via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/YCLnh3-PzkA/
Thursday, 19 September 2013
Samsung Galaxy Mega: The Biggest Smartphone Ever
via Tech http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/mashable/tech/~3/0qoDSRaUbqc/
Ads creep into Pinterest with introduction of promoted pins
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/jx1vnRB9Ii8/
Hyperkin Retron 5 combines ten consoles into one on December 10 for $99
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/_qp4SCLQYyY/
Astrofotógrafos del año 2013
Guiding light to the stars por Mark Gee
Esta impresionante foto de Mark Gee de la Vía Láctea y el faro de Cabo Palliser de la Isla Norte de Nueva Zelanda es la ganadora de la edición de 2013 del concurso Astronomy Photographer of the Year organizado por el Real Observatorio de Greenwich y la revista Sky at Night.
Esta y las que ganaron de las demás categorías están en 2013 winners .
Las de años anteriores están en 2009 winners, 2010 winners, 2011 winners y 2012 winners.
La de Mark es un panorama compuesto por 20 fotogramas tomados con una Canon EOS 5D Mark III, un objetivo de 24mm y con una exposición de 30 segundos a ISO 3200.
(Vía Universe Today).
via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/ciencia/astrofotografos-ano-2013.html
The Caktus Hug Sensor Makes Sure You're Drinking Enough Water
Summer’s all but over, but it’s no less important to stay hydrated. According to the CDC 43 percent of Americans drink fewer than four glasses of water a day, and while the actual amount you should drink varies from person to person, four glasses probably doesn’t cut it.
That’s where Caktus, a neat Finnish hardware startup that presented at TechLaunch’s second New Jersey demo day, comes into play. Their mission? To fix that dearth of drinking with an app and a curious sensor that straps onto your water bottle.
The sensor (called, adorably enough, the Hug) is a foam-lined gizmo that wraps itself around a water bottle and quietly tracks its motion. It’s not just a pint-sized koozie though — the Hug quietly monitors the bottle’s movements so it can provide its user with a rough idea how much fluid they’ve imbibed so far. Think of it as a giant Jawbone Up that straps onto your water receptacle and you’re on the right track.
As always though, the hardware is only part of the equation. A companion app (iOS only for now) uses an algorithm to suss out which of those motions actually correspond to the user lifting the bottle to drink and which are just noise caused by random movements. The app also tracks ambient temperature and keeps tabs on what sorts of exercise you’re doing (you still have to punch that in yourself) so it can update your hydration goal in real time.
To hear founder Panu Keski-Pukkila tell it, the Hug (and the rest of Caktus) was born out of pure necessity. An avid extreme athlete, he grew used to his girlfriend reminding him to drink more water while he was out carving up slopes in the Alps. When she moved to New York, though, that useful feedback mechanism disappeared and Keski-Pukkila set out to create something that could fill that particular hydro-centric void.
And you know what? As downright kooky as the whole thing sounds, the combo of the Hug sensor and the app actually worked really well. In a brief demo, the sensor was accurately able to determine that roughly two ounces of water were squeezed out of the bottle, and the partner app updated almost immediately. With the Hug, you’re not quantifying yourself so much as you’re quantifying the stuff that goes in your body. That said, the team is taking a proactive approach when it comes to all those fitness-tracking gizmos floating around out there. They’ve already managed to bake in Fitbit support so users won’t have to punch in how many glasses of water they’ve downed in a day.
For now the device is still strictly in its prototype phase, but the team is eagerly working to get the Hug, its partner app, and a dev-friendly API ready for prime time by early next year. So far they’ve locked up $25k in seed funding from the TechLaunch accelerator, and they plan to launch a crowdfunding campaign in early 2014 to lock up the cash necessary to start producing these things en masse.
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/XuTagmS-CLo/
Galería de fotos de la Tierra tomadas por sondas planetarias
La Tierra vista por la sonda Kaguya mientras esta sobrevolaba el polo sur de la Luna
Una bonita recopilación de imágenes de la Tierra tomada por diversas sondas espaciales no destinadas a estudiarla pero que la vieron desde la Luna, desde otros planetas, o simplemente al pasar cerca mientras realizaban una maniobra de asistencia gravitatoria.
