Close your eyes. What do you see when you think about artificial intelligence? Hal 9000 defying human orders? Ava savagely murdering her maker? What about ARIIA taking over the country from deep inside the Pentagon? With a new competition, XPRIZE and IBM Watson challenge us to think slightly more pragmatically (or at least less apocalyptically dystopian) about the implications of… Read More
Pro-privacy organization Tor, which distributes anonymizing web browser tools, has published a social contract — promoting what it dubs its commitment to ‘advancing human rights’. Read More
Facebook has to train people how to make great video if it wants it “at the heart” of its services like Mark Zuckerberg promised, so today it launched a slew of new video analytics. Creators can now see the audience demographics of their video viewers, what moments were most engaging in their live broadcasts, and how shares and cross-posts boosted their view counts. But… Read More
Silk‘s co-founder and CEO, Salar al Khafaji, announced today that private data analytics unicorn Palantir would be acquiring the company. The transaction appears to be an acqui-hire, with members of the Silk team directly joining Palantir in new roles. Founded in 2010, Silk helps data journalists, activists, NGOs and businesses produce data visualizations in the cloud without the need… Read More
Service-level agreements (SLAs) are key when it comes to choosing a service that is going to play an important part for your own service. Cloud hosting services have an SLA, software-as-a-service products have an SLA, even airlines have SLAs. Software-as-a-service startup Algolia just revamped its SLA, and it’s interesting to see how the company is wording its policy. SLAs are simple: if… Read More
The Flex Company, the makers of a disc-shaped tampon alternative, has raised $1 million from Y Combinator, Amplify.LA and several others and acquired menstrual disc competitor Softcup for an undisclosed amount. Flex now owns all of the market’s menstrual disc products, which the company says are ultimately easier to use than tampons and menstrual cups. The discs, which have not… Read More
Listen up, would-be TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2016 attendees. Time is quickly running out to get your hands on tickets to the best startup show in the Bay Area at the deeply discounted, early-bird price point of just $1,995 apiece, so get on over to our ticketing page today before prices jump on Saturday, August 13. Read More
Since news broke of the fatal accident involving a Tesla Model S that was on “Autopilot,” the media and various experts have been locked in high-speed Socratic dialogs on the pros and cons of self-driving cars. To date, most questions have focused on three key areas: liability, the technology and ethics. Read More
IFTTT made a name for itself as a platform for people to easily build (or pick up pre-built) scripts to automate tasks in and between various apps — say, to turn on the air conditioner using your home’s smart thermostat when your car tells it that you are 20 minutes’ drive away. Now, as part of the company’s bid to grow in ubiquity, it is taking the next natural… Read More
It is, sadly, just for businesses, so slow your roll before you start daydreaming about what you’ll load onto yours. The company showed off a few new products at the Flash Memory Summit in Santa Clara, but nothing quite as jaw dropping as what the company is calling “the largest SSD ever demonstrated.” The 60TB SSD is firmly in demonstration mode, meaning it’s sort of… Read More
I’ll be in Columbus, Ohio, on Wednesday, August 10, to hold a night of pitches and open mic shenanigans so bring your guitar and pitching shoes. The event will be at O’Toole’s 4796 W Broad St, right off I-270. We’ll start at 7 p.m. sharp with pitches, so get there after work. And at 8pm or so we’ll have an open stage with live music – I’m going to… Read More
BMW is working on an Alexa skill for its new BMW Connected app, which will arrive later this year and let car owners do things like check their remaining fuel levels and lock their car doors via voice commands to their Echo speaker.
The new BMW Connected app arrived in the North American App Store in April, and will roll out in the UK. It’s able to connect to any car with… Read More
Sending a letter to the White House is getting a digital upgrade today. In addition to accepting hand-written missives by postal mail and emails, the public can now send a note to President Obama via Facebook. On the the White House’s Facebook page, you can use Messenger to “speak” to the administration by way of the newly launched White House Messenger bot. To use the… Read More
JD.com, Alibaba’s closest rival in China, is targeting profitability after reported its Q2 2016 earnings which, while on target with expectations, saw revenue growth continue to slow. Read More
The Apple App Store shows no signs of slowing down, despite the fact that people seem to limit the number of apps they use regularly to just a small handful. But developers keep building, so the apps keep coming. According to new analysis out this morning from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower, the App Store is expected to more than double its size over the next four years, reaching 5… Read More
Your next Adidas runners might be made in America – by a robot. The shoemaker revealed more details today about its coming ‘Speedfactory,’ which it previously announced would be coming to the U.S. in 2017. The factory will call Atlanta home, and feature 74,000 square feet of robot shoemaking capability, with full operational status target for the end of next year. The factory… Read More
Apples are the second most commonly consumed fruit in the U.S., according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, but the way apples are harvested in the orchard hasn’t changed much in the past two centuries. It’s still a manual process, by and large. Now, SRI Ventures, a kind of startup incubator within the Menlo Park research and development firm SRI International,… Read More
Apple’s iPhone SE strategy looks to be going as planned. The new four-inch iPhone looks gave Apple a welcome sales bump in key markets between April and June. Read More
You don’t do things halfway when it comes to tasks like mapping the light of millions of galaxies. That sort of job requires a fairly massive undertaking like, say, 5,000 ten-inch cylindrical robots each measuring the width of a finger that are tasked with gathering light from galaxies, stars and supermassive blackhole-powered quasars. And, of course, one doesn’t simply flip… Read More
Get ready for a massive MacBook Pro update. Apple is planning to unveil new 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Pro laptops with retina displays soon. According to a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is building a completely new pro laptop with many new features, such as a Touch ID sensor and an OLED mini screen above the keyboard. If you’ve been following MacBook Pro rumors,… Read More
