Livescribe, the company whose magic smartpen makes taking notes a whole lot easier, is back with completely revamped capabilities and cloud integration that almost makes you want to be a student again. The company’s new Sky Wi-Fi smartpen has been recording what you hear and synchronizing it to what you write since it launched in 2008, but it now digitizes and syncs notes across iOS and Android devices via the cloud. The new pen – which is available starting Monday at retailers such as Amazon, Best Buy and Livescribe.com — is a huge leap forward for the company who already makes the note-taking process that much more painless for students and business people. If you’re not familiar with how it works, here’s a quick rundown: When taking notes with a Livescribe pen in its accompanying black notebook – which features high-tech dot paper for digitizing the content — the pen records everything you write and hear. To replay the audio, users can tap a word in the section of notes and the recording will begin playing from that exact spot. Now, the updated pen takes it a step further with cloud capabilities, so it’s possible to access content remotely via smartphones, tablets and PCs. It also launched a full integration with social networks and Evernote, allowing users to wirelessly send digitized notes directly to their accounts. Although notes could be sent to Facebook, Twitter, Dropbox and Evernote in the past, mobile integration in the cloud for the first time. (The connector buttons for the social networks will be available starting early 2013.) The new cloud capabilities shine via the service’s existing Pencast feature in Evernote, a note-taking app which helps users keep track of to-do lists, save ideas and stay organized. Similar to watching a movie, a Pencast relives exactly how notes were taken: After pressing play, audio starts and notes that were taken at that time will appear on screen in sync. Evernote, which already has more than 40 million subscribers, is a natural fit for Livescribe because its userbase is already note-taking savvy and looking for new ways to stay organized. The news about the partnership comes just a few days after Evernote announced more than 100 new features to its platform. Developers will be able to integrate content created with the Sky Wi-Fi smartpen into apps and services too. The company announced on Monday the pre-release of the Livescribe Mobile SDK (0.9), with limited availability starting in December. A launch for Android is expected to debut before the end of the year, while iOS is planned for early next year. Because the Mobile SDK will allow the smartpen to connect directly with tablets and smartphones via Wi-Fi, new opportunities will undoubtedly open for developers looking to integrate the pen into platforms. The Sky Wi-Fi smartpen comes in various models with different pricing options: 2GB (200 hours of audio recording time), $169.95; 4GB (400 hours), $199.95; 8GB (800 hours of audio, plus a one-year subscription to Evernote Premium), […]
If you’re hungry, you better smile: Researchers at the University of Toyko have developed a smile-activated refrigerator, which requires users to flash a grin before entering. The system, which is called the “The Happiness Counter,” aims to naturally encourage smiling in our every day lives. Equipped with built-in Sony CyberShot digital camera that features smile-recognition technology and an attached light sensor, it can sense when a smile has been flashed and unlocks the refrigerator door. Although you would think this could cure late-night food-binging for those feeling down, it’s still possible to open the refrigerator if you don’t smile — you just have to tug at it harder. “We feel that the happiness counter will naturally encourage the act of smiling in the multitude of daily frustrations, thus enhancing a positive mood and the communication of people,” a spokesperson said in a product video. The fridge might actually make smiling easier, too: researchers conducted a series of trials to test its effectiveness and found participants were more likely to smile forcefully in the first few days of using the system, compared to day 10 when people were much more likely to smile naturally. The team also believes this type of smile-activated technology has potential to boast productivity and morale in the workplace. For example, a “Happiness Counter” could be installed outside a meeting room, and only those who smile are allowed to enter. “Increasing the number of smiles in the workplace will enhance the atmosphere for everyone and they might be able to produce some nice ideas,” a spokesperson said in the video. Are you intrigued by the concept? Do you think it could really make a difference in your overall mood and outlook? Let us know in the comments below. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/10/10/smile-refrigerator/
