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  • LeAnn Rimes Feud With Brandi Glanville Just Keeps Going

    LeAnn Rimes has a long and storied past with Brandi Glanville; since LeAnn married Brandi’s ex, Eddie Cibrian, the two have been going at it in the press nonstop. Brandi was initially upset that Eddie cheated on her with LeAnn while the two of them were filming a movie together, but now she’s set her sights on LeAnn’s mothering skills and even the way she gives Mother’s Day gifts.

    Glanville took to Twitter to talk about LeAnn’s gift–a bouquet of flowers–and said that the two of them don’t speak when they run into each other in public.

    LeAnn reportedly replied with, “This was actually the first acknowledgement of my gesture I was made aware of. I didn’t see anything else sent to me. It wasn’t for the ‘thank you.’ It was to just simply say Happy Mother’s Day,” though that tweet appears to have been deleted. She did seem to allude to the situation in another post, however.

    LeAnn has claimed in the past that she entered a rehab program to learn how to cope with stress after two of Brandi’s friends allegedly began harassing her and making threatening phone calls. They have also had Twitter wars before, after Brandi accused LeAnn of keeping laxative pills in her purse and being negligent when Brandi’s son ate them, thinking they were candy.

  • Still Playing Games On Google+? You Have Until June 30 To Clear Out

    Does anybody still play games on Google+? If you do, Google’s got some bad news.

    Google announced at Google I/O that it’s shutting down Google+ Games on June 30. Now, it doesn’t mean that the games on Google+ will cease to exist. They’ll just cease to exist on Google+. As such, Google recommends that players get in touch with the developers of their favorite games to find out where their favorite games will be hosted after June 30.

    Why is Google shutting down Google+ Games? The short answer is Google Play game services. It’s a rich set of APIs that allow game developers to offer a googlified game experience across Android, iOS and the Web. The games even have built in Google+ support for matchmaking and other services so those who still play games with friends on Google+ will be able to continue to do so on the new service.

    Google Play game services may be making Google+ Games redundant, but it’s probably not the only reason for the closure. Around this time last year, Google+ Games lost two major developers – Wooga and PopCap. Both developers said that they were removing their games from the service after finding that the player base on Google+ wasn’t worth their time. There haven’t been reports of any major developers leaving Google+ Games since then, but it might have been a sign of things to come as Google itself apparently feels the player base on Google+ isn’t worth supporting.

    So, what happens to the players who have invested hundreds of hours, and maybe even hundreds of dollars, into Google+ Games? Google says that “some games will be migrating data to an alternative destination where you can continue to use your unused payments.” You’re going to have to contact the developer of your favorite games to find out all the details though.

    [h/t: Engadget]

  • Tommy Chong Touts the Economic Benefits of Weed

    Tommy Chong, along with co-star Ceech Marin, became famous in the 70s and 80s for the Ceeech & Chong movies, which satirized and glorified many aspects of hippie and stoner culture. Now, Chong is, unsurprisingly, advocating for the legalization of marijuana.

    According to an Associated Press report, Chong recently stated that marijuana could be the cure for the ailing U.S. economy. Chong stated that legalizing and taxing marijuana and hemp could provide enough revenue to “save the world.” From the AP:

    “Look at the situation we’re in now. Sequesters. Cuts. Everything cut across the board. Now, the government is tapped into the biggest cash crop in the world,” Chong said. “There’s little manufacturing cost. You don’t have to do anything except watch it grow and get a couple of hippies to cut it and then put it in a bag.”

    Chong, who revealed last year that he battled prostate cancer, still tours occasionally with Marin. He is also using social media to promote marijuana legalization. His Facebook and Twitter accounts are filled with statements such as these:

  • Google Gives Businesses A New Reason To Use YouTube

    Google is now letting businesses use YouTube to sell products. Businesses have been using YouTube to market products almost as long as YouTube has been around (at least since businesses figured it out that it could be about more than cat videos), and for quite some time, businesses have been able to advertise through clickable ads inside of YouTube videos.

    Now, Google is taking the YouTube ecommerce thing to a whole new level by essentially letting users shop for products right through the business’ YouTube channel.

