September 20, 2016
U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has introduced new
federal guidelines for the emerging highly automated vehicle industry --
including self-driving and semi-autonomous vehicles -- creating a
framework that will help drive one of the most important new sectors in
the national economy. Foxx was joined by Mark Rosekind, administrator of
the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
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Oracle Does the Cloud Dance September 19, 2016 
Sunday's Oracle OpenWorld keynotes were good -- especially compared
with prior years -- but they still suffered from the perennial problem
of trying to stuff too much content into a two-hour event. Diane Bryant,
SVP at Intel and a big Oracle partner, spent an hour covering a very
broad landscape. Perhaps the most interesting information in Bryant's
presentation concerned Intel's new line of chips.
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Steam Blows Off Aggrieved Indie Dev September 19, 2016 
Independent video game developer Digital Homicide Studios on Monday
posted a response to its ban from Valve's digital distribution platform
Steam. Valve banned the development studio this weekend, after Digital
Homicide reportedly initiated legal action against 100 users who had
posted negative reviews of its games. Digital Homicide accused the users
of cyberbullying and other offenses.
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Samsung Troubles Deepen Following Formal CPSC Action September 19, 2016 
The Consumer Product Safety Commission and Samsung last week
announced a formal voluntary recall of about 1 million Galaxy Note7
smartphones, after the high-end flagship device was found to have
overheated or caught fire in at least 92 incidents. Samsung was notified
of 26 cases of people being burned by the defective 5.7-inch
smartphones and 55 cases of property damage, according to the CPSC.
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Why Russian Hackers Are Doing the US a Favor September 19, 2016 
Colin Powell's hacked email once again showcases that what people
in office tell us and what they actually think are two very different
things. Politicians work for us -- we are supposedly their employers.
Yet we seem to know far less about what they do and think than what we
need to know in order to vote intelligently. Powell's comments are
actually far more damaging to Clinton than Trump.
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New Apple Products Have the Right Gaming Stuff September 17, 2016 
Apple wants to attract gaming fans to the more powerful graphics
and processing power embedded in its new iPhone 7 and Apple Watch Series
2 products. The iPhone 7 features the new A10 Fusion chip -- the most
powerful ever in a smartphone, according to the company. The CPU fuses
two high-performance cores that run twice as fast as the iPhone 6 with
much more efficient use of battery power.
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Google Pursues Both Fiber and Wireless Broadband Ambitions September 16, 2016 
Google Fiber is reaching its tentacles into North Carolina's
Research Triangle, a move that seems to contradict the gloom-and-doom
rumors of layoffs and low consumer interest. The Triangle is Google
Fiber's eighth incursion. It's already available in Atlanta; Austin,
Texas; Charlotte, North Carolina; Kansas City, Kansas and Missouri;
Nashville, Tennessee; Provo, Utah; and Salt Lake City.
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Sony Kicks The Last Guardian Down the Road Again September 16, 2016 
The first wave of previews for SIE's long-in-development video game epic The Last Guardian
appeared following a demo at the Tokyo Game Show earlier this week, and
reactions were mixed. Much of the coverage of this PS4 game, first
announced at E3 in 2007, has focused on its long development process and
delays. It originally was to be a follow-up to Fumito Ueda's Shadow of the Colossus.
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Udacity Fuels Autonomous Vehicle Engineering Dreams September 15, 2016 
Online education company Udacity on Tuesday introduced a new
"nanodegree" program in self-driving auto engineering. President
Sebastian Thrun made the announcement. The goal is to build a
crowdsourced, open source self-driving car, he said. Students will learn
the skills and techniques used by self-driving car teams at the most
innovative companies in the world, Udacity has promised.
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Arya.ai's Braid Aims to Weave Together Neural Network Components September 13, 2016 
Startup Arya.ai on Monday introduced Braid, an open source tool
available for free to companies developing neural networks. Braid is a
flexible, customizable, modular meta-framework that works with operating
systems for deep learning, according to the company. It is designed for
rapid development and to support arbitrary network designs. It is
simple and scalable, Arya.ai said.
