Month: September 2017

Speck announce line up of new cases for the iPhone 8, 8 Plus and X. #Speck

The new cases include Presidio Ultra, Speck’s toughest and most rugged case yet. It’s drop tested up to 4.5 metres, features four layers of protection, 360 degree port coverage and is dirt and dust resistant. The two piece case is a Presidio base (3-metre drop protection for everyday use) and then you add the Impactium Ultra Bumper for rugged protection. Speck’s dual-layered cases are perfectly suited to protect the glass back on the new phones.

Some great news for those who aren’t ready to upgrade yet: Speck’s new iPhone 8 cases will fit the iPhone 6, 6s and 7, and same goes for Plus!

Presidio ULTRA is Speck’s toughest case yet, designed to withstand extreme drops and resist the elements. Presidio ULTRA is drop tested up to 4.5 metres, features four layers of protection, offers 360-degree port coverage and is dirt and dust resistant.

Presidio ULTRA is designed to be flexible for those who never have the same day twice, whether that’s a working parent on the go, or the weekend warrior who clocks out from their 9 to 5 and then heads straight into adventure. Presidio ULTRA starts with a dual-layer, one-piece Presidio case, which provides slim 3 metre drop protection that’s perfect for daily use. By adding the IMPACTIUM ULTRA Bumper, the case becomes ultra-protective, ready to defend against drops, dirt, dust and whatever else might come its way.

“We wanted to make an ultra-protective case in a way that felt authentic to Speck,” said Speck VP of Design Bryan Hynecek. “Presidio ULTRA is unique in that its convertible to give customers options of rugged protection when they need it, and slim protection when they don’t.”

Speck has also made improvements to two of its most popular cases, Presidio CLEAR and Presidio GRIP. By employing a sophisticated microdot technology, the No. 1 best-selling clear case in the U.S., Presidio CLEAR, is now even more clear and continues to resist UV yellowing and scratches. The ridges on Presidio GRIP have been redesigned with an improved grip geometry, resulting in a more tactile hold.

iPhone 7 cases 

Speck is also introducing a metallic collection for the first time. Presidio METALLIC provides 3 metre drop protection and comes in five of this season’s top colours: rose gold, gold, tungsten grey, taro purple and peppermint green. The assortment features chic jewel tones with a scratch-resistant finish, the perfect accessory to complement the newest iPhones.

iPhone 8  collection Gallery 

1 / 8

The full Speck line up for iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X includes:

  • Presidio ULTRA (£44.95) — Rugged, slim case with 4.5 metre drop protection and 360-degree port coverage
  • Presidio (£19.95 – £24.95) — Superior slim protection with IMPACTIUM™ Shock Barrier
  • Presidio CLEAR (£19.95 – £24.95) — The bestselling clear case in the U.S.*, now with improved clarity
  • Presidio GRIP (£19.95 – £24.95) — Improved grip geometry offers a more tactile hold
  • Presidio METALLIC (£24.95) — Shimmery tones with 3 metre drop protection
  • Presidio CLEAR + PRINT (£24.95 – £29.95) — Embedded designs won’t fade or scratch
  • Presidio CLEAR + GLITTER (£24.95 – £29.95) — Glitter crystals embedded in the case add sparkle that won’t flake off
  • Presidio SHOW (£19.95 – £24.95) – 3 metre drop protective case with a clear back and a bumper that seamlessly matches the iPhone
  • Presidio WALLET (£29.95) — Securely holds three cards or cash

Speck cases are available now at SpeckProducts.co.uk, John Lewis, Dixons, O2, Smultrons Inc. and CompuB.

Unboxing – First look at #Foobot. A Smart Indoor Air Quality Monitor #Air #Humidity #BreatheBetter 

Foobot is the most advanced data processing smart monitor in the market, helping you take control of your indoor air quality, either by working with other home automation devices or simply by giving you detailed knowledge of something which is effectively invisible. By scanning your environment day and night and learning from your habits, Foobot will provide you warnings and actionable advice to keep your air in the home fresh and pollution free. It constantly measures VOCs, PM2.5s, CO2, temperature and humidity, and logs them in five minute intervals to find the best solution for air quality needs.Footbot has also recently launched in the United Kingdom.

