Month: October 2018

Announced last year at CES, the original Vapor found Misfit finally going full smartwatch. The Fossil-owned wearable company announced this morning that it’s going back to the well, with the simply named Vapor 2. The new watch includes built-in GPS, NFC support and adds a smaller, 41mm build to the mix.

The additional size option is a nice one for the company. After all, Misfit’s long prided itself on being both fashion focused and gender inclusive, but only offering a wearable device in one size is a good way to bypass a large potential user base.

After all, two of the top Android smartwatches, the Fitbit Versa and Samsung Galaxy Watch, opted for their own in-house OSes. Huawei also recently announced that it would do the same with the Watch GT.

The new Vapor has a round 328 ppi display and sports the Snapdragon Wear 2100 inside. It’s arriving, “soon,” priced at $250.

Announced last year at CES, the original Vapor found Misfit finally going full smartwatch. The Fossil-owned wearable company announced this morning that it’s going back to the well, with the simply named Vapor 2. The new watch includes built-in GPS, NFC support and adds a smaller, 41mm build to the mix.

The additional size option is a nice one for the company. After all, Misfit’s long prided itself on being both fashion focused and gender inclusive, but only offering a wearable device in one size is a good way to bypass a large potential user base.

After all, two of the top Android smartwatches, the Fitbit Versa and Samsung Galaxy Watch, opted for their own in-house OSes. Huawei also recently announced that it would do the same with the Watch GT.

The new Vapor has a round 328 ppi display and sports the Snapdragon Wear 2100 inside. It’s arriving, “soon,” priced at $250.

The idea of using computer vision and AI to enable cars to drive themselves is well-established, but how about using similar technology to keep an eye on a human driver instead of the road? That’s the thinking behind Tel Aviv-based EyeSight, which has developed an in-car “AI vision” system that claims to be able to detect when a driver loses concentration or gets dangerously distracted.

Using advanced facial processing, it tracks a driver’s gaze direction, pupil dilation, eye openness and head position and uses proprietary algorithms to determine attentiveness. The resulting “smart car” can either do something to alert the driver (e.g. sounds and vibrations) or potentially temporarily activate self-driving mode. So far, so clever.

However, in terms of the business case for selling EyeSight’s tech into car manufacturers, there are two other noteworthy dynamics at play. The European New Car Assessment Program (Euro NCAP), a voluntary vehicle safety rating system backed by the European Union, will require new car models to have Driver Monitoring Systems (DMS) by 2020. Cars released after this point without DMS won’t be able to achieve a five-star safety rating.

This is also where autonomous vehicles comes into focus, too. It is well accepted that in the interim stages before we reach level 5 or full autonomy, semi autonomous driving technology that goes well beyond cruise control will become more and more commonplace. This sees AI and computer vision take over various driving functions, but still requires human assistance, intervention and responsibility. However, some argue that this stage is potentially more dangerous than either human driving or fully autonomous vehicles as there is a much higher risk that a human will lose concentration or stop paying enough attention to remain safe.

“DMS is even more important for semi-autonomous vehicles, which have some self-driving features. The autonomous system must be sure that a driver is alert and awake before it hands over control of a moving car to a human,” notes EyeSight.

In addition to driver monitoring, the EyeSight tech can scan the entire cabin of a car, understanding who and what is in the vehicle. This includes being able to detect children, thus “helping ensure that babies aren’t forgotten in locked cars,” which is also a feature that Euro NCAP will require by 2022.

All of which hasn’t gone unnoticed by investors, with EyeSight picking up $15 million in growth funding. The round is led by Jebsen Capital, Arie Capital, and Mizrahi Tefahot, and will be used to deploy in-car AI vision system. The Israeli company is already partnering with two major car manufacturers and says the technology will be in at least four car models by 2020.

The idea of using computer vision and AI to enable cars to drive themselves is well-established, but how about using similar technology to keep an eye on a human driver instead of the road? That’s the thinking behind Tel Aviv-based EyeSight, which has developed an in-car “AI vision” system that claims to be able to detect when a driver loses concentration or gets dangerously distracted.

Using advanced facial processing, it tracks a driver’s gaze direction, pupil dilation, eye openness and head position and uses proprietary algorithms to determine attentiveness. The resulting “smart car” can either do something to alert the driver (e.g. sounds and vibrations) or potentially temporarily activate self-driving mode. So far, so clever.

However, in terms of the business case for selling EyeSight’s tech into car manufacturers, there are two other noteworthy dynamics at play. The European New Car Assessment Program (Euro NCAP), a voluntary vehicle safety rating system backed by the European Union, will require new car models to have Driver Monitoring Systems (DMS) by 2020. Cars released after this point without DMS won’t be able to achieve a five-star safety rating.