    “Every day, millions of people turn to YouTube for advice, from learning how to do the perfect smokey eye to trying out a new recipe for mashed potatoes,” says Danielle Tomassini from the Google Shopper team. “People are using YouTube not just for entertainment, but to learn a new skill, find more information, and shop for products. This presents a unique opportunity for consumer goods brands to reach shoppers in the moment and provide them with an easy way to go from watching a video to purchasing the product.”

    The new offering comes in the form of a new channel gadget, and lets users shop for products from various retailers from the comfort of the YouTube channel they’re already browsing.

    “This new channel gadget will enable shoppers to seamlessly move from browsing how-to videos and featured products to finding which retailers carry them, check availability, compare prices and make a purchase, all with fewer clicks than today,” says Tomassini.

    Google has launched the gadget with Unilever to highlight hair products from TRESemmé.

    “There is a growing interest for ‘hair how to’ videos on YouTube with millions of users going to YouTube to learn about hairstyles and hair care,” says Tomassini. “By providing hair tutorial videos, tips and tricks, and interviews with trendsetters, TRESemmé has already generated more than 2.7 million views on their channel. Through their newly designed channel, TRESemmé can also now connect these consumers with the products they’re watching in the demo videos in a faster more efficient way, shortening the shopping journey.”

    You can see the feature in action at the TRESemmé YouTube channel.

    YouTube Ecommerce

    As you can see, this includes not only a “Buy Now” button, but product reviews and a “Learn More” button, which enables the business to share details about the product, to hopefully help convince customers to buy it:

    YouTube Learn More

    When the user clicks “Buy Now,” they’re presented with the option to select the products they want to purchase. While TRESemmé only has a single product highlighted here, one can only assume that businesses can include more. It’s unclear what the limit on this might be.

    Select Products

    From there, users can comparison shop from stores that have the product available, and see if it is in stock. When they click on one of the stores, they’re taken to the product page on that store’s site.

    Soap Product Page

    It’s interesting that Google isn’t tying this into Google Shopping (otherwise, you wouldn’t be seeing Amazon there). That doesn’t mean they won’t in the future.

    Google is actually offering the gadget as a premium offering for its consumer goods clients, produced through GloTo.

    So far, Google isn’t making it incredibly easy to just go and set one of these channels up. Right now, you have to speak with a Google representative to determine “if the shopper channels is the right solution for your brand”.

    The feature could play a major role in turning YouTube into a major driver of ecommerce. However, there are some things greatly holding it back. One is the aforementioned lack of Google Shopping integration, but another major factor is that it requires users to actually be on a channel page. How much YouTube viewing do you do from the channel page? If your’e like me, probably not a whole lot.

    People consumer videos from their YouTube homepage stream, when they’re shared via social media, and when they’re embedded on other web pages. None of these scenarios will cater to sales through this new feature (unless ads pointing to to the channel as the landing page are placed within the videos).

    But this could just be a starting point, and could grow into something much bigger.

  • Samsung planning to free up storage space on Galaxy S 4 for users

    samsung_galaxy_s_4_usable_space

    It looks like Samsung is about to respond to the recent criticism of the Galaxy S 4 that the guaranteed 16GB of internal storage turned out to be about only half of that, due to bloatware and the heavy Touch-Wiz UI. Samsung’s initial response was that users should get expansion microSD cards to get some more storage— obviously this wasn’t an acceptable answer to end-users. If a company promises a certain amount of storage, then the phone should actually have that amount of storage, or at least something close to it.

    After an outrage from the Android community, Samsung seems to have taken a complete 180 turn on the issue. Today the company announced that it would be looking to update the phone to optimize software in order to free up space for customers. Whether this means they’ll be removing some bloatware or some of the Samsung “smart” features, we know either way that the company is looking to right their wrong. Check out the press release after the break.

    “We appreciate this issue being raised and we will improve our communications,” Samsung spokesperson said for CNET UK. ”Also, we are reviewing the possibility to secure more memory space through further software optimisation.