Foobot uses internal sensors to check for pollution in the form of chemicals and particulate matter, which are up to five times more common indoors as a result of confinement and alerts you via its companion app and the LEDs on the device itself.

 

 

The device is sensitive to:

•            PM2.5s – Particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometres, like dust, pollen and pet dander

•             VOCs – Volatile organic compounds, toxic gases like formaldehyde and ammonia. This sensor is also sensitive to carbon monoxide, a potentially dangerous gas.

•             Carbon dioxide – Exhaled naturally from humans. Not itself harmful, but indicative of poor circulation. This is measured via data from other sensors.

•             Humidity – Low humidity can cause irritation. Excessive humidity let mould and dust mites grow.

SEE https://foobot.io/ for more.

TCS Global Trend Study on AI Reveals Industry Wide Investment by 2020 #AI

Tata Consultancy Services, a leading global IT services, consulting and business solutions organization, today unveiled the industry findings of its Global Trend Study titled, “Getting Smarter by the Sector: How 13 Industries Use Artificial Intelligence.” Focusing on the current and future impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the study polled 835 executives across 13 global industry sectors in four regions of the world, revealing that they all identified artificial intelligence as increasingly important to their strategic competitiveness by 2020.

Disrupted Industries like Travel, Hospitality and Telecom Making Boldest Investments in Artificial Intelligence

 Consumer Packaged Goods, Utilities and Insurance Outpace Other Industries in AI Investment as a Percentage of Company Revenue 

According to the study, 80% of executives in all 13 industries currently invest in AI and almost 100% plan to invest by 2020.  The insurance industry outspent the other twelve verticals surveyed, investing on average $124 million in AI systems, compared to a cross-industry average of $70 million. Consumer packaged goods reported the second most significant spend at $95 million.

 

 

Looking ahead to 2020, AI continues to be seen as a long term strategic bet, with ten of the 13 industries planning to increase their investments in AI. The increases are most dramatic among industries with the lowest current investment levels, including the travel, transport and hospitality industry, which plans to increase its spend by 750%, from $4 million in 2015 to $34 million to 2020. This is followed by rises in media, entertainment and information services (292%), industrial manufacturing (74%), healthcare (44%), and banking and finance (29%).

 

“The second phase of our Global Trend Study highlights that all industries see AI technology as a major game-changer on their business competitiveness by 2020,” said K. Ananth Krishnan, Chief Technology Officer of TCS. “It’s striking that the sectors making the boldest current or future AI investments and citing the most significant results seem to group around industries like insurance, travel, hospitality, and telecom, where disruption is having a major impact, and consumer-focused sectors such as the consumer-packaged goods industry, where the customer experience can be significantly enhanced by AI innovation.”

 

AI Investments as a Percentage of Revenue and ROI

The leading investors in AI, determined as a percentage of average company revenue, were the consumer-packaged goods (CPG) industry (0.66%), followed by utilities (0.53%), insurance (0.52%) and telecommunications (0.39%). Companies reported that their AI initiatives had a strong positive impact on both revenue improvement and cost reduction in the specific business areas where they invested in artificial intelligence. The average revenue increase across all 13 industries was 17%, while the average cost reduction was 12%. Telecom companies generated the most value from AI investments in 2015, in terms of revenue improvement (average 25%) and cost reductions (average 20%).

 

AI used in the IT function most frequently

The most frequently mentioned business function using AI was perhaps unsurprisingly in IT, with high-tech and utilities companies more frequently using cognitive technology in their IT operations than the 11 other industry sectors. Across all 13 industries studied, only 29% of companies are using AI in sales today. However, more than half the CPG companies (52%) and nearly half the retailers (49%) are using AI tools to improve sales performance.

 

Potential headwinds to AI adoption

Effectively managing the security risk of AI systems is of paramount importance for the majority of industries, with companies in the automotive, banking and financial services, CPG, technology, industrial manufacturing, and telecoms industries all stating this as the number one success factor to derive real value from AI. Moreover, all industry sectors cited the importance of getting managers and employees to trust the advice provided by AI systems, and getting employees to learn about and adopt the new processes and systems that AI requires.

