Posts tagged Home
SEO Positive Partners With Bournemouth Nursing & Residential Home – PR Web (press release)
Feb 2nd
 TechJournal South |
SEO Positive Partners With Bournemouth Nursing & Residential Home
PR Web (press release) SEO Positive has announced the acquisition of a search engine optimisation contract with Windsor Court Care, a family owned nursing and residential home servicing the heart of Dorset. Windsor Court Care is a registered nursing and residential home … 4 SEO Questions for 2012 Free SEO Book Provides Important 2012 Updates New SEO Tool SEOprofiler Reports Positions on Google, Yahoo and Bing and … |
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Nest & The New Era of Home Appliances
Jan 31st
Earlier this week I listed 5 signs of a great user experience in a tech product. One sign is that it changes you. I referred to revolutionary products like the iPhone and Twitter, that modified our online behaviors or habits. This trend is becoming more noticeable with the so called Internet of Things, where everyday objects are connected to the Internet. If a device or object has traditionally been a static thing, then it’s guaranteed to morph into something different once it becomes interactive.
Over the coming decade, we’re going to see a lot of new Internet-connected household devices that will literally change the way you live. A great example is a new device from a very well-funded startup called Nest Labs. At the end of 2011, the company released a Web-enabled thermostat called the Nest. Yes, a thermostat. It was designed by the man who invented the iPod for Apple, Tony Fadell.
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The Nest thermostat is a round, shiny, stainless steel-encased object that is attached to a wall in your home. It features a scroll-wheel navigation, inspired by the original iPod. There is a digital screen in the middle, which changes color according to the temperature (orange for heat and blue for cool). You can have more than one Nest in your home and they’ll act as a network.
The idea behind Nest was directly inspired by the revolution in smartphones, which transformed the mobile phone into a full-fledged mobile computer. Nest labs co-founder Matt Rogers explained in a blog post how he and Fadell aim to do the same for the thermostat:
“The gap between the consumer experience in mobile products and the ones in our homes is enormous. I’ve been a programmer my entire life and could not program a thermostat for the life of me. I looked at it and thought, this beige plastic box cannot be the best our generation can come up with. Surely, there must be a better way.”
So other than the elegant design of Nest (another of the 5 signs of a great user experience), what makes the product different from the traditional thermostat? The main difference is that Nest is powered by 6 sensors and proprietary algorithms, which enables it to “learn” your living habits and adjust the temperature automatically throughout the day and night. The company claims that Nest will have created a personalized temperature schedule for you after just one week of use. Nest has WiFi, which enables it to monitor weather patterns. You can also control it via an iPhone app or on the Web.
Nest is a lot more expensive than the traditional thermostat you’d buy from your local hardware store. It costs $249, plus an installation fee of $119 if you want to get it professionally installed (which All Things D’s Katherine Boehret learned is a good move). The idea is that Nest will save you money on your energy bills. Note that Nest is currently sold out, but you can add your name to an email list to be notified of availability.
The thermostat is the first home device out of Nest Labs, but it intends to expand to other devices. In a CES video interview with Techcrunch, Nest Labs co-founder Matt Rogers noted that “there are lot of things in the home that have not been changed in 20-30 years.” The smoke alarm is one example of a device ripe for Internet connection, given that it operates via sensors.
It remains to be seen whether Nest can capture a large chunk of the thermostat market, especially given its high price relative to traditional thermostats. But there’s no doubt that this is where household devices like the thermostat are heading.
Using data and the Web to learn your living patterns and change your life for the better. Get used to that, because it’s what the next generation of home appliances will do.
Photo credit: Seth Frankel, via Nest.com
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Future Of the Smart Home? Engineer Hacks Android With the Kinect API
Jan 25th
Take two open source projects, do a little creative hacking and ingenuity and what do you get? The Android-Kinect project. An engineer that goes by the name DDRBoxman hacked a Galaxy Nexus smartphone with his a projector, a PC and Microsoft’s Kinect API and was able to use “touch” based gestures to control the user interface by interacting with the projection. Everybody has been waiting for The user experience brought to us by the film Minority Report. Well, this engineer might have brought us closer than any other hack before.
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DDRBoxman works through something called Recursive Penguin, which from its website we cannot tell is a personal project or some type of company. The Facebook link on Recursive Penguin leads to an Android developer by the name of Colin Edwards that works for a mobile development studio called Ironclad Mobile (which is now called Uncodin), based in Austin, Texas. Uncodin has funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to create a an app to boost math test scores for 9th graders and has some funding from DARPA for a mobile training application, according to the Facebook page.