    “Samsung is committed to listening to our customers and responding to their needs as part of our innovation process.”

    Source: CNET

     

    Come comment on this article: Samsung planning to free up storage space on Galaxy S 4 for users

  • I used to think I couldn’t get out of hell: Chicago public school students react to TEDxYouth@Midwest

    TEDxYouth@Midwest-1

    Jullien Gordon, a founding partner of New Higher, says on the TEDxYouth@Midwest stage , “Our generation has two choices, we can hope or we can hustle.”

    Earlier this month, 450 Chicago public school sophomores and juniors, plus 120 of their teachers, crowded into the city’s Harris Theater for TEDxYouth@Midwest, an event all about inspiring, motivating and empowering the young people of a city known for youth gun violence, but full of so much more — culture, history, educators and students dedicated to helping their city thrive.

    Chicago’s public schools have been a fixture in the news lately. 54 schools in the city are slated to close in 2013, and according to reports in The Chicago Tribune, the 2011-12 school year brought the highest number of public school students affected by gunfire since 2008. Twenty-four students were killed; 319 students shot.

    At TEDxYouth@Midwest, organizers strove to turn the focus from problems, and keep it focused on the potential. 17 speakers addressed the audience, including people like guerrilla gardener Ron Finley, who is planting gardens in South Central LA; Dr. Benjamin Harrison, a researcher working on growing replacement tissue for patients who have lost their own; and Chicago native Zoe Damacela, who started her own apparel line as a high school student in the city.

    This year, TEDxYouth@Midwest launched their TEDxMidwest Youth Connections Program, a project pairing TEDxYouth@Midwest students with career experiences designed to open the doors to potential careers — from job shadowing to summer internships to discussions with local entrepreneurs. Through the program, 35 TEDxYouth@Midwest student attendees found summer internships and, next year, the team at TEDxYouth@Midwest hopes to raise that number to 100.

    “The event was levels better because of the students’ infectious energy, and its potential to really have a life-changing effect on hundreds of kids and teachers,” said organizer Mike Hettwer. “The speakers were so motivated to speak there.”

    The immediate effects of the event shone in students’ responses to comment cards asking how their thinking changed throughout the event. Some of their responses are truly incredible. A sampling:

    I used to think… “That once you made a bad decision, that was it for you. People say you write your life’s story in ink — if you make a mistake there is no way to erase it. You are done!”
    Now I think… “That I should no longer aim for perfection, but rather strive for success. Success is not measured by how many times you fall, but actually choosing to get up once more then you fall.” 

    I used to think…”That you have to use violence in order to make peace.”
    Now I think… “But I realize that I can use peace to make peace.”

    I used to think… “That because I am considered a minority, I would not be able to do amazing things I really want to do.”
    Now I think… “That I can do anything I set my mind to if I do not let anything hold me back. Only I can prevent myself from achieving my goals and my passion.”

    I used to think… “I couldn’t get out of Hell.”
    Now I think… “I can with Mellody Hobson’s speech.”

    I used to think… “I was one of the few teenagers passionate about science.”
    Now I think… “TED is all about diversity of ideas and other people are as passionate about science as I am.”

    I used to think… “If you come from a broken home, would live in a broken future.”
    Now I think… “You can shape your own future and get away from the brokeness.”

    I used to think… “This was going to be a long boring program with weird snacks.”
    Now I think… “This experience has been the best experience in my whole entire life.”

    The audience at TEDxYouth@Midwest was made up of sophomores and juniors.

    The audience at TEDxYouth@Midwest was made up of sophomores and juniors.

    TEDxYouth@Midwest-2

    Dave Gallo, Director of Special Projects at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) talks about the deep sea and its deep secrets.

    One of the amazing comment carders from TEDxYouth@Midwest.

    One of the amazing comment carders from TEDxYouth@Midwest.

    Read much more about TEDx and its extraordinary constellation of events on the TEDx Blog »

  • Every Second, 800+ Apps Are Downloaded from Apple’s App Store

    As we told you on Wednesday, Apple’s App Store just hit a huge milestone – 50 billion total app downloads (excluding re-downloads and updates, of course). Today, they made it official with a release that mentions a couple other interesting facts.

