Iphones secretly tracking users without knowing.

Based on the discussion in class, it is very scary to be tracked by strangers without knowing. If you have an iphone or want one soon, how do you feel about your locations being stored as data where anyone can access it? And maybe your home being one of those locations? Researchers found that there is a hidden tracking file in the iphone that I am guessing users were not suppose to know about it. The researchers who found the tracking file posted it online and you can now see where all the locations you have been since you got the phone! SCARY right?
"Cell phone providers collect similar data almost inevitably as part of their operations, but it's kept behind their firewall. It normally requires a court order to gain access to it, whereas this is available to anyone who can get their hands on your phone or computer, "By passively logging your location without your permission, Apple have made it possible for anyone from a jealous spouse to a private investigator to get a detailed picture of your movements."

This is so scary.. and it invades privacy!

"This is a map of everywhere I've been for the last months. Everywhere," he writes on that tech site. "I didn't carry around a tracking device. The FBI isn't sending goons in unmarked vans to track me. All I did was use an iPhone."

source: CNN

General Mills can't get the kids attention

According to the New York Times, kids are unaffected by the ads they are seeing on websites. The Banner ads that have interactive games as a way to draw attention to them are going unnoticed. Sure the kids still play the game but can they tell you who or whats its for? A study showed out of 112 kids only 10% of the kids were able to identify what the brand was in an ad. 34% of the kids thought a celebrity had created the ad.


http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/children-fail-to-recognize-online-ads-study-says/?ref=technology

Library in the palm of your hands

Looks like driving to the library to check out books are going to be in the past, the kindle is starting to take charge and allow users to check out books through a service called "Library Lending". Not only that, but it will allow you to take your own notes on while using the book on your kindle such as margin notes and highlighting text. This can be a big help to the more frequent library users, as well as users in general because the worry that a certain book you want is currently checked out is no longer a problem.

Source Article:

http://digitallife.today.com/_news/2011/04/21/6506792-soon-youll-check-out-kindle-books-from-your-library

Excuse me waiter? Can I use your tablet?

Today I found an article that talks about a company called E la Carte that is starting to introduce the usage of tablets in restaurants that would ultimately replace the need for a waiter. I find this to be pretty interesting because the tablet would offer customers an easy way at ordering food, paying the bill, and keeping them entertained while waiting for the food. It is a smart way to keep service going at restaurants by eliminating the middleman, and there are dozens of times I remember waiting around for the check. Having these tablets would allow me to pay and leave almost as soon as I finished eating. However, this does kind of kill the social aspect of going out to eat, where you get to have a light conversation with the waitress or converse with your friends instead of staring at a tablet playing video games.

Source Article:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/innovation/04/20/server.tablet.mashable/index.html

yellowBird: 360 degree video

I stumbled upon (literally. I used the application "StumbleUpon" to find this) a very interesting video recently. It advertises what a company called "yellowBird" uses: 360 degree, panoramic video. Basically, it looks like a pretty basic youtube video of a snowboarder at first, but when you click it and actually load the video, it becomes something much more. It is a 360 (count em, three hundred and sixty) degree video recording where you can literally click and drag all around the perspective of the camera.

The video starts off with the camera-man simply standing at the top of the mountain for a few seconds to, I presume, get the viewer familiar with the click and drag mechanism. Then, it cuts to daytime where a bunch of snowboarders immediately come into the picture. You can click and drag and keep track of one snowboarder if you'd like, or move the perspective to see all the other snowboarders doing their tricks and antics, or you can even just face forward and admire the mountains in the far background. This type of video really is quite revolutionary, and it makes viewing the ride down a mountain very fun by creating an interactive way to watch the video!

The official yellowBird website is a very simple site where it basically has some little information pieces on it. It looks like yellowBird is a company that will come and film events using their 360 degree technology. They don't elaborate much on how the video camera(s) work, but with my handy-dandy google gadget I was able to break their silence and figure out that the company uses a 6-lens camera that is much like what the Google Street-view cars are equipped with.

I think that this technology is a really interesting idea. Basically, any computer that has Adobe flash can play the videos and watch from whichever angle they choose. I can see it being extremely useful at sporting events or anything that is extremely mobile. The snowboarding video is a great example of it being used.

The official yellowBird website is at: http://www.yellowbirdsdonthavewingsbuttheyflytomakeyouexperiencea3dreality.com/

Quite a long URL.

I think the company is doing some interesting stuff with the technology. I'm interested to see this sort of thing used more widespread in the future at large-scale events and become more accessible to the public. The website has a cool looking feature that notifies you of yellowBird's LIVE demos, which I can only assume would be a 6-lens camera set up at some sort of event where people can live stream and view it, which would be incredibly cool.

At the moment it doesn't seem like there are any other companies that are offering this sort of service, but I imagine in the near future more will pop up and maybe even a consumer product that allows people to make these videos on their own. Now that would be something!

Speak No Evil

A team of UK scientists has developed a headset that can bring voices back to those who have lost their speech due to injury, cancer, stroke, and other maladies. The prototype uses magnets positioned in the user's mouth or tongue to take the place of low-tech solutions like throat valves, which have the tendency to get clogged. When the subject speaks, changes to the magnets' movements are detected by the device, which associates specific facial movements with corresponding words (the device currently has a vocabulary of about 50). The device is still not completed yet, but the developers are working to make it the size of a Bluetooth headset.

U.S. Military Chooses Android

The Defense Department has just chosen the Android phone to develop an app for "use in tactical operations by the U.S. Army and the Marine Corps". Weighing two pounds, the Joint Battle Command-Platform (JBC-P Handheld) is going to essentially become an android phone for the military. By entering information of an enemy that has been spotted, the information will be transfered to the other team and warn them, as well as giving them all the information. "We're trying to set this program up so that it can rapidly adapt and maintain relevance to the current warfighting generation," Daniels said.

Link:
http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Army-Marine-Corps-Android-Phone,news-10946.html