Tech News

There’s a new way to assess a person’s risk of developing heart disease today. This is thanks to Google and its health-tech subsidiary, Verily. The device scans the back of your eyes, accurately deducing your age, blood pressure, and whether you smoke. Doctors can use this to predict your risk of suffering from a major cardiac event.

The algorithm that’s used is both faster and easier for doctors to use – because it doesn’t need a blood test. While it does need more thorough testing before being used in a clinical setting, the Nature Journal of Biomedical Engineering has already published a paper about it. Currently about 300,000 patients were analyzed by this tool. Doctors scanned them and compared the results to their known medical data.

Will This Technology Replace Doctors?

Luke Oakden-Rayner, a medical researcher at the University of Adelaide who specializes in machine learning analysis, told The Verge that the work behind this new technology is solid. He believes this shows how AI can help improve those diagnostic tools that already exist. This isn’t meant to replace doctors. Instead, it’s an extension of the work they’re already doing.

Some people argue that this idea sounds unusual, but it’s not. It actually draws from a body of established research showing that your eye’s fundus (the rear interior wall) is full of blood vessels that are a reflection of your overall health. Using a camera and a microscope to study these blood vessels, doctors can infer the important predictors of cardiovascular health. Artificial Intelligence helps speed this up and is correct 70% of the time. This is only slightly less than the SCORE method that’s commonly used and needs a blood test, which is correct 72% of the time.

AI Creating New Medical Insight

Google feels this is more than a simple way of judging cardiovascular risk. They believe it’s paving the way for AI-powered scientific discovery in an age when most medical algorithms replicate existing diagnostic tools. There’s hope that eventually artificial intelligence will create entirely new medical insight. This is demonstrated in their other initiatives, such as Project Baseline, where they’re currently collecting medical records from over 10,000 people.

The idea of an AI doctor churning out new diagnoses without human oversight is still a long way off. Google itself even admits that this will take decades. Nevertheless, they also believe that their research shows this isn’t a far-fetched idea.

As voice control and artificial intelligence becomes increasingly prominent, companies are doing more and more to make their devices better. Recently, companies have been coming out with AI chips, which allow for more on-device processing and in turn faster processing speeds.

However, the big news is the development of AI chips by a company named Arm. This company makes chips so that other companies who may not have the resources to build their own can use the design to implement specialty chips into their own devices. Therefore, more companies than just the big startups, such as Apple, Google, and Amazon – who have already begun designing and implementing their own custom AI chips – can make use of AI chips to better AI technology on their devices.

Chip Designs by Startups

Apple has already been designing its own chips for different aspects of its iPhones. In terms of AI, Apple has designed the A11 Bionic Chip with a “neural engine”. This neural engine powers FaceID and ARKit using on-device processing for machine learning algorithms. Google has the same idea. For years, Google has been developing its own AI hardware, but recently it has begun developing custom AI chips for its own devices.

Similarly, Amazon has jumped on board by designing its own AI chip for Alexa and Alexa powered products. This will allow for more on-device processing and faster response times, because devices will no longer have to communicate with the cloud. All of these companies are making custom AI chips because it is the next step to compete and stay relevant.

Chip Designs by Arm

But what about companies that don’t have the knowledge or expertise to create their own custom chips? That is where the company, Arm, comes in. Last week, Arm announced Project Trillium, which is a pair of chip designs for AI. This changes the game completely because if Arm can create AI chips for companies to buy, the chips will no longer be special and unique to only large companies who have the resources to manufacture their own; potentially, this means all devices will soon have a chip in them specifically for AI that will make AI functions faster, more efficient and able to progress to the next level.

Uses of Arm Chips

One chip is called the Arm Machine Learning processor (ML), which is the more general chip used for anything from facial recognition to translation. The second chip is more specialized and used for things like finding interesting bits in images (such as faces) and sending them to the ML processor to go through processes like facial recognition; this chip is called the Arm Object Detection processor (OD).

According to Jem Davies, Arm VP of Machine Learning, “…what’s special about these processor designs is that they should scale up – meaning they could be used in Internet of Things (IoT) devices or modified and enlarged for use in datacenters” (Gershgorn). The news of Arm entering into AI chip development really means that the hardware can become more mainstream and less specialized.

Next Step for AI Chips

However, Arm is looking past the immediate benefit of AI chips in smartphones and other similar voice controlled devices, and looking towards where it can be used in the future. The company sees the most growth of the technology coming from its use in IoT devices and internet-connected cameras. Time will tell where AI chips will take devices and technology in the coming months and years.

Google has become extremely well known around the world. Although it began as just a search engine generating revenue from ads, it has been changing with the times to become a multi faceted tool along with an assortment of supporting gadgets. Google now has a browser, a phone, apps and it’s not stopping there. New research is constantly in the works, and Google is determined to remain relevant in the future. This is a look at Google’s evolution and where it is looking to go with its technology.

