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15 Minutes Into the Future

By Kelly Faircloth 1/18 12:57pm

15 Minutes Into the Future

This is how it starts, guys. (Photo: screencap)

Don’t Tech Nerds Read Ray Bradbury Any More?

Coming soon to a CES recap near you: Microsoft is twerking that Kinect technology just as fast as it can, creating all kinds of weird futuristic use cases to help separate you from your hard-earned dollars.

Fast Company reports that Microsoft Research has created something called the “Illumiroom,” which promises to splash the “Call of Duty” combat experience all over your living room walls. (Given that this idea is still in the “proof of concept” stage, it’s not too late to change the name, hint hint.)

Here’s how it works: Read More

By Steve Huff 10/09/12 10:50am

15 Minutes Into the Future

Elon Musk (Photo: Mark Lennihan/AP)

Old-School Car Dealers Whining That Tesla Dealerships are Illegal

Elon Musk‘s aerospace venture is off to a good start with the recent launch of SpaceX’s Dragon cargo ship, but his Tesla stores selling expensive electric Model S sedans are running into problems with fossil-fueled competitors.

Several state associations of auto dealers are invoking older laws protecting conventional methods of selling cars by claiming the way Tesla sells cars is unfair to other dealers and possibly even illegal. Here’s one example out of several cited by Automotive News: Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 8/08/12 2:20pm

15 Minutes Into the Future

"Wait, can't I just Google the address?"

NYPD Unveils Creepy New Surveillance System Developed with Microsoft

Just last week, news broke that the NYPD would soon begin rolling out new tech that brings together information streams like CCTV footage and criminal databases. Developed in partnership with Microsoft, it’s dubbed (with disturbing blandness) the “Domain Awareness System.”

Today, Mayor Bloomberg makes it official with an announcement. However, there’s a little detail that’s new: New York gets a 30 percent cut of any future sales to other cities, which’ll go to counter-terrorism and crime-prevention programs. (That sounds to us like a whole lot of surveillance cameras.)

The official announcement explains the system like so:  Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 8/01/12 9:08am

15 Minutes Into the Future

Mr. Milner. (Photo: Wikipedia/Debray Riveros)

Yuri Milner Starts His Own Nobel Prize, Begins Wiring Money to Penniless Physicists

It’s a question as old as semiconductors: Once you’ve racked up a couple of billion dollars investing in the tech sector, what are you to do with all that cash? Russian entrepreneur Yuri Milner–who’s made himself quite a nice little nest egg betting on companies like Facebook and Groupon–has a somewhat novel answer. The New York Times reports that he’s founded his very own Nobel Prize.

The Fundamental Physics Prize will dole out $3 million each to worthy, boundary-pushing thinkers. No experimental proof required, says Mr. Milner: Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 6/28/12 11:26am

15 Minutes Into the Future

"Check my specs, guys." (Photo: Screencap)

Start Saving Your Pennies: Google Glasses Are Coming in 2014, Says Sergey Brin

Yesterday’s bonkers skydiving demo left plenty of gadget geeks–your Betabeat staff included–amused but intrigued. Google cofounder Sergey Brin announced that developers in attendance at I/O could order a $1,500 prototype to experiment with, but made it clear these weren’t market ready. Unacceptable! When can we expect the future to land on our face, Mr. Brin?

Luckily, Bloomberg TV got an answer out of him in an interview outside I/O: they’d likely hit the shelves in 2014. “Within a year after that I want to have broad consumer offering,” he told Bloomberg while wearing his own pair, complete with hilarious clip-on sunglasses. Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 6/19/12 11:15am

15 Minutes Into the Future

Snazzy, but slightly style-challenged. (Photo: Changizi.wordpress.com)

Forget Taking Snapshots, Let’s Use High Tech Glasses to Read People

Googlers are swanning about all over the place wearing their Project Glass specs, snapping pics with the president of Turkey and showing them off to Charlie Rose. And sure, it’s a pretty cool prototype. But can it help the search behemoth’s more awkward employees make sense of human emotions? Didn’t think so, Mr. Brin.

In a blog post yesterday (h/t Technology Review), Mark Changizi, director of human cognition at research outfit 2AI Labs, announced that the company has just received its first shipment of 02Amps, described as “patented eyewear that amplifies one’s view of the emotions and health visible in the color and pallor of other people’s skin.”

And they didn’t even have to raise money on Kickstarter.   Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 3:30pm

15 Minutes Into the Future

Faux Mr. Weyland in a faux TED Talk. (Prometheus-movie.com)

Hey, a New Use for LinkedIn: A Viral Marketing Campaign for Prometheus

Slightly strange emails from LinkedIn recruiters are nothing out of the ordinary. But writer and UX designer Dustin Curtis (whose work you might recognize) reports that he recently opened his email to one from a James Holm, claiming to be a recruiter from the Weyland Corporation. If that name sounds familiar, it’s probably from the exhaustive marketing campaign for Prometheus, Ridley Scott’s return to the world of Alien. Perhaps you’ve seen the trailer disguised as a commercial for their shiny new model of android; here’s another that’s a spot-on faux TED talk.

That’s right: Unless someone has taken his fandom way too far, it looks like the Prometheus marketing team is using LinkedIn to further its viral marketing campaign.

Mr. Curtis reproduced the entire email at his blog. And boy, is it deadpan: Read More