Episode 188 – Star Wars Bucks

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With the opening of the latest installation of the Star Wars saga this weekend, Michael and Michael start off this episode, recorded a week earlier, with the new AR capabilities of the Star Wars app.  Michael M, being the enterprising person that he is, boldly managed to try this out by loading up the image on a website to allow the AR experience to work.

The newest Starbucks opened in Shanghai and in addition to being the largest in the world, coming in at 30,000 sq ft, is also AR-enabled.  Visitors to this Starbucks can walk around with their AR-enabled phone to learn more about the inner workings of this Starbucks, earning badges to receive a custom roastery photo filter when all the badges are collected.

Michael M was fascinated by the way the Kuri robot emotes by changing the shape of the eyes using “eyelids” that come up from the bottom of the eyes, as well as from the top.  Michael R shared an intriguing app that reads audio waveforms, which the PhonoPaper app describes as “the 2D audio barcode (by analogy with the QR-code)”

Selected Links

The First Order Arrives… In The Star Wars App — http://www.starwars.com/news/the-first-order-arrives-in-the-star-wars-app

The Star Wars App — http://www.starwars.com/games-apps/star-wars-app

Mashable article:  The world’s biggest Starbucks outlet is also AR-enhanced — http://mashable.com/2017/12/05/starbucks-shanghai-outlet

Wired article:  The Genesis of Kuri, the Friendly Home Robot — https://www.wired.com/story/the-genesis-of-kuri/

Rosie the robot from the Jetsons — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_The_Jetsons_characters#Rosie

Twiki the robot from Buck Rodgers in the 25th Century — http://buckrogers.wikia.com/wiki/Twiki

IEEE Spectrum article:  New Carbon Nanotube Sheets Claim World’s Top Heat-Sink Performance — https://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/nanotechnology/new-carbon-nanotube-sheets-claim-worlds-top-heatsink-performance

Handbrake — https://handbrake.fr

Apple App Store article:  From Hit Game to Arcade Sensation — https://itunes.apple.com/us/story/id1309536407

Kate Bush’s album Ariel — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerial_(album)

PhonoPaper app — https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/phonopaper/id865947553?mt=8

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Episode 187 – Bionic Eye

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On an unseasonably warm Friday, Michael & Michael get together to discuss a sports to business application of virtual reality, that of training retail store employees to prepare for the oncoming rush of bargain hunters on Black Friday instead of the rush of oncoming defensive backs.

A favorite topic of ours — augmented reality use methods — resurfaces in this episode, this time prompted by the recent Apple acquisition of a Canadian AR company called VRVANA, which leads to a conversation about miniaturization of this technology, ultimately embedding into bionic contact lenses, or even a potential direct optic nerve connection.  At the very least, we don’t bring up spiders in this episode.  Whew.

The team talks about home robotics, and Rosie from the Jetsons seems to be cropping up in many articles.  The concept of a friendly companion robot is one that many companies are chasing after, and the article for this show comes from an experience with a robot called Jibo.

Closing out the show with a discussion on wearables, Michael and Michael are amazed at the new capabilities enabled by the Kardiaband, and what this implies for future medical devices to improve and save lives.

Selected links 

MIT Technology Review article:  Finally a Useful Application for VR: Training Employees — https://www.technologyreview.com/s/609473/finally-a-useful-application-for-vr-training-employees/

Business Insider article:  Apple bought a Canadian AR startup for $30 million — and it could give Apple an edge in the next big thing — http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-buys-vrvana-totem-mixed-reality-headset-2017-11

VRVANA — https://www.vrvana.com

Hackday io — Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril Sensitive Sunglasses project — https://hackaday.io/project/580-peril-sensitive-sunglasses

Futurism article: Bionic Contacts: Goodbye Glasses. Hello Vision That’s 3x Better Than 20/20 — https://futurism.com/bionic-contacts-goodbye-glasses-hello-vision-thats-3x-better-than-2020/

Transitions photochromic transition eyeglasses — https://www.transitions.com/en-us/

Wall Street Journal article:  This Cute Little Robot Made My Family Mad — https://www.wsj.com/articles/this-cute-little-robot-made-my-family-mad-1511980911

Rosie from the Jetsons — http://thejetsons.wikia.com/wiki/Rosey

Jibo — https://www.jibo.com

Roomba — http://store.irobot.com/default/robot-vacuum-roomba/

Sphero BB-8 — https://store.sphero.com/products/bb-8-by-sphero

Thomas Friedman’s Thank You for Being Late — http://www.thomaslfriedman.com/thank-you-for-being-late/

TechCrunch article:  FDA clears AliveCor’s Kardiaband as the first medical device accessory for the Apple Watch — https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/30/fda-clears-alivecors-kardiaband-as-the-first-medical-device-accessory-for-the-apple-watch/

Kardiaband for Apple Watch — https://store.alivecor.com

Chuck Norris facts — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Norris_facts

What games are the hosts playing?

