Wednesday, 30 November 2016

Snapchat’s Spectacles go on sale via Minion-like vending machines

snap-spectacle-machine-light1 Snapchat’s Spectacles are arriving starting today, and they’ll be available to buy via pop-up vending machines that look almost trademark infringingly like Minions. The so-called Snapbots will dispense Spectacles in either Black, Coral or Teal starting today, letting you first try them on virtually via an integrated AR display. Snapbot accepts debit or credit cards, and will… Read More

A robot can solve a Rubik’s Cube in 637 milliseconds

screen-shot-2016-11-10-at-8-44-32-am A robot called the Sub1 Reloaded can unscramble a Rubik’s Cube in 637 milliseconds – considerably less than the fastest human time of 4.9 seconds. The robot, built by self-driving chipmaker Infineon, uses six motors to turn and twist the cube after another computer scans it, solves the puzzle virtually. The arms quickly begin to move the cube into a solved position. The robot is… Read More

The Yale Real Living Assure Lock is just the thing to thwart lock-picking zombies

screen-shot-2016-11-10-at-9-09-09-am The first thing you’ll notice about the Yale Real Living Assure Lock is that it has no keyhole. There is no backup key, no physical keypad, and it looks like something that you’d mount on the outside of the Enterprise so Chekov can get back in after attaching a “Shatner/Nimoy ’74” bumper sticker to the right rear engine. The $199 lock, which is Yale’s… Read More

How long until Facebook Frames?

Summer portrait of happy afro american young woman wearing summer clothes and sunglesses, standing against blue background and laughing at camera. Snapchat’s Spectacles are already causing huge lineups and mild millennial frenzy in LA now that they’re on sale via super-exclusive Snapbot vending machines. It’s almost inevitable that Facebook copies this, too, so gird your nose bridge for Facebook Frames. Here’s our exclusive (and very fake) early preview of their promo site copy, which unsurprisingly looks a lot… Read More

What it’s like to use Snapchat Spectacles

snap-spectacle-2 Snap’s Spectacles are having a spectacular debut today, with (at least) hundreds of people lining up at their first Snapbot pop-up vending machine location in Venice Beach. We got the chance to speak to a few of those lucky enough to have grabbed some today, and they told us what it’s like to use the clip capturing face wear. Jameson Detweiler, co-founder and CEO of AR startup… Read More

Photos in Daydream VR offers a powerful trip down memory lane

daydream-view-1 I’ve resolved to take a lot more panorama images from now on, and Daydream View is the reason why. Google’s new mobile VR headset, which makes it possible to use Daydream VR in Android 7.1 on the Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones, is an easy and enjoyable way to try out virtual reality, and its most powerful feature might be your boring old photo library. We’ve already… Read More

Startups, join TechCrunch at CES in Hardware Battlefield

robot-hardware-battlefield-469x266 CES is loud, obnoxious and just too big. It will shave years off your life. I love it. And if you’re a hardware startup, you probably love it too. We’re looking for startups to compete in Hardware Battlefield, where 24 companies will battle for a $50,000 check, a robot trophy and the chance to rise above the noise as the champion of Hardware Battlefield. Apply here. Hardware… Read More

Gadget Story Time with EPIKGO hoverboard

I have a love-hate relationship with hoverboards. They make me happy when I ride them but they suck to fall off of lol. The other day I saw a guy carrying his newborn baby while riding a hoverboard and I started having a minor anxiety attack. EPIKGO sent me their hoverboard to try out and they couldn’t have picked a more qualified and handsome person. At one point I had my own… Read More

DJI says it’s learned its lessons from the Mavic Pro delay

DJI Mavic Pro Timing is everything. And for DJI, the timing for the Mavik Pro, the stars seemed to align perfectly. A couple of weeks after GoPro’s big unveil, the company had a folding drone of its own that was smaller and more feature packed that the Karma. And, in spite of being late to the announcement part, DJI announced that it would be first to market with its device – a decided bonus of… Read More

Kickstarter smash hit INSTRUMENT 1 from Artiphon is now available to buy

stick-music Take a Chapman Stick, add a lot of tech in its belly and jam a USB cable up its jacksie and you get something that looks vaguely like an INSTRUMENT 1. It’s a completely new type of musical instrument developed by Artiphon. Funded through a seven-figure Kickstarter campaign, the instrument is shipping now, and we can’t wait to see what people will be creating with it. Read More

Tuesday, 29 November 2016

Tesco Bank halts online banking after weekend hacker fraud

Tesco Bank halts online banking after thousands of current account customers were hit by fraudulent transactions by hackers at the weekend

Monday, 28 November 2016

Welsh government earmarks £80m for new broadband scheme

The Welsh Government is planning to invest up to £80m to extend its broadband roll-out across the entire country by 2020

Security Think Tank: Back up risk assessment with broker advice on cyber insurance

What should organisations consider if they are to prepare for cyber insurance?

