Category: Business
New startup looking for copy superstars
Helping out NoteStream and sharing this amazing opportunity to be involved with a hot startup since early Beta.
We’re growing, and looking for the right people to grow with us! We need to hire someone to help convert long form articles to sequential Notes, adding pictures and titles as needed. Strong English, computer and organisational skills are necessary. Hours and location are flexible. Healthy dose of common sense and a good sense of humor recommended. Contact me via LinkedIn or email resume@notestream.com
NoteStream is an iPhone app. We make it easy to learn about the things you’re interested in – think craft beer and the arts – not the heavy lifting of advanced calculus.
Third Substantial Solar Flare in 2 Days | NASA
Time to break out the old book map.
The sun emitted a mid-level solar flare, peaking at 9:59 p.m. EDT on Oct. 21, 2014. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, which is always observing the sun, captured an image of the event. The same active region previously emitted an X1.1 solar flare on Oct. 19. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth’s atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however — when intense enough — they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel.
http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/oct-22-2014-second-substantial-flare-in-two-days/#.VEnSyxnn_qA
Apple’s TV Strategy is About to Get Very Interesting | Analysis & Insight
Is Apple TV going anywhere?
Based on the company’s current strategy, the worldwide installed base of Apple TV devices will be 22.7 million at the end of 2014 and 73.4 million by the end of 2018. Sound OK? Well, not really when you realize that the installed base of tablets at the end of this year will be 427 million, rising to over 1 billion by the end of 2018.
Here are a couple of other trends that put Apple TV in perspective: smartphones and tablets are now the fastest-growing means of accessing and consuming internet TV content, accounting for 54% of program requests for the BBC’s iPlayer service in February 2014 – up from just 17% in January 2012 (in comparison, smart TV sets, gaming consoles and connected Blu-ray players hardly register). Meanwhile, the number of OTT service accounts is sky-rocketing, from nearly 600 million at the end of 2014 to what we project will be over 1.4 billion by the end of 2018.
With those numbers as a backdrop, Apple TV now seems to be moving at a glacial pace. But more than that, it also seems that Apple TV is developing in a vacuum or, to put it another way, it is heading in a direction that is orthogonal to the wider market.
Magic Leap Secures $542M Led By Google For “Lightweight Wearable” Tech That Merges Physical And Digital Worlds
“If you think about what mobile computing is right now, it’s portable, it’s great, and I call it ‘making your hand happy,’ in that you can hold it and it’s great,” Abovitz said. “Your hand is happy, but your eye is not. What I mean by your eye is not happy, if you step outside your office and look at San Francisco Bay, it’s just this visual feast, and there’s no movie theater, there’s no television display, there’s nothing that will ever match the grandeur of what our own brains can create in terms of visual experience.”
Virtual Fitting Room Startup Metail Raises Further $12M — Shunning UK VC Money Along The Way | TechCrunch
That long-term vision, says Adeyoola, is for Metail to become the ‘Google of sizing and shape’. That’s because the startup’s 3D visualisation technology, which enables a clothes shopper to upload a photo and dial in a few basic measurements to create a virtual representation of themselves known as a ‘MeModel’, also creates a lot of data. In addition, a user only has to create ap MeModel once as it’s portable across supporting sites.
YouTube launches Google Preferred to allow advertisers to be paired with the most popular and engaging channels
“These are powerful signals. And in tests we’ve run in the US, ads on Google Preferred channels show significantly higher brand awareness and recall.”
At the event, the company revealed that YouTube viewership is growing at 50 per cent YoY and over one billion fans are coming to YouTube every month.
It was also revealed that 45 per cent of all YouTube content consumed in the UK is watched on a mobile phone or tablet.
Robert Kyncl, head of content and business operations at YouTube said that the platform is “investing heavily to turn YouTube stars and channels like Zoella, Vice News and SlowMoGuys into even bigger household names.”
