FUNKY GREEN: 08/29/13

Thursday, 29 August 2013

Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime on the Xbox One and PS4's launch lineups: 'meh'

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Facebook details proposed changes to its data use policies following court order

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Introducing Peripheral Vision

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¿Por qué los ATV de la ESA llevan aire y oxígeno si el primero contiene el segundo?

Depositos del ATV Los vehículos de transferencia automatizados de la Agencia Espacial Europea tienen tres depósitos en los que pueden llevar dos tipos de gases distintos.

Esto es así porque los depósitos 2 y 3 están conectados entre ellos, mientras que el 1 es totalmente independiente.

En las cuatro misiones que llevan hasta ahora estos depósitos han sido utilizados siempre para llevar aire y oxígeno a la Estación Espacial Internacional, por lo que cabe preguntarse por qué llevar aire y oxígeno si a fin de cuentas el aire contiene un 21 por ciento de oxígeno.

Tal y como se puede leer en Why does ATV carry both air and O2? la respuesta es que a los responsables de la misión de vez en cuando les interesa aumentar la presión relativa de oxígeno en la atmósfera de la Estación, es decir, para enriquecer en oxígeno la atmósfera de esta.

El aire, por su parte, es necesario porque cada vez que llega o se va una nave o cada vez que se abre y se cierra una esclusa para un paseo espacial se pierde un poco de la atmósfera de la EEI, y aunque hay equipos a bordo para regenerarla, nunca está de más tener una reserva extra.

Como norma general la presión atmosférica en la Estación se mantiene en 750 milímetros de mercurio, un poco por debajo de los 760 que se consideran estándar al nivel del mar.

# Enlace Permanente

via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/ciencia/por-que-atv-esa-llevan-aire-y-oxigeno.html

Xbox One to bring higher quality voice chat through dedicated hardware and the power of Skype

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Archos outs a phone and several Android tablets ahead of IFA

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Fourquare's new push recommendations appear even when you don't check in

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Qualcomm trolls MediaTek's octa-core tech with not-so-subtle video

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Digital Storm targets PC enthusiasts with exclusive HydroLux cooling solution

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Mail Digitizing Service Outbox Opens To All San Francisco Residents

Outbox, a startup that digitizes your physical mail and makes it available on the web and via iPhone, Android, and iPad apps, says that it’s now generally available in San Francisco.

After a trial period in Austin, Outbox launched in San Francisco earlier this year, but it was a beta version of the service with a wait list — the company says there are still thousands of people on that list who should get in now that Outbox is available to anyone in the city.

In advance of today’s news, we went on a mail run with Outbox co-founder Evan Baehr and one of the company “un-postmen” Francis Sanchez. One of the misconceptions about Outbox, Baehr said, is that its users are “all nerds.” And sure, he admitted that “digital natives” are a big part of the early customer base, but he added:

We actually have a lot of different demographcis that have found things about Outbox that are interesting. So we have a lot of moms on the platform who just want to be better managers of their home communication. We’ve got a lot of travelers who are away for businesses, consultants or salespeople, and they want to be able to manage this important workflow when they’re not at their house.

And there are, naturally, privacy concerns about having a startup open up all your physical mail. Outbox tries to address those concerns with backgrounds checks on its un-postmen, shredding and recycling all the physical mail that you don’t want, and offering $1 million in identity theft insurance.

“We can lay out all the extreme measures we’ve gone through to keep your mail safe, [and] there are certain people out there that just aren’t convinced by that,” he acknowledged. “And you know what, at the end of the day, Outbox isn’t for everybody.”

Baehr suggested that the “best testament to what we can pull off” is that as far as the team is aware, Outbox has not yet had any security breaches. (In the video, it sounds like Baehr is suggesting that Outbox has processed more than 1 million pieces of mail, but a spokesperson clarified that the company has processed more than 300,000 pieces, resulting in more than 1 million images.)

The interview with Baehr and with Sanchez also illustrates some of how the processes that Outbox has put in place for collecting your mail. Those are particularly important, Baehr said, because they allow the company to keep costs down and charge customers only $7.99 a month.

Since the launch, the company also raised a $5 million Series A. As for what’s next, Baehr said Outbox is planning its launch in New York City.

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BlackBerry landing page prematurely declares 'BBM for Android and iPhone is here'

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Lovefilm gets MTV and Nickelodeon through streaming deal with Viacom

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First Smartphone-Controlled, Personalized Drone Is a Kickstarter Hit

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This Hacked-Together 2k Cinema Camera Has a Mac Mini Brain

Flickr for iOS update brings new filters, camera features and editing tools

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UniKey Founder Talks About The Future Of Access Control Ahead Of October Ship Date

The UniKey Kevo has been a hot topic for the past year, its touch-triggered unlocking amazing the likes of investors, TV shows and retailers alike. The auto-lock system first appeared on an episode of “Shark Tank”, and shortly thereafter received a round of funding which brings the company’s total to $2.75 million.

We caught up with UniKey founder Phil Dumas at the ff Venture Capital office (FFVC is one of UniKey’s investors) to chat about the device being a pre-order and how to deal with competition.

But first, let’s clear up what exactly the UniKey Kevo does just in case you missed it. The Kevo uses Bluetooth 4.0 to identify you before unlocking your door, just with a touch. Unlike Lockitron, which can allow users to remotely lock and unlock their door, Kevo doesn’t support that function but rather focuses on proximity and convenience. Kevo users never have to reach in their pocket or wallet.