Michael R: Injustice 2 — https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/injustice-2/id1109008423?mt=8

Michael M:  Nonstop Chuck Norris — https://itunes.apple.com/ph/app/nonstop-chuck-norris/id1154002816?mt=8

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Episode 186 – Accio Mjolnir

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Michael and Michael use their prognostic skills to divine what the next Niantic game might be in 2018 based on the non-specific reports in the media about the Wizards Unite game to be unveiled in a few months.

Could there be a spell collecting game that drives players to bookstores and libraries to discover & unlock spells?  Maybe use newspaper vending machines as something to check into in order to open powerups.  How about zoos to collect your own fantastic beasts into your virtual menagerie?

Speaking of pictures, the data in the pictures can provide an huge amount of value in monetizing the activities of.the players. Warby Parker is doing this — using the new capabilities of the iPhone X facial mapping to recognize the contours of the user’s face in order to match the best glasses to the face of the user.

Any sufficiently advanced technology looks like magic, and Michale R has found a couple examples of two Avengers, Thor and Iron Man whose mighty feats are duplicated by a drone and micro-gas turbines, respectively.  Check out the videos to see these in action.

Selected links 

Tech Crunch article:  Niantic’s follow-up to Pokemon Go will be a Harry Potter AR game launching in 2018 — https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/08/niantics-follow-up-to-pokemon-go-will-be-a-harry-potter-ar-game-launching-in-2018/

Fortune article:  Commentary: Pokemon Go’s Creator is Making a Harry Potter Game.  Will It Bomb Too?  — http://fortune.com/2017/11/14/harry-potter-pokemon-go-game-augmented-reality/

Pokemon Go Starbucks drink link — 

9 to 5 Mac article:  Warby Parker is using face mapping on the iPhone X to provide glasses recommendations — https://9to5mac.com/2017/11/07/warby-parker-is-using-face-mapping-on-the-iphone-x-to-provide-glasses-recommendations/

Warby Parker iOS app — https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/glasses-by-warby-parker/id1107693363?mt=8

Mashable article:  Real-Life ‘Iron Man’ sets Guinness World Record because of course he does — http://mashable.com/2017/11/09/iron-man-guinness-world-record-tony-stark-richard-browning

Tech Crunch article:  Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robot is a parkour master — https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/16/boston-dynamics-atlas-robot-is-a-parkour-master

Reddit: AI email program designed to reply to email scammers — https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/7brzw4/rescam_ai_email_program_designed_to_reply_to/

Tech Crunch article:  They turned ‘Rampage’ into a movie (and here’s the first trailer) — https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/16/rampage-trailer/

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Episode 185 – Transparency

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Jimmy Kimmel’s Tonight Show, Tonight Showbotics, featuring Hanson Robotics’ Sophia

They’re playing basketball! 🏀 Both for the start of the college basketball season, and at the state fair.  Michael R found an interesting article about how one can win those games of skill and chance at the state fair, leveraging a combination of science and professional sports talent.

In addition to making transparent the ways that a Mets pitcher can win the games at your local carnival, the team takes a look at the transparent skull of Sophia, the artificial intelligence android by Hanson Robotics, how NPR is crowdsourcing journalism with the recently made public JFK Files, that Facebook & Twitter are making strides in ad transparency and how a recently created Soduku Solver uses augmented reality and optical character recognition to do it’s thing.

Michael M remarks that these examples show a gateway to where augmented reality and artificial intelligence is about to explode in a very short amount of time.  How do you think that the combo of AR & AI will change the world?

Selected links 

Kurtis Blow Basketball video —

Mets — http://mets.com

NC State fair — http://www.ncstatefair.org

TechCrunch article:  Watch a real rocket scientist figure out (and beat) carnival scams — https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/26/watch-a-real-rocket-scientist-figure-out-and-beat-carnival-scams/

TechCrunch article:  Saudi Arabia bestows citizenship on a robot named Sophia — https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/26/saudi-arabia-robot-citizen-sophia/

Hanson Robotics — http://www.hansonrobotics.com/robot/sophia/

Tonight Show with Jimmy Kimmel Tonight Showbotics with Sophia — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bg_tJvCA8zw

Future Investment Initiative where Sophia was announced as being the first robot to receive Saudi Arabian citizenship — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bg_tJvCA8zw

NPR article: The JFK Files: Calling On Citizen Reporters — https://www.npr.org/2017/10/26/560220148/the-jfk-files-calling-on-citizen-reporters

TechCrunch article: Facebook says its ad transparency features will go live next month — https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/27/facebook-says-its-ad-transparency-features-will-go-live-next-month/

TechCrunch article: Twitter announces new ‘transparency center’ for ads — https://techcrunch.com/2017/10/24/twitter-advertising-transparency/

Prototypr blog post:  Behind the Magic: How we built the ARKit Sudoku Solver — https://blog.prototypr.io/behind-the-magic-how-we-built-the-arkit-sudoku-solver-e586e5b685b0

Magic Sudoku — https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/magic-sudoku/id1286979959?ls=1&mt=8

Watson on Jeopardy —

What games are the hosts playing?

none!  Busy busy busy!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 27:14 — 31.6MB) | Embed

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