Para recordar, una vez más, nuestro punto azul pálido.
- Cádiz desde la Estación Espacial Internacional, La costa de España desde la Estación Espacial Internacional y El Golfo de Vizcaya desde la Estación Espacial Internacional, algunas otras fotos tomadas desde otra nave espacial.
via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/ciencia/galeria-de-fotos-de-la-tierra-tomadas-por-sondas-planetarias.html
iOS 7 bug enables user to bypass lockscreen, send emails and status updates
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/dyYpEYPbUK8/
Don't miss Wikimedia, OLPC, Leap Motion, Voltaic and more at Expand NY!
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/DsV4lktUOc8/
Google drops its black menu bar, rolls out more streamlined look for the web
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/NguZ0x-Bs0M/
Google's iOS Update for Chrome Is More Connected Than Ever
via Tech http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/mashable/tech/~3/T5ZfFcr8iRk/
Target also selling the iPhone 5c for $79.99 on-contract, now accepting pre-orders
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/t2H4sRmd1-0/
Google Wallet for iPhone Launches in the App Store
via Tech http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/mashable/tech/~3/YzjuoH0Um3E/
15Five, The Employee-Manager Feedback Network, Launches 2.0 With Like Buttons, Private Messaging And More
15Five, a startup backed by the likes of 500 Startups and Yammer’s David Sacks that provides a platform to help the working world communicate better with its managers, has had a dose of its own medicine. Taking feedback collected from its users since its exit from beta in August 2012, the company is today rolling out a rebuilt version 2.0, with a smoother interface, an easier way to get new employees involved, and more features geared at larger groups and teams with matrix reporting structures — that is, teams reporting to more than one manager.
The app, founded and run by David Hassell, is also adding two new investors to the company. CTO and co-founder Dharmesh Shah, whose company is one of 15Five’s customers; and another founder who wants to remain anonymous, but whose startup is also using 15Five. Their investment brings the total raised by 15Five to $1.4 million.
15Five has been picking up steam in the last year, now serving 600 businesses and increasing revenues five-fold. Hassell declines to say how many people exactly are using 15Five now within those businesses except to note that they range from small startups through to groups at larger organizations like Citrix. Indeed, as with the companies of 15Five’s two newest investors, early adopters of the service have been startups and other tech companies, but that is slowly changing to include bigger organizations and those in other verticals, because everyone can benefit from better communication at work that isn’t specifically related to actual projects but about how well things are going in general. This was part of the reason for the new version.
One of the new features in version 2.0 creates a new separation between users and groups, with users now able to report into different groups led by different managers — a way of better representing structures at organizations that follow the matrix-management model. Managers who do not necessarily always work with a particular person can now request to follow them on the platform anyway for periods of time — say, when they are on a project together.
Another new feature — which really should be a part of any collaboration software, and yet so often is not (hello, Convo) — is a “follow-up” section, where users can flag conversations they would like to track. Once something in the follow-up section is finished, it can be moved to another new section for resolved conversations and threads.
15Five has taken a lot of clues from social media in its very conception — after all, the infinite loop of feedback that you can have on sites like Facebook and Twitter has made the idea of providing feedback online in the workplace more natural — and in this new version, it has added another feature for people to acknowledge other people’s comments: a “like” button. And you can also comment on it publicly or privately on any post.
There is also an improved inbox-style dashboard to be able to see all your ongoing conversations — whether you are a manager or employee.
Hassell says that this new version has been nine months in the making — he calls it his second baby, since right now his partner happens to be around nine months pregnant. But while babies are perfect things, the products of a startup sometimes are not. Hassell has described 15Five more than once to me as a “lean startup” — when the $1 million round was being announced, he even said he intentionally wanted to keep funding low in the early days to make sure that what they were making was matching what users actually wanted and needed.
“We didn’t invest in underlying infrastructure because we did it on a shoestring,” he recalled.
But what that also meant was that in creating version 2.0, the team realised they needed to start from scratch to rebuild the whole platform more flexibly, using Python. This is not an easy thing to do, but it was worth it. Hassell says that the new platform gives 15Five a “phenomenal testing framework” that now lets the company make rapid changes when they are needed.
