So let's say you're the CEO of a highly touted startup that's just clearing the runway, when Google announces that it's creating an ecosystem in your product category that you're not part of. What do you do? One thing you and your investors do is give an optimistic interview to a publication that's as high on the journalistic foodchain as you can manage. Say, Fortune … [Read more...]
What if the iWatch is … a Ring?
Artisans have been making watches for about 200 years, argues Craig Hockenberry. (Actually, he says they've been making them since the 15th century, but he's wrong.) Does Apple really want to compete with them? Or does it have something else in mind? Of course, there have been billions of bits spilled speculating on what the iWatch is going to look like and when it's going … [Read more...]
Ars Technica Goes Deep on Android Wear
The always excellent Ars Technica site has dug up every screenshot they could find on Android Wear and makes what sound like a lot of good assumptions about what it is and how it will look and work. At its core, as previously reported, is the Google Now interface, which is (roughly speaking) the Android counterpart to Apple's Siri. So if Now doesn't work as expected, Wear will … [Read more...]
Google Enters the Real-World Wearables Market with Android Wear
Now we know for sure: Google Glass was a toy. Google announced today its entry into the practical world of wearables, with Android Wear. This version of the Android operating system will essentially expand on notification devices like the Pebble watch or the Samsung Gear. Where those devices drive information from a phone to a wearable device like a wristwatch, Android Wear … [Read more...]
What a Pro Basketball Shootaround Looks Like Through Glass
We wrote back in January that the NBA's Sacramento Kings were playing around with Google Glass. CNET was invited to a shootaround recently: here's what a pro basketball player sees (minus peripheral vision, which is one of their most important assets) when he plays. … [Read more...]
FiveThirtyEight Takes On Fitness Trackers
Some months ago, we reported that different brands of fitness trackers appear to count steps in fundamentally different ways from each other -- and that called their accuracy into question. Yesterday, Nate Silver's ESPN-owned data journalism site FiveThirtyEight.com launched, and there was a wonderful piece about just that topic. Reporter Carl Bialik counted his own steps … [Read more...]
Profile of Thad Starner, Father of Wearable Computing
If anyone could lay a claim to having invented the idea of wearable technology, it's probably Thad Starner. Now a professor at Georgia Tech, Starner's been strapping computers to his face for about 20 years. (Scientist Gordon Bell and writer/researcher/tinkererSteve Roberts are in that pantheon, too.) Besides his work in Georgia, Starner is a technical lead on Google … [Read more...]
Why People Hate Google Glass
Our friend and colleague Ron Miller has an insightful piece on TechCrunch about why people have a visceral negative reaction to Google Glass. It's not about Glass, Miller writes -- it's about any new technology. (He nabs an interview on the subject with Dean Kamen, who knows a thing or two about the adoption of new tech.) For what it's worth, we think Miller is on to … [Read more...]
Feel What The Players Feel
It's the ultimate insider's sport fan gear. Imagine wearing your favorite player's jersey, but clothes being tricked out to receive sensations of what the player is feeling as he's on the field. They're trying it out in Australia. Foxtel and the agency CHE Proximity worked with three Australian Rules Football players -- Scott Pendlebury, Luke Hodge and Trent Cotchin. The … [Read more...]
Must-Read: The Economist Writes About Conductive Fabrics
There are lots of challenges to building electronics into clothing, but perhaps chief among them is the problem of getting durable wiring onto (or into) fabrics. The Economist has an excellent article about who's doing what to solve that problem; it's a rare must-read and must-clip if this is a problem that's important to you. In fairness, the article may be a little ahead … [Read more...]