    Count one second. Good. In that time, 800 apps were downloaded from Apple’s App Store. That pace means that every month, Apple now sees more that 2 billion app downloads.

    “Apple would like to thank our incredible customers and developers for topping 50 billion apps downloaded,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. “The App Store completely transformed how people use their mobile devices and created a thriving app ecosystem that has paid out over nine billion dollars to developers. We’re absolutely floored to cross this milestone in less than five years.”

    In honor of this milestone, Apple gave away a prize for the lucky person who just happened to download number 50,000,000,000. His name is Brandon Ashmore from Mentor, Ohio, and the lucky app was Say the Same Thing, a word game that lets you and a friend bridge word gaps to find common ground. Today, he’s the proud owner of a $10,000 App Store gift card.

    This isn’t the first time Apple has done this sort of promotion for a big milestone. Back in March of 2012, when Apple hit 25 billion app downloads, they gave away another $10,000 gift card to a Chinese man who downloaded the popular puzzle game Where’s My Water.

    Apple says that the App Store currently boasts over 850,000 apps. They’ve come a long way from the 500 that they started out with way back in 2008.

    If you were wondering, the most popular apps of all time out of those 50 billion downloaded are Angry Birds (paid) and Facebook (free).

  • Dodge & The Fast and the Furious

    Dodge Daytona

    It’s no secret that Dodge has had a long standing relationship with the Fast and the Furious movie franchise. From Dom’s 1970 Charger to the new Challengers and other Dodge products, Chrysler is banking on the fact that the F&F will continue to help bolster brand recognition with automotive enthusiasts throughout the world. The new film, Fast & Furious 6 is no exception and continues this tradition by incorporating some new Alfa Romeos into the action. Ralph Gilles, SRT CEO sits down for the cameras to tell us about the ins-and-outs of this relationship.

    Source: Youtube.com

  • Android shipments explode in Q1 as iPhone stalls; Windows Phone tops BlackBerry

    Smartphone Shipments Q1 2013
    Microsoft and BlackBerry are fighting to become viable alternatives in the mobile market, and while Android and iOS accounted for a majority of smartphone shipments in the first quarter, Windows Phone made some significant moves that propelled it ahead of BlackBerry. Research firm IDC found that Windows Phone shipped 7 million smartphones, accounting for 3.2% of all shipments in the first quarter of 2013, more than double the year-ago quarter. Microsoft was able to overtake BlackBerry, which despite its new BlackBerry 10 operating system, saw smartphone shipments decline from 9.7 million units to 6.3 million units, accounting for 2.9% of global channel sales.

    Continue reading…

  • Nick Offerman Is Back Reading Mindless Celeb Tweets

    One of the funniest minutes on late night is back for its 9th installment, and we couldn’t be happier. Ladies and gentlemen, I present Nick Offerman from Parks and Recreations reading tweets from young female celebrities.

    In this episode, TV’s Ron Swanson reads tweets from such starlets as Katy Perry, Miranda Cosgrove, and Jennette McCurdy.

    If you’re interested, there’s a lot more where that came from.

    [TeamCoco]

  • Charles Darwin Wrong About Coral Atolls, Shows Study

    Though Charles Darwin is known as the father of modern biology, evolutionary biologists are well aware that he got many aspects of evolution wrong. In particular, with no knowledge of genetics Darwin was left to speculate heavily on the mechanisms of evolutionary change.

    Now, geologists have discovered another hypothesis on which Darwin was not entirely right. According to a LiveScience report, a new paper published recently in the journal Geology shows that Darwin was wrong about how coral atolls grow.

    In his 1842 book The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs, Darwin had originally proposed that coral atolls grow as islands sink and are actually very thick. Though in the 1950s Darwin was proven right about atolls being thousands of feet thick, geologists at MIT have now found that glacially induced sea-level cycles (a mechanism that had not been uncovered in the 19th century) are also responsible for coral atoll growth.