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Bezos Trots Out New Glenn Rocket Design September 13, 2016 
Jeff Bezos on Monday disclosed details about the New Glenn rockets
his Blue Origin aerospace company plans to build. "Blue Origin's next
step ... meet New Glenn," he tweeted. Bezos released illustrations of
two models, the New Glenn 2 and the larger New Glenn 3. They're larger
than all other rockets except the Saturn V, which NASA used for the
Apollo program to send astronauts to the moon and other missions.
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Facebook's Sandberg Expresses Regret Over Deletion of Historic Vietnam War Photo September 12, 2016 
COO Sheryl Sandberg has acknowledged that Facebook was wrong to
delete posts showing an iconic image of a naked girl fleeing a napalm
attack during the Vietnam war. The admission came in a letter to
Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg. Facebook last week repeatedly
deleted the Pulitzer Prize-winning photo, "The Terror of War," on
grounds that it violated its nudity restrictions.
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How China Could Take Over the World's Tech and Automotive Markets September 12, 2016 
Nvidia and Baidu recently made an announcement with regard to
self-driving cars that deserves closer attention. China currently is
behind the U.S. in automotive technology, but it has passed the U.S. and
Japan in automobile production -- I actually thought Japan was still
ahead. China is producing twice the number of cars the U.S. is producing
right now.
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Dreaming Up Einstein September 10, 2016 
Salesforce isn't waiting for Dreamforce to begin the drumbeat over
its AI offering called "Einstein." There is so much to discuss about
this turn of events that it's hard to begin, so rather than starting at a
conventional jumping-off point I'll start with the name. You couldn't
have lived at any point in the 20th century and not have some idea of
who Albert Einstein was.
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Apple Puts Its User-Friendly Stamp on Fancy iPhone 7 Cameras September 9, 2016 
Apple raised the ante for cameras in flagship phones with the
announcement of its iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. Others already have
taken the dual-camera approach to smartphone photography -- notably HTC,
LG and Huawei. "While it's not the first dual camera mounted in a
smartphone, it's on par with the others in terms of basic
functionality," said Brian Blau, a research director for Gartner.
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Sony's PS4 Pro Gets the Jump on 4K, HDR TVs September 8, 2016 
Sony on Wednesday officially unveiled the powered-up PlayStation 4
Pro, which features smoother graphics, thanks to higher frame rates.
This new version of Sony's bestselling video game console includes
support for 4K resolution and high dynamic range, making it fully
compatible with 4K/UHD displays. Some developers will add PS4 Pro
support to existing games, as well as upcoming releases.
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Apple Hopes iPhone 7 Extras Will Make Up for Missing Headphone Jack September 8, 2016 
Apple CEO Tim Cook on Wednesday officially unveiled the iPhone 7
and iPhone Plus, confirming a rumor that has evoked widespread dread:
The traditional headphone jacks are gone. The new iPhones are sleeker
than their predecessors, though, as well as water resistant. Their
biggest plus might be the advanced lenses in what Apple claims is the
most sophisticated smartphone camera in the world.
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Google's Russian Android Appeal Falls Flat September 7, 2016 
A Russian appeals court has rejected Google's appeal of a $6.75
million fine regulators imposed for anticompetitive behavior -- that is,
for forcing mobile device vendors to put Google Play apps on the main
screens of devices using the Android operating system. The Ninth
Arbitration Appeal Court handed down its ruling last month, confirming
the decision of Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service.
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Gadget Ogling: Smart Desks, New-Wave Gaming, and Roaming Routers September 7, 2016 
After a long, laborious process and a lot of scraping paint
splotches from the floor, the office space in my new apartment is ready
for me, and I will soon no longer need to write this column from my
kitchen table. So, I'm in the market for a desk.
With my nascent interest in standing desks, the Gaze Desk seems a decent
option. It switches between standing and seated modes with a button
press.
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Nvidia, Baidu Team on Cloud-to-Car AI Platform September 1, 2016 
Nvidia and Baidu have agreed to collaborate on the incorporation of
artificial intelligence in a cloud-to-car autonomous vehicle platform,
Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang said Wednesday. The companies plan to
integrate Baidu's cloud platform and mapping technology with Nvidia's
self-driving computing platform. They also will work together to create
solutions for high-definition maps.
