According to a new study, Twitter’s data-gathering ways can be used to predict big. potentially world-shaking events. Nathan Kallus, a PhD student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, analyzed thousands of tweets associated with the 2013 coup in Egypt, and claims that the social unrest associated with it was, in fact, predictable ahead of time.
Smart plug
Smart plugs may be the trojan horse that will bring the internet of things and the smart home to mainstream consumers. But is there enough value in connecting a lamp or a coffee maker to make smart outlets an entry point to the internet of things for mainstream consumers?
Continue reading… “Are smart plugs the gateway to the Internet of Things?”
Bitcoin will start its transformation from a mere currency into an entire open-source.
Bitcoin’s valuation didn’t just skyrocket in 2013, but its infrastructure, services, and adoption exploded as well, culminating in recent announcements that major online retailer Overstock.com and NBA team the Sacramento Kings would accept the digital currency as payment.
Continue reading… “Bitcoin is not only digital currency, it’s Napster for finance”
We saw such a change in web design over the last couple of years that it is unbelievable to anticipate what could possibly the next hot things. What trends will flourish this year and which ones will fade off? This year the design scene will be very interesting to watch as there will be a bunch of changes going on making for some exciting new trends actually.
Like the Cloud in 2012, the Internet of Things is about to come on strong.
Google bought Nest for an incredible amount of money a few weeks ago. Do you know what Nest is or what they do? More specifically, do you have any idea what Nest is trying to do or what platform they are built upon? If the answer to all those questions is no, don’t worry, you’re not alone.
Continue reading… “Where does the Internet of Things stand?”
The Internet affects the economy differently than the new businesses of the past did.
John Doerr, a venture capitalist, predicted in the 1990’s that the Internet would lead to the “the largest legal creation of wealth in the history of the planet.” The Internet has created a tremendous amount of personal wealth. Just look at the rash of Internet billionaires and millionaires, the investors both small and large that have made fortunes investing in Internet stocks, and the list of multibillion-dollar Internet companies—Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Amazon. Add to the list the recent Twitter stock offering, which created a reported 1,600 millionaires.
Continue reading… “The Internet is the greatest facilitator of inequality in history”
In the cryptocurrency world, Bitcoin (and Litecoin) garner the most attention, but there are now 83 (and counting) virtual currencies to store your wealth in. Bitcoin’s market cap is over $10 billionis and is by far the highest but we wonder whether the miasma of mimiccers – from Unobtainium to the ironically-named StableCoin and from ‘Philospher Stones’ to HoboNickels – serves to reduce the confidence in Bitcoin as a new method payments, or bolsters it as the clear market winner.
Continue reading… “There are now 83 (and counting) cryptocurrencies in the world”
EteRNA
The latest research rage is crowdsourcing – Kickstarter to raise funding, screen savers that number-crunch, and games to find patterns in data – but most efforts have been confined to the virtual lab of the Internet. Researchers have now crowdsourced their experiments by connecting players of a video game to an actual biochemistry lab.
Continue reading… “EteRNA – an online video game connects players into a real biochemistry lab”
Nielsen put out its latest figures on the state of the advertising market across old and new media platforms this morning. One big takeaway is that Internet advertising continues to be the fastest-growing medium, but it remains a small player. Global display advertising across the web, mobile internet and apps collectively grew by 32.4% in 2013 — by far the biggest leap of any media — but that still worked out to a 4.5% share of the overall spend in ads. In contrast, television grew only 4.3% but remains the behemoth when it comes to ad spend, taking nearly 58% of the market.
Continue reading… “Internet display ad spending up 32% in 2013, but still just 4.5% of market share”
Google to offer free rides in self-driving cars for shoppers.
Self-driving cars have a lot to do with Google’s core business selling ads. Google was just awarded a patent for an ad-powered taxi service. The patent would allow advertisers to offer potential customers a free ride to their place of business.
Continue reading… “Google patents ad-powered taxis that offer to transport web shoppers to stores”
Petnet SmartFeeder
The Internet of everything is all the rage now. New solutions continually pop up in a bid for more control over your home. Petnet, a smart pet-device maker based in Los Angeles, intends for its connected devices to make a difference to your dogs and cats.
Continue reading… “How the internet of everything can make a difference to your pets”
Marc Andreessen, co-founder of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz
By Marc Andreessen: A mysterious new technology emerges, seemingly out of nowhere, but actually the result of two decades of intense research and development by nearly anonymous researchers.