    The new paper finds that reefs can grow or not as sea levels rise or sink with the melting of glaciers. With different islands sinking at different rates, the processes combine to create the variety of different atoll growths seen throughout the world. Researchers state that this accounts for reefs that Darwin’s purely subsidence-based ideas don’t.

    Being magnanimous, a co-author the the study told LiveScience that Darwin was “mostly right.” The paper points out that the Society Islands, where Darwin gathered evidence for his reef book, is one of the rare places on the planet where glacial cycles and sinking combine in such a way as to create “perfect” atolls.

  • Kirstie Alley Slams Abercrombie CEO

    Kirstie Alley isn’t happy with Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries after some remarks he made about the way his company does things.

    Jeffries was quoted in a Salon interview in 2006 as saying: “In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and a lot of friends. A lot of people don’t belong [in our clothes], and they can’t belong. Are we exclusionary? Absolutely….”That’s why we hire good-looking people in our stores. Because good-looking people attract other good-looking people, and we want to market to cool, good-looking people. We don’t market to anyone other than that.”

    Though he said the words several years ago, they’re coming back to haunt him now after resurfacing during promotion for a book called “The New Rules Of Retail” by Robin Lewis and Michael Dart. The authors reference the fact that A&F don’t offer XL sizes in their stores, which has garnered a petition on Change.org. Now, the fact that the company openly admits to having exclusionary practices has enraged many, including celebrities.

    “Abercrombie clothes are for people who are cool and look a certain way and are beautiful and are thin’ and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That would make me never buy anything from Abercrombie,” Alley said. “I’ve got two kids in that bracket, but they will never walk in those doors because of his view of people — forget women, his view of just people.”

    Jeffries’ comments have received so much backlash that a filmmaker, Greg Karber, went on a mission recently to find A&F clothing at Goodwill stores and donated every piece he found to homeless people in his city. So far, Jeffries has had no comment.

  • Justice Department Says It May Support Email Privacy Bill

    In the debate over email privacy, law enforcement has usually been on the side claiming a warrant requirement when accessing email would impede investigations. It’s a good sign then when the largest law enforcement agency – the Department of Justice – comes out in support of a warrant requirement.

    The Hill reports that Attorney General Eric Holder told the House Judiciary Committee that the Justice Department would be in support of legislation that requires law enforcement to obtain a warrant before accessing email. His support gives a major boost to those who want to update the ECPA – a decades old bill that allows law enforcement to obtain emails without a warrant as long as said email is more than 180 days old.

    Of course, Holder did have some reservations. He said that any update to the ECPA should include exemptions for “certain very limited circumstances.” For example, he said that law enforcement agencies shouldn’t have to obtain a warrant for civil investigations.

    It was encouraging, however, to hear that Holder is in support of “the general notion of having a warrant to obtain the content of communications.” It’s only slightly less encouraging to think that his idea of exemptions may cut our large swaths of the bill, thus making it less effective.

    If the Justice Department truly is in favor of updating the ECPA, it will be interesting to see which one it comes out in favor of. Many hope that it would support Rep. Zoe Lofgren’s bill – The Online Communications and Protection Act. It’s a far reaching bill that not only requires a warrant before accessing email and other online communications, but also requires a warrant when accessing any geolocation data from mobile device carriers.

    Lofgren’s bill may be too far reaching for the Justice Department though. It may instead opt to back something like the ECPA Amendments Act of 2013, a bill from Sen. Patrick Leahy that only requires law enforcement to obtain a warrant when accessing email. It says nothing about geolocation data.

    Regardless, the Justice Department’s support may not even be enough to pass anything this soon. Both the House and the Senate are wrangling with other issues at the moment, and it looks like ECPA reform has been put on the back burner yet again.

  • BlackBerry Live 2013 Thursday Morning Brief: Wrapping it Up with Sessions, Certification, and More [VIDEO]

    What a week! We’ve seen a lot of exciting news come out of BlackBerry Live and BlackBerry Jam Americas this week including app launches and announcements, partner demos, the future vision for BlackBerry from Thorsten Heins, and more. Today we wrap up BlackBerry Live with a flourish – be sure to check out the hands-on labs, breakout sessions, the BlackBerry Store, and the Showcase. Check out the video below for today’s morning brief:

    [ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

    If you missed the keynote general sessions, you can replay the full videos for BlackBerry Live and BlackBerry Jam and their respective web sites.

