Blog
Speech intention can be decoded from brainwaves
By cdharris at February 2, 2012 | 8:20 am | 0 Comment
UC Berkeley scientists have demonstrated a method to reconstruct words that a person may be thinking, by examining brainwaves using fMRI. The technique reported in PLoS Biology relies on gathering electrical signals directly from patients' brains, via implanted electrodes. Computer models reconstructed words/sounds from the signal patterns. Although the possible more...
Blog , Data Visualization , Emerging Science and Technology , Technology and Privacy
Physibles and the future of brands
By cdharris at February 1, 2012 | 9:57 am | 0 Comment
Brands have a psychological reality in that they provide differentiation for goods that might otherwise be seen as interchangeable commodities. I give you vodka, salt, and baking soda, as pertinent examples. The advent of 3-D printers in recent years, though, introduces a possibility that branded goods may have less utility in the future. The Pirate Bay, more...
Blog , Data Visualization , Emerging Science and Technology , Media and Markets
Augmented Reality Glasses
By cdharris at January 15, 2012 | 12:46 am | 0 Comment
Daily Mail: "Translucent TV: Lumus' PD-18-2 is a set of spectacles that can beam high-quality images directly into your eyes but allows the user to see through the images more...
Blog , Data Visualization , Emerging Science and Technology , Media and Markets
Will Daily Deals Revitalize Newspapers?
By cdharris at January 14, 2012 | 3:42 pm | 0 Comment
"Groupon is Hastening the Demise of the Newspaper Industry," wrote a trade publication in April 2011. However, some newspapers are betting that "daily deal" offerings could reinvigorate the industry. Newspapers are turning to startups such as Shoutback and Nimble Commerce and others offering consulting and white-label systems to power deal mechanisms. And more...
A Year in Snapshots: Photos around the World for each day of the year
By cdharris at January 3, 2012 | 11:11 am | 0 Comment
Mobile travel guide provider Triposo provides free travel guides, augmented by location based data. With the abundance of data from a variety of open datasets, Triposo has created a remarkable short video showing photos taken around the world, on each day of the year. On a world map, the relative density of the photo data is shown. Notice the brighter dots at more...
Scale wants to post weight chart to Facebook
By cdharris at September 2, 2011 | 8:47 pm | 0 Comment
My new scale at home -- a sleekly gorgeous black slab of glass -- asked me if I wanted to share my weight chart to my Facebook or Twitter friends.? Apart from that being a terrifying idea,? it also raises some interesting questions about the implications of widely sharing this kind of data online,? how wireless devices like this one will aggregate and store data, and more...
Bulletproof Human Skin
By cdharris at August 23, 2011 | 1:38 pm | 0 Comment
A Dutch artist and research team created a piece of "bulletproof" skin from spider silk and human skin cells and discovered that the new substance can withstand bullets, but only slow-moving ones. Â While not providing enough protection to classify as a material for use in bulletproof armor or vests, the new material is extremely strong and lightweight. Jalila more...
ISPs required to track all activity for a year
By cdharris at July 30, 2011 | 6:53 pm | 0 Comment
While ostensibly this bill passed in order to allow law enforcement improved ability to track child pornography activity online, it is extremely broad in scope. Essentially, internet service providers (ISPs) will now be required to keep extensive records on each customer and everything they do online, and maintain those records in a revolving annual cycle. Privacy more...
Embedded Camera-Eye
By cdharris at July 10, 2011 | 2:42 pm | 0 Comment
After losing an eye in a car accident, Tanya Vlach is trying to raise money to have a webcam fashioned like an eye installed in the non-functional eye socket. The prosthetic camera-eye is designed to be waterproof, capable of wireless HD video transmission at 720p, and will include zoom and still-capture features, activated by blinking. On Vlach's wishlist for the eye -- more...
Bioreactive Media , Blog , Emerging Science and Technology , Geolocation and Psychogeography
Cal-Adapt: Understanding California’s Climate Change Predictions
By cdharris at June 8, 2011 | 6:34 am | 0 Comment
UC Berkeley's Geospatial Innovation Facility -- with support from the Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) agency -- has developed a climate adaptation planning tool it is calling "Cal-Adapt" [cal-adapt.org.] The tool models climate change scenarios in a mapping format, including projections through 2099 for factors such as wildfire risk, sea-level rise more...
LinkedIn InMaps Reveals your Professional Network
By information aesthetics at January 24, 2011 | 11:13 pm | 0 Comment
INMAPS [linkedinlabs.com] is a new service that visualizes the collection of a LinkedIn 'connections' as a single network graph.? Each color corresponds to a different group within an individual's professional network and helps identify ways in which the LinkedIn member is connected to others in different categories (and areas where the connections may be more...
BMW Puts Its Logo On The Back of Eyelids
By cdharris at January 2, 2011 | 5:49 pm | 0 Comment
"Persistence of vision" is a phenomenon that allows our eyes to experience a continuous moving picture when confronted with a series of still images or frames that pass by in a fast sequence.?? Recently,? experiments on "closed eye visualization" have been used for advertising purposes,? as when BMW's Dutch ad group flashed the BMW logo in a dark movie theater,? then more...
Visualizing Science Readers
By cdharris at December 8, 2010 | 2:25 pm | 0 Comment
Curious about what scientists might be reading?? Springer (noted publisher of more than 5 million scientific and academic titles) has launched a new analytics tool that reveals how its users and subscribers are downloading its content. There are a number of interactive visualization tools at the site,? including a world map illustrating the origin of download more...
Blog , Data Visualization , Datamining , Geolocation and Psychogeography , Media and Markets
Professor has camera surgically implanted
By cdharris at November 16, 2010 | 12:17 pm | 0 Comment
From Slashdot: NYU Professor Wafaa Bilal is having a camera surgically implanted in the back of his head. Described as an art project, the camera will take a photograph every minute for one year, and a curated selection of shots will be exhibited in a new museum opening in Qatar. Bilal will also release a live stream of images from the camera. Both NYU administrators more...
When will your relationship break up? Facebook knows.
By cdharris at November 2, 2010 | 11:03 pm | 0 Comment
Facebook now has aggregated a huge dataset revealing patterns in relationship "status" changes.? Based on this,? researcher and data visualization expert David McCandless created a predictive chart (shown) which he unveiled at the July 2010 TED conference in Oxford, England. According to McCandless,? the spikes in breakups on Facebook were:? 1) immediately following more...
