Jul 16
Jul 16
We’ve seen this bot
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Jul 16
Technically, this steerable paper airplane wasn’t designed for making pinpoint attacks on a teacher or college lecturer—more as a highly affordable unmanned aerial vehicle that could be used to blanket a given area with cheap sensors. But clearly the researchers at Queensland University of Technology haven’t realized the full potential of their creation.
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Jul 16
Instagram may not yet have figured out how to make money, but some of its users have.
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Jul 16
The penguin has been getting awfully cozy with game developers lately. This time it’s with the company known to make GPUs melt at the faintest whisper of its name: Crytek. According to a recent job listing, the German shooter shop is looking for a programmer to work on a Linux version of CryEngine. Of course, you need to relocate to Deutschland and have a few years experience in software development under your belt. Seeing another major PC studio devoting resources to the open-source OS only increases the growing momentum for Valve’s Steambox ecosystem of choice. To answer the eternal question, it appears that yes, even the Tux can run Crysis.
Filed under: Gaming
Via: VG 24/7
Source: Crytek
Jul 16
Gesture In The Picture, As Intel Picks Up Omek But PrimeSense Dismisses Apple Acquisition Rumors
Posted in: Today's Chili
Yet more exits for Israeli startups, with the latest two developments a throwback to the hardware and engineering muscle that raised the tech profile of the region in the first place, before the Waze’s of the world got us thinking about Israel as a hotbed of consumer internet companies.
Today, reports leaked out, and we have now confirmed, that Intel has acquired Omek Interactive, a company it had already invested in that makes technology for gesture-based interfaces. At the same time, Israel publication the Calcalist is reporting that Apple is circling around PrimeSense, another developer of gesture-based technology that has been used in Microsoft’s Kinect. Together, the moves could be a sign that gesture-based controls such as those in Microsoft’s Kinect may become even more prevalent.
The Apple/PrimeSense talk, however, appears to be too early, if not altogether inaccurate. The Calcalist’s report notes that this is based around some meetings between the two companies, and that the price for the deal would be around $280 million. But a source at the company described the report as “BS.”
This is “journalist delusion based on unverified and twisted hints,” the source added, also questioning the valuation: “280M? Come on! We’re worth 10 times that. ” Up to now, PrimeSense has raised nearly $30 million from investors that include Gemini Israel Funds, Canaan Partners, Genesis Partners and Silver Lake Partners and bills itself as “giving digital devices the gift of sight.”
Meanwhile, we have contacted Omek, where the person we tracked down on the phone giggled (yes) and then referred us to Intel for any questions.
We have yet to hear back from Intel or investing arm Intel Capital. A post on Harretz notes the deal actually concluded last week. Haaretz has also managed to get a confirmation directly from Intel: “The acquisition of Omek Interactive will help increase Intel’s capabilities in the delivery of more immersive perceptual computing experiences,” the statement says.
Update: Intel has confirmed to me that the transaction has closed. In addition to the same statement it gave Haaretz, an Intel spokesperson added it’s not confirming the value of the deal, and “we are also not disclosing the timelines on future products that integrate this technology.”
The reported value of Intel’s deal for Omek is between $30 million and $50 million. Without actually hearing from Intel on the details, for now there appears to be a few lines of thinking behind why Intel is going beyond being simply a strategic investor. (Omek has raised $13.8 million to date, with $7 million of that coming from Intel Capital.)
The first of these — as explained in a story in VentureBeat, which first reported talks between the two in March of this year — is that Omek may have been in the market to raise more money and that it chose the exit route instead of going it alone.
Another is that Intel wants the technology as part of its bigger moves into 3D visualization and “perceptual computing”, Intel’s catch-all term for gesture, touch, voice, and other AI-style sensory technologies. This is also the subject of a $100 million investment fund Intel launched in April.
And a third is more mundane and cynical, and potentially true regardless of Intel’s wider, more airy ambitions. The blog GeekTime suggests that this is a hardware play: Intel wants Omek for technology that it can embed into chips. The more functionality it can add that will drive new purchases of those chips by device makers, the better:
“The search for worthy power eating technologies to justify the need for yearly chip version upgrades is an integral part of the hardware industries market management strategy,” it writes. “Device companies must be convinced of the need to design their products to support the more expensive vanguard models of the processing world, placing the need for innovation above price point, and even quality in some cases.”
Whether or not the PrimeSense news is accurate, 9to5Mac makes a convincing argument for how the startup’s intellectual property could fit in with other IP at Apple already; and with Apple’s bigger ambitions to develop products that take it further into the living room, specifically with Apple TV.
And that, in the end, seems to be the crux of today’s news as well. However you cut it, and whoever ends up controlling it (in the tech sense), gesture is increasingly coming into focus and will let us get machines to do our bidding with the wave of a hand, or finger, soon.
Jul 16
The Oculus Rift is making waves with virtual reality gaming, and while only developers can get their hands on the new headset, the general public will be able to grab an Oculus Rift for themselves at some point in the future, but at what cost exactly. The developer kit is priced at $300 right now, but the company would love for their product to be free up front.
Speaking with Edge Magazine, Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe says that the company is pondering over different business models with the Rift, including a strategy where gamers wouldn’t have to pay anything up front for the VR headset, but would pay some kind of subscription cost every month or every year.
Iribe notes that “the lower the price point, the wider the audience.” The company has “all kinds of fantasy ideas” and said that they would “love” if the headset wouldn’t cost anything. Iribe says that the Rift definitely won’t be free at the beginning when it first launches to the public, but over time the headset could see a lower and lower subsidized cost.
Iribe also points out that the company is “targeting the $300 price point” with the product’s official launch to the public, which is the price point as the developer kit is right now, but he says that “there’s the potential that it could get much less expensive with a few different relationships and strategies” in the future.
The Oculus Rift raised $2.4 million on Kickstarter last year, and the company recently received $16 million in funding last month from venture capitalists Spark Capital and Matrix Partners in order to fund the Rift’s mass public launch. There’s no official release date for the headset just yet, but we should be expecting it rather soon.
SOURCE: Edge
Oculus Rift aiming for subsidized cost, could be free with subscription is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 16
Jul 16
Lytro has landed in the UK, with the clever light-field camera finally up for sale, though rivals have already begun to circle. The camera, which allows the user to focus on different parts of the frame after the image has been taken, by recording the angles that light hit the sensor, went on sale in the US in early 2012, and was hailed as somewhere between a curiosity and a real advance in photography.
Where normal cameras fix their focus before they shoot a frame, Lytro works on a different principle. Its patented lens and sensor assembly can measure not only the point at which light strikes the CMOS, but the angle at which it hits. By preserving both those elements, Lytro’s software can recalculate the focal point across any point in the image.
In the UK, the 8GB Lytro will be offered at £399, in grey, blue or pink. A second version, in red, will offer 16GB for £469.
Lytro recently released an iOS companion app for the camera and in the process activated its previously-dormant WiFi support. The app supports browsing what photos have been taken by the camera, as well as playing with the adjustable focus from your iPhone’s display, and then sharing the images.
However, the photography market hasn’t stood still since Lytro’s launch. For instance, Bell Labs has been working on a lensless camera that can do similar post-photography editing, while likely more closer to market at Pelican Imaging’s camera array sensors which we’re expecting to show up in Nokia handsets.
Lytro’s camera will go on sale in the UK from July 22.
Lytro camera hits UK as rivals ready their retorts is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Jul 16
AT&T now has the Nokia Lumia 1020 available for preorder. The new phone
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