This is also where autonomous vehicles comes into focus, too. It is well accepted that in the interim stages before we reach level 5 or full autonomy, semi autonomous driving technology that goes well beyond cruise control will become more and more commonplace. This sees AI and computer vision take over various driving functions, but still requires human assistance, intervention and responsibility. However, some argue that this stage is potentially more dangerous than either human driving or fully autonomous vehicles as there is a much higher risk that a human will lose concentration or stop paying enough attention to remain safe.

“DMS is even more important for semi-autonomous vehicles, which have some self-driving features. The autonomous system must be sure that a driver is alert and awake before it hands over control of a moving car to a human,” notes EyeSight.

In addition to driver monitoring, the EyeSight tech can scan the entire cabin of a car, understanding who and what is in the vehicle. This includes being able to detect children, thus “helping ensure that babies aren’t forgotten in locked cars,” which is also a feature that Euro NCAP will require by 2022.

All of which hasn’t gone unnoticed by investors, with EyeSight picking up $15 million in growth funding. The round is led by Jebsen Capital, Arie Capital, and Mizrahi Tefahot, and will be used to deploy in-car AI vision system. The Israeli company is already partnering with two major car manufacturers and says the technology will be in at least four car models by 2020.

Finding clothes that are the right fit can be a laborious, psychologically challenging experience. RedThread, a custom clothing startup founded by former GoPro VP of Direct to Consumer, E-commerce and Digital Meghan Litchfield, aims to do away with sizes and instead focus on actual fit.

“What we’re doing is we’re kind of challenging the apparel industry and everything that it does, from how women shop, to how clothing is designed, to how it’s manufactured, and ultimately, to how women feel about themselves and perceive their bodies,” Litchfield told TechCrunch. 

Currently, RedThread makes and sells four items: ankle and wide legs pant for $148 each, a snap jacket for $168 and a tee-shirt for $78. Down the road, RedThread plans to expand its apparel offerings, but the goal will always be to offer everyday basics for working women. RedThread designs its clothes to ensure they’re easily tailorable.

“We’re able to [custom fit] more quickly than if you just brought in a random pair of pants and tried to get it tailored,” Litchfield said.

 

[gallery ids="1735829,1735830,1735846"]

Using its patent-pending tailoring algorithms, manufacturing process and designs, RedThread delivers clothes direct to consumers within one week of purchase. All RedThread requires from you is a short fit quiz — where you answer questions about your fit challenges — and four photos (three from different angles and one of an empty room). To capture the photos, RedThread texts you a link after purchase to scan your body. For each angle, RedThread tells you exactly how to stand.

[gallery ids="1735835,1735834,1735836,1735837,1735838,1735839"]

From there, its 3D mobile body scanning technology pulls 15 specific measurements from the model and inputs them into RedThread’s algorithms to calculate the best fit for you. Today, the process is about 80 percent math and 20 percent human, Litchfield said.

“But the more the algorithm learns about how to do this, the more the technology can drive the decisions,” she said. “We envision a world where we’re at 95 percent math, five percent human.”

As you can see, I went through the body scanning process and it was pretty straight-forward. If this actually works (which I’ll report back on), that’d be pretty magical. But here’s the thing: these clothes really aren’t my style. I’d much rather RedThread license its technology (assuming it works well) to brands from which I already buy clothes.

Down the road, RedThread would be open to partnering with other clothing brands, Litchfield said. But the priority for the company is to “build an apparel brand that women love,” Litchfield said. “And I don’t think there’s one out there right now. Because the industry is toxic and creates these standard sizes and doesn’t make women feel great about themselves. So, therefore, we want to own the whole experience.”

Finding clothes that are the right fit can be a laborious, psychologically challenging experience. RedThread, a custom clothing startup founded by former GoPro VP of Direct to Consumer, E-commerce and Digital Meghan Litchfield, aims to do away with sizes and instead focus on actual fit.

“What we’re doing is we’re kind of challenging the apparel industry and everything that it does, from how women shop, to how clothing is designed, to how it’s manufactured, and ultimately, to how women feel about themselves and perceive their bodies,” Litchfield told TechCrunch. 

Currently, RedThread makes and sells four items: ankle and wide legs pant for $148 each, a snap jacket for $168 and a tee-shirt for $78. Down the road, RedThread plans to expand its apparel offerings, but the goal will always be to offer everyday basics for working women. RedThread designs its clothes to ensure they’re easily tailorable.

“We’re able to [custom fit] more quickly than if you just brought in a random pair of pants and tried to get it tailored,” Litchfield said.