G Suite

Google already has G Suite, which is a collection of intelligent apps. Specifically, it consists of Gmail, Google Docs, Google Drive, and Calendar; an alternative to Microsoft Office. Although G Suite will probably never take over Office as the leader, it is currently ranked second, which is not bad. G Suite is a small part of Google’s plan to stay relevant. It “…is a cornerstone of Google’s efforts to diversify revenue, which overwhelmingly comes from online ad sales,” (Paresh) at the moment.

So, while Google is diversifying what it does to keep gaining income as technology changes, it is also becoming self reliant. G Suite means that Google no longer has to be loyal to Microsoft. Since the release of G Suite, there has been constant growth, which is a very good sign for Google. As G Suite continues to be perfected, more and more people & companies will use it and it will continue to bring revenue. However, this is not the only means Google has implemented in an attempt to stay relevant.

AMP Stories – Visual Storytelling

Most recently, Google came out with AMP Stories, which are essentially like Snapchat Stories with news stories. AMP Stories are loaded with graphics allowing for a visual storytelling experience and are available on mobile devices when using Google search. This is the latest addition to the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project, and just another example of Google branching out and keeping up with the newest waves of technology. They are trying to keep their spot on top of the mobile content market by making their search extremely fast and mobile-friendly. This way, Google is staying relevant and continuing to gain revenue in the search engine domain it is so familiar with.

Smartphone by Google

At the end of 2016, Google debuted the Google Pixel, an Android smartphone. This alone suggests that Google is looking to compete with Apple, Samsung, and even Amazon to remain relevant. In fact, it may have no choice but to compete. “Voice interaction represents a potential paradigm shift that could someday become the primary method by which people use and navigate the internet,” (Nowak) which means Google as a search engine would lose relevance and money.

Google already has Google Assistant (which the Pixel was first to get) as a voice controlled artificial intelligence helper, but relying on that alone would be dangerous. Sales of the Pixel are nowhere close to Apple and Samsung, but they have been constantly growing over the past 2 years. This is a good sign, and shows that the Pixel could really compete in the future.

Google’s Solution to Voice Interaction

Google Assistant is an extremely powerful tool with the belief that voice interaction will take over internet navigation as well as other tasks in the near future. Although it has only been around for about two years, it has already been very successful. By the end of the year, it will be available in 30 more countries, which will make it available in a grand total of 52 countries. This is a huge step for Assistant, because it has been very limited geographically, and competing with Amazon’s Alexa for the top spot could come down to expanding language capabilities as Alexa is also very limited in that area.

Again, Google comes in at second, but is still a prominent competitor. Keeping that up will only aid Google in the future; with Google being near the top in many of its endeavors, it is hard to see a future without it. That is just what Google wants, and the reason why innovation is still happening in the office.

Artificial Intelligence Taking Precedence

Perhaps the most important research Google is currently working on is artificial intelligence (AI). This is the next step as it will aid in voice interaction immensely. Google is definitely taking AI seriously – the new spot in the office for AI researchers on the google Brain team is next to the top Google executives. And Google is not the only one; Samsung has launched Bixby voice control, which is strengthened by AI, and many others have also been researching and implementing that research in their technology.

For Google, Jeff Dean of the Google Brain team says that, “The promise of AI is that [it] can produce solutions to previously unsolved problems that will really help people”. Artificial Intelligence is the next step, and people are already hungry for more after experiencing the power of voice interaction tools, such as Google Assistant. If Google can keep improving Assistant and coming up with more innovations, its relevance won’t be a question in the near future.

Since the turn of the 21st century, automotive industries have increasingly been working towards making vehicles safer for drivers with innovative technology. A recent example of this is autonomous vehicles. Most cars now have cruise and traction control, which are early advancements to the coming years of fully autonomous vehicles that will allow drivers to not even have to well…. drive. Car companies have been in a fierce race for such an achievement.

In 2015, the auto industry saw a spike in AEB (Autonomous Emergency Braking), which has since then brought down the amount of unwanted collisions because of unaware drivers. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), in 2012 they had researched that at the very least one-third of auto crashes are from rear-end collisions. Therefore, NHTSA has set a requirement that by 2022, almost all new cars will be sold with the AEB systems installed. This will increase the quantity of vehicles sold because of the new technology and prospect of safer driving. However, this is not where the advancements end.

Even though self-driving cars are still in earlier testing stages, how far away are companies from releasing the first autonomous car? Well, with the help of government funding new driving regulations/laws, we may not be far off. Experiments are already in the works to get even more new technology implemented. Testing has been done with a sensor on the top of the vehicle that has 32-64 lasers and operates in 360 degrees. Much like the AEB system, these sensors will allow reverse camera assist and collision avoidance. The lasers are there to detect surrounding objects and their distance from the vehicle. This will allow the driver to sit back without having to steer or control the vehicle. Seemingly, the final thing to think about when developing this technology is how speed will be controlled.

The advanced technology with GPS systems in vehicles has increasingly improved over the past decade. GPS systems can now detect the speed limit of any road you may be on, and if you’re exceeding that speed limit. This exact technology in the GPS system is what will help observe and control the speed of autonomous vehicles. Development will be done so that it will have the ability to correctly measure how fast you are going (miles per hour on the gauge) by sensing the motion of the car’s wheels and the tachometer.