Google has updated Google TV with several important features, including a voice search and a new TV guide called PrimeTime. The voice search option enables you to start watching TV shows, movies and YouTube videos simply by speaking to your TV. You can also open apps, go to websites and perform searches. Google’s search engine will even recognize various natural language search queries; for example, saying “how to tie a bow tie” will get you an instructional video on YouTube. As far as PrimeTime goes, it’s a renamed TV & Movies app which Google launched last year. It enables you to access favorite channels, see recently watched shows, browse for best live shows or find suggestions based on content you like. Google is on fire lately when it comes to Google TV updates. Only last week, Google announced it would start offering music and movies to Google TV owners in some European countries. And yesterday, Google launched an updated Google TV and Android YouTube app which enables you to play videos you’ve found on your Android device on a Google TV with one click. The update will be rolling out to LG devices “this week,” followed by other devices, Google claims. Check out an overview of the new features in the video above. Get Your Tickets to Mashable Media Summit The Mashable Media Summit 2012 will explore the impact that technology is having on media, and how digital media is affecting our lives and changing the world. This one-day conference will bring together the brightest minds in media, including content creators, technology leaders, entrepreneurs, social media executives and journalists. Date: Friday, Nov. 30, 2012 Time: 9:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. Location: The TimesCenter, 242 West 41st Street, New York, NY 10036Tickets: Purchase early bird tickets on Eventbrite. A Look Back at Last Year’s Mashable Media Summit Mashable Media Summit 2011 Media Summit 2011 The Mashable Media Summit on Nov. 4 at the Times Center in New York City attracted professionals in digital, tech, advertising, sales, marketing, mobile and publishing from all over the world. Media Summit 2011 We had a packed house in attendance for this year’s Media Summit. The Future of Social Media Pete Cashmore, founder and CEO of Mashable, speaks on the future of social media, its current landscape and what trends to expect for 2012. Media Summit 2011 This year’s Media Summit was located at the Times Center in New York City. Social Media Grows Up: The Evolving Role of Social Media in News Organizations Mashable‘s community manager Meghan Peters chats with Katie Rogers, social media manager at The Washington Post; Anthony De Rosa, social media editor at Reuters; and Drake Martinet, social media editor at AllThingsD. Teaching – and Learning From – The Old Grey Lady Brian Stelter, a media reporter and blogger at The New York Times speaks at the Media Summit. The Filter Bubble: How to Fix Content Curation Eli Pariser, author and chairman of the board at MoveOn.org, discusses how human editors and algorithms […]
Video-sharing platform Vimeo launched on Wednesday a new iPhone app with the ability to uploaded recorded videos faster and easily share them to social networking sites. The free app — now available in the Apple App Store — allows users to record videos and upload them directly from the app. Users can pause uploads and start them again when needed. Social sharing is a major focus in the redesign, making it simple to share clips with others via Facebook, Twitter, email or iMessage. The platform carried over some existing features to its new look, such as the option to like, comment and add videos to a Watch Later queue. A nice new perk is that now you can watch clips while uploading your own at the same time. “We redesigned it to be smarter and more intuitive so you can do what you want, when you want, really easily,” Vimeo said in an official blog post. “You can take your feed on a road trip (just not while you’re driving), relax in the park with your Watch Later queue or catch a Staff Pick or a friend’s video while in line for lunch.” Although the update is only for iPhone users now, the company is reportedly working on new iPad and Android apps, according to VentureBeat. To coincide with the launch, the company released a quirky video to demonstrate why one might want such an app. Be sure to check it out above. The news comes just two months after Vimeo announced a program called Tip Jar, which gives creators the ability to monetize their films and videos. Instead of enabling ads on videos, viewers can “tip this video” by donating anywhere between $0.99 to $500 after watching a clip. Image via Flickr, roland Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/11/28/vimeo-app-iphone/
