philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

A Cleaner, Cheaper Way to Make Metals

While Infinium’s approach can be used to produce other metals, including magnesium and aluminum, the company is starting with rare earths because they fetch much higher prices. Its first customer is the U.S. government, which needs rare earth metals for its stockpile of strategically valuable materials. Rare earth ore is mined in just a few places in the world, and high costs and environmental challenges have prevented companies from processing rare earth ore to make metals domestically.

The key advance for Infinium was developing alternative molten salts that don’t react with the zirconium oxide, so that it can last long enough to be practical.

Finding an alternative to carbon has long been the “dream” of the metals industry, says Donald Sadoway, a professor of materials science at MIT who is not involved with the company. “I believe [Infinium’s] technology is sound. It’s real,” he says. Whether the company succeeds “is all about the economics,” he says. “No one cares about the flow chart for the process. You care about the prices. If it produces a good metal at a lower cost, people will be interested.”

Read the full story here: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/527526/a-cleaner-cheaper-way-to-make-metals/?utm_campaign=newsletters&utm_source=newsletter-daily-all&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20140604

New Technologies to Help Seniors Age in Place

Some researchers are studying how to adapt radar technology, which has been used for years to catch highway speeders and in weather forecasting, to applications for assisted living. Others are testing the 3-D sensors used in gaming systems like the Xbox to develop nonintrusive alert systems.

The goal with the elderly is to detect a fall without disturbing them unless they have just fallen. "The whole idea is you cannot have visual access to inside," says Moeness Amin, director of the Center for Advanced Communications at Villanova University.

Read the full story here: http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-technologies-to-help-seniors-age-in-place-1401749932

New Chip to Bring Holograms to Smartphones

One chipset, small enough to fit into a smartphone, is capable of projecting video on a surface with a 48-inch diagonal. A patchwork of chips, laid together, can form far larger and more complex images. The first iteration of the chip, which is scheduled to begin shipping next year, will only project 2-D videos, but the next version, expected to follow soon after will feature holographic capability, according to Ostendo's chief executive and founder, Hussein S. El-Ghoroury.

During a recent test reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, Ostendo showed a working prototype: a set of six chips laid together that beamed a 3-D image of green dice spinning in the air. The image and motion appeared consistent, irrespective of the position of the viewer.

According to Ramesh Raskar, an associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is working on 3-D displays for MIT's Media Lab, Ostendo's advantage and the key to its 3-D capability is its resolution. The Retina display on Apple Inc.'siPhone, for example, has about 300 dots per inch, Ostendo's chips are at about 5,000 dots per inch.

Ostendo, which says it has several opportunities with major handset manufacturers, expects the first 2-D projector unit to be in the hands of consumers before the summer of 2015. With a lens attached, it will be less than 0.5 cubic centimeters, roughly the size of the camera in the iPhone. It also expects to begin manufacturing the second version of the chip, with 3-D capability, in the second half of 2015. The cost to the consumer should be about $30 a chip, Ostendo estimates.

See the full story here: http://online.wsj.com/articles/new-chip-to-bring-holograms-to-smartphones-1401752938#printMode

Watch the video of the hologram here: http://stream.wsj.com/story/world-stream/SS-2-44156/SS-2-546759/?mod=wsj_streaming_world-stream

ESPN Opens New Digital Center

“The group working on DC-2 was given a simple assignment,” said Jodi Markley, senior vice president of operations for ESPN. “Design and build technology that hadn’t been built yet, create studio environments with unlimited capabilities for content creation, make it a very comfortable place for our employees to work, and make it green. This facility far exceeds that original assignment. In fact, DC-2 is the most technically sophisticated media facility in the United States.”

Much of the planning and new technology that went into DC-2 was based on close consultation with the network’s employees and ESPN President John Skipper highlighted the work of Chuck Pagano, the network’s CTO, who played a key role in designing the new facility. Pagano, who started with ESPN before it even began broadcasting in 1979, will be retiring in June.

See the full story here: http://www.c2meworld.com/creation/espn-opens-new-digital-center/

The FCC may consider a stricter definition of broadband in the Netflix age

The FCC soon intends to solicit public comments on whether broadband should be redefined as 10 Mbps and up, or even as high as 25 Mbps and up, according to an agency official who asked not to be named because the draft request was not yet public. The new threshold would likely increase the number of people in the United States that statistically lack broadband, which in 2012 amounted to 6 percent of the population.

