introduces regulations for private drones, which could be as soon as 2015.
The game begins with Elias telling his sons about the legend of how the Ghosts first appeared. Meanwhile in space, the Federation hijack the controlling space station of the Orbital Defense Initiative (ODIN),[7] an orbital superweapon that utilizes kinetic bombardment, and use it to destroy several cities in the southwestern United States. The surviving American astronauts sacrifice themselves to self-destruct the space station and prevent the other ODIN satellites from launching their payloads further inland. Elias and the young Logan and David narrowly escape the destruction of San Diego.
Ten years later, the United States has fought the Federation to a stalemate along a front that comprises the destroyed cities, also known as "No Man's Land". Logan and Hesh are part of a US unit commanded by Elias and during a patrol, they spot an American working with the Federation who is called "Rorke". Soon after, the brothers are ambushed and rescued by members of the Ghosts who are seeking their companion Ajax, who was captured by Rorke. Logan and Hesh join the mission to rescue Ajax but arrive too late to rescue him and after he is killed by Rorke, they reunite with their father who reveals himself as the leader of Ghosts. Believing his sons are ready to join his unit, Elias welcomes them into the Ghosts and they learn from him that Rorke once were their leader. However, during a successful mission to assassinate General Almagro, then president of the Federation in the capital Caracas, Elias is forced to abandon Rorke, who was presumed dead, but instead turned traitor and is now hunting down his former companions.
The Ghosts manage to locate and capture Rorke, but while flying back home, Rorke's men attack their plane and rescue him. The team then is forced to land deep into the Amazon Jungle where they witness a rocket being launched with an unknown purpose. Once reunited and rescued, the Ghosts storm a Federation laboratory in the Andes and obtain data regarding a classified operation in a factory at Rio De Janeiro. To secure a path to the factory, the Ghosts destroy the Federation's Atlas oil platform located in Antartica to lure the enemy fleet away from their objective and sink their remaining destroyer guarding the Brazilian coast. Once inside the factory, the team discovers that the Federation had reverse engineered the ODIN's technology and developed their own orbital bombardment system. After destroying the factory, Elias and his sons regroup in Las Vegas but are captured by Rorke who kills Elias in front of Hesh and Logan who later find an opportunity to escape.
Realizing that once the Federation's ODIN become operational they will be defeated for good, the United States pool all their remaining forces in a synchronized attack to take down an enemy space center in Chile while a small team of soldiers boards a shuttle to take over the Federation satellites in space. Once both objectives are completed, Hesh and Logan pursue Rorke to avenge their father and are seemingly successful, only to find out during the aftermath that Rorke survived their battle. Logan attempts to defend his wounded brother, but has his arm broken and is kidnapped by Rorke, with the former Ghost announcing his plans to brainwash Logan into killing the rest of the team. In a post-credits scene, Logan is seen being kept inside a pit in the jungle, presumably going through the same torture methods that Rorke went through.
Smart Lock Systems
These smart lock systems, like August's (pictured), work with or replace traditional locks and deadbolts, granting keyless access to homeowners through bluetooth phone recognition technology and allowing those owners to customize and monitor other entrants' access (like a housekeeper, for example).
The release of BBM to iOS and Android users is at best too little too late. Sure there are millions who love the program including myself, but the fact is I already have two cross-platform, feature rich messaging apps and don’t know that I will add another despite my familiarity with the iconic messaging app. WhatsApp, Line, Viber, and others already fill this need for tens of millions of users worldwide.Never mind the delays, it is finally here and BBM for Android and iOS is completely free. It supports all Android-powered smartphones running Ice Cream Sandwich and above, and iPhones running iOS 6 and above.It’s features include everything you’ve come to expect from the program: traditional instant messaging, group chat for up to 30 people, and user profiles.In order to use the app, you will need to signup for a BlackBerry ID, which will only take a few minutes. Signup is done through the app once its installed. For those concerned about privacy, you’ll be happy to hear that BlackBerry will assign you a PIN and you will not need to disclose your phone number or email to anyone in order to begin messaging.
For millions, the app will be a matter of nostalgia. There are a large number of Android and iPhone users who have owned a BlackBerry at one time or another.
Once again, I’ve not read a single report that suggests that BBM will rescue BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB), however, it’s nice they decided to throw a life preserver to those who love the app years after they jumped BlackBerry’s sinking ship.
Today, Blackberry released their preliminary financial results for the second quarter of the fiscal year 2014, and it’s worse than imagined. While nobody believed BB10 would fully resurrect the once mighty smartphone company, nobody expected operating losses approaching $1 billion, either.
According to Yahoo! finance, Blackberry will also remove itself from the consumer market, opting to focus on enterprise and end-to-end solutions instead. They’ll also trim their lineup from six devices to four, with two high-end offerings and two lower-specced phones.
Blackberry will also cut 4,500 jobs, and attempt to reduce their operating expenditures by 50% before the end of Q1 FY 2015.
In addition to the operating loss of $950-995 million, the Waterloo, Canada company will also see a pre-tax inventory charge of $930-960 million, primarily attributable to Z10 devices. Blackberry did make $1.6 billion, of which half is service revenue, and expects to see revenue on 3.7 million smartphones, primarily BB7 devices.
The company expects their adjusted net loss to hover in the $250 million range, or about $0.50 per share. At the time of writing, Blackberry stock is currently trading at $8.73, and has fallen $1.80 on the day, which is more in tune with their GAAP loss of $950 or so.
This marks an end to Blackberry’s consumer presence, and a sad exit for a once prominent and ubiquitous company. While the enterprise market got them to where they were, programs like BYOD and Apple’s increasingly strong presence in enterprise will prove difficult. Google is also pushing hard, and has many top-tier companies “going Google”. Blackberry may find sourcing contracts for enterprise or government difficult in the current landscape.
It seems even the most obvious solutions for survival may no longer be viable for Blackberry.
Of course, it's important to remember Apple has seen similar lags in share prices after previous announcements. According to The Guardian, the low stock prices could be in response to the iPhone 5c. While the on-carrier arrangement offers a $99 iPhone, the unlocked price is still seen by some analysts as being too pricy.
Check out the new i phone specs VS the Samsung galaxy S4
Sunday, 8 September 2013
Unveiling of Apple I Phone 5s
With the release of the new Apple I Phone days away, it is safe to say that Apple have everyone right where they want them.The large buzz around what the phone looks like, the innovative features that the phone comes with has basically paved the the way for leaks and rumoured released dates.This hype has slowly eroded the fact that Apple is not really big on innovations when it come to the I phone. With the exception of the I Phone 5 sire and making new OS that Apple has basically released I Phones with the same specs with a bigger size and a prettier exterior design and calling it innovative.Honestly in my mind there is no topping the I Phone 5 even with the new rumoured fingerprint software because i can just download a finger print if i wanted that software or even download a more secure one but regardless of the lack of the innovation in the mobile industry Apple has undoubtedly raised the bar with the launch of the I Phone 5 with the convenience of sire and not to mention there ever so lovely OS the I Phone 5 is undoubtedly the greatest phone to grace our earth i was even surprise myself after i had jumped on the bandwagon that android had broken Apple's monopolistic dominance. This shows what competition does for innovation ..... after-all apple is a company an the aim of a company is to make profit innovation comes after.
BlackBerry Ltd recently posted disappointing quarterly results that translated to a whopping $4.4 billion of losses. However, the Canadian smartphone manufacturer still strives harder to attempt to obtain a much needed turnaround.