Zoella, YouTube creator, added: “I think people watch YouTube because they can watch whatever content they want – everything from learning how to apply makeup to changing a hoover bag – and the advice is from real people who they can connect with. We’re normal people and we’re just filming our lives.”
Apple Patent On The NFC Mechanics Of Apple Pay Details Its Inner Workings | TechCrunch
Most of you know I am not an Apple fanboy. I have been a loyal Android user mostly because of the openness and lack of closed walls. Reading this I have to admit Apple nailed it. This patent is so simple and only works in a closed environment. If Apple can displace all the POS operating systems in the next 24 to 48 months I think they will create enough continued demand for their product to just save them from being just another technology company in the wearables space .
Apple has applied for a patent (via AppleInsider) related to its new Apple Pay mobile payment system, and within the document, it goes into detail about how the near field communication between the phone and the payment terminal at participating stores works. Essentially, it explains in more technical and specific terms what Apple talked about on stage at its iPhone 6 event in September, but it’s well worth a closer look, especially as it details some of the things Apple didn’t talk about with much specificity, like how Apple Pay works on accessories like the Apple Watch.
The filing discusses the basics, like how Apple’s new smartphone uses an NFC module to communicate to a merchant’s payment terminal. But it discusses in detail the way the tokenized transfer occurs, whereby shoppers only transfer a special, single-use digital token that the POS system will decode using a shared secret, but at no time does a user’s credit card information ever actually leave the secure enclave contained on the user’s device. That applies to the Apple Watch, too, which also has a secure enclave chip to store payment info.
Thync’s neurosignalling wearable will change your mind — literally | VentureBeat | Business | by Mark Sullivan
Wearable devices are everywhere. Most use sensor technology to measure things your body is or isn’t doing. Another class of devices, like insulin pumps, takes action on the measurement data to change some condition in the body.
One Los Gatos, Calif.-based company, Thync, is developing wearable devices in that second class, but the body part being acted upon is the mind.
The company says its startups use neurosignaling algorithms — waveforms that signal neural pathways — to shift and optimize the wearer’s state of mind in areas related to energy, calm, and focus. Thync says its device taps directly into the user’s brain.
In short, the device sends low-grade electronic or ultrasound signals to the cranial nerves, which send information to the brain. The Thync device can currently send three types of signal: one for calm, one for focus, and one for energy. You can control the type and intensity of the signal using an app on your phone.
Thync represents the consumerization of a technique called transcranial direct-current stimulation (tDCS) that doctors have been using for years to treat depression, head injuries, learning disabilities, and poor memory.
Now it will be used for serving up good vibes.
The company says it has raised $13 million in venture funding from Khosla Ventures since it launched in 2011. “Thync is at the groundbreaking intersection of neuroscience and consumer technology,” said Khosla Ventures’ Samir Kaul in a statement.
Thync was founded by engineering and neuroscience experts from Stanford, Harvard, and MIT. The company says it’s built “a safe, effective, aesthetically designed lifestyle device that anyone can use.”
The wearables market is projected to top more than $7 billion in 2015, with an estimated 300 million wearables to be shipped. Thync says its technology platform comprises neurosignaling algorithms, hardware, software, and biomaterials
http://venturebeat.com/2014/10/08/thyncs-neurosignalling-wearable-will-change-your-mind-literally/
Epson’s Moverio smartglasses: A Google Glass competitor with a point (review) | VentureBeat | Reviews | by Devindra Hardawar
Love to see our client get the well deserved press. This is one determined team!
The big difference between Epson’s and Google’s smartglass attempts is in their philosophical approach. Google wants you to wear Glass all the time to perform much of what you can already do with your smartphone. Epson, on the other hand, is positioning its smartglasses as something you’d wear for specific tasks, such as working with architectural plans or piloting an airplane. (Note that Google Glass developers are also finding that smartglasses work well for specific tasks, such as performing surgery.)
http://venturebeat.com/2014/10/07/epsons-moverio-smartglasses-are-a-google-glass-competitor-with-a-point-review/
Pete Deutschman 