IOT Hot Tub

Buying a hot tub for Christmas? ....is it connected to the internet?


- https://www.pentestpartners.com/security-blog/hackers-in-hot-water-pwning-smart-hot-tubs-yes-really/

Tesla AR patent

How the heck can Tesla secure a patent for what amounts to a “right mouse click” for context in AR
https://next.reality.news/news/tesla-files-patent-for-ar-manufacturing-tool-elon-musk-talks-factory-innovation-weed-sec-fine-60-minutes-0191217/

Talks about obvious…… (admittedly I think its ridiculous any article can be written about patents without quoting the patent number being referred to…..but I know they don’t teach good journalism in schools anymore…).

Unicorns in 2018

I looked at this graphic and thought…..how is Soundhound a unicorn??? As a long time user I cant even understand their business model.

More at

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-11-16/startup-bubble-derivative-stock-market-bubble

ICO article in the SMH

The problem with articles like this is it doesn’t actually make it any clearer on what the laws are around ICO’s in Australia…..or what makes a successful ICO (or clearly define that they are all shams….if that’s actually the case).

https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/michael-clarke-s-coin-toss-falls-foul-of-asic-20181106-p50e9v.html? 

How are regular punters supposed to know when the MSM finance experts cant actually clear it up.

Thoughts?

Facebook political control.....of customers messages

Interesting post here about how Facebook deleted a page with 3m subscribers.....but 'after' the user had spent $300,000 on facebook ads.....


https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-10-19/facebook-sells-disabled-iraq-vet-300000-ads-then-deletes-his-influential-pages

Its an interesting issue, sure Facebook has the rights to control who is saying what on their site.....but should they be forced to refund the money they happily took from that customer who was building up this follower base?

Blockchain lettuce

So in other words..... a database.
- https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/24/business/walmart-blockchain-lettuce.html


Should someone let the Walmart/IBM marketing departments know what a BlockChain/Distributed ledger actually means.....?

BlockChain scalability

ThankYou ++


Christopher Heine‏

"Helpful to understand current scaleability:
Bitcoin can process about 4-5 transactions per second.
Ethereum maxes out at about 25 transactions per second.

Visa can process over 24,000 transactions per second."

Re https://www.cbinsights.com/reports/CB-Insights_Blockchain-Explainer.pdf

Siri being used for Salesforce

Really interesting “branding move” by Apple to “license out” SIRI to Salesforce
- https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/24/apple-and-salesforce-are-teaming-up-to-launch-siri-into-enterprise.html


I think its probably going to be allowing Apple to “offset sunk costs” on SIRI development that can be spread out over other customers in completion with Amazon Alexa eg will we see a Samsung “SIRI enabled Microwave” next week?


Irony is NLVR as a technology has been available for years to perform the exact function they are already describing (even available as a service platform - eg. check out a 10 year old project I was putting together years ago around 2005 - http://www.cognation.net/asterisk/tellme )

SiliconDust - YACC

Ready this months edition of Multi-Channel and came across this article


- https://www.multichannel.com/news/silicondust-steps-into-skinny-bundle-fray

SiliconDust Steps Into Skinny-Bundle Fray
Pleasanton, Calif.-based, privately held technology company SiliconDust, maker of the HDHomeRun line of networked over-the-air tuners and DVRs, quietly rolled out its own virtual pay TV service, offering 45 channels for $35 a month.


In other words......YACC (Yet Another Cable Company).

Basically $35 a month means I may as well subscribe to a cable company and you aren't even offering me enough variance/content in order to differentiate yourself.

Its perplexing why these lemmings want to become YACC's.




Cheers,
Dean

Jurassic Kingdom Augmented Realtiy

Nice marketing video, haven't seen it in person yet, not sure it does much based on the video (eg jumping on table...hmmm ok).

Considering the Topps baseball cards were from 2009.....want MOAR.
- http://blog.collins.net.pr/2009/03/3d-baseball-cards.html


- https://www.theverge.com/2018/9/7/17828856/facebook-jurassic-world-fallen-kingdom-augmented-reality
The augmented reality experience is simple: you open the Facebook or Messenger mobile app, scan a QR code-style pattern, and tap the screen to place a dinosaur in your real-life surroundings. You can see a hostile Indoraptor by scanning codes in various chains of retail and grocery stores. (There are apparently 17,000 total locations in the US.) And if you buy a copy of Fallen Kingdom, you get a card with the code included in the package. This will let you see the friendly velociraptor Blue.

S&P 500 2009 to 2018

Worthy reading

- https://twitter.com/wolfejosh/status/1033420830548611073

Why Can’t Europe Do Tech?

Worthy reading - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-08-16/inside-europe-s-struggle-to-build-a-truly-global-tech-giant

I wish they covered;
1/ revenue per employee
2/ profits per employee

Rather than just valuations....as I think USA VC skews the results. But then again - I think SAP is a great company

:)

Victory Fridges

Awesome marketing campaign idea - https://twitter.com/wingoz/status/1029356825517252608

 

 

Movie Pass

Interesting article - http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-04/moviepass-struggles-to-stay-afloat-as-cinema-subscriptions-grow/10066216


However misses some nuances.... MoviePass is a failure as they are paying full retail but AMC Cinema Chain has launched a followup scheme that is similar...but is doing quite well because they are only paying out wholesale rates.


Wish the article covered the differences a little more.

LiveStream incubators is a thing now??

LiveStream incubators is a thing now??

https://www.facebook.com/cnbc/posts/10156947333009369

Biological space contamination?

Reading this today and thinking "Lol.....have you met humans?"

Do we have a duty to protect the environment on other planets?