    Make sure that you check out the daily specials in the BlackBerry Store, including HS250 Bluetooth headsets, and microfiber pockets for BlackBerry Z10 smartphones.

    What are you most looking forward to today? Share in the comments below.

  • Gmail Gets Quick Actions To Let You RSVP, Check-In, and Review Right From the Inbox

    Google says they want to help you tackle your digital to-do’s as quickly as possible, and to this end they’ve added some new quick action buttons to Gmail that let you interact with important emails right from the inbox, without ever opening the email.

    Starting today, Google will begin to roll out a few new quick actions inside Gmail, including event invite responses that link to Google Calendar, places reviews that let you rate a restaurant, for instance, right inside Gmail, and one-click actions like confirming a product or site registration via email.

    “These buttons appear next to certain types of messages in your inbox and let you take action on an email without ever having to open it. For example, you can RSVP to your friend’s party invitation or rate that restaurant you went to last night all right from the inbox. You’ll be checking things off that to-do list in no time,” says Google.

    Another quick action involves check-ins for flights. Although the quick action button in this scenario takes you outside of Gmail for confirmation, flight emails now feature a useful card with all the pertinent info – time of departure, terminal and gate, estimated arrival time, and whether of not the flight is on time.

    Google is also asking developers to add custom actions to their emails, and they say that they hope to add many more action in the near future. Developers can go here for more info. These new actions should hit your Gmail inbox in the coming weeks.

    If you’re curious about more new stuff from Google (and there’s a lot of it), check out all the news from Wednesday’s I/O conference keynote.

  • Amazon cloud watcher Newvem now watches Azure too

    Newvem made its name monitoring your Amazon Web Services workloads and recommending where you can extract savings with another instance type or where you need to close security gaps. Now it’s adding analagous services for Microsoft Window Azure as well.

    The theory behind tools like these is basically this: sure, public cloud computing is billed as cheap, but too often it turns into a wasteland of dormant instances and other fallow resources. So as inexpensive as it can be, it’s not necessarily efficient or as cheap as it could be. Companies like Newvem, Cloudability, CloudynCloudVertical et al say they can help you optimize all that and save more.

    Newvem for Windows Azure covers many of the same core usage and cost metrics as the AWS version. A “heat map” helps users visualize their workloads as they move from on-premise implementations to the cloud, according to Newvem VP of marketing Cameron Peron. The free beta is available now to all Azure users. Newvem’s AWS version started out free as well, and a base level of capabilities remain free, but as of late last year, the company started charging for higher-level services.

    Newvem said it sees Azure — which launched its AWS-like Infrastructure-as-a-Service  capabilities last month — gaining traction.

    “The size of the Azure installed base is probably one of [Microsoft’s] best-kept secrets,” Peron noted. Well, not that secret since Microsoft recently said Azure is a $1 billion-a-year business – a claim that some find difficult to swallow. Newvem would not comment when asked if Microsoft helped fund its Azure tool, but given that Microsoft wants to build the Azure ecosystem and compete better with AWS (as well as the spanking new Google Compute Engine), I’d say it’s a safe bet.

    It’s also true that companies like Newvem, which built services around AWS, have been perplexed to see AWS adding richer and deeper monitoring and management services like Trusted Advisor. Given that, it makes sense that these companies offer multi-cloud capabilities.

    Newvem for Azure

    Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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  • Six Numbers Reveal the Booming Business of Auto-Analytics

    For millennia people have run by feel, an “art of combining our breath and mind and muscles into fluid self-propulsion over wild terrain,” says Christopher McDougall in his anthropological study of the topic.

    Many of us still run this way, of course, but for how much longer? Now we can lace up a pair of “smart” sneakers and instantly shift from running by feel to running by metrics. Guesses at how far and how fast are replaced by real time stats on pace and meters travelled.

