Blockchain-powered marketplaces will be like steroids for crowd investing
Crowdfunding, but for promising cancer drugs. Like a Kickstarter campaign, but instead of a memento or special access to the product, you get an actual share in the drug’s potential future sales. Would you do it? Biotech firm Agenus wants to give you a chance—something it says is now possible thanks to blockchain technology.
As for Agenus, the problem it is trying to solve is that biotech companies often have trouble raising money to develop new drugs and bring them to market, since the process is so risky and expensive. Agenus is betting its new crypto-token, which it calls the Biotech Electronic Security Token (BEST), will be more compelling to investors than traditional biotech financing instruments. Particularly attractive will be the ability to trade them on regulated internet marketplaces, the first of which are just now starting to go live. The new approach, proclaims CEO Garo Armen, has the potential to “revolutionize the financing of drug development.”
Whether they have issued or plan to issue “digital securities,” “tokenized securities,” or “security tokens” (pick your buzzword), this is essentially what Agenus and every other such project is aiming to pull off: an ICO that follows the rules.
See the full story here: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/613135/blockchain-powered-marketplaces-will-be-like-steroids-for-crowd-investing/?utm_campaign=the_download.unpaid.engagement&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=71132857&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-91lX_sT138-yWBoFtQX11Kcmx1I711hWn5zi_AEXyhDHorefp4XQKxQhaNhbLMkKUu8LVAKup1opR8m4t5bAnH23xz_w&_hsmi=71132857
The Digital Art Market Heats Up
[NOTE: 2 photos of USC’s Perry Hoberman’s work are featured in the PRINT version of this story (but not in the online version)]
VR experts predict bright future
VFX house Framestore, meanwhile, is experiencing growing demand for virtual reality work. Its VR team has grown from three to approaching 100, according to head of VR Karl Woolley.
He said the early hype around VR led people to think it would take off quickly and that there would soon be headsets in every home. Instead, he added: “The real demand for VR is coming from the rollout of more location-based experiences. And this is where I think we’ll see it continue for the time being.”
Meanwhile, location-based VR company Dreamscape Immersive, whose investors include AMC and Steven Spielberg, has just opened its first VR experience centre in a Westfield shopping mall in Los Angeles and plans to open four more in the US this year.
See the full story here: https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/tech/vr-experts-predict-bright-future/5137971.article
MIT’s AI can train neural networks faster than ever before
Abstract network molecular block chain structure - 3d rendered image on black background
Today, AI can design machine learning systems known as neural networks in a process called neural architecture search (NAS). But this technique requires a considerable amount of resources like time, processing power and money. Even for Google, producing a single convolution neural network -- often used for image classification -- takes 48,000 GPU hours. Now, MIT researchers have developed a NAS algorithm that automatically learns a convolution neural network in a fraction of the time -- just 200 GPU hours.
While this is certainly not uncomplicated, it could be a step toward putting AI and machine learning in the hands of more people and companies, freeing it from the towers of tech giants.
See the full story here: https://www.engadget.com/2019/03/22/mit-ai-automated-neural-network-design/
Google Stadia is a Net Neutrality Nightmare
Google Stadia will run video games on Google’s own hardware in a server farm and stream the experience to anything with a screen.
But the United States government just recently gave up its ability to prevent internet service providers like Comcast and Verizon from charging different amounts for different types of internet services, placing all legal leverage in the hands of the corporation, such that the whims of your internet consumption pertain ever more to the depth of your wallet. A successful Google Stadia is a prime target in a post-net neutrality world, and the hungry demon between you and Google is the devil itself: Comcast.
See the full story here: https://variety.com/2019/digital/opinion/google-stadia-is-a-net-neutrality-nightmare-1203170741/
This app uses augmented reality to rewrite ‘herstory’
The study’s authors Kay A. Chick and Stacey Corle wrote: “Women have and still do make up 50% [of] Americans, but are represented in only a small fraction of the historical record… As long as textbook publishers focus on military and political history over social history, men will be highlighted in American history textbooks and the number of women portrayed will not see significant change.”
A novel solution
To set the historical record straight for Women’s History Month, commemorated in March, a new app uses augmented reality to “add” the missing women into school textbooks in California.
Lessons In Herstory allows students to scan over any portrait of a man in the book A History of US, Book 5: Liberty For All? 1820–1860 to unlock a related story about a forgotten woman in history.
The app was made by Daughters of the Evolution, an organization to help young women create the world they want to live in, co-founded by a San Francisco-based advertising agency.
It currently features a diverse selection of 75 women from the 19th century, including Harriet Tubman and Gertrude Stein, who were chosen by author and feminist historian Kate Schatz.
See the full story here: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/03/this-app-uses-augmented-reality-to-rewrite-herstory/
nreal and Netease AR showcased augmented reality game YuME at GDC 2019
nreal, developer of sunglass-style mixed reality glasses, showcased their nreal light glasses with Netease AR’s augmented reality game YuME at GDC 2019 this week.
nreal light uses USB Type-C to tether to 5G smartphones using the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Mobile Platform to enable mixed reality and augmented reality applications and gaming. The MR glasses featured 1080p HD display, 52° Field of View, and 6DoF (Six Degress of Freedom) tracking. The glasses even come with interchangeable prescription lenses, foldable temples, and nosepads.
See the full story here: https://techaeris.com/2019/03/23/nreal-and-netease-ar-showcased-augmented-reality-game-yume-at-gdc-2019
ALIBABA ACQUIRES ISRAELI AUGMENTED REALITY START-UP INFINITYAR
Founded in 2013, InfinityAR is a provider of an operating system that turns augmented reality glasses into a content-augmentation platform, based on its own inside-out simultaneous localization and mapping solution, or SLAM.
InfinityAR has been working with Alibaba since 2016, when Jack Ma’s group led an $18m. Series C financing round for the company, in partnership with Japanese IT and entertainment firm Sun Corporation.
In December 2018, the Alibaba Group made a strategic investment in Tel Aviv-based public transit optimization start-up Optibus, and since 2016 has also invested in cloud-connected dashcam developer Nexar, advanced GPU data warehouse providers SQream Technologies, augmented-reality company Lumus and e-commerce search engine firm Twiggle.
See the full story here: https://www.jpost.com/Jpost-Tech/Business-and-Innovation/Alibaba-acquires-Israeli-augmented-reality-start-up-InfinityAR-584443
Cyberpsychology and Mobile UX: 5 Ways To Optimize Cognitive Load
#4 Balance text and imagery information
Don’t display to a user more than you have to. Use only relevant graphics and a balanced mix of imagery and text. That will help you make a user understand your product better by tapping into the visual and verbal processing centers of the brain.
#5 Structurize your content
Display information in small, easily digestible chunks of information.
Read the full story here: https://www.business2community.com/mobile-apps/cyberpsychology-and-mobile-ux-5-ways-to-optimize-cognitive-load-02183421