Items tagged with home
Among a number of other updates announced this week at Google IO, it was revealed that hands-free calling was coming to the popular Google Home AI assistant. And those hands-free calls will quite literally be free – the update itself and calls made from the device will come at no additional cost.When the feature rolls out, calls can be made from the Google Home in a couple of ways. Users can allow the device to scan and store their contacts, which can be referenced directly, or calls can be made from Google search results. For example, someone could say “Call Mom” – assuming there was a contact labeled Mom -- and the device would call the number associated with that contact. Users, however, could...
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The Internet, as you know, is increasingly becoming intertwined in just about everything. From phones to coffee makers to automobiles, if there's a way to add a connection, it's being added. The next frontier seems to be the home. Automating an abode isn't entirely novel, but doing so on a consumer level has become quite a popular goal of late. A few years back, SmartThings launched to harmonize ZigBee and Z-Wave products, while producing apps that would enable homeowners to unify various smart products. Today, SmartThings is being added to Samsung's portfolio. In an effort to keep pace with its primary rivals, Samsung has acquired the start-up for a reported $200 million, giving itself a shot...
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Following Google’s initial foray into the connected home front with the acquisition of Nest is an acquisition of Dropcam, a startup that makes a cloud-based WiFi video monitoring service. Rumors had emerged a few weeks ago that this was happening, but now the deal is going through for $555 million. According to the Wall Street Journal, Nest co-founder Matt Rogers confirmed that the company is paying cash for Dropcam. The deal will close pending regulatory approval. There are, of course, concerns over any Google-owned products and services in the connected home because of the search giant’s ad-focused revenue stream, but Rogers assured that neither Nest nor Dropcam will sell ads, and...
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It may seem a little odd, but the smart lock might be the next big competition ground. With August launching last week, Goji has introduced this week the Goji Smart Lock. It's the first electronic deadbolt to provide a new level of home-access control and information-including picture alerts-via smart phones so that homeowners feel more confident and secure about who is coming and going from their homes. The Goji Smart Lock is the only lock that has a built-in camera to send homeowners real-time picture alerts via text and email to give them visual confirmation of who is activating their lock. It's just another step in home automation becoming more mainstream. The Goji Smart Lock works with Bluetooth...
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Don't call AT&T just a carrier, at least not any longer. The company most often associated with being the first U.S. mobile provider to offer the iPhone has branched out in a major way since 2007. At this stage, it's also offering phone, broadband, and pay-TV services under the U-verse umbrella, and soon, it'll also be dabbling into the home security and automation market. In fact, it's something we're pretty excited about. The home automation market has been largely underserved. The only major players require professional installation and cost tens of thousands of dollars per home. For most consumers, that's just way out of reach. Starting this week, AT&T Digital Life is launching in...
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And just like that, it's a wrap. Motorola's parts weren't all suitable to Google's future needs, but it was clearly an all-or-nothing ordeal back when the purchase went down. Now, Arris is taking Motorola Home's cable and internet businesses away from Google, and it's likely a win-win. The company this week announced that it completed its acquisition of the Motorola Home business from a subsidiary of Google, which will reportedly "enable Arris to transform how service and content providers deliver entertainment and communications." Google comes out with $2.2 billion from the sale, and Arris also issue Google 10.6 million shares of its common stock in connection with the transaction. This acquisition...
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The HTC First went on sale this past Friday, to coincide with the availability of Facebook Home, the social networking giant’s launcher that puts Facebook content front and center on some Android devices. We’re hard at work cranking out our full review of the HTC First, but while that’s being worked on, we thought some of you would like to see some video of the phone in action. If you’re unfamiliar with Facebook Home, it essentially replaces a phone’s home screen and app launcher with Facebook content that’s pumped in from your feed, and incorporates a handful of new chat-related, notification, and sharing features. HTC worked closely with Facebook...