    If you think you’ll never make the switch, think again. As Nike learned from studying millions of users, the magic number of times a runner needs to see her data before becoming a more “science-based” runner is just five. Once a person crosses that threshold they are “massively more likely” to keep running by metrics than by feel alone.

    That’s a great number. Here are five more I’ve come across in my ongoing study of the field of auto-analytics.

    auto21.gifAuto analytics have a long tradition in the U.S. Benjamin Franklin was an early adopter, though his self-tracking experiments grabbed fewer headlines than his apocryphal kite-flying ones. Franklin quantified his progress toward achieving 13 personal goals, assigning himself a “little black spot” on days he failed to make progress on a particular goal.

    New research (PDF) suggests that 69% of Americans participate in some self-tracking behavior just in areas related to health and wellness. Within this group of self-trackers there’s a fundamental behavioral switch going on from analog tracking to digital. Old-school methods requiring you to painstakingly detail your life with pen and paper are being replaced by tech that can collect data automatically or passively, and even interpret the data for you. Already 21% (PDF) of people who self-track use smartphone apps or gadgets that make self-tracking behavior more efficient and the data more dependable.

    auto485.gifWe take for granted now that, standing in a hotel lobby, we can find the quickest route to our destination, learn the name of the song playing and change a meeting time, all witha few taps. We navigate the external world this way. But have you thought much about using algorithms to discover the seemingly invisible and silent world within yourself, of cognition, physiological functioning, and emotions?

    More of us will eventually do this. By 2018, 485,000,000 wearable computing devices will ship globally, including smart watches and smart clothing, according to ABI Research. And don’t suspect this just means we’ll all be wearing dorky electronic glasses. Sensors will detect everything from the number of steps we take to minutes of REM sleep per day. Many killer apps for wearable analytics probably haven’t been imagined yet.

    auto0.3.gifPeople tend to gravitate toward the health and wellness applications of auto-analytics. But they will be used for “softer” disciplines too, like innovation and creativity. Traditionally measures of creativity, cognition, and focus have been a “mysterious art,” as Tom Davenport points out. But many types of wearable computing will allow professionals to migrate from art to science in the way they monitor their work and try to improve the thinking part of their job performance.

    Consider that lab research using EEG headbands already shows users tend to have a measurable spike in gamma-band brain waves 0.3 seconds (PDF) before the “aha!” moments that spark the creative process. Many of these headbands are coming out of labs and are now available on store shelves, allowing anyone (who’s willing to look a bit geeky) to measure their neurons firing and seek patterns in their creative thinking, and adjust your routines to enhance creativity.

    auto5000.gifWhen we think of Big Data, we tend to think of large organizations, even nations, crunching terabytes of information. But you have Big Data inside yourself. Consider the BodyMedia FIT Armband, which contains four sensors and collects 5,000 data points a minute on your metabolism, sleep patterns, and activity levels. That’s 2.4 million data points in a work day.

    What’s more, this is the kind of big data that comes with analysis: The wearable technology uses code and insights from IBM analytics teams to crunch your data and offer algorithm-generated recommendations on how users might improve personal decisions on diet and exercise to optimize health.

    auto84.gifWe began by mentioning how the ancient art of running can now be made scientific. Now think broadly about what other once-immeasurable forms of human movement might benefit from quantification, from karate kicks to dance moves to top-spin forehands.

    Apple’s recently amended 84-page patent filing shows the extent to which the company has been thinking about changing self-measurement the way it changed music. As one analyst sums up: “the company is…developing an entire wearable/detachable computing platform and ecosystem comprised of wireless sensing systems for monitoring…sports activity, athletic training, medicine, fitness and wellness in humans.”

    Most intriguing is Apple’s interest in developing wearable devices that offer users quantitative insight on movement in business and industrial settings. Soon you might be measuring your attempts to “manage by walking around (MBWA)” or to use more hand gestures during key client presentations.

    Frederick Taylor’s famous Time and Motion studies aimed to make factory work more scientific. Imagine if Taylor had the tools we’ll have now. It looks like we’re moving toward a New Taylorism, only this time, the worker takes control of measuring effectiveness. It could create increased autonomy through self-knowledge, and revolutionize, again, management, and the way they live and work.

