Weekly#185

GoPro Inc. on Monday unveiled two new cameras and its first drone and also cloud storage (WSJ)
Pokémon to Create Games for Nintendo’s Next System (WSJ)
Europe Hangs Up on Cross-Border Roaming Fees
European Commission revises its original plan to limit free roaming to 90 days a year (WSJ)
MIT scientists built a device that uses radio waves to detect your true emotions—even when you’re not showing any
The device, which the team is calling EQ-Radio, emits a harmless radio frequency signal. If the waves hit a person in the room, they bounce off, changed very slightly by that person’s breathing and heartbeats. EQ-Radio notes these minute changes in the reflected waves, and uses them to record those vital signs. It does this over and over again, tracking variation in breathing and heart rate. Changes in vital signs like these are often related to how we feel. (QZ)
Apple approached British supercar-maker McLaren to discuss an acquisition or a strategic investment in the firm.(TheVerge)
Google or Salesforce could be about to bid for Twitter
Estimote announces the Mirror, a dongle that turns any TV into a smart beacon system (TechCrunch)
For every 20 nights an employee sleeps seven hours or more, Aetna rewards them with US$25…
Aetna brought in Duke University to study the effectiveness of its wellness program, which also includes better sleep information, yoga, and meditation. CEO Mark Bertolini said he’s seen “69 minutes more a month of [worker] productivity on the part of us just investing in wellness and mindfulness. (WEF)
Expanded Netflix research shows how quickly viewers get hooked to series (TheDrum)
The importance of Branded IP in Cinema
Forecasted Market Trend of Image Sensors
Google’s ‘Show and Tell’ AI can tell you exactly what’s in a photo (almost): System generates captions with nearly 94% accuracy
Allo brings Google’s smarts to messaging (Tech Crunch)
The McKinsey Global Institute’s latest research is optimistic that China’s strategy will succeed. It foresees continued growth in the number and income of urban consumers, and predicts that 700 Chinese cities will generate US$7 trillion, or 30 per cent, of global urban consumption growth between now and 2030.
Netflix’s spooky 12-minute film noir only makes sense to engineers and developers (QZ)
The cultural differences between East and West, according to one artist (QZ)
Stephen Hawking: If aliens call, we should be ‘wary of answering‘
The world’s first hydrogen-powered passenger train is coming to Germany (TheVerge)
Rosetta will crash into comet 67P next week
Here’s how Snapchat’s new Spectacles will work

Weekly#184

Your First 10 Hires Must Be All-Stars (Jackie Xu)
Apple is loading up talent for its push into Google Glass territory (BI)
3 of the biggest Android smartwatch makers aren’t launching new devices this year (LG, Huawei, and Lenovo) (BI)
MIT website makes you decide who a self-driving car should kill in an accident (BI)
Fidget Cube: A Vinyl Desk Toy (Kickstarter)
Machine-Learning Can Read Your EEG and Uncover Your Habits (Futurism)
Canva raises $15 million at a $345 million valuation for its online design tool (VB)
Uber’s Self-Driving Cars Debut in Pittsburgh
Up to 1,000 Uber customers in the city will be part of the first real-world tests for regular people (WSJ)
Apple has fully autonomous vehicles on closed routes, but is rebooting its Car project again (9to5Mac)
Samsung Plans Software Update to Cut Galaxy Note 7 Fire Risk
The software would limit the battery to a 60% charge (WSJ)
Twitter Arrives on Apple TV, Fire TV, Xbox One
Company shifts into video with new app as it seeks to revive user growth (WSJ)
Alexa and Amazon Echo Now Available in the UK and Germany (VB)
The 10 best launch partners for Amazon Echo’s Alexa (Wired UK)
Raspberry Pi just sold its 10 millionth computer (The credit card-sized computer sold 100,000 on the first day it went on sale in 2012) (Wired UK)
Apple is likely to continue making iPhones without headphone jacks, and next year’s iPhone will have a full-screen face with the virtual button built directly into the screen, according to two people at the company who spoke on condition of anonymity because the product details are private. (NYTimes)
Unearth millions of years of natural history in new @GoogleArts exhibit: http://g.co/naturalhistory
Atlas robot adds high-wire balancing to its list of human tricks (Mashable)
The combined revenues of AWS, Microsoft Azure, and GCP are still less than $15B for a market penetration of just 1%-2% of the Total Available Market (TAM).
(Forbes)
Technicians are now using Microsoft Hololens to repair elevators.
Google acquires Urban Engines to bring its location-based analytics to Google Maps (VB)
Germany’s first smart bridge to open next month (RW)
Spotify hits 40 million paying subscribers, up 10 million in 6 months (VentureBeat)
- Spotify, 40 m, Sep 2016
- Apple Music 17 m, Sep 2016
- Pandora 3.9 m, Jun 2016
- Rhapsody, Napster 3.5 m, Dec 2015
- Tidal 3m, Mar 2016
- Deezer 3m, Jun 2015 (Source:Business Insider and Company Announcements)
Tesla Motors has new Autopilot Software, primary information will be derived from radar.
To understand the update, it is important to know how AutoPilot previously worked. A rear-view mirror camera, front bumper radar sensor and 12 ultrasonic sensors developed an image of the car’s surroundings. AutoPilot looked at the image from the camera, to recognize signs, obstacles, and movement and react accordingly.
In AutoPilot 8.0, Tesla has moved the primary information sensor from the camera to radar. The benefits of this move include six times more information per object, ability to work well in fog and heavy rain, and longer range. (ReadWrite)
This pioneering tech company figured how to make work-from-home work (QZ)
Automattic, the maker of WordPress.com
With a staff of 450 spread over 45 countries, Automattic is often regarded as one of the largest and most successful examples of a fully distributed workforce.
Report : Ten Digital Ideas, Oliver Wyman [PDF]
- MOVE AT CLOCK SPEED
  Companies need to behave like digital disruptors | p. 4
- BEWARE OF DIGITAL BUZZ
  What it takes for complex innovations like blockchain
  to work out | p. 6
- SHARE OR SHRIVEL
  Why no business can ignore the rise of the sharing economy | p. 8
- BECOME DIGITALLY LEAN
  German manufacturing is leading a digital industrial revolution | p.10
- BE MODULAR
  A lesson for financial services | p.12
- PREPARE FOR THE NEW DRONE DATA WAVE
  Companies are turning drones into a competitive advantage | p.14
- DON’T JUST DIGITIZE, HUMANIZE
  Companies’ digital futures will depend on emotional bonds as
  much as functional superiority | p.16
- STAY AHEAD OF SMARTER APPS
  Make way for uber-trucking | p.18
- LEARN FROM ONLINE RETAILERS
  Personalized recommendation engines are coming to healthcare | p. 20
- GO TO CYBER EXTREMES
  What to do when digitalization goes wrong | p. 22