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Echo Owners May Get Their Own Kind of Music September 1, 2016 
Amazon is planning two music subscription services, according to
rumors that began circulating last week. One is a $10 a month offering
that is similar to Spotify and Apple Music, and the other is a $4-$5 a
month cut-rate service available only on Amazon's Echo device. Amazon
reportedly wants to launch both in September, but it has yet to finalize
deals with major music labels and publishers.
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Intel's Kaby Lake Chip Promises Deeper Internet Immersion August 31, 2016 
Facing a shrinking market for personal computers and a stalled
market for tablets, Intel on Tuesday unveiled its 7th-generation
processors, code-named "Kaby Lake," which deliver more speed and power
than its 6th-generation chipsets, while improving battery efficiency.
Intel has positioned the new Kaby Lake chipsets as ideal for the
immersive Internet.
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Europe Duns Apple for $14.5B in Illegal Tax Breaks August 31, 2016 
The European Union on Tuesday nailed Apple with a $14.5 billion
bill for back taxes. "The European Commission has today has adopted a
decision that Apple's tax benefits in Ireland are illegal," said EC
Competition Chief Margrethe Vestager. Tax breaks Ireland granted to
Apple for more than two decades artificially reduced Apple's tax burden,
in breach of European Union rules, she explained.
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HPE, HP Sued for Elbowing Out Older Employees August 30, 2016 
HPE and HP are facing a potential class action lawsuit brought
earlier this month by four former employees. The companies engaged in
widespread age discrimination during a restructuring of the legacy
computer and printer manufacturer, according to their complaint. HP from
2012 to 2015 made a series of discriminatory job cuts involving tens of
thousands of workers, the suit alleges.
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Snazzier Fitbits Sport Beefed-Up Feature Sets August 30, 2016 
Fitbit on Monday announced two new fitness trackers with sleeker
looks, more durable construction and greater data-gathering
capabilities. The Fitbit Charge 2, priced at $149.95, features
continuous heart-rate tracking. It uses the data to generate a cardio
fitness score and provides guidance for improving it over time. The
Charge 2 displays real-time exercise stats.
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American Breaks People August 30, 2016 
It's easy to lose sight of people in a CRM discussion, focusing
instead on the great technology and what it does under optimum
circumstances. We should keep the customer in mind at all times,
however, for without them what are we? Forgetting the customer is
dangerous both for customers and vendors in this social age. Far from
being a universal good, automation can obstruct human interactions.
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Amazon Sets Up New Auto Research Shop August 25, 2016 
Amazon on Thursday launched Amazon Vehicles, a research and
community site that will let users compare new and used cars, and shop
for auto parts, among other things. The site will let customers view
everything from specs, images, videos and customer reviews of thousands
of brand new to classic vehicles, potentially offering stiff competition
to Edmunds, Kelley Blue Book and Autotrader.com.
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Einstein to Make Dreamforce Appearance August 25, 2016
Salesforce plans to unveil Einstein, an artificial intelligence
product, at next month's Dreamforce 16. Einstein integration will give
Salesforce's sales, service, marketing, collaboration and e-commerce
products predictive suggestion and insights capabilities. It will serve
as a new nerve system across the entire business. AI is key to
Salesforce's future, CEO Marc Benioff has emphasized.
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Gadget Ogling: Musical Pizza Boxes, Backup Backpacks, and Tattooing Robots August 25, 2016 
Call it a gimmick, but I'm very much into the idea of having a
pizza box that doubles as a turntable. Pizza Hut partnered with Novalia
to make the box, which includes pitch and volume controls, a mixer, and
touch-sensitive decks. Using printed electronics, DJs can crossfade,
rewind and even scratch. The box pairs with smartphones and computers
using Bluetooth and works with DJ software.
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In a Political Season August 24, 2016 
Many, if not most, people I know don't want to talk about it -- the
election, that is. Lots of them have views but they don't want to share
them, based on a dislike of contentiousness. Who likes conflict? There
is an article floating around the Internet that I lost track of that
says nobody's mind ever changes in a heated debate about something so
vital, so why engage?
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