DDRBoxman downloaded the Android 4.0 ICS source tree from the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) and created a custom ROM for his Galaxy Nexus. He then sends command to the Nexus with TUIOForAndroid. TUIO is, “an open framework that defines a common protocol and API for tangible multitouch surfaces” according to TUIO.org. The PC is then configured with the touch interface through the open source Kinect API and voila! We have a tangible user interface on the wall.
The Kinect API is fascinating. Some of the greatest innovations of using motion-based input methods are being cooked up at the MIT Media Lab where they use Kinects and its API as a cheap implementation of motion computing. That includes 3D interfaces, motion tracking and an array of other innovations.
Now, think of the potential with mixing Kinect with Android. One of the untapped potentials of Android is that it is not just a mobile platform. Android could run on set-top televisions boxes or control all of the electronics in your household. The concept of the “smart home” takes a step forward in the marriage between the two open source projects. It is all the more delicious that the sources come from two companies that have historically been at each other’s throats: Google and Microsoft.
Google announced a framework at I/O last year that can bring Android to all of your appliances or devices. Called Android@Home it was the first notion that Google has projected that Android could be have far more uses and be more ubiquitous than most people originally believed. Now, add the Kinect API to Android@Home and you could walk into your kitchen, wave to turn on the lights, program your microwave from across the room with just a few waves of you hand. Then, go into your living room where you have an Android smartphone hooked to a projector running the Netflix app and stand in the middle of the room, swiping the air until you find your viewing material for the evening.
This all sounds like some crazy science fiction movie a la Minority Report. It is not. The fact of the matter is that right now, this technology exists. The hack by DDRBoxman is just the beginning. Within the decade, we will see this type of functionality in homes across the world.
View full post on ReadWriteWeb
iOS Developers Take Home $700 Million in Q1
Jan 24th
Apple just blew everybody out of the water. It is astonishing, really. Revenue of $46.33 billion? Yeah, Greece called. It is looking for a bailout. Anyway, there is one number that is making mobile developers across the world salivate: $700 million.
That is the amount that Apple paid out to iOS developers in the last quarter. Apple has paid out $4 billion cumulatively to iOS developers through the App Store. If we extrapolate those numbers considering Apple’s 30% take of App Store purchases, the company did $1 billion in gross sales through the App Store in the quarter. Mobile developers: this is the carrot you are chasing.
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We have written several times that it is unlikely that developers will ditch iOS in favor of writing for other platforms, such as Android or Windows Phone. There is too much money to be made in iOS for developers to choose and Android-first strategy, unless they are looking at some market inefficiencies that could be better served by developing for something other than iOS. We have seen some developers focus on RIM for that specific reason.
There are 550,000 apps in the App Store according to Apple’s CFO Peter Oppenheimer and that includes 170,000 for the iPad (a number that could be misleading as many iPad apps are made with the “+” designation that means they function on both the iPad and iPhone). If we figure that the Android Market is generating even 50% of what the App Store does, that makes mobile applications about a $1.5 billion quarterly market or $6 billion a year. That is probably a high estimate considering that Apple’s last quarter happened to coincide with the holiday shopping season (Oppenheimer did note a lot of activity on iTunes and the App Store on Dec. 25).
Note, we are talking gross revenue here, not just application sales. That would include in-app purchases as well. What this does not include is money made through advertising within mobile apps, which makes the number quite a bit higher. Google does not take a cut for itself with 70% going to developers and 30% split among various parties like payment processors.
For 2012, perhaps $6 billion is not low at all between Andriod and iOS app revenue. Smartphones such as the iPhone 4S and new Android devices continue to make their way into more and more hands. Apple has sold 315 million iOS devices in its history and Android still technically outsells Apple devices. There were 37 million iOS devices sold in the last quarter and about 15 million iPads. Estimates place Android sales for the quarter within the 60-65 million range.
The fact of the matter is that there will be money to be made by some smart entrepreneurs looking to make some great apps in the near future. Developers, it is time to cast your net. Working across both iOS and Android, there is a decent living to be made writing mobile applications.
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Google to Protest SOPA on Home Page Tomorrow
Jan 17th
Generally, Google’s trademark bare home page has only been used to celebrate significant birthdays and events with Google Doodles, or to promote Google features, such as Google Offers or the addition of a blue arrow to call attention to the …
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Google To Join Anti-SOPA “Blackout Day” With Home Page Protest
Jan 17th
Google has confirmed to several media outlets (initially CNET) that it will join other prominent websites, including Wikipedia, in protesting the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Protect IP Act (PIPA) bills. While Wikipedia has said it will go dark, Google will simply link to information on its…
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Tips on Working From Home Effectively: Part Two
Dec 5th
In my previous article I talked about the basics that you need to work from home. This time I’m going to get into some issues that get a little bit beyond basic and into personal preference. These include music, beverages, file synchronization, time tracking, and invoicing. Music “Music has charms to soothe a savage breast” [...]
