Friday, 27 May 2016

Google quietly discontinues the Nexus Player

nexus-player The Nexus Player may have been the best TV media player no one ever bought. Google and Asus introduced the Nexus Player back in November 2014. It was one of the first Android TV devices, and a more-than-capable device. And yet, despite Google’s weight behind this device, it hasn’t been a mainstream success, especially when you compare it with the Chromecast. Read More

Heavy Internet use leads to school burnout in teens

Teens As if you didn’t need more proof that your darn kids need to get off the computer and into the back yard, researchers at the University of Helsinki and Department of Psychology have found that excessive Internet use — essentially bordering on addiction — leads to school burnout in teens. There isn’t much detail on the definition of excessive use (you’ll know it… Read More

Terrapattern is reverse image search for maps, powered by a neural network

culdesacs Terrapattern is a visual search engine that, from the moment you first use it, you wonder: Why didn’t Google come up with this 10 years ago? Click on a feature on the map — a baseball diamond, a marina, a roundabout — and it immediately highlights everything its algorithm thinks looks like it. It’s remarkably fast, simple to use and potentially very powerful. Read More

Nuheara’s IQbuds are somewhere between wireless headphones and a hearing aid

Nuheara I went into the Nuheara demo not knowing what to expect. Not in the sense of, “How good will these be?” so much as, “I’m not exactly sure what these things do.” Like, are they headphones? Are they hearing aids? The answer, interestingly enough, is a little bit of both. The IQbuds are, ostensibly, Bluetooth earbuds. That they’re completely wireless is enough… Read More

Dish ships the HopperGo, a tiny little cloud player for TV on the run

IMG_0990 Originally announced at CES in January, the minuscule HopperGo is a 64GB USB drive with a built in wireless access point. The little device connects to your Dish Hopper 3 or Hopper 2 – essentially Dish’s DVR – and sucks down up to 100 hours of TV. You can then unplug the little bugger and watch for four hours on one charge through the Dish Anywhere app. When I first pulled… Read More

Netatmo launches new platform to make smart objects talk to each other

Camera HD-(mur bois)-RVB French startup Netatmo just introduced a new developer platform called Netatmo Connect so that developers can build software and hardware integrations with Netatmo products. Netatmo sells weather stations, thermostats, indoor and outdoor cameras. The startup raised $32 million in November 2015. It's interesting Read More

How ready is the Internet for IoT?

Internet of Things IOT We’re currently witnessing rapidly expanding product launches and sky-high elevated expectations from the emerging deployment of the Internet of Things in both personal and commercial domains. Stakeholders — ranging from hardware manufacturers and service providers to cloud platforms — are vigorously weighing in to position their offerings in anticipation of windfall rewards… Read More