Reports are circulating this week that Apple will reportedly release facial recognition capabilities for iOS 5 as an open API for developers.
The technology was made available as a result of Apple purchasing Swedish facial recognition algorithm specialist Polar Rose in 2010.
Polar Rose is the developer behind Recognizr, which Digital Trends describes as “a social media linking app co-developed with TAT that recognizes users and displays their network profiles on-screen.”
The iOS API can determine where a user’s mouth and eyes are located, and can process images for face detection, which introduces new possibilities for Faces and iPhoto. Since it is an open API, we should expect that third party developers will create more advanced facial recognition applications.
GigaOM reports: “It’s not something Apple is advertising about with the software update yet, but as it develops, it could become one of the most significant additions ever introduced to Apple’s mobile operating system.”
Engineers in the UK have designed, built and flown a model aircraft, the entire structure of which has been printed (including its two-meter wings, control surfaces and access hatches).
The Southampton University Laser Sintered Aircraft unmanned air vehicle (UAV) was printed layer by layer on an EOS EOSINT P730 nylon laser sintering machine.
The electric vehicle, the first of its kind to be completely printed, is capable of a top speed of nearly 100 miles per hour.
“The flexibility of the laser sintering process allows the design team to re-visit historical techniques and ideas that would have been prohibitively expensive using conventional manufacturing,” says University of Southampton professor Jim Scanlon. “This type of structure was initially developed by Barnes Wallis and famously used on the Vickers Wellington bomber which first flew in 1936. This form of structure is very stiff and lightweight, but very complex. If it was manufactured conventionally it would require a large number of individually tailored parts that would have to be bonded or fastened at great expense.”
“This is a great example of what 3D printers are making possible,” comments ETCentric staffer George Gerba.
The new Olympus SP-810UZ, available this fall for $330, promises DSLR features in a compact design.
Although not as ultrathin as other compact offerings currently on the market, Olympus says the camera is more convenient than a full-sized DSLR and touts a 3-inch LCD, 14MP resolution, 3D capability, ability to shoot 1080p video, in-camera panorama, 10 filters and a 36x ultra zoom.
There is also an optional Eye-Fi SD card, adding Wi-Fi capability for users who want to automatically upload images to a computer.
Olympus claims its optical zoom is presently the longest in any compact camera. “The SP-810UZ is the best zoom performance Olympus has ever delivered,” says product manager Jennifer Schmell. “No compact camera from Olympus has ever offered such impressive wide-angle zoom performance.”
Technicolor announced this week that it would be acquiring physical and electronic distribution assets from Cinedigm Digital Cinema.
The deal, which will enable Technicolor to expand its footprint in physical and satellite delivery, is expected to close in September.
It allows Cinedigm to sell the assets of its noncore business while growing support of key areas of alternative content and digital cinema operational software, Cinedigm CEO Chris McGurk told The Hollywood Reporter.
According to ETCentric contributor Carolyn Giardina of THR: “Technicolor will acquire Cinedigm’s physical and electronic distribution assets, including replication equipment and hard-drive inventory as well as a minimum of 300 satellite roof rights in the U.S. and Canada, resulting in an increase of about 40 percent in Technicolor’s North American satellite footprint, which now will include some 1,100 locations. Technicolor will become Cinedigm’s preferred content servicing partner for postproduction through distribution services.”
Technicolor is also acquiring Laser Pacific — the noted post facility that provides feature film, TV, restoration and visual effects services. (Laser Pacific was purchased by Kodak in 2003 for $30.5 million, and was sold to HIG Capital in 2010.)
In related news, ETCentric recently reported that Technicolor and Deluxe have entered into agreements whereby Technicolor will subcontract its 35mm print business to Deluxe in North America, while Deluxe will farm out its 35mm print distribution business in the the U.S. to Technicolor.
Britain’s High Court ruled in favor of Hollywood studios on Thursday, forcing Internet service provider British Telecom to block access to the Newzbin2 website, a hub for pirated media content.