The company has a partnership with Kwikset, one of the largest lock manufacturers in the U.S. so that installation is quick and easy.

“We’re not the first company to unlock a door with a phone,” said Dumas. “But we are the first company to make the experience so much better than a traditional key. All you have to do is touch the lock.”

But what if you lose your phone? Well, Kevo is set up to let you log in through the web app or on a different device to gain access. Each Kevo also comes with a fob, with extra fobs available for $25 each.

Eventually, Unikey will move into other spaces, including automotive, air travel, professional settings, etc. to ensure that, one day, you’ll be able to throw out all your keys. There is also potential for Unikey to partner with home control and home automation companies in order to trigger certain events in the home based on a door locking or unlocking.

For now, however, the company is getting through its pre-order phase. If you’re interested in the $219 Kevo, you can pre-order at Amazon, Newegg, Home Depot, and Build.com. Shipping begins in October.

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Flickr for iOS Unlocks New Camera Abilities

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Photo hints that lower-cost Moto X could use swappable back panels

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GameStop's next-gen digital strategy doesn't exist, because it doesn't need to... yet

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Mailbox intros expanded search, signature and Chrome browser option

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Ex-Skypers Aim To Bridge The Gap Between Email And Messaging With Launch Of Fleep

When you get pitched a new messaging startup from an Estonian team comprising a number of ex-Skype engineers, you kind of have to take notice. Launching officially today is Fleep, a web and iOS app that wants to bridge the gap between ‘reply all’-style group email and enterprise messaging/IM services.

Its premise isn’t new, of course: one way to help users achieve the holy grail of in-box zero is to try and get many of those conversations taking place outside of email in the first place. In that sense, Fleep’s immediate competitors include the likes of Yammer, HipChat, and Campfire. Or, to some extent, even Skype itself, and a plethora of other instant messaging services.

However, Fleep’s positioning is subtly different from many competing services in that it’s user-centric and doesn’t adhere to the walled garden mentality of an internal company messaging system. “We are solving for all collaborative end users everywhere, not just for big companies to use internally,” says Fleep co-founder and CEO Henn Ruukel, describing the app as designed to be open. Instead, it’s about “me and my conversations”, which could be with anybody, not just those in the same organisation as you. In fact, it’s the need to “work across company borders” that keeps people using email for group conversations, notes the startup, even though email was never really designed for that purpose.

At launch, the functionality and UX of Fleep is pretty paired down, though this might also be its upside. To start a new conversation, you click on the ‘create new’ button and enter the names of those who you want to see and become part of the conversation. If they aren’t already using the app, however, you can enter their email address instead where they’ll be able to interface with the conversation via email in the usual old-skool way, although in this instance, their participation also gets pulled into Fleep for the benefit of those who are using the web or iOS app.

Conversations, which on the desktop version appear listed in a side panel a bit like an in-box, are threaded, can each have a title, and are fully searchable. So far, not wholly different to email, perhaps. It’s at this point that Fleep introduces a few tricks of its own, however. One of those is the ability to pin a message, in the form of an editable note, to the right hand panel of the app, making for a very lightweight way of extracting important or actionable information. In addition, any images or other attachments that are part of a conversation can be browsed separately via the files tab, so that it’s quick to find an important asset.

And that appears to be pretty much it, for now. However, I’d suggest that the team and its backers make this one to watch closely. As well as a number of ex-Skype engineers — along with Ruukel, Asko Oja, Erik Laansoo and Marko Kreen are ex-Skype — the other co-founders are Liis Peetermann (ex-Techstars) and Andres Järviste (ex-Fujitsu). Meanwhile, Fleep has raised €260,000 in seed funding from Skype’s founding engineers Jaan Tallinn and Priit Kasesalu.

Finally, on the positioning of Fleep, which is entering a very crowded space, Ruukel had this to say: “Unlike corporate products like Yammer, we’re not trying to sell the concept of Fleep to a CEO or CIO as a company-wide integration decision. We’re more interested in empowering end users around the world to work more efficiently, together, to get things done (while hopefully saving an inbox or two in the process).”

In other words, this appears to be a consumer-led marketing play, even if Fleep’s end goal is to help users get more work done.

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Playjam GameStick releases worldwide September 30th

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Watch a Red Hot Nickel Ball Destroy a Box of Crayons

Waze update taps Google as default search provider, tips hat to new owners

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This Week On The TC Europe Podcast: 4G In Europe, Twitter's New French Office And European Exits

It’s already the second episode of our weekly radio show! This is the TechCrunch Europe Podcast, wherein we European writers discuss tech news, as well as what’s happening in our startup scene.

This week, Apple acquired Swedish company AlgoTrim, ARM snatched Sensinode and Docomo bought Austrian e-commerce platform Fine Trade. What does it mean for European startups?

Join Natasha Lomas, Ingrid Lunden, Romain Dillet, Canadian-turned-Londoner Darrell Etherington, and honorary Euro John Biggs to comment on 4G in Europe, Twitter’s new office in France and the current trend when it comes to exits in Europe.

We invite you to enjoy our weekly podcast every Thursday.

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Intro music by Espanto.

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