 

[gallery ids="1735829,1735830,1735846"]

Using its patent-pending tailoring algorithms, manufacturing process and designs, RedThread delivers clothes direct to consumers within one week of purchase. All RedThread requires from you is a short fit quiz — where you answer questions about your fit challenges — and four photos (three from different angles and one of an empty room). To capture the photos, RedThread texts you a link after purchase to scan your body. For each angle, RedThread tells you exactly how to stand.

[gallery ids="1735835,1735834,1735836,1735837,1735838,1735839"]

From there, its 3D mobile body scanning technology pulls 15 specific measurements from the model and inputs them into RedThread’s algorithms to calculate the best fit for you. Today, the process is about 80 percent math and 20 percent human, Litchfield said.

“But the more the algorithm learns about how to do this, the more the technology can drive the decisions,” she said. “We envision a world where we’re at 95 percent math, five percent human.”

As you can see, I went through the body scanning process and it was pretty straight-forward. If this actually works (which I’ll report back on), that’d be pretty magical. But here’s the thing: these clothes really aren’t my style. I’d much rather RedThread license its technology (assuming it works well) to brands from which I already buy clothes.

Down the road, RedThread would be open to partnering with other clothing brands, Litchfield said. But the priority for the company is to “build an apparel brand that women love,” Litchfield said. “And I don’t think there’s one out there right now. Because the industry is toxic and creates these standard sizes and doesn’t make women feel great about themselves. So, therefore, we want to own the whole experience.”

If nothing else, Motiv’s fitness ring was a welcome reprieve from the umpteenth wrist-worn tracker. And it worked surprisingly well. The followup essentially looks the same as the original (save for some new finishes), but features a couple of new tricks, including two-factor authentication.

The new hardware is available today, bringing with it the ability to log into supported accounts using a gesture. The ring is also offering up something called WalkID in beta, which essentially measures the wearer’s gait to further verify identity. It’s not nearly as distinct as, say, a fingerprint, but the way we walk is distinct enough to further distinguish fakers.

In the near future, the product will support passwords in Google Chrome and Windows Edge, courtesy of the FIDO2 and WebAuthn standards. The company says the ring will soon add support for fingerprint and facial recognition in-app, adding another layer of protection for users.

It’s a bit of a strange addition for what is primarily a fitness device, and probably not enough in and of itself to convince users to pick up a ring — though it does further distinguish a product that, quite frankly, is probably already distinguished enough.

If nothing else, Motiv’s fitness ring was a welcome reprieve from the umpteenth wrist-worn tracker. And it worked surprisingly well. The followup essentially looks the same as the original (save for some new finishes), but features a couple of new tricks, including two-factor authentication.

The new hardware is available today, bringing with it the ability to log into supported accounts using a gesture. The ring is also offering up something called WalkID in beta, which essentially measures the wearer’s gait to further verify identity. It’s not nearly as distinct as, say, a fingerprint, but the way we walk is distinct enough to further distinguish fakers.

In the near future, the product will support passwords in Google Chrome and Windows Edge, courtesy of the FIDO2 and WebAuthn standards. The company says the ring will soon add support for fingerprint and facial recognition in-app, adding another layer of protection for users.

It’s a bit of a strange addition for what is primarily a fitness device, and probably not enough in and of itself to convince users to pick up a ring — though it does further distinguish a product that, quite frankly, is probably already distinguished enough.

Gamers, worldwide! A new seasons is upon us. New games like Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 and Red Dead Redemption 2 have either arrived or are on the way, which means we’re wading into a holiday season of fresh gaming.

But with new games also come new esports to watch.

The competitive season for Black Ops 4 Multiplayer (the CWL) doesn’t start until December. But TwitchCon still has some Black Ops 4 goodness coming our way on October 27. Four teams, made up of pro players/streamers, will compete in the first high-stakes Blackout tournament. Blackout is the new Battle Royale mode for Black Ops 4.

Officially, the Doritos Blackout Bowl starts on October 27 at 3:30pm ET, and interested viewers can check out the stream here.

Here’s how it will work:

Four teams of four pro players/streamers will drop into the Blackout map alongside public players. As with any Battle Royale game, they’ll loot up and start picking players off. The tournament will be scored based on kills and match placements.

Kills are worth one point, and various placements will earn the team a multiplier. A top ten placement yields a 0.5x multiplier, a top five placement yields a 0.75X multiplier, and a top 3 placement wins the team a 1.25x multiplier.

So who’s playing?

Team Ninja will be led by none other than Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, who will be joined by his teammates JoshOG, Gold Glove, and Fearitself. Team Shroud will include Shroud as team camptain, alongside Just9n, Chocotaco, and Chad. Jack “Courage” Dunlop, who transitioned from CoD pro caster to professional content creator for Optic Gaming last year, will lead a team comprised of Karma, TeePee and Hysteria. And finally, Dr. Lupo will lead the fourth team, with teammates including Annemunition, Mad Ruski, and Ninja with no L.