In almost all sectors, addressing people’s fears about losing their jobs was not ranked as a major barrier. This was underlined in phase one of the Global Trend Study released in March this year, which found companies with the biggest revenue and cost improvements from AI see the need for at least three times as many new jobs in each function by 2020 because of cognitive computing innovations.

Review – Playertek – For the footballers who want real stats. #Football #PLAYERTEK

Darryl Henderson reviews the PLAYERTEK. The package of the Playertek GPS is very small and slick looking. It’s a really good look for this device. It fits all the equipment in perfectly and even has a special part for the GPS pod itself which I found was a nice touch.

UNBOXING PLAYERTEK 

I found the PlayerTek GPS very useful for tracking my results while playing football, I used it for two training sessions one short shape session which didn’t involve much running or high intense sprinting and another session which was pretty much a very tough end of week session. The GPS pod tracks loads of cool figures like your speed, distance covered and even displays a heat map on the football pitch which you were playing on. I feel that this device suits my game better for training rather than games as it pushes me harder on the training ground and challenges me to do better than previous training.

I found the app for Playtek very good and it tracked some very interesting parts of my game like speed and even showed a heat map which are displayed excellently on the app. The app itself has lots of different settings which I found useful as I changed the speed into Mph. I found the app fairly easy to use and didn’t struggle trying to figure out how to use it.

The only downfall I have towards the whole package was that it lacked any real instructions which made it hard for me to understand what I was doing when I first used it. I will share more in the coming weeks but out now due to injury but so far i like what I see and can recommend this for anyone who wants real stats that help in many ways and can push you to better yourself.

Buy at http://www.playertek.com/

 

Irish company to launch global jobs platform for people who want to work from home. #Abodoo #Jobs 

An Irish tech start-up will launch a global jobs platform for people who want to work from home tomorrow, Tuesday, 12thSeptember, at 12.30pm.  

Abodoo will match people who want to work remotely with suitable job opportunities.  The platform has been developed by Irish couple Vanessa Tierney and Ben Wainwright, who were inspired by their own experiences of remote working.

At tomorrow’s launch, Abodoo will outline its plans for global expansion.  The company will also highlight key figures on the business case for remote working.

 Representatives from eir and the IDA, both of which are backing Abodoo, will attend the launch.

 

Commenting in advance, Abodoo co-founder Vanessa Tierney said:

“Remote working is growing rapidly, thanks to technological advances.  Working from home is often associated with freelancers, but more and more employers now see the value of offering their permanent staff this option.  Abodoo will make that easier for them to do, and easier for people who want to work from home to find exciting career opportunities.”


Android 7.1.1 Now available for Nokia 3 users in Ireland #Nokia #HMDGlobal #Nokia3

If you are the owner of the new Nokia 3 in Ireland you can now check for the latest update which is 7.1.1 right now. The device came with 7.0 and was behind the Nokia 5 and 6. This will bring some additional features to your handset. HMD did earlier say that the device would get the update and given it’s a week or so late it’s not really an issue and they have delivered the goods which is important for users..

The update is quite large so ensure you are connected to your Wi-Fi as its 748.3MB. The update is rolling out around the world as we speak so you check if you are reading from another region. Be patient as always as everyone will not get it at once as its phased and enjoy the benefits when you do receive it.

Sophos are coming to Ireland. #Sophos #Cybercrime #Data #Malware

Cybercrime makes headlines every day, and for a good reason: it’s no longer just something that happens to other people. Most of us either know someone who’s been hit by cybercrime – credit card fraud, perhaps, or ransomware, or having their email account hacked – or have been victims ourselves.

Sadly, it’s unlikely that cybercrime will slow down in the near future – the crooks are making far too much money to stop.

The rise of what’s called “Crimeware-as-a-Service” – a underground style of cloud computing where non-techie crooks let someone else run the IT side of their cyberattacks in return for a cut of the profits – has made cybercrime easy. Wannabe cybercrooks can now get started in the crimeware scene as easily as the rest of us can get online with a turnkey website, or run our own blog.