The lean model 15Five adopted from the start has also helped it learn other things about its users. Hassell likens the tendency for services like 15Five’s to gym memberships, if not done right: “I looked at the gym membership model, and you can see that the reason they do annual plans is because they know all members are unlikely to come in all the time. I was conscious of that, and I wanted to know in real time if people were using and leaving the service.” This is partly why the company decided to offer shorter contracts of usage to businesses.
Initially, he says, churn on the site was 4% per month, and “that was too high.” The beta tests of the new platform indicate that now it is well below 2%. Similarly, there is the issue of getting people in the workplace to use it. “Compliance doesn’t have to be 100% to work, but just has to be enough so that people are using it and getting something out of it,” he says.
Hassell is aware that the use of gamification has become quite trendy in the world of HR, but he has so far resisted incorporating that into the site. “With gamification, you are playing into someone’s psychology to be competitive. But we are focused on how to make this platform so valuable that people feel compelled to use it,” he says.
That said, he says the company is working on something that sounds more like something from the quantified self movement, by providing more information to employees about their usage statistics on 15Five, and those of the rest of the company. “We’ll build it ourselves and won’t make it quite so bubbly or gamey,” he says.
15Five is priced at $49 per month per business for the first 10 months, and then $5 per employee per month, with different bulk pricing options for larger teams. Today there are lots of small companies in the 10-15-user range, he says, and then some bigger customers in the 500-800-employee range, with 20% at 50 or more users.
The new version out today is geared to serving bigger businesses, to better serve the Fortune 500 companies that Hassell says 15Five is starting to acquire as customers. But Hassell says 15Five is not yet at the point of being prepared to expand its existing self-service model to the “full enterprise” structure that would require larger salesforces and other kinds of infrastructure. That could, however, be the next step after 15Five raises its next round.
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/zDnPMU26wYk/
The Engadget Podcast is live at 3:30PM ET!
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/GUnkFWSIC9o/
Google makes its Quickoffice app free for both Android and iOS users
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/RRsfgpteHbI/
Google promises UK regulator that Waze will remain separate pending review
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/I8jKxiYAPK8/
Peripheral Vision 004: Reggie Watts on using technology to make art, pterodactyls
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/gZ5FodEDDLs/
Micro-robots fabricados con cepillos de dientes
Los bristlebots son pequeños robots vibradores cuyos componentes son la cabeza de un cepillo de dientes, un micromotor y una pila botón. Basta pegar el motor al cepillo, asegurarse de que el voltaje de la pila coincide y soldar algunas conexiones. Variando la posición en la que se coloca la pila y se reparte el peso se puede conseguir que el pequeño chisme «camine» por la mesa.
No es muy inteligente pero es un simpático robotijo. Y de aquí ha dominar el mundo con un ejército de pequeños siervos mecánicos hay solo un paso, ¡mwahahaha! En Kipkay los venden ya en kits y todo.
via Microsiervos http://www.microsiervos.com/archivo/hackers/micro-robots-cepillos-dientes.html
Dispatch updated for iOS 7 with background email retrieval
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/gSCWocIfWU0/
Hands-on with the new PlayStation Vita
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/Zasgjxb_98M/
With 1M Users Now On Board, Learnist Brings Its “Pinterest For Learning” To Android As It Looks To Go Big Abroad
![Screenshot_2013-08-06-17-01-32[3]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_uf7eNsoVH8Y1stk9rklNWGCd-191Ick9P01kwaCHQPlIZ1u0cbieO9gl7cGJkxx-Y4BPsF4DSMNJh0cbefIUasu_EZl1OGRKnBIamybz4qrdMYciC89aUCyViRHq3jySGIwIa3IbUUrAsYOPGSf8Rz7kAhwZ_aEJLAPo5ZmqHXTFA3Zm9_7aljgpOG5A=s0-d)
When Grockit first emerged back in 2008, it had set its sights on building a full-service, social learning service that would give students a better way to study for standardized tests, among other things. One of the first startups to combine game-ification with personalized adaptive test prep programs, Grockit enabled students to study solo or in groups by connecting with live instructors or perusing its library of video content.