Newzbin2 has more than 700,000 users, and opened last spring after its predecessor, Newzbin, was shut down by court order. The members-only site aggregates illegally copied material found on Usenet discussion forums.
“In my judgement it follows that BT has actual knowledge of other persons using its service to infringe copyright,” said Justice Arnold in his ruling. “It knows that the users and operators of Newzbin2 infringe copyright on a large scale, and in particular infringe copyrights of the studios in large numbers of their films and television programs. It knows that the users of Newzbin2 include BT subscribers and it knows those users use its service to receive infringing copies of copyright works made available to them by Newzbin2.”
The suit was hailed as a victory for creative industries by the Motion Picture Association, which repped the studios in the suit. The ruling marks an important precedent, opening the doors for copyright holders to call on ISPs to help prevent infringement.
Chris Marcich, MPAA president and managing director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa said: “This ruling from Justice Arnold is a victory for millions of people working in the U.K. creative industries and demonstrates that the law of the land must apply online.”
Amazon has announced a deal with NBCUniversal to offer Universal films online, in a move designed to step up competition with services such as Netflix and Hulu.
Amazon offers subscribers to its “Prime” program discounts on shipping of products, and free access to an online library of films. The service costs $79 a year.
Amazon announced an agreement last week with CBS that expanded its library to more than 8,000 titles. The NBCUniversal deal will grow Amazon’s library to more than 9,000 movies and TV shows (compared to Neflix’s 20,000).
Films such as “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” “Being John Malkovich,” and “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” are part of the deal.
In an effort to help emerging artists reach wider audiences, the Sundance Institute has partnered with online video outlets including Hulu, Amazon, Netflix, iTunes, YouTube and SundanceNow.
The deals are not exclusive to any one platform, so films can be made available simultaneously on competing sites.
Films will be packaged under the Sundance name as part of its recently launched Artist Services Initiative. Marketing guidance will also be provided to filmmakers through the new Web-based program.
New Video will serve as the aggregation partner for online distribution, taking a small cut of the revenues. However, the online services will not purchase the movies, enabling the filmmakers to retain their copyrights.
Sundance hopes that the online initiative will provide an audience for films that typically do not find conventional distribution. First to be distributed: “Connected: An Autoblogography about Love, Death & Technology” by Tiffany Shlain and “On the Ice” from Andrew Okpeaha MacLean.
Verizon began selling the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 this week, the first LTE-supported tablet available in the U.S.
A 16GB version of the Honeycomb 3.1 device is offered at $530, while a 32GB model is available for $630 (although InformationWeek was not impressed with the pricing of the data plans). Verizon will also offer the Wi-Fi-only model for $499.
Additionally, the wireless provider will begin selling an LTE-ready HP Pavilion Entertainment laptop and will upgrade its Motorola Xoom tablet to LTE in September. InformationWeek reports the new HP laptop “ships with Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit and it features an 11.6-inch, high-definition HP BrightView LED display at 1366 x 768 pixels. Under the hood, it is powered by a 1.6-GHz AMD dual-core processor, offers 2 GB of RAM, and 320 GB worth of storage with HP’s ProtectSmart hard drive protection.”
ETCentric recently reported that Verizon expanded its LTE 4G network to more than 100 markets last week. Verizon claims its customers can expect download speeds between 5 and 12 Mbps and upload speeds between 2 and 5 Mbps.
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) published the 802.22 standard for Wireless Regional Area Networks (WRANs), designed to make wireless Internet widely available in sparsely populated areas.
The new standard sends and receives data in the so-called “whitespaces,” the places in the UHF and VHF spectra between TV broadcast signals.
IEEE claims the standard will allow transmission of data at speeds of up to 22 Mbps, and will be able to communicate over distances as great as 100 kilometers without interfering with reception of existing TV broadcast stations.
In addition to channel specifications, the standard addresses “the required cognitive radio capabilities including dynamic spectrum access, incumbent database access, accurate geo-location techniques, spectrum sensing, spectrum etiquette, and coexistence for optimal use of the available spectrum.”