What are our obligations to prevent biological contamination?


Read the eight ethical questions we should be asking about exploring outer space here: http://ow.ly/1GkT30kHP4A

PillPack

Great write up on the “journey” of Pill Pack - https://t.co/IuH9tU8dQO

The dream of computing power....where and when its available

The most important thing for you to read today and understand how its going to affect you tomorrow....

- https://www.usv.com/blog/an-overview-of-the-distributed-computing-landscape

Fighting Ad Fraud

Worthwhile listening to this podcast.

 

Digital advertising fraud cost companies an estimated $16bn last year. Often the clicks or downloads generated by the ads they paid for came not from people, but robots.

- https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3cswgzy

 

Could your Samsung tv replace your Amazon Echo?

Could your Samsung TV replace your Amazon Echo?

Thoughts?

 

 

UWON, South Korea-- Kim Hyun-suk, who leads Samsung Electronics Co.'s push into artificial intelligence, is perplexed by the voice-activated speaker craze.

"Deep down, I wonder why everyone is talking about speakers," said Mr. Kim, the new CEO of Samsung's consumer- electronics unit, in a rare interview. The South Korean company sells half a billion devices and appliances every year.

"Isn't it the same as already having 500 million speakers out there?" Mr. Kim said.

Samsung, the world's largest maker of smartphones, TVs and semiconductors, is about to find out if that is true. Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Amazon.com Inc. have popularized the tabletop speaker, creating a mainstream gadget that people are comfortable speaking to. This has given the two American companies an early advantage in bringing AI into the home.

But Samsung--whose own voice-activated speaker has yet to debut--has a broader vision: It promises to put AI features and internet connectivity onto all its products by 2020.

The goal is to transform Samsung's stand-alone home appliances into an army of easier-to-use synced devices capable of fielding verbal commands. The bet, if successful, would increase consumer demand for Samsung's lineup of phones, appliances and televisions, as it fends off the growing ambitions of Silicon Valley rivals and lower-cost Chinese manufacturers.

• https://www.wsj.com/articles/samsung-wants-every-appliance-to-talk-to-you-by-2020-1527076012

MATRIX and RIOT FOSS messaging?

Anyone out there using come across https://Matrix.org  FOSS secure messaging platform?




I’d never heard of it before today but came across this article
-  https://matrix.org/blog/2018/04/26/matrix-and-riot-confirmed-as-the-basis-for-frances-secure-instant-messenger-app/
We’re incredibly excited that the Government of France has confirmed it is in the process of deploying a huge private federation of Matrix homeservers spanning the whole government, and developing a fork of Riot.im for use as their official secure communications client! The goal is to replace usage of WhatsApp or Telegram for official purposes. It’s a unbelievably wonderful situation that we’re living in a world where governments genuinely care about openness, open source and open-standard based communications – and Matrix’s decentralisation and end-to-end encryption is a perfect fit for intra- and inter-governmental communication.


Seems that more than a few people have indicated they are moving to https://about.riot.im/riot-is-free/   eg. https://blog.status.im/were-moving-to-riot-for-safer-decentralized-collaboration-df54af3db2ef  from Slack/Telegram etc but i’m unable to understand why SPAM that’s happening on Slack/Whats App isn’t just going to move across?


I am also particularly interested to hear what peoples thoughts are on their VR conferencing offering - https://matrix.org/vrdemo/#/room/#vrvc_worried-plankton:conf.matrix.org and how it compares to other solutions they’ve tried.




Cheers,
Dean

.app TLD

https://sedo.com/us/about-us/news-press/newsroom/the-app-revolution-a-key-step-in-development-is-being-missed/

As you may have heard the new gTLD domain extension .app is quickly approaching its General Availability phase

 

 

Did anyone register a .app domain?

 

Do you intend to on May 8^th?

Blue Apron - changing or dying?

Interesting move by Blue Apron.

"Blue Apron to Sell Meal Kits in Stores to Buttress Sagging Deliveries Move comes as retailers like Walmart, Kroger and Amazon offer their own kits in fast-growing segment"
https://www.wsj.com/articles/blue-apron-to-sell-meal-kits-in-stores-to-buttress-sagging-deliveries-1521118800

Makes you wonder if this is the pivot to bigger and better eg the Kraft of pre-made kits....or the grasping of a dying venture capital created "industry".

Cheers,
Dean

Distribution lists from external sources in Exchange 2007

Ugh....distribution group settings in exchange 2007 - must uncheck box for mail to come from outside.

Can you believe this isnt an option in the setup process???

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/ie/en-US/56e342e4-1aed-4164-a7b9-0e5fabf102f0/cannot-send-to-distribution-group-emails-from-outside-exchange?forum=exchangesvrgenerallegacy

Voices

Can you really believe everything you hear with your own ears anymore?   

- http://research.baidu.com/neural-voice-cloning-samples

Thoughts on App only launches

Interested in hearing what peoples thoughts are on “app only” launches versus app+website.
eg Cohort - https://twitter.com/deancollins/status/959086867219124224


Sorry but while I’d happily sign up to a new tool that just wanted my email address via a website….i’m not interested in signing up for ‘most’ tools that are going to require access to my cell phone (and all the data contained on it).
eg they are probably doing this so that they can easily pull in my contacts/geo location/mobile phone number etc to cross link and build network effect…….but if I don’t know you and I don’t trust you….why would I open myself to an attack vector.


Thoughts?

Agtech in Australia 2017

Its a bit ridiculous with the wording eg "farmer-entrepreneurs" but apart from that worth a read

- https://blog.agthentic.com/2017-the-year-agtech-hit-the-mainstream-55c7d3303f10