Yet, five years later, Grockit found itself in survival mode — never quite finding the explosive adoption that could justify the $25 million in capital had raised over the years from big-name investors like Mark Pincus and Reid Hoffman. Last year, the team began to experiment with new tools, chief of which was Learnist, a digital clipboard that was later dubbed its “Pinterest for education.”
Over the next six months, Learnist took off and, eager to ride the wave, Grockit put all of its efforts behind the new product, selling off the Grockit name, test prep business, technology and platform to Kaplan in July.
Today, as it looks to expand its international reach and support the fastest-growing mobile platform, the team is bringing its learning network to Android. With the launch of its new Android app, users will be able to find multimedia learning experiences and expert knowledge in areas that interest them, collaborate with like-minded learners, and connect and share content across social networks.
Backed by a fresh $20 million from Discovery, Summit, Atlas, Benchmark and others, Learnist is eager to ride the growing adoption of mobile learning tools both in and outside of the classroom and bring its network to a wider audience.
Learnist was initially developed for K-12 teachers and students, allowing users to create “learn boards” for everything from reading assignments to Common Core-supported Math lessons, but the founders have since expanded that scope in an effort to attract a wider set of life-long and casual learners. In much the same vein as Coursera, Learnist is looking to create a network that applies to both formal and continuing education and can be used alongside classroom tools like Schoology and Edmodo to create a more holistic classroom learning experience, for example, while giving casual learners a place to store and view their various learning projects.
Since launching its iPhone and iPad apps last year, the knowledge sharing network has attracted over one million users, who are now using the platform to aggregate and share their projects across a range of topics. Grockit/Learnist co-founder and CEO Farb Nivi says that, long-term, he wants Learnist to become a “smart RSS feed for learning,” allowing anyone and everyone to share pieces of content and discover topics and lessons that are relevant to them. The goal, he says, is to build a library of quality crowdsourced content, surfacing content that matches users’ browsing patterns and areas of interest.
In the day or so that Learnist has been on Google Play, China has quickly become the largest source of downloads (outside of the U.S.) for the app. It’s this kind of international reach that Learnist hopes to tap into, adding to the 40 countries that its users represent today. Nivi believes that Learnist is now well-suited to provide a solution in regions where the demand for online learning is being pushed forward by growth in digital publishing and distribution tools and the rapid adoption of smart mobile technology.
With its new Android app, Learnist users can embed 40 different types of media in their learn boards and with the recent launch of “Learnist SmartRSS,” users can now tap into content uploaded from the hundreds of media companies that have created profiles and are now publishing to Learnist. Looking ahead, users can expect Learnist to continue to hone its search and discovery tools, as it quietly becomes yet another entrant (see Noodle, for example) into the race to build a better search and discovery engine — with, in Learnist’s case, a digital clipboard in tow.
via TechCrunch » Startups http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/techcrunch/startups/~3/4QkJVWbc6Sc/
Sony confirms PS4 gesture and voice control, HDMI capture for games
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/-H7KYhflN2c/
Tumblr adds push notifications to Android app, iOS version to follow suit
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/EH7YWaw7IXw/
Nikon's AW1 is the world's first waterproof interchangeable-lens camera (hands on)
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/ZUAnZtHlBS4/
Hands-on with the PlayStation Vita TV, Sony's $100 microconsole
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/MGqeS6IsCAc/
20 Apps That Look Great on iOS 7
via Tech http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/mashable/tech/~3/9LUZV84vwB8/
The Engadget Mobile Podcast is live at midnight ET!
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/wUqp3sFLTh0/
Camera Lens Adjusts Focus Like a Human Eye
via Tech http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/mashable/tech/~3/S0dEzOUFmKI/
Bloomberg: Staples and RadioShack remove Amazon lockers from stores
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/WqpWBkLjdWw/
Sony plans to sell 5 million PlayStation 4 consoles by the end of the year
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/-bvRMSTOVXc/
Live from Sony's Tokyo Game Show 2013 keynote!
via Engadget RSS Feed http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/MWve4pUuePI/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)