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Home Appliance Repair Company in Howell, NJ, Announces SEO Campaign – PR.com (press release)
Nov 20th
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Home Appliance Repair Company in Howell, NJ, Announces SEO Campaign
PR.com (press release) Prospect Genius is a search engine optimization (SEO) company that utilizes effective online marketing to assist small businesses in connecting with customers via the Internet. By choosing to work with Prospect Genius, AA All Tech Appliance is striving … Appliance Repairs Pro in Atlanta, GA, Partners With Web Marketing Firm to … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
OpenStack Leaving Home: Foundation Coming in 2012
Oct 5th
OpenStack is going to be taking another major step in open governance next year. According to Rackspace, the time has come to form an OpenStack Foundation. Rackspace president Lew Moorman will be discussing an OpenStack Founation during the “state of the union talk” tomorrow at the OpenStack Conference in Boston.
Why now? Today I spoke with Rackspace’s Mark Collier and Jonathan Bryce, and their response was that now is the time given the level of contributions from other companies.
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Influence, Not Control
Bryce, chairman of the project policy board, said that it’s been talked about since the beginning. However, the fact that the last milestone release had 12 features from eight companies in the OpenStack project showed that OpenStack is “a living, breathing thing, not dependent on any one company.”
The company has taken some criticism about heavy-handed governance while OpenStack was maturing. Rick Clark, one of the founding members of the Rackspace team guiding OpenStack, voiced concerns about Rackspace’s control of the project when he left the company for Cisco. Clark, who took pains to make clear that he felt Rackspace meant the best for the project, said he was still concerned that Rackspace was controlling rather than influencing OpenStack. “Rackspace has a choice to make; they can try to control the project and eventually fail, or they choose to influence it and succeed.”
Jonathan Bryce Talks Rackspace Governance Earlier This Year
It looks like, ultimately, Rackspace is choosing influence over control.
It’s worth noting that Rackspace has gotten pretty strong positives from many in the OpenStack community on its management of the project. Piston Cloud Computing’s CEO, Joshua McKenty said, “Rackspace has done an amazing job of shepherding this open source project through its infancy, and they have gradually handed off many of the
responsibilities for OpenStack to the broader community. The role of an OpenStack Foundation will be to manage the last of those responsibilities.”
McKenty also said that OpenStack has always functioned as a meritocracy. “I think the most fundamental marker of that will be over the coming months – when we see that this next step in the management and organization of the project has almost no impact on the day-to-day functioning of the community, which has relied on merit and so-called ‘lazy consensus’ since its inception.”
Leaving Home
With OpenStack nearly ready to leave the nest, does Rackspace have any regrets? Collier said that the company had “absolutely no regrets,” and that the project had actually been “nothing but positive” for Rackspace.
Before, Collier says that companies would plan strategy and come to Rackspace when they decided they needed third-party hosting. Now? Collier says that companies bring Rackspace in to discuss transforming their IT, automating processes, and so on. “It’s a much higher level conversation.”
Structure Still Unresolved
Collier said that Rackspace will be transitioning the trademark and other intellectual property to a foundation, but the actual makeup of the foundation is still up in the air. One key consideration, said Collier, is ensuring that the foundation has resources on par or better than what is currently provided by Rackspace. “We have a rough idea what resources are needed, the last thing we’d want to do is turn OpenStack over to an underfunded entity.”
Beyond that, though, Bryce said that the structure for the foundation is to be determined. Why not set up the project with existing foundations, like Apache? Bryce said that it makes sense to have a standalone foundation that’s “more like a tightly focused Apache foundation.”
“OpenStack is made up of very closely related projects that make up a cloud operating system. There’s tight coherence around release schedules, integration points, important things to maintain. It makes sense to have something that’s just focused on OpenStack because of the tight integration around a broad set of technologies.”
We’ll be watching the foundation formation with great interest. How the project is staffed and funded are going to be crucial to its success. It will be interesting to see how much of the current Rackspace staff that’s tasked with OpenStack transitions to the foundation, and where new blood comes from as well.
But generally, this looks like a good move. OpenStack has evolved very, very quickly. Mistakes have been made, but not fatal ones. What do you think? What suggestions do you have for the OpenStackers as the project moves towards more independence?
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