philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

12Jan/21Off

IonQ CEO Peter Chapman on quantum computing adoption, innovation and what’s next

IonQ has a plan to commercialize quantum computing and Peter Chapman is CEO expected to make it happen.

Chapman, son of a NASA astronaut, started working in the MIT AI Lab when he was 16, invented the first sound card for the IBM PC, wrote software for the FAA and led a Ray Kurzweil company to build tools for the blind.
IonQ
 recently made news for its roadmap and proposing a new performance metric called Algorithmic Qubit.

Simply put, Chapman has been ahead of the technology curve. Chapman joined IonQ in the summer of 2018 because he is betting that quantum computing can achieve Artificial General Intelligence (AGI).

Here are a few highlights from my conversation with Chapman on the future of quantum computing.

See the full story here: https://www.zdnet.com/article/ionq-ceo-peter-chapman-on-quantum-computing-adoption-innovation-and-whats-next/

12Jan/21Off

AI, applied to Accounting: Opening the black box

Justin Adams, whose company Anduin has just launched an AI-enabled accounts receivable platform, insists there is an “art” to billing that must remain in the AR process for it to be meaningful and profitable — the deep knowledge of a client over time, for example, can affect a billing relationship. And Samantha Bowling of Garbelman Winslow CPAs isn’t interested in simply speeding up the audit with AI — she wants to provide an audit of such high quality that it’s unquestionable. These types of service goals can only be achieved by marrying AI with the human professional, with all the professional’s experience, skepticism and emotional intelligence.

The biggest benefit of applying artificial intelligence to audit, for Bowling, is the risk analysis.

“Now that there is a direct link between QuickBooks Online and MindBridge, it automatically connects and does the risk analysis,” Bowling said. “I used to think MindBridge was an audit stamping tool that looked at transactions and identified anomalies, directing our attention and telling us where to look. But I realized it’s actually a great risk assessment tool in the very beginning of an audit.”

See the full story here: https://www.accountingtoday.com/news/opening-the-black-box-ai-applied

12Jan/21Off

ArchAI: Using AI to automatically detect archaeological sites


ArchAI
 https://www.archai.io covers this gap with instant, high accuracy assessment at an early stage. Founder Iris Kramer is using technology developed during her PhD in deep learning and previous degree in archaeology. She combines the two domains to deliver an innovative product that applies the power of AI to the construction industry to deliver rapid results and improved outcomes by automatically detecting archaeological sites on earth observation data.

ArchAI is seeking partnerships with large construction companies, particularly those involved in major infrastructure projects where she can quickly bring significant, scalable benefits. She is also considering the possibility of bringing on board a co-founder with either an established reputation and connections at board level within the construction industry or extensive experience in using deep learning and would be interested to hear from anyone who fits that profile.

See the full story here: https://futureworlds.com/archai-using-ai-to-automatically-detect-archaeological-sites/

12Jan/21Off

Taking Udacity to New Heights

At Udacity, we think of the Nanodegree program as a new “fourth degree.” The three common university degrees — the Bachelor’s, Master’s, and PhD — have been with us for more than six-hundred years!  While these programs form a strong foundation for a student’s career, the reality is that technology is moving too fast today to ever be done learning. To be the best, workers need to continuously refresh their skills and learn about the latest technologies in their field.  That’s the role of the Nanodegree program.

See the full story here: https://blog.udacity.com/2019/05/udacity-new-heights.html?fbclid=IwAR335IwhZ3A8Ezvs2GpQZIGTbQOzvkL7Pvjcb3UZmUBl_-vTWz8HjiJ5mws

11Jan/21Off

Vuzix’s new microLED smart glasses look like tech you’d actually want to wear on your face

Wearable tech and augmented reality provider Vuzix is back at CES 2021 with another pair of its smart glasses, this time with a new advancement. The latest pair is powered by microLED technology, thanks to a partnership with the Chinese firm Jade Bird Display. MicroLED displays have emerged in recent years as viable alternatives to OLED screens, driving advancements mostly in the television space. 

Yet, the tech in this context allows for ultra small but powerful display projectors to be fitted into both sides of the smart glasses, which, to Vuzix’s credit, look pretty close to something you’d be comfortable wearing out in public on a daily basis. 

Combined with Vuzix’s waveguide tech and its display engine optics for mapping the image onto the inside of the glass, the result is an impressive-looking gadget that can project a stereoscopic monochrome or color image onto both lenses at a variety of pixel densities and resolutions, depending on the software requirements.

Vuzix’s smart glasses, which are more in the realm of heads-up displays than true AR, are aimed more toward the enterprise, especially after Intel acquired a 30 percent stake in the Rochester, New York-based company back in 2015.

See the full story here: https://www.theverge.com/2021/1/11/22225605/vuzix-microled-smart-glasses-next-gen-ar-heads-up-display-ces-2021?fbclid=IwAR2gmu7ng_LdXp85H4UG51D5JjppKCs25ql2pOY30uwnEJUGKObPsSfuJMA

10Jan/21Off

THE ANTIDOTE TO ZOOM FATIGUE IS HERE

The reason why Zoom exhausts us, but we can hunt for fossils with our friends in Animal Crossing for hours, is that the game takes advantage of new social opportunities in the digital environment (e.g. digitally fishing together) instead of trying to make the environment fit into a preconceived notion of social interactions (e.g. boardroom meetings).