Paul Ducklin, Senior Technologist at Sophos, will be in Dublin on Wednesday 27 September 2017,  Paul is a passionate security technologist who not only knows the history of cybercrime but is also hands-on with the newest and most critical cyberattacks seen in SophosLabs.

Paul will also discuss about..

 

–         How Crimeware-as-a-Service and Ransomware-as-a-Service “packages” work.

–         How the Internet of Things (IoT) is opening up doors for cybercriminals to exploit your connected devices. Paul can demo live how crooks can automatically seek, find and exploit IoT devices and connected to your network – even if those devices are supposed to improve security.

–         How data-stealing and remote access malware works, and why it can be hard to spot, including Mac Malware samples that connects your computer up to the Dark Web and lets the crooks use it remotely for anything they like.

Review – The VEATIVE all in one VR Headset. #VR #teaching #education #science

I am a big fan of VR and also AR but over the last few months the VR industry has seemed to take a bit of a nosedive when it comes to VR content which is sad to see as it was gaining traction but hopefully that will change in the coming months.

Over the last year or so there has been several MEDICAL VR apps to hit the stores which are an excellent idea and ideal for those whom are in the industry we have special access to some apps and are looking at some as we speak and this idea from Veative Labs is one such great idea when it comes to education and hopefully we will see more like it in the coming months.

Check out what the headset looks like in our unboxing 

This may look like your typical headset but its far from it,the personal model will be available in September this year and you will be in for a treat.. The headset has all the features you would expect to find on the more advanced ones such as gear VR but there is much more going on inside and more features on the outside plus you get a remote to navigate and participate in programmes in the apps provided.

Another difference here NO DEVICE is required which is good in one respect but you do need to charge the headset itself, after a few minutes setting this up via the instructions it will look like your standard layout but here is where the magic begins going beyond, You can ad your own apps from the playstore for instance and the experience here does not drop compared to other VR head offerings,in fact it might be even a bit better, There is a lot of technology going on under the hood and if remove the plate on front like you would on headsets you would understand a bit more.

So whay exactly is this then..

Veative – is an educational VR company and they launched their all-in-one VR solution at the show. It comes complete with a wireless controller and a built-in mobile device – eliminating the need for a separate mobile phone or need to purchase a controller.

They’ve adapted VR technology and designed it specifically for use in educational and training environments. Its modules are interactive, easy to use, and enable student-centered learning, that reinforces any science or mathematics curriculum. They launched 300 modules across Biology, Maths and Physics for secondary school.

In the app you have multiple choices on what subject you want to take a task on You will be presented with a Dashboard from here you can then go forward a choose subjects..

You can join the lab, and self-study in here you can then select subjects available see images below for what is optional for the user right now. Below are some examples as this is still not publicly available yet and will be soon..

On these exercises you will be given training prior and objectives and so on then you can begin your task and really its about memory but also the workings of such,especially the heart and then you get to start the heart up, Medical would have been my favourite choices here being honest but its worth a look at all the options at hand, With the skeleton for example you are given a task to find the coffin,find the bones missing and place them in the coffin in their respective places and there is some false bones thrown in for good measure, Also which makes in interesting is that you a timed on all occasions so you can keep at it and repeat tasks should you fail and watch yourself improve over time.

Veative launches pioneering all-in-one virtual reality headset for education

Veative’s innovative VR Learn solution comes pre-loaded with high-quality content that aligns to curriculums and slots neatly into the classroom – supporting teachers in delivering more engaging and effective lessons. With 300 modules launching at Bett today, Veative will develop 1000 by mid-2017 and 1500 by the end of the year. Currently available in biology, chemistry, physics and maths, all modules can be easily adapted for any language and any curriculum. They include 3D models, 360-degree videos, tasks, exercises, simulations and other interactive activities, all complemented by smart analytics and classroom management apps for teachers.

 A global expert at fusing technology with education for immersive, interactive learning, Veative has adapted VR technology and designed it for use specifically in educational and training environments. The wireless controller completes the package and enables true interactivity with VR objects and subjects – bringing learning to life for today’s digital-savvy students.