  • Ringadoc raises $700k to move closer to the frontline of virtual health care

    Ringadoc, a San Francisco startup that helps doctors manage patient phone calls, has raised an additional $700,000 in seed funding.

    The round, which included Siemer Ventures, Telegraph Hill Group and Dr. Lyle Dennis, a neurologist and founder of HealthKeep, brings the startup’s total amount raised to $1.9 million. Previous investors include FF Angel, Practice Fusion CEO and founder Ryan Howard and former president of One Medical Group Sharon Knight.

    The startup launched in 2010 as a service for providing on-demand telephone and video chat access to physicians. For $40, consumers could use Ringadoc to connect with doctors anytime, day or night. But earlier this year, in a bid to bring more doctors on to its network, it pivoted to its current product, which targets physicians with an after-hours messaging and phone service.

    Typical after-hours messaging services require patients with after-hours questions to leave messages with a non-medically trained operator, who then looks up an on-call doctor and passes the message along. When the doctor calls back, the patient needs to recount her symptoms all over again.

    With Ringadoc, patients leave a secure message with a cloud-based answering service that automatically finds the appropriate physician – patients only need to explain their issues once and the cost, Ringadoc says, is cheaper than most existing systems. To date, the company said it has handled more than 100,000 phone calls for physicians.

    With the new funding, CEO and founder Jordan Michaels said the company plans to beef up sales and marketing, as well as enhance the product so that it could integrate with other tools used by doctors’ offices, including practice management and electronic health records systems. Since Ringadoc is capturing valuable patient engagement data through its telephone calls, Michaels said, they want to enable doctors to make the most of that functionality.

    “We’re tracking a lot of two-way conversations and that’s an important piece of the health care conversation,” Michaels said. “Our vision is to be on the frontline of virtual care for patients.”

    For now, the company is focusing on its physician-focused product. But, later this year, he said, it could start expanding to patients and restore the startup’s initial mission of providing on-demand physician access to patients.

    Recognizing the need to address the shortage of doctors in the U.S., other companies are also working to streamline physician-patient communication and promote virtual health care. For example, PingMD targets physicians with a mobile app for more efficiently communicating with patients and peers, HealthTap offers consumers a mobile- and web-based service for messaging and querying doctors and Sherpaa works with employers to help patients and doctors connect via video chats and phone calls.

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  • Miss USA: Crush On Prince Harry Is “Meant To Be”

    Miss USA, Nana Meriwether, isn’t shy when it comes to talking about her crush; maybe it’s because they’re both royalty.

    Meriwether, who has a model’s physique and stands at a statuesque 6′ tall, was overjoyed to hear that Prince Harry is 6’2″ and says that must mean the two of them were meant to be together.

    “Perfect!” she said. “We are meant to be! Miss USA is like royalty in America so it’ll be a pleasure to meet him…It would make a great story — we should totally get married.”

    Sadly, it’s unlikely the prince would be down for marriage just for the story, and since he’s already got a girlfriend it doesn’t look like she’ll be earning a new title soon. But she isn’t the only one who admires Harry; she was joined at his charity fundraiser in New York by several celebrities, including Will.i.am, who had nothing but kind things to say about the young royal.

    “I am a great admirer of Prince Charles and his charity work and I think it is incredible Harry has made it part of his legacy to carry this on. He doesn’t have to do what he does, so I applaud him. He’s a party prince, a soldier and a philanthropist. He’s a regular guy. If Harry was a movie character he would be Iron Man,” he said.

  • Watch The Entire Google I/O 2013 Keynote Here (All Four Hours Of It)

    Google gave an incredibly lengthy keynote to open up Google I/O on Wednesday. This included a number of announcements pertaining to Android, Google Play, Chrome, Google+, Search and Google Maps, yet still didn’t come close to covering all of the company’s announcements for the day.

    At the end, CEO Larry Page made a surprise appearance, and engaged in a Q&A session with audience members.

    More Google news here.