shared 18 May, 2013
Developer releases template code to allow almost anyone to create a Google Glass app
Google has started to ramp up the selection of apps available for Google Glass after official apps for Facebook, Twitter, CNN, Elle, Evernote and Tumblr were released at Google I/O on Friday, but now there’s an easy way for almost anyone to create a dedicated Glass app.
New York-based developer Chris Maddern, who runs Applaunch and works for video startup Animoto, has released an open-source code that is effectively a template to create basic apps for any Web-based service, and with minimal fuss.
[read in full]shared 17 May, 2013
Behold, The Forefathers Of Google Glass
A vision of the future from 1996.
Via: wearcam.org
This photo from 1996 is a “self-portrait” of Steve Mann (far left), then an MIT PhD student. According to the image’s caption, the photo was “captured using wireless communications to additional camera located in front of the group.”
As the world braces for and grapples with the concerns of wearable computing, it doesn't hurt to take a look back at the early stages of this technology. And, as some have already pointed out, chances are you're never going to look as cool wearing Glass as these pioneers.
[read in full]shared 17 May, 2013
Facebook’s stock has lost 31% of its value since it went public one year ago
On May 18th, 2012, Facebook went public at a per-share price of $38. The company experienced a brief gain, spiking into the 40s, but ended its first day of trading just a few cents above the set $38 price.
The following days saw the stock decline, under its listing price. The stock would fall as low as $17.55 before it began a period of recovery. As Facebook has grown its income from mobile users, and proven that its desktop market share isn’t transitory, investors have warmed to its shares.
[read in full]shared 17 May, 2013
Hundreds of LED-equipped umbrellas will descend on MIT this Sunday night
Residents in the Boston area will have the chance to see a pretty unique art installation this weekend. On Sunday evening, hundreds of LED-enabled umbrellas will light up Cambridge thanks to a collaboration between MIT and a Connecticut-based dance group known as Pilobolus. The event is called UP: The Umbrella Project and was first performed up in Camden, Maine last October. Over 300 members of the MIT student body, faculty, and staff will participate; each gets an umbrella lined with red, green, and blue LED lights plus a controller to let them change the lighting as they see fit, and all of the movements will be broadcast onto a large inflatable screen so that the performers can see their movements.
[read in full]shared 15 May, 2013
Stuxnet virus may have actually helped the Iranian nuclear program
in 2009, the U.S. and Israel launched the Stuxnet virus to throw a wrench into the Iranian nuclear program. It might have backfired.
The virus was distributed in a social hack via thumbdrives scattered around the Iranian nuclear facilities at Natanz. The virus itself screwed with a system in large industrial computers, which caused the centrifuges used in refining uranium to overheat.
Common wisdom was that the Stuxnet worm had significantly delayed the Iranian’s production of nuclear weapons by causing the country to rebuild a large part of its nuclear power plants’ hardware and software.
[read in full]shared 15 May, 2013
The Most Beloved "Game Of Thrones" Characters On Twitter
Find out who’s watching Game of Thrones , and who their favorites are, in BuzzFeed’s original Twitter analysis.
Source: Yiren Lu for BuzzFeed
We know a lot about the characters on Game of Thrones, thanks to five books and countless fan sites. Finding out who’s watching those characters is a little trickier. Luckily, Twitter has some answers.
BuzzFeed analyzed 200,000 tweets related to GoT to determine viewers' demographics (above) and positive and negative reactions to different characters.
[read in full]shared 15 May, 2013
Shopping cart-mounted tablet detects nearby items and offers recipes in real time
Regular readers of Springwise may remember the Hellmann’s mayonnaise campaign in Brazil that printed recipes for those who purchased the mayonnaise, using the other items also being bought as ingredients. Unsatisfied with stopping there, the company has returned with the Recipe Cart, which uses NFC technology to immediately suggest meal ideas to shoppers as they walk past other ingredients.
The campaign was the brainchild of digital agency CUBOCC, who fitted shopping carts at the Pão de Açúcar shopping center in São Paulo with touchscreen devices.
[read in full]shared 14 May, 2013
Well, This Is Just Awful: ‘Renting’ Disabled People to Skip Lines at Disney World
The lines at Disney World are awful, we can all agree, but the lengths to which some people will go to bypass them are worse. Wealthy Manhattan parents are reportedly using a service that typically assists disabled children around the theme park to drive their non-disabled families around in a “handicapped” scooter, allowing them to skip lines by up to two hours.
It sounds like something out of a “Modern Seinfeld” episode. But in this case, the horrible people are real.
[read in full]shared 14 May, 2013
After $15B in payments, Square debuts Square Stand hardware to select US retailers for $299
Square announced today the launch of a new product it’s calling Square Stand, a new way to process point of sales transaction right from the iPad.
At a press conference held across the street from Square’s headquarters in San Francisco, CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey shared the company’s new hardware designed to help local businesses with a brick and mortar location. The company claims that the new iPad tool will give merchants a “remarkable new way to manage and grow their business, all for the price of a cash register.”
iPad payments account for nearly 50 percent of total payments processed by Square so bringing this to brick and mortar stores to take on the physical cash register could make things more simplistic for merchants.
[read in full]shared 14 May, 2013
The billboard turning thin air into water
Residents in rural Peru have received 15,000 litres of clean drinking water this year, courtesy of a billboard that has been making it out of thin air.
Co-produced by outdoor advertising provider Clear Channel and Lima’s University of Engineering and Technology, the billboard cost around $32,000 to make. It works by condensing vapour in the air (humidity in the region is around 98 per cent) into water, before passing it through a series of filters and running it under UV lamps for further purification.
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