Weekly#183

Google to buy cloud software company Apigee for $625 million (Reuters)
Elon Musk calls SpaceX blast a ‘most difficult, complex failure’ (Reuters)
Turning vans into rolling distribution hubs for package-dropping robots could greatly improve the efficiency of delivery networks.( Technology Review)
a16z Podcast: All about Microservices (thx Murat for the link)
Sony announces powerhouse PlayStation 4 Pro and slimmer PS4. More than 43 million PlayStation 4 consoles have been sold to date (WSJ)
Google’s DeepMind makes progress in computer-generated speech (FT)
Researchers usually avoid modelling raw audio because it ticks so quickly: typically 16,000 samples per second or more, with important structure at many time-scales.
When You Change the World and No One Notices (Morgan Housel)
Which Industries Are the Most Digital (and Why)? (HBR)
Twitter launches an Alexa app
Sending a container from Shanghai to Europe costs half what it did in 2014 (Economist)

Apple’s iPhone 7 Event in Under 5 Minutes

The Uber effect: the cost of a New York taxi license has halved in two years
Cassandra keeps growing at Apple, now 115,000+ nodes in production
Smartphones vs Digital Cameras

Weekly#182

The rocket explosion Thursday that destroyed a Facebook Inc. satellite (estimated cost 195 mio USD) marks a significant setback to the social media company’s nascent effort to spread internet access to unconnected parts of the world. (WSJ)
When a Commercial Rocket Blows Up, Who Pays?
#IoT revenues still less than 1.5% of revenue for even the most advanced telcos.
Google suspends Project Ara (Modular Smartphone)
Samsung recalls Galaxy Note 7 phones after battery fires
BlackBerry teams with Samsung for ‘spy-proof’ tablet for Germany
Alibaba’s Tech-Hub Hometown Hosts the World’s Leaders
10 Free Data Visualization Tools
Spotify Can’t Live on $10 a Month
Amazon Dash one-button device arrives in Britain
Ship Operators Explore Autonomous Sailing
Google Takes on Uber With New Ride-Share Service
An Algorithm to Predict a Bestseller (5000 books, 30 years, 2800 features, %80 accuracy)
Rocket Internet Loss Widens Following Write-Downs
Why Utility Poles are so important to the future of the Internet
Several scientists familiar with Google’s progress, including Devitt, suggest that a functioning 50-qubit quantum chip, enough to overpower conventional supercomputers at a certain kind of calculation, could be ready by as soon as the end of 2017.
Short URLs Considered Harmful for Cloud Services
How to fill out security questions.
Stanford : One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence (2016 Report)
One-word article in Friday’s New York Times
Electric cars in : 2009: ~6,000 2015: ~1.2 Mn