How augmented and virtual reality will reshape the food industry

 Augmented reality content can be found on everything from wine bottles to IKEA’s catalog and virtual reality experiences are much more detailed, with rich layers of interactivity from hand controllers to gaze triggers, and a VR film has even won an Oscar. With Apple and Google both debuting augmented reality platforms (ARKit and ARCore, respectively), Facebook heavily invested in its… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Julian Assange’s Twitter account goes offline, returns

 It’s a Christmas miracle of sorts. Julian Assange’s Twitter account disappeared from the site, returned, and now there’s a bouncing baby Corgi up top. The account appears to have gone offline around 7:00/8:00PM ET on Christmas Eve, a silent night for the Wikileaks founder. Attempts to access the page overnight were met with a “Sorry, that page doesn’t… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Using drones to build the ambulance fleet of the future

 It’s that time of year again. Sleigh bells overhead and our jolly, bearded benefactor wafting gifts down the chimney to eagerly awaiting hands. We’ve heard every version of this tale. Except, perhaps, the variant that is currently playing out in East Africa. In the funny way that magic tales and science fiction sometimes become reality, if you swap out sleigh bells for… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Vice founders apologize for allowing a “boy’s club” culture at the company

 Vice Media founders Shane Smith and Suroosh Alvi say they are “truly sorry” for not doing enough to stop inappropriate behavior at the company. In a public statement issued shortly before The New York Times published an article on Saturday that described multiple accounts of sexual misconduct by Vice employees, Smith, its chief executive officer, and Alvi said they are taking… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Edward Snowden’s new app turns any Android phone into a surveillance system

 NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden is among the backers of a new surveillance app that helps guard against computer hijackings. Haven is an open source app that will run on any Android phone, particularly inexpensive and older devices. It operates like a surveillance system, using the device’s camera, audio recording capability and even accelerometer to detect movement and notify a user.… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Quiet

 he trip began just before the end of school. From the wood-shaving smell of third grade out into the clean fall air, sprung free by my mother who appeared at the little window in the classroom door like a treat. You were the one who got out early. You were the one walking down an empty hall toward the big triple doors of the school.
We were leaving school to drive to my grandmother’s house. Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

The AI chip startup explosion is already here

Business man in front of a huge screen with overlay of digital bric-a brac. All eyes may have been on Nvidia this year as its stock exploded higher thanks to an enormous amount of demand across all fronts: gaming, an increased interest in data centers, and its major potential applications in AI.
But while Nvidia’s stock price and that chart may have been one of the more eye-popping parts of 2017, a year when AI continued its march toward being omnipresent in… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Ted Chiang is a genius, but he’s wrong about Silicon Valley

 Ted Chiang isn’t just one of the greatest science-fiction writers alive — he’s one of the greatest writers alive full stop. Which is why I was so saddened and disappointed by his recent excoriation of Silicon Valley in BuzzFeed. As the tech industry grows ever more powerful, we need brilliant minds critiquing and dissecting its many flaws. Instead we got a trenchant takedown of… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Saudi Arabia’s TechUtopia Neom will have to reinvent the rules to succeed

 Saudi Arabia’s legal environment is currently built for an economy that no longer exists, and a social world that most of the planet has left behind. The dream of Neom should be for a bridge to the legal world that can sustain a better life for all Saudis, and a case study of how a reinvented legal infrastructure – propelled by new technology – can be the capstone for a… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch

Theranos gets $100 million in debt financing to carry it through 2018, with some caveats

 Theranos has secured $100 million in debt financing. Yes, someone gave the blood testing company known for handing out questionable test results money.
First reported by Business Insider, the company reportedly told investors it had secured the money from Fortress Investment Group, a New York-based private equity firm that was acquired by Softbank earlier this year.
Of course, this is debt… Read More


Source: Tech Crunch