See the full post here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/05/30/the-fcc-may-consider-a-stricter-definition-of-broadband-in-the-netflix-age/

Samsung is working with Oculus on a media-focused VR headset

Samsung wants to be first to market with a virtual reality headset, but it doesn't want to invest the time and money that Oculus and Sony are. Oculus VR wants to create a high-quality virtual reality headset specifically for gaming, and it doesn't want to rush one out. And thus, a convenient partnership is born between the two companies: Samsung makes the OLED screens that Oculus needs for its final product; Oculus makes the software that Samsung needs for its upcoming headset.

We're told by sources close to both companies that Samsung's using an early form ofOculus' mobile SDK -- an exclusive use as part of the deal -- developed in part by John Carmack. We were also told that the OLED screens that Oculus is getting as part of the deal are of higher resolution than 1080p, and that the screens will also be used in at least some of Samsung's next flagship phones. And this is where things get weird.

Rather than having its own screen, Samsung's VR headset uses your phone directly. It plugs in using an existing port on your phone (think: micro-USB) and becomes the screen. The headset itself has built-in sensors -- an accelerometer at the very least -- so any motion-tracking functionality is offloaded from your phone's processor.

Wait! Before you write it off forever as "one of those headsets that straps your phone to your face," we're told there are some pretty great benefits to using a mobile device. For one, the rear-facing camera allows for video passthrough. That's to say, "You can see through the phone using the rear camera, which shows a video feed of the outside world to your eyes." Pretty intense sounding, but a smart addition for making long-term use more realistic. While the latency is too great to make augmented reality applications possible, it's a convenient way to pause whatever you're doing and, say, have a sip of a tasty beverage.

Finally, expect Samsung to tout this device as a media player as well.

Oculus VR and Samsung declined to comment for this story.

See the full story here: http://www.engadget.com/2014/05/30/samsung-oculus-partnership/

The past, present, and future of in-car infotainment

Speech recognition for vehicles has been in development for a while now, with companies like IBM andMicrosoft, and more recently Apple and Google, helping out. Apple's Siri in particular is popular, although Audi seems to be forging a closer relationship with Google. And increasingly, cars are being designed with their own integrated connectivity rather than relying on a customer's device. Chrysler announced in-car EVDO hotspots back in 2008. And both Audi and Chevrolet have introduced mobile data to company products, each appearing to buck industry trends of debuting these sorts of features in range-topping supersedans.

As autonomous cars become more of an everyday reality, it’s probable that we’ll see drivers being able to enjoy more visually dependent entertainment, but even that can only happen with adequate safeguards to prevent someone from binge-watching Breaking Bad right into a pileup. And speaking of driver line-of-sight, expect to see developments in heads-up displays (HUDs), too. Right now, some Chevrolets and BMWs have HUDs, but they’re small and only display salient information like speed. Google believes that Glass can display text to people driving without it being distracting, and if they’re right, presumably that can be adapted for a more panoramic view out of a windscreen. As you'd expect, this may require some rigorous study before lawmakers can be persuaded it’s safe to unleash such an experience on our roads.

See the full story here: http://arstechnica.com/cars/2014/06/the-past-present-and-future-of-in-car-infotainment/2/

Virtual Reality Poised for Mass Entertainment, but Can Hollywood Make It Happen?

Newborns are about unrealized potential; so are new technologies. Franklin understood that aviation would change the world, though it took the arrival of airplanes to realize some of his predictions. Today it seems to be virtual reality’s turn to take flight, perhaps to become as impactful as cinema and television. But the pioneers trying to tell stories in VR are grappling with the same question that confronted Ben Franklin that distant Wednesday in Paris: “What good is it?” Or, more precisely: “How do we use it?”

“I think from a cinematic storytelling perspective, we may be right around — or even before — (the time) metaphorically, when the Lumiere brothers created ‘Train Pulling Into La Ciotat Station’ ” (in 1895), says Eugene Chung, director of film & media for Oculus.

Because VR was nurtured in gaming devices and simulators, videogames have seemed like the most natural fit for the medium. But many developers are already using it for live-action experiences and trying to find the best way to fit it to narrative storytelling. “The original motto of Oculus was, ‘Step Into the Game,’ ” Chung says. “We’ve since modified it to letting people ‘Experience the impossible.’ ”

“Locomotion is a big topic in VR,” [Sony's Rick] Marks says, “How do you move around a 3D world?” “Walking” with a joystick feels fine in a console game; in VR, it can induce simulator sickness. Marks’ team is experimenting with letting players use “teleportation” — which amounts to jumping from point to point.