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Facebook Home has been out and about for select Android phones since April 12th, and while the whole Home experience is not likely to ever arrive on iOS due to the restrictions of the OS, Facebook is doing its best to bring as much of Home as it can to iPhone and iPad. The new iOS app update, which is being pushed today for iPad, iPod touch and iPhone, introduce chat heads, so long as you're in the Facebook app. In other words, those who are scrolling through the Facebook app and get a message, will see a chat head pop up. But, due to iOS' limitations, when you leave the Facebook app those heads will vanish. Stickers and a refined look for iPad are also on the change list, for those interested....
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While the first "Facebook phone" is HTC's First, those with select Android devices already can now take advantage of most of the same features. For Facebook loyalists and power users who own an HTC One X, One X+, One, Samsung Galaxy S III, S 4, or Note II -- you can now find the updated Facebook Home application in the Google Play Store. It's free to download, and it delivers the same lock screen takeover, chat head functionality and tighter FB integration throughout. It's missing a few small tweaks that only the First has, but it's worth a look if you're a heavy social networker. It's also easy to uninstall if you have a look and find that it's not for you. Have a crack at it and let us know...
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Well, you had to know some negative feedback was en route. It seems that each time Facebook redesigns its News Feed, an entire swath of the Internet comes out and swears that they'll never use Facebook again. But then, active users just increase more and more. But with Facebook Home, it's a little different. Analysts are users alike have been asking Facebook for more clarity on what Home means for privacy -- particularly for those who go with an HTC First, where there's really no avoiding the Facebook connection. Today, the social network tossed up a blog post detailing a few answers. Clearly, the company states that: "Home doesn't change anything related to your privacy settings on Facebook,...
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Mark Zuckerberg took the stage at Facebook’s Menlo Park headquarters to announce Home, which as expected is not a new piece of hardware nor a completely new operating system, but a deep Facebook integration with Android that goes beyond what an app can do. Zuck put it in a nutshell by saying that instead of phones being designed around apps, Facebook wanted to design around people. More to the point, Home is designed to make communicating and Facebooking easier to do. The first main feature is the Cover feed, which functions as both a lock screen and a home screen. Your lock screen has sliding pictures that displays what amounts to your Newsfeed, only one story at a time. You can comment...
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Talking to one's car and smartphone isn't nearly as strange as it used to be, largely thanks to things like in-car infotainment systems and products such as Google Now and Siri. But talking to the walls of one's home? That's still pretty loony. Soon, however, a company named iSpeech hopes that it won't be so odd. The company has launched a "Siri-like" voice recognition platform for the connected home, which aims to give homeowners the ability to use their voice to control things like the HDTV, kitchen appliances, and more. Even things like the thermostat and lighting can be controlled by voice, not to mention a washer / dryer and even a security system. It's all based on natural language commands,...
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PlayStation Home is getting a lot friendlier these days. Sony's DADC LOOT group has partnered with a slew of companies to bring feature films, television, radio, and live events to Sony Computer Entertainment America's PlayStation Home social game platform. With the addition of Crackle, Ustream, and RadioIO social experiences to PlayStation Home, users can invite friends to share traditional entertainment experiences in a virtual environment, communicating with each other in real time-whether across town or on the other side of the world. Created by LOOT, Sony DADC New Media Solutions' internal development team, the PlayStation®Home real-time social game platform is available on PlayStation®Network...
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Intel Intelligent Home Energy Management Energy-efficient computing based on Intel architecture now brings power-saving energy controls to your home. The Intel Atom processor is the heart of a low-power embedded computing panel designed to exchange monitoring and control data with smart appliances, smart plugs, smart electric utility meters and sensors located throughout the home. Intel recently demonstrated at their Tech Heaven event, a concept design for a central control center that provides family members with information to not only control utility costs, but also help them plan their daily activities, access personal messages and activate home security systems. See more about how Intel...
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You might find this unusual, and think it useless, but for those without the lifeline of a phone number, this is a boon.Since the acquisition of Grand Central last year, Google has been participating in periodic Project Homeless Connect events in which it has been providing the homeless with free phone numbers and voicemail accounts that they can access from any phone. More than 4,000 phone numbers and voicemail accounts have been distributed this way, Craig Walker, a senior product manager of voice products for Google, told the San Francisco Chronicle.On Wednesday, Google announced that it would expand Grand Central's project and partner directly with homeless shelters that will now be able...