What’s interesting about the Doritos Blackout Bowl is that the organizers have opted to make this tournament a public affair. Not only will it be livestreamed, but the players themselves will actually load into a public Blackout lobby, meaning the pros will be battling it out with real-life Black Ops 4 players.

The prize pool for the tournament is $250,000.

Disclosure: The author’s father works for Pepsico, which owns Doritos. The author does not own any Pepsi stock. She’s just a gamer who loves CoD.

While the blockchain world has seemingly blazed along in the last 18 months, much of the action has been in the currency world. The underlying technologies building this world are growing at an equally blistering rate, but until now few have threatened to ‘game the game’. Today at the Web3 Summit in Berlin, Parity Technologies founder Gavin Wood demoed launching a blockchain in under 60 minutes, a previously unheard-of feat. Although it was hard to ascertain the demeanor of the quiet, and often subdued crowd of hardcore, hoodie-wearing blockchain developers arraigned before him in the vaulted, wooden paneling of East Berlin’s old DDR-era symphony hall, the excited chatter in the hallway after the presentation was palpable.

In a grand gesture, Wood launched a new blockchain in about 15 minutes from a brand new Mac laptop, from which he dramatically tore off the shrink wrap, in order to demonstrate how little time and set-up it would take, and how few tools would be needed to pull off what might previously have taken days or even longer, depending on the complexity of the project. Developers sitting in the front row of this live demonstration literally gasped as Wood fired-up the platform.

While startups – whether web, mobile, crypto or blockchain-based – routinely launch themselves literally from software built for the last 25 years, the blockchain world, with its many idiosyncratic ways of creating new products, has not had the same luxury. Polkadot, under Wood’s tutelage, seems on the brink of changing all that, and the summit clearly understood the ramifications.

Parity’s Substrate 1.0-beta will be out in November 2018, and, he says, will be “the biggest bet against blockchain maximalism.” Decoding that in his speech, he said the industry had become too “nationalistic” about one type of blockchain beating another: “Maximalism creates barriers to entry and reduces the fun for technologists,” he said.

Substrate, which is the foundation for Polkadot (a ‘para chain’ aiming to act as a link between many different types of blockchains) will now come as a standalone blockchain framework. This will allow developers to build highly advanced blockchains customized for any project. And that, say seasoned observers who spoke to TechCrunch, is ‘game-changing’ and could radically accelerate the development of blockchain technologies.

In a statement, Parity explained that while Polkadot and Substrate share a goal to spark new a wave of blockchain innovation, they remain two distinct technologies. Substrate, says Parity, is “like the software or PC” that people choose for their application, whereas Polkadot, a protocol that connects blockchains together, “is like plugging a network card into that computer”.

Substrate, they say, will give blockchain innovators the framework for “maximum freedom with minimal effort” as it is “highly customisable, adaptable, and made by blockchain developers for blockchain developers”. It allows developers to focus their effort “on the thing they care most about — the state transition function,” while providing them with the networking, consensus and security as well as an upgrade path to interoperability with Polkadot.

Additionally, Substrate promises a future where developers won’t have to wait for (for instance) the core team that controls the development of Ethereum, to implement improvements. The idea is that they can build what they want to build, knowing that Substrate is ‘generic’ enough to be able to fit with new versions of Ethereum that come down the line.

Asked to unpack this by TechCrunch, Wood said on stage: “All of the lessons we learned developing Ethereum and Polkadot have been distilled down into a single stack of tooling that allows you to get all these advantages, in terms of time, cost and money. How well this works is going to be dependent on us. But it’s my hope that when we put out Substrate 1.0 this will be a turning point that makes the promise of a multi-chain world a captivating one… I hope this creates a new class of developers that sits in the sweet spot [between low and high skilled developers], where you can do just enough that allows you to get a job done and well without having to create your own blockchain.”

At the conference, Wood also announced that the Substrate software will be relicensed to Apache 2, which will “instantly open the door to all of the Fortune 500 to actually experiment with it.” He also presented a new Polkadot design that, he says, allows for “infinite scalability.”

Commenting, Trent McConaghy, founder of Ocean Protocol and also a speaker at the conference, said that with Substrate, Pokaldot had just made the whole blockchain developer ecosystem jump forward “between 2 and three years”.

Attendee Keld Van Schreven, partner of blockchain project investor KR1, said: “It’s like being able to generate HTML pages without having to know HTML. In the Web 1.0 world that was transformational to the early Internet ecosystem. Substrate will make it much easier to deploy blockchains. And the Lease model means there is a quality control there. What they’ve done here is extremely hard, technically. They just made it look easy.”