Another challenge arises from a sense few people are even aware of: “Proprioception,” the body’s positional sense. Going into a VR world and being unable to see your own body and arms can quickly become disorienting.

Many VR pioneers are learning from stage directors, who have always had to guide the audience’s attention using lighting, sound and staging, without being able to control point of view as a film director can.

Some VR creators are also studying theme park design. Hilary Lewis, an architectural historian who has done a deep study of the look and layout of Disneyland, observes: “What (Disney) did at the theme parks was take all the talents they had in developing film and apply that to creating a three-dimensional space you could walk around in. If that’s not the beginning of virtual reality, I don’t know what is.”

VR faces yet another obstacle: Putting on goggles and headphones is isolating. Yet, that’s the point: You shut out the real world for an artificial one. But entertainment is social, too. Today’s VR can quickly become a strangely ghostly, lonely experience, like Scrooge revisiting the shadows of Christmas Past or the dead Emily Webb reliving her birthday in the final act of “Our Town.” Developers are hard at work making the VR experience social, adding avatars for multiple users, and the like. That may turn out to be crucial if VR is ever to rival TV and movies.

Read the full story here: http://variety.com/2014/digital/news/virtual-reality-poised-for-mass-entertainment-but-can-hollywood-make-it-happen-1201193873/?curator=MediaREDEF

The Internet as we know it is dying

How Facebook and Google are killing the classic Internet and reinventing it in their image

If you’re not an avid gamer, the kind of person who enjoys watching other gamers narrate their own adventures through the latest first-person shooter, you’ve probably never heard of Twitch TV. But the three-year-old site is an extraordinary success story. At peak viewing times, it boasts a bigger audience than MTV, TNT or AMC. 32 million peoplewatched the finals of last year’s “League of Legends” tournament. So there’s little question why Google might be interested in laying down $1 billion for the site. The young male advertising demographic is notoriously hard to corral. Twitch TV’s got it.

But for the gamers who produce much of the content, the idea that Google’s copyright cop, ContentID, might suddenly be patrolling their world is a nightmare. It is not uncommon for Twitch TV gamers to stream themselves playing a game while simultaneously listening to recorded music. If, after integrating with YouTube, rights holders start using ContentID to claim ownership over the intellectual property in over those videos, the advertising revenue generated by those videos would no longer end up in the hands of the creators of that revenue. Even scarier, to some, is that the possibility that years of previously produced streams might suddenly come under interdiction. And ContentID is by no means infallible: They make plenty of (costly) mistakes.

From a copyright holder’s point of view, bringing a new sheriff into town probably seems entirely just and proper. To be sure, there is an element of the Twitch TV squealing that comes off as decidedly juvenile. Grow up kids! Join the real world! But there’s a deeper story here, a tale of dangerous consolidation. Through YouTube, Google already wields an enormous amount of power over the ability of people to make their livings from independently producing online video. Bringing another huge audience under Google’s roof further solidifies Google’s ability to dictate terms: Play by our rules or you don’t play at all. By all accounts, Twitch TV has built its success by virtue of its ability to foster a sense of shared community. Does that community survive once it is sucked into the Google maw?

But the indisputable fact remains. Between the two of them, Facebook and Google control the universe of online advertising and determine how the currents of web traffic flow. (And let’s not forget Amazon’s disproportionate power in the world of retail.) Both companies are engaged in a winner-takes-all strategy of constant expansion, gobbling up any newly emerging companies that have succeeded in accumulating a critical mass of users. Both companies, accountable only to their shareholders, enjoy enormous power in influencing our civic conversations.

It’s no wonder that there is so much sound and fury on the Web. Because they just keep getting bigger, while we feel increasingly powerless.

See the full story here: http://www.salon.com/2014/05/26/the_internet_as_we_know_it_is_dying/

Hachette and Amazon Dig In for a Long Fight Over Contract Terms

“Amazon wants to do away with gatekeepers,” explains NYT in a related article. “It promises a world where books are cheap, where anyone can publish anything, where there are no editors or distributors saying this is not what is selling now, go away.”

“Hachette is holding fast to the traditional publishing system that underpins modern culture. It was a world where publishers bankrolled writers in return for a large cut of the proceeds, where editors improved prose and sharpened arguments, and where books were selected and presented rather than simply released. They cost more, too.”

“The dispute is about money, but the outcome — whether Hachette gives up on pricing and pays a little more for marketing, or not — is about so much more.”

See the full story here: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/technology/amazon-hachette-book-publisher-dispute.html?_r=0