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Microsoft's troubles don't all revolve around Vista. In fact the Redmond firm's Windows Home Server has been corrupting user's data for few months now with no end in sight. Microsoft claimed to burning the midnight oil during the holiday season in order to resolve this issue. So what are the results of all that burnt oil?Two months have passed and the issue has not been resolved. Instead, Microsoft conceded that the scope of the problem is much bigger than initially estimated. Microsoft acknowledged numerous customer reports of corruption in the following programs, though it says it has thus far been unable to replicate them:Apple iTunesZune SoftwarePhotoshop...
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I remember the good old days when banks would offer new customers gifts like toasters or other housewares when you opened up an account. Of course, the good old days weren't really very good, because you had to stand in line at the bank fairly often instead of using direct deposit, internet banking, credit and debit cards, and ATMs to manage your finances remotely. The final reason to visit a bank regularly might become a thing of the past, as CheckFree Corp. is equipping banks with the tech they need to allow customers to scan checks slated for deposit, then deposit them electronically.Called Remote Deposit Capture, the technology lets people scan checks through their home computers and deposit...
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What good is a file server if you can't store files on it? Uh, huh. Microsoft has posted a Knowledge Base article, KB946676, which warns of file corruption issues with Windows Home Server. "When you use certain programs to edit files on a home computer that uses Windows Home Server, the files may become corrupted when you save them to the home server," Microsoft said in a support document posted last week. The document went on to list the software, which includes Windows Vista Photo Gallery, Windows Live Photo Gallery, OneNote 2003, OneNote 2007, Outlook 2007, Microsoft Money 2007 and SyncToy 2.0 Beta. Others programs, however, may also corrupt files stored on a home server powered...
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We're still at a loss as to how so many computers (especially laptops) with sensitive data end up getting stolen. One would think that anyone entrusted with such data would know that a major law suit and bad press were just lurking around the corner in the guise of a thief.All that being said, about 10,000 employee records were on a laptop that was stolen recently from a Home Depot in Massachusetts.“The retailer tells Team 5 Investigate[r – sic]s it is confident that this personal information was not the thief's target, but that is little consolation to thousands of Home Depot workers, including Anthony Garro, of Salem. He and his wife both received letters from Home Depot headquarters...
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While it might not sound as fun as bashing in an opponents face with a well placed move in Virtua Fighter 5, the Cell CPU at the heart of each and every PS3 can also be put to use helping researchers understand diseases such as various forms of cancer, Alzheimer's & even Parkinson's disease.Due to the highly parallel nature of the research project and the aptitude of the Cell CPU for such tasks, it isn't very hard to figure out just why the project supervisors are giving the PS3 such praise:"The recent inclusion of PS3 as part of the Folding@home program has afforded our research group with computing power that goes far beyond what we initially hoped," said Vijay Pande, Associate Professor...
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There's bad, and then there's evil. But spammers are worse than evil. And the worst version of evil is to use our beloved Homer Simpson to trick you into giving up your e-mail address, and then signing you up for a spam barrage. Don't click on that survey about the Simpsons movie. The spammed e-mails try to lure unsuspecting users to a Web site, where their e-mail addresses will be harvested for later spamming attacks, according to researchers at Sophos. To get users to visit the site, the spam claims recipients will be given a $500 Visa gift card if they click on a link and participate in an online survey about the movie. Each e-mail contains...
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Windows Home Server, officially announced earlier this year, is already at the release candidate stage. The software is designed to allow users with a home network to have a single, quick, and easy to use interface that will allow users to access media from other PCs, NAS boxes, and even Zunes. The idea is make life easier for families that might have everything from videos to music spread out across multiple machines where it can be confusing to remember where everything is. That's assuming that the users are even computer savvy enough to know how and where to look.There's even a contest for people who can create the best hardware and/or software add-ins. Click here for details. "Windows...
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