 “There’s been an explosion in VR for the events and gaming sectors and we fully expect 2017 to be the year that VR really takes hold in education,” predicts Ankur Aggarwal, CEO of Veative. “But VR in education needs to go beyond the current basic virtual tours. Our Veative Learn VR headset, loaded with our quality content, is interactive, immersive and engaging – making it extremely effective in enhancing the teaching experience and bringing learning to life.”

Having spent some time with this and not as much as I would like to due to workload right now this certainly is one fantastic idea and really gets you stuck in and involved,try teaching this in a classroom and heads would stray but with this headset on ALL STUDENTS would be locked in and no distraction and being physically involved in each subject with interactive scenes you will pick up and learn faster and much more than in an open space its a really great idea and I cant wait to see what has to come in the future and anyone with kids who are tech savy,(they do not have to be either) should look at this and so should all schools because you will soon see results via this form.

About Veative

Veative Labs is a new partnership between Piron Corporation and Almotahida Education Group, both established experts in developing high-quality digital educational tools and content. Veative provides a pioneering mix of 3D, virtual and mixed reality products to enhance and enrich learning for students around the world. With a global team of 200 and growing fast, Veative embraces new-generation VR technology fused with high-quality content to create the finest immersive learning experience. Veative is based in Singapore, with offices in India and the UAE. For more, visit www.veative.com.

Pure Telecom and open eir agree €35M infrastructure deal. #openeir #PureTelecom

Pure Telecom has signed a €35M deal with open eir that will allow it to offer customers high-speed broadband and phone services through open eir’s network. The two-year deal will give Pure Telecom access to almost two million potential customers – helping it to reach its goal of 100,000 customers by 2019.

Pure Telecom today announces that it has signed a €35 million deal with wholesale telecoms provider open eir. The two-year agreement allows Pure Telecom to offer almost two million potential customers high-speed broadband and phone services via open eir’s nationwide open access network.

As open eir rolls out high-speed fibre broadband across Ireland, the agreement will help Pure Telecom extend its reach across the country and offer broadband speeds of up to 1,000Mbps.

Pure Telecom is currently on an aggressive growth path and is aiming to reach 100,000 residential customers by 2019. In order to acquire more customers and facilitate its growing numbers, the company announced 32 extra jobs earlier this year.

Pictured announcing Pure Telecom and open eir’s €35 million infrastructure deal are Paul Connell, CEO, Pure Telecom, and Orlagh Nevin, Director of Sales, Marketing and Service, open eir

The deal follows a €20 million agreement signed by the telecoms companies in June 2015. The latest agreement reflects Pure Telecom’s growing customer base, which rose 25% on 2015 figures, reaching 42,500 in 2016. The rise in numbers led to Pure Telecom’s best-ever financial year, up 17% on 2015 figures to reach €20 million. Demand for broadband services is also at an all-time high as an increasing amount of consumer leisure time relies on a high-speed internet connection.

Speaking about the announcement, Paul Connell, CEO, Pure Telecom, said: “At Pure Telecom, our strategy is very focused. We provide the best service at competitive prices. That is why we work with a number of Ireland’s leading wholesale providers, so that we can give customers the solution that best suits their needs.

“open eir has the most extensive phone and high-speed broadband network in Ireland and one which is growing by the day. We are delighted to announce this agreement as it is key to helping us extend our reach to existing and potential customers in cities and towns across the country, as well as rural Ireland. It will help us to meet our target of 100,000 residential customers by 2019, which we are already well on our way to achieving.”

Orlagh Nevin, Director of Sales, Marketing and Service, open eir, said: “For more than 15 years, Pure Telecom has shown itself to be a savvy business that knows how to attract and retain its customers. It therefore makes a lot of sense for us to partner with the company again as we continue our large-scale rollout of fibre broadband across the country.

“Earlier this year, we made a commitment to the Government that we would connect 300,000 homes in 890 communities throughout the country to fibre broadband. This means that by the end of next year, two years ahead of our initial target date, we will have a fibre broadband footprint of 1.9 million premises in Ireland – greater than any other operator in the country.”