It’s hard to overstate the impact of digital photography. Over the last two decades, virtually every aspect of how we take, keep and share photos has been transformed. But despite the explosive innovation around digital picture-taking, the end result has actually changed very little. A photo is still a photo. And a poorly focused photo is still as bad as ever.
Ren Ng aims to fix that.
Ng is the founder of Lytro, a Mountain View, CA start-up that has been lauded by tech-obsessed first-adopters and photo enthusiasts alike. The product that has everyone so excited? A compact “plenoptic” digital camera. The camera, a short square-edged tube, uses a unique sensor resembling an insect’s multi-faceted eye to capture “all the light traveling in every direction in every point in space.” Pair the camera with Lytro’s proprietary software, and the result is an image that can be focused and refocused after it’s taken. Use Lytro’s special Flash widget to post that photo on your blog or site and everyone who sees it can focus and refocus on any point in the image. In the words of Wired’s John Bradley — it’s “addictive.”
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Cash, coins and credit cards are so Twentieth Century.
At least, that’s the opinion of the electronics manufacturers, phone companies, banks and credit card issuers that expect cellphones to be the main way consumers pay for purchases in the not-so-distant future.
The trouble is, that vision-of-tomorrow is somewhat blurry, as evidenced at the U.S. cellphone industry trade show held this week in New Orleans. There are a lot of ideas, but little agreement.
The stakes, however, are high.
“Eighty-five percent of the world’s transactions are still made with cash and checks. We have a wonderful opportunity to convert those,” said Gary Flood, MasterCard’s president of global products and solutions, in a keynote speech at the show.
One concept that gets a lot of attention is the “digital wallet” — a virtual repository for our credit card numbers, receipts, coupons. It’s not much different from a PayPal account, which can be linked to different cards. A lot of companies see the wallet as the key to influence in the world of mobile payments, especially if it sits on a cellphone, not just on a PC. Google introduced its Wallet last year. It’s available on a few phones that can be tapped against certain payment terminals to complete a payment.
When I went through security at the Las Vegas airport last week, you could have knocked me over with a feather. The Transportation Security Administration guy told me not to take off my coat, my shoes, my belt, my watch. “Huh?” I said. I reached down to pull my laptop out of my bag. “No, you can leave that in there,” he said.
Baffled, I strolled through. It was an old-style metal detector — not the newer, stand-there-with-your-hands-up whole-body scanner. It was amazing. It was like going through security on Sept. 10, 2001.
“Welcome to TSA PreCheck,” the agent said as I passed.
It wasn’t until I was on the plane, settled in with Wi-Fi, that I could figure out what had happened. At some point, I had opted in to the new TSA PreCheck program, which is being tested with three airlines (American, Delta and Alaska) at 12 airports.
The idea is to offer lighter, faster security to domestic travelers who are known to be safe bets — those who’ve agreed to a background check.
TSA PreCheck is free. All you have to do is opt in. At the moment, only selected frequent fliers are offered this opportunity, which pops up automatically when they visit the airlines’ Web sites. (Here’s the American Airlines page, here’s the Delta one, and here’s the Alaska Airlines page.)
For the rest of the story, check out the NY Times article here: http://nyti.ms/KgmPEa
When her father became ill just before Christmas last year, Dr. Socorrito Baez-Page faced an increasingly common conundrum. Her aging parents wanted to stay in their town house, but her mother couldn’t handle the caregiving alone.
So Dr. Baez-Page, a general practitioner in Alexandria, Va., moved her parents into her home, converting the dining room and TV nook on the main floor into a bedroom. But the four steps down to the bathroom in the split-level home have proved hazardous.
Nobody is happy. “My mother is embarrassed to have to use the commode by her bed at night,” said Dr. Baez-Page. And space for everybody is tight.
The solution? Though many families are often forced to consider nursing homes under these circumstances, the Page family found another option. They ordered a MEDCottage — a prefabricated 12-by-24-foot bedroom-bathroom-kitchenette unit that can be set up as a free-standing structure in their backyard. It’s more than a miniature house — it’s decked out with high-tech monitoring and safety features that rival those of many nursing homes.
The floors, for instance: “It’s got special rubber floors, so even if you fall, you’ll be safe,” noted Dr. Baez-Page’s husband, Dr. David Page. Indeed, according to Kenneth Dupin, a minister and the founder of N2Care, the Virginia company that worked with the Virginia Tech College of Engineering to design the MEDCottage, you can drop an egg from 18 inches onto the special flooring without breaking it.
Video games at bars are nothing new — you can find the occasional trivia game sitting on a bar counter, and arcade games have been in bars for years. But you’ve probably never seen a bar game quite like this: Sega has begun to sell a urinal-mounted video game unit called Toylet in Japan.
The game interfaces with the urinal itself to control the action on the game’s screen, which is mounted at eye level. To play the games, you’ll need stellar aim, not to mention the right amount of pressure and volume.
The Pebble, a watch that is being developed to work with the iPhone, has raised more than $7 million in financing on Kickstarter, a case that has signified the site’s coming of age. http://nyti.ms/Ixx1gj
Power2U– is the ONLY home-safe, UL Listed in-wall product on the market that incorporates two traditional three-prong AC wall sockets along with two USB 3.0/2.0/1.1 ports for charging and/or powering up to four devices at once. From Newer Technology, this easy to install AC/USB outlet eliminates the clutter created by multiple cables and unsightly bulky power adapters. This outlet is also energy efficient with spring-loaded “Safety Shutters” that turn power off to the USB ports to eliminate wasteful “vampire” energy usage. Available in Black, Ivory and Light Almond. The cost is $27.99 or $22.99 each when buying two or more—available at Other World Computing at www.macsales.com/power2u
Rule number one of Facebook’s Hackathon: If you’re new, you must hack!
Facebook in Menlo Park, Calif. staged another Hackathon on Tuesday evening. The event kicked off around 7 p.m. at Facebook’s massive headquarters. During the course of the night, engineers and communications specialists alike will code and create new ideas that could potentially one day be integrated into the Facebook you know and love. If anything, the ideas could at least turn out to be entertaining.
Don’t miss learning about an app that allows you to shoot videos from front and back, a USB wall outlet, some very innovative free apps and a chipmaker that will help allow you to snack all the time and still lose weight.
What’s Wow Now Steve Greenberg, who is also the author of Gadget Nation and the star host of Invention Hunters on the Food Network, is about to do a gadget TV segment on Dr Oz. Steve takes us behind the scenes to show us what most TV viewers never get to see–the Jimmy Fallon Dressing rooms. WOW!!
When I went through security at the Las Vegas airport last week, you could have knocked me over with a feather. The Transportation Security Administration guy told me not to take off my coat, my shoes, my belt, my watch. “Huh?” I said. I reached down to pull my laptop out of my bag. “No, you can leave that in there,” he said.
When her father became ill just before Christmas last year, Dr. Socorrito Baez-Page faced an increasingly common conundrum. Her aging parents wanted to stay in their town house, but her mother couldn’t handle the caregiving alone.
Gadget Nation