In the age of Photoshop, it’s almost impossible to say with absolute certainty whether any given image is real, but one former Photoshop employee hopes to change that. Fourandsix Technologies, a startup founded by a former Adobe Photoshop executive and a digital forensics expert, unveiled its first piece of software this week, which promises to help law enforcement determine whether a photo is authentic or not. The software, called FourMatch, analyzes the meta data in picture files to quickly determine if a photo has been modified. FourMatch relies on a comprehensive database of more than 70,000 “signatures” that are left on a file from each piece of hardware and software that goes into creating it. As the company explains in a description of the product, “Once an image has been edited and resaved from a software product, this signature is changed to match the software rather than the original capture device.” FourMatch is primarily intended for police and lawyers who need to determine whether a photograph has been tampered with in any way between the time it was first captured and submitted as evidence. However, the software won’t tell you exactly how the image has been altered — if it has been at all — because it only analyzes the file data rather than the image itself. For this reason, it can just tell you if a file has been touched by another application. “This first product we’ve put out is not a magic bullet that will tell you everything you need to know about an image,” Kevin Connor, the company’s president and co-founder who worked at Adobe for 15 years, told Mashable. “This is sort of a first step and there are certain scenarios when it will be very valuable, particularly in the law enforcement space.” Indeed, the software currently retails for $890 so it’s clearly not intended for the average consumer. In the future, though, the startup plans to release other tools to determine the authenticity of pictures that should have broader use. In particular, Connor sees a growing need for technology that can detect photo fraud in medical research, help media companies assess whether their photographers have been too liberal editing their photos and sift through pictures going viral on social media to figure out whether they’re real. Likewise, he thinks tools like this could help banks verify the authenticity of pictures of checks and other payments taken by customers. “People are using images more and more to communicate and facilitate transactions,” Connor said. “There will be more situations when you might want to be able to verify that it’s true.” Image courtesy of Fourandsix Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/09/21/fourandsix-fourmatc/
Any high school-aged coders with a love for space and NASA out there? Read on. Zero Robotics, a robotics programming competition set up through MIT, is entering its fourth year — and there’s still a day left to register. Here’s how it works: Students can sign up in teams for free on the website. Over the course of the semester, they compete head-to-head with other teams in writing programs — sort of situational, scenario-based challenges. Gradually, the challenges get more difficult. Then, after several phases, finalists are selected to compete in running code for the International Space Station (ISS) — which is broadcast live by an astronaut on board the ISS. Since 2009, the competition has allowed participants to compete in a series of coding challenges through an online platform. “There’s a whole ranking system that tells them how well they’re doing as they’re going through it,” said Jake Katz, co-founder of the competition and research assistant in the Space Stations laboratory at MIT. “And throughout the course of the season, the game gets slightly more complex. They start out in two dimensions and then they will soon, around Oct. 5, be going into 3-D competition — then we add some additional challenges towards the end.” The original kick off for this year’s competition was on Sept. 8. But, Katz said, there’s still a day left to register. “There have been people participating so far, and are already off and running with it, but it’s still possible to join in and make a submission for the first phase,” he said. “We have 75 teams so far, and that’s just from the U.S.” There are an additional 43 teams from 19 other countries, he said. The competition is sponsored by NASA, DARPA, TopCoder, Aurora Flight Sciences, CASIS and MIT. TopCoder, a programming company, designed the platform the games are played on. “In 2009, when we started, we had just two teams competing against each other,” Katz said. “Just two years later, we had about 100 teams from all over sign up.” Check out the promotional video below: What kind of code would you write to run on board the ISS? Let us know in the comments. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/09/26/zero-robotics-mit/