Tom Boellstorff, a professor of anthropology at UC Irvine who studies online spaces, tells Inverse that dynamic, game-like platforms are likely to become more popular this year and next. It's all in service of ensuring that our online interactions can still be as emotionally and psychologically fruitful as they are in person.

If you're looking for a video conferencing platform that will incorporate more water cooler chat, Gather Town or Kumospace may be the solution for you.

 Spatial ... uses virtual reality to create life-like avatars of users that can interact together in a 3D space — even moving files and documents through the air like Tony Stark.

See the full story here: https://www.inverse.com/innovation/zoom-fatigue

10Jan/21Off

He Created the Web. Now He’s Out to Remake the Digital World.

But now, Mr. Berners-Lee, 65, believes the online world has gone astray. Too much power and too much personal data, he says, reside with the tech giants like Google and Facebook — “silos” is the generic term he favors, instead of referring to the companies by name. Fueled by vast troves of data, he says, they have become surveillance platforms and gatekeepers of innovation.

“Pods,” personal online data stores, are a key technical ingredient to achieve that goal. The idea is that each person could control his or her own data — websites visited, credit card purchases, workout routines, music streamed — in an individual data safe, typically a sliver of server space.

Companies could gain access to a person’s data, with permission, through a secure link for a specific task like processing a loan application or delivering a personalized ad. They could link to and use personal information selectively, but not store it.

Mr. Berners-Lee’s vision of personal data sovereignty stands in sharp contrast to the harvest-and-hoard model of the big tech companies. But it has some echoes of the original web formula — a set of technology standards that developers can use to write programs and that entrepreneurs and companies can use to build businesses. He began an open-source software project, Solid, and later founded a company, Inrupt, with John Bruce, a veteran of five previous start-ups, to kick-start adoption.

Inrupt introduced in November its server software for enterprises and government agencies. And the start-up is getting a handful of pilot projects underway in earnest this year, including ones with Britain’s National Health Service and with the government of Flanders, the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium.

Tech companies have formed a Data Transfer Project, committing to make personal data they hold portable. It now comprises Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft and Twitter. The Federal Trade Commission recently held a “Data to Go” workshop.

Inrupt is betting that trusted organizations will initially be the sponsors of pods. The pods are free for users. If the concept takes off, low-cost or free personal data services — similar to today’s email services — could emerge.

Whether his team can realize that vision is uncertain. Some in the field of personal data say the Solid-Inrupt technology is too academic for mainstream developers. They also question whether the technology will achieve the speed and power needed to become a platform for future apps, like software assistants animated by a person’s data.

Inrupt faces a series of technical challenges, but none that are “go-to-the-moon hard,” said Bruce Schneier, a well-known computer security and privacy expert, who has joined Inrupt as its chief of security architecture.

See the full story here: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/10/technology/tim-berners-lee-privacy-internet.html?fbclid=IwAR1WU_nQRCuYdknU5xoYEQQjdVpJoPJMIllU38dJaEd_2I5nRt4o82VZRXUhttps://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/10/technology/tim-berners-lee-privacy-internet.html?fbclid=IwAR1WU_nQRCuYdknU5xoYEQQjdVpJoPJMIllU38dJaEd_2I5nRt4o82VZRXU

9Jan/21Off

Fraunhofer IOF to Revolutionize Quantum Communications and Microscopy

New encryption methods

In the world of communication, Fraunhofer IOF is developing a new encryption technology known as "quantum key distribution" (QKD for short)  to protect data today against the cyber attacks of tomorrow. At CES 2021, Fraunhofer IOF will showcase the EPS (short for “Entangled Photon Source”) that generates entangled photon pairs that can serve as the basis for generating quantum-based keys. 

Microscopy

But that's not all that Fraunhofer IOF uses entangled photon pairs for. These elements also serve as the basis of a new microscopy technique that does not cause irreversible damage to the samples as light radiation does. This is because these two photons exchange information with each other without having to interact with the sample itself.

https://interestingengineering.com/fraunhofer-iof-to-revolutionize-quantum-communications-and-microscopy?utm_content=151143435&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-508209262538427&fbclid=IwAR1R8VFCTXGQG3S96wG1J4O93O4gyMo8qaXi6YEAq_3b1hfrPgjEJ8ESlyo

8Jan/21Off

Glossary of the Most Popular AR Terms

AR Terms

AR Advertising

The use of augmented reality in advertising allows consumers to interact with brands in a more immersive and exciting manner. 3D objects and animations help maintain customer loyalty and make interactions with ads more engaging and meaningful.

ARKit and ARCore

These AR terms define the two software development kits (SDK) launched by Apple and Android to help developers create native AR apps for the most popular mobile operating systems.

...

https://arpost.co/2021/01/07/glossary-of-the-most-popular-ar-terms/

8Jan/21Off

Facebook to launch ‘smart glasses’ in 2021 but without augmented reality

The glasses, which are being built in partnership with Ray-Ban and parent Luxottica Group SpA, will connect to a device — though users won’t be able to overlay digital objects onto their real-world view, a foundational element of AR.

“These are certainly connected glasses, they are certainly providing a lot of functionality, [but] we’re being quite coy about which functionality precisely we are providing,” Bosworth said. 

https://theprint.in/tech/facebook-to-launch-smart-glasses-in-2021-but-without-augmented-reality/581062/