Oracle consummates acquisition of NetSuite, eyes $1bn cloud revenue

$9.3bn acquisition is in line with Oracle’s avowed move to cloud as a delivery mode for its business applications

Apple garners local support for Irish datacentre as legal challenge looms

Residents of Athenry, County Galway, unite to back Apple’s Irish datacentre plans as consumer electronics giant awaits High Court decision on legal challenge

Newcastle United implements software to understand Toon Army better

Football club’s marketing teams are using data analysis software to give them a better picture of what supporters like off the field

Wednesday, 16 November 2016

HPE: The UK business one year after split

The headlines say one thing, but Marc Waters, UK and Ireland managing director of Hewlett Packard Enterprise, is confident CEO Meg Whitman’s strategy is paying off

Gartner Symposium: CIOs should build a digital platform

Gartner’s Barcelona Symposium opened with the familiar themes of reinvention and evolution. The difference this year is Uber-like business models

The transformation of Randstad’s IT infrastructure

Digitisation is one of the key themes in Randstad's latest financial report, with the transformation of its IT infrastructure a fundamental step in achieving this

Google cloud platform heats up the cloud market in Asia

Google is set to inject more life into the Southeast Asian cloud market with new products and local datacentres

Tesco Bank theft shows need to take cyber security more seriously

Tesco Bank compromise should act as a wake up call to UK businesses to take cyber security more seriously, say security experts

Tuesday, 15 November 2016

SSE Enterprise Telecoms doubles network footprint in Capita deal

SSE Enterprise Telecoms set to expand national Ethernet connectivity service for business customers, while Capita and Updata get additional strength for outsourcing projects

Security Think Tank: Cyber insurance a great complement to good security practice

What should organisations consider if they are to prepare for cyber insurance?

European agencies seek to bolster co-operation on cyber crime

Fifth annual joint workshop seeks to foster better co-operation between national cyber incident response teams and law enforcement agencies to establish a network to discuss topics of mutual interest

AWS shares datacentre security secrets to inspire more enterprise cloud adoption

CISO says there is no need to sacrifice security to pursue innovation in the cloud, as he reveals how the cloud giant safeguards customer information in its datacentres

BT boosts broadband speeds for SME and consumer customers

Telco is increasing the broadband speeds it makes available for small businesses and consumer customers using its fibre-to-the-premises network

Will computer vision help France take a lead in AI?

There are signs that France could become a centre for artificial intelligence research and development

Human-machine teaming key to cyber defence, says Intel Security

Intel Security is working with a select group of customers on developing systems to enable human-machine teaming to get the best of both worlds in applying cyber threat intelligence

ANZ bank puts cloud expert in leading IT role

Australian bank has recruited another senior executive from the IT supplies sector to support its digital developments

Samsung will release a software update to stop unreturned Note 7s from charging above 60%

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 This morning Samsung announced that it was issuing a voluntary recall to address some 700-plus reports of malfunctioning top-loading washing machines, including one very unfortunate case of a broken jaw. It was the cherry on top of what has already been a rough few months for the hardware giant, driven mostly by the prolonged saga of the Galaxy Note 7. Heading into the weekend, the… Read More

How to facilitate the path to brownfield IoT development

iot internet of things city As the Internet of Things evolves toward becoming one of the fastest expanding sectors in the tech industry, a lot of focus is being given to greenfield development, the process of creating new devices from scratch. The greater potential lies in brownfield development, the integration of connectivity and data collection into things and designs that already exist. Read More

Monday, 14 November 2016

The new 64-bit Orange Pi is a quad-core computer for $20

orangepipc2_info Need a teeny tiny computer that can run Android or Linux? Only have $20? Well you’re in luck. When we first met the Orange Pi (get it?) the company was selling a nice Raspberry Pi clone for $15. Now they’re selling a souped up version with all the trimmings. The board includes an Ethernet port and three USB ports. It has 1GB of memory, H5 High Performance Quad-core 64-bit… Read More