We’ve all been to a party or barbecue where the music is just awful. And of course, being the polite guest that you are, you can’t just unplug the host’s smartphone and swap yours in for a better playlist. On a quest to save your sanity and make the music at your next gathering more interactive, Internet Explorer and Nokia launched a new music platform called Mix Party, making playlist creation collaborative. Here’s how it works: The host of the party can open Mix Party on his Xbox using Internet Explorer. Although the host needs an Xbox with Xbox Live subscription, anyone with a smartphone can play along. First, download the accompanying smartphone app, which requires scanning a QR code to join the Mix Party. Then vote on which songs to play next. The service is free through the month of July, and at the end of the offer, you will be prompted to sign up for Nokia Music, an ad-free service that launched in September 2012, exclusive to Lumia smartphone users. The concept actually builds off Nokia Music, which lets you to download up to four one-hour music mixes. Users can upgrade to the platform’s unlimited access plan for $3.99 a month, which gives Mix Party users access to Nokia’s full library, so you can hear any song at your next gathering. Nokia has been creeping further into the music game over the past year. The mobile manufacturer has also built Nokia Mix Radio, a free service that lets you skip songs and save playlists for offline use (like when you’re underground on the subway). What creative ways do you manage playlists at parties? Let us know in the comments below. Image via Gilles Mingasson/Getty Images Read more: http://mashable.com/2013/07/02/nokia-mix-party/
John McAfee, the founder of anti-virus security firm McAfee who is currently detained as a murder suspect, is now blogging from a jail cell in Guatemala. McAfee was arrested on Wednesday night after illegally entering Guatemala from Belize. He has been on the run since last month to evade police in Belize who consider him a person of interest in relation to the murder of his neighbor. He recently started a blog called The Hinterland, which details his experience hiding from police, and is currently blogging from a computer given to him by police. “I am in jail in Guatemala. Vastly superior to Belize jails,” McAfee wrote. “I asked for a computer and one magically appeared. The coffee is also excellent.” He has been responding to reader comments and calls the people he has met at the jail “nice” and “sympathetic.” “I am using the computer of one of the wardens, or whatever title is used here,” he wrote in another post titled “Can’t Sleep.” “He is a sweet man and a gentleman. The world is heavilly populated with gentle people. He makes me coffee and tells tender stories about his life. He is a good companion. I believe I could spend weeks in the desert with him as a sole companion without once becoming irritated.” McAfee said his future is unknown as of now: “Only time will tell what will happen. No one has a crystal ball. However, I would be truly shocked if I did not conduct the press conference tomorrow as I had originally planned.” McAfee has hardly been out of the public eye while dodging police. In addition to blogging, he has been featured in video clips posted by Vice. In fact, the magazine has uploaded a video of McAfee getting detailed in Guatemala to YouTube. McAfee tells readers to “stay tuned” and “blogging from a jail cell might be a groundbreaking activity.” He also asked: “Anybody have friends in the State Department?” McAfee founded the anti-virus software company by the same name in the late 1980s. He retired in 1994. Photo via Johan Ordonez/AFP/Getty Images Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/12/06/mcafee-blog-jail-guatemala/
We’re excited to announce the revamped Mashable Vine Challenge. Each week we’ll present a theme and ask you to create the best Vine video based on a chosen topic. In honor of Social Media Day, this week’s theme is special connections. Social Media Day is all about celebrating the connections that have come into our lives because of social media. In an instant, you can make a friend across the globe. These connections can bear the fruit of a new friend, career or soulmate. Use your Vine video to explore a standout connection between two people or things. We encourage you to attend a Social Media Day Meetup in your city. Be sure to shoot a Vine video and tweet it with the hashtag #SMDay. In our first two Vine Challenges, we were excited to see you take interesting approaches to the themes. For this week’s challenge, we want you to embrace your creativity and interpret it in your own personal style. Tweet your video by 5 p.m. E.T. on Monday, July 1 with the hashtag #SMDay for a chance to be featured in our Vine Challenge roundup on Mashable. Edit: See the Results of This Challenge Stay tuned for the following Vine Challenge theme to be announced next Wednesday. We look forward to seeing your #SMDay Vine videos! Join the Social Media Day Movement Sign up to attend or organize your own event on the Mashable Meetup Everywhere page. Use the #smday hashtag on Twitter, Instagram, Google+ and any other social network of your choice. Find your Mashable Meetup community: Other Social Media Day Resources: Social Media Day Meetups Happening Worldwide How to Organize a Mashable Meetup How to Make Social Media Day Official in Your City Past Social Media Day Celebrations Homepage Image by Mashable Read more: http://mashable.com/2013/06/26/vine-challenge-smday/