U.S. General Services Administration (that oversees the bulk of purchasing and acquisitions for the federal government) is the first federal agency to migrate its email systems completely into the cloud.
Unisys recently completed moving GSA’s 17,000 employee email accounts into the Google Apps for Government email client.
According to Digital Trends, “Unisys claims the move should save the GSA about 50 percent over the infrastructure, maintenance and personnel costs of an in-house email system. The change is part of a federal effort to save around $3 billion over the next five years by shutting down 40 percent of the federal government’s costly data centers.”
Nextgov.com reports an additional 15 agencies — including the USDA, NOAA and the Army — have plans to move into the cloud.
Facebook announced the launch of “Facebook for Business” this week.
The service does not introduce any features new to Facebook, but is reportedly making it simpler for organizations to set up on the social networking site.
“Facebook allows small businesses to create rich social experiences, build lasting relationships and amplify the most powerful type of marketing — word of mouth,” a Facebook spokesperson told GigaOm. “We created Facebook.com/business to make it even easier for people to reach these objectives and grow.”
Facebook provides business services including user profiles for organizations, advertisements, sponsored stories, and assistance with creating Facebook apps and using social plugins.
The timing is interesting, since Google+ has recently been shutting down company profiles for violating user policy.
Amazon announced this week that its revenue increased a staggering 51 percent to $9.9 billion in Q2, with significant help from the highly successful ad-supported Kindle (now the most popular version of the e-reader).
Amazon finance chief Tom Szkutak explains this marks the Seattle-based company’s best growth rate in 10 years.
However, the growth also comes at a cost; profit declined 8 percent as the world’s largest online retailer continued to invest in fulfillment centers and digital offerings. Additionally, operating expenses rose 54 percent.
Amazon also had 5,300 new hires in the quarter, giving the company a total of 43,200 employees, up from 28,300 a year ago.
Investors appear unruffled by Amazon’s infrastructure spending; stock rose 5.7 percent to $226.40 on Tuesday.
Brian Barrett of Gizmodo provides a compelling and timely opinion piece that addresses various issues related to the current and future cost structure of online media (“The Biggest Lie the Internet Ever Told: Free Everything, All the Time”).
Barrett’s post reminds us that the Internet is still in its infancy — and online media is still essentially in beta, and as it continues to grow we should accept that not all content can remain available for free.
We’ve seen an interesting collection of revenue and advertising models in recent years that were designed to keep up with online media distribution and related technological advances (all of which are really still in beta form) — as well as a steadily climbing level of consumer demand.
Barrett points out that in order to move forward we may need to recognize the need for paid subscriptions and get past the philosophy that everything on the Internet is meant to be free.
He cites recent examples of online media approaches that have drawn criticism (“each one a flaming arrow launched straight at the heart of free”), such as Hulu Plus, the New York Times paywall, the TIME magazine paywall, and Fox’s recent decision to delay new episodes from streaming.
Ustream launched its first iPad-optimized app this week. According to TechCrunch, the app “allows users to view live and recorded content streaming through the service — and to stream their own footage direct from their iPad 2.”
The company released its Android app on Honeycomb two weeks ago. There is also an iPhone version available.
The free Ustream app supports AirPlay, which means users can stream whatever they are watching on their iPad 2 to bigger screens.
“The AirPlay support is especially nice because while the video is projected onto your TV you can still use your iPad for chatting and social stream,” writes Gizmodo.
Ustream will also allow users to broadcast their own videos using either of the iPad 2’s cameras.
Gizmodo calls the new ESPN 2.0 service, available on Microsoft’s Xbox 360 beginning August 25th, “super polished and super useful.”
The new interface includes the ability to watch two content streams in 720p simultaneously, a series of scrolling live thumbnails to select other games and access scores and stats, and the ability to control the system using voice commands over the Kinect.
Viewers can pause one game to focus on another, for example, or watch replays on one side of the screen while the other game keeps playing, or even access the same game twice (using one screen for replays and keeping the other screen for live coverage). Additionally, a live scoreboard runs vertically down the right side of the screen.