With autonomous vehicles, people could potentially be completely dependent on technology when driving. The concern with technology is knowing that it could fail. With the vehicle virtually replacing the human eye with sensors and cameras, we are creating a vulnerability. The sunlight and weather, such as freezing temperatures and excessive heat creates wear on them. Putting weather conditions and UV rays aside, how will self driving vehicles detect a defective traffic light, road work, or construction zones making the roads differ from their original state?, considering GPS systems are not always be up to date. The next step will be finding a solution to these problems. Can we one day safely rely on technology to drive?

Samsung Galaxy S2 Keeps Breaking Records: Over Three Million Units Sold – It’s not a surprise to anyone that the Samsung Galaxy S2 has being a commercial success, it has all the features to be.

But it is very interesting to know exact numbers, and according to Samsung, the phone has exceeded 3 million units sold. What is really impressive it’s that it has achieved it in just 55 days since it appeared on the market.

Thus it becomes the fastest phone that has ever been sold in the history of the Korean company. A Samsung Galaxy S2 has a new owner every 1.5 seconds.

The Original Samsung Galaxy S2

The original Samsung Galaxy S took 85 days to get to the same amount of items sold, a figure that should also be taken into account, considering that it was the first major Android bet by Samsung. We’ll see how long it takes the new phone to reach 10 million phones sold.

Samsung reports that in the UK it has been the best selling phone, and it has being the main selling phones in the country for 17 consecutive weeks. Another major market, the United States, is still waiting for his appearance with major cell phone carriers. In other countries the stock has sold out on several occasions.

Secret of the Samsung Galaxy S2

In addition to creating a good product, the secret of getting such important figures in no time at all it’s due to Samsung’s ability to release their phones globally with the largest possible number of operators. This time the Samsung Galaxy S2 appeared in 120 countries with 140 associated operators.

Comparisons of the Samsung Galaxy S2

Comparisons are sometimes odious, but we think it is interesting to know the data from its main competitor outside from Android: iPhone 4 sold more than 1.7 million in just three days, keeping in mind that the Apple phone had a better name made in the market, in addition to appearing in the U.S. since the beginning.

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After a period of uncertainty when it seemed that OpenOffice.org had died from the fall of its server for more than 15 days, Oracle has taken a final step. In a press release they announced the donation of OpenOffice.org to the Apache Foundation, a nonprofit organization focused on the development of free software projects.

OppenOffice is one of of the most popular office suite by users because of the fact that it’s open source and free to distribute, which is direct competition with Microsoft Office, since it includes tools such as word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, vector drawing tools and database. It’s available on multiple platforms: Windows, Linux, BSD, Solaris and Mac OS X. Supports many file formats as the default format, including ISO / IEC standard OpenDocument (ODF), among other common formats, and more than 110 languages​​.

It was expected that Oracle would do something to OpenOffice.org after most developers and companies supporting this project went to LibreOffice, and certainly now no longer left them a profit. However it was not expected for Oracle to donate OpenOffice.org to the Apache Foundation, since they recently had major differences with the new Java licensing.

The Apache Foundation have shown their satisfaction with the decision of Oracle and have confirmed that they “welcome the individual projects and developer community” that will work with OpenOffice.

With the early development of electric vehicles and hybrids within the different automotive brands and the growing demand for diversification of comprehensive services related to such units, the retailer company selling electronics, Best Buy, wants to participate in the business of selling electric vehicles in the U.S..

Chad Bell, a manager at Best Buy who supervises the efforts of mobility and transportation, said that the company is holding talks with automotive brands to sell electric vehicles with its more than 1,100 stores in the U.S. “We probably have more traffic on a weekend week than in any car dealership in a month.” The benefits for a small automaker would be huge as the retail division would combine a broad network of services.

On the other side in regard to major automotive brands, Bell notes that Best Buy is holding talks with Ford and Mitsubishi. With these brands the company could teach consumers how to synchronize your Smartphone with the infotainment system of the vehicle or show how to load their units.

Currently, the company is selling Brammo electric motorcycles and has obtained contracts to install power chargers for electric vehicles from Ford and Mitsubishi.

At their different blogs, Sony announced the new downloadable update to prepare for the total restoration of the PlayStation Network that failed on April 20. Hours later they announced that the PSN Restoration had started.

This is the announcement issued at the PlayStation Blog for the U.S.:

“Thank you for your patience and encouragement over the last few weeks. As covered in the post from earlier today, you can now update the firmware on your PS3 and change your password. Kazuo Hirai just announced that we have begun the phased restoration by region of some of the services, starting with online multiplayer functionality.

Please note that these services will take a bit of time to be turned on and rolled out to the whole country. The process has begun and some states are being turned on now, so please be patient as we reach your city and state. We’ll be updating the map below as service comes online in individual states. It will take several hours to restore PSN throughout the entire country, so please keep checking back for the latest updates. In the meantime, now’s a great time to get your PS3’s firmware updated, which is required to get online.”

It is not clear if everyone is able to play online as we write this, but they have a map that shows which states have the service restored. You can check the official Playstation Blog to check if the service is back for your state.

Announcement Link: Click Here