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Personalized iPad Magazine Zite Learns As You Read, ...

08 Mar 2011 18:50:12 EST

Have you ever created a Genius playlist on iTunes or set up a station on Pandora? Just plug in one song, and you instantly hear music that matches your tastes. Think of Zite, the free personalized iPad magazine that launched today, as the Genius playlist or Pandora of news discovery--but with one noticeable advantage: Zite is smarter, at least for now. Developed by researchers at the University of British Columbia's Laboratory for Computational Intelligence, the technology behind Zite can learn your reading habits and personalize content based on your interests. When first opening the app, Zite will immediately begin personalizing your experience. Link a Twitter account or Google Reader, and Zite will analyze (not simply display) your feeds to create a magazine tailored to your interests. You might get sources you know, you might get content you want from sources you don't know. (And yes, you'll occasionally get stories you have no interest in--just tell Zite and it ...

Is This Charlie Sheen's Social Media Guru?

08 Mar 2011 08:23:22 EST

He claims so. The weirdest new member of Charlie Sheen's digital entourage is a wedding photographer, paranormal investigator, and accused scam artist who has almost certainly never met the man at all. He seems to have mastered the modern art of shorting celebrity. But is Phillip Daggett-Brunelle #Winning? He responds to Fast Company's questions. And the plot thickens like #TigerBlood.

World's First Bionic Eye Approved for Use in Europe [Video]

07 Mar 2011 12:30:15 EST

Could blindness soon be a thing of the past? A California company called Second Sight recently received approval in Europe to sell the Argus II, a $115,000 gadget that can partially restore sight to patients with degenerative eye disease.The retinal prosthesis bypasses damaged photoreceptors with a mini video camera housed inside a pair of glasses. The camera sends signals to an implanted chip near the retina, which stimulates retinal cells and produces visual light patterns. Second Sight's system only works for people with retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative disease, because the disease only damages the eye's photoreceptors and leaves retinal cells intact. For these patients, the retinal prosthesis is effective enough that they can recognize objects, see people, and follow movements, according to MIT Technology Review.Second Sight isn't the only company working on a bionic eye. A startup called Retina Implant AG is also performing trials on a prosthesis to help patients with ...

Home Town Farms Provides Healthy, Affordable, and ...

04 Mar 2011 02:10:12 EST

We are in the midst of a global food crisis, with the price of food skyrocketing globally over the last year. As the cost of corn has jumped 87% and wheat 74%, tens of millions of people are finding it harder than ever to feed their families, with the rising price of food even helping to trigger the wave of social unrest sweeping the Middle East. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) said a record 40 million Americans, or 1 in 8, may not be able to eat without government assistance. As the CEO and co-founder of Home Town Farms in San Diego, Dan Gibbs has developed an innovative solution: commercial vertical organic urban farming that provides food that is not only lower in cost, by higher in quality as well. The causes of our rising food prices are many. Bad weather in key growing regions around the world has lead to short supplies. The steady growth of the world's population to reach seven billion this year has stretched the world's agricultural production capacity ...

MIT Scientist Captures 90,000 Hours of Video of His ...

02 Mar 2011 13:58:38 EST

Cognitive scientist Deb Roy blew the curve for Flip cam-packing proud pops. Since he and his wife brought their son home from the hospital, Roy has captured his every movement and word with a series of fisheye-lens cameras installed in every room. The purpose was to understand how we learn language.

MIT Scientist Captures 90,000 Hours of Video of His ...

02 Mar 2011 13:58:38 EST

MIT Scientist Captures 90,000 Hours of Video of His ...

02 Mar 2011 13:58:38 EST

iPad 2 Demo of Garage Band, iMovie

02 Mar 2011 11:50:03 EST

iPad 2 apps demos

EcoStrip with Green Gadgets on the Today Show

22 Feb 2011 02:55:20 EST

We don't usually pay a lot of attention to the power strips buried under our desk in the cord spaghetti but maybe we should. Because an eco-friendly power strip like EcoStrip might just hold the secret to saving real money by harnessing the power of energy efficiency. Energy efficiency remains a huge opportunity for homes, offices, and corporate sustainability programs to save resources and save money, estimated by McKinsey and Company in 2009 to represent over a trillion dollars in potential savings. Solutions often involve long lists of things we should do like turning out the lights but the best solutions are simple and making savings automatic. One of these is EcoStrip, an eco-friendly power strip that saves energy and saves money all on its own without nagging anyone or sending memos about recycling. If you're in charge of producing solid results with your company's sustainability efforts, EcoStrip is a solution to consider because the results are automatic, significant, and ...

DARPA's Mind-Controlled Prosthetic Arm Could Be on the ...

09 Feb 2011 15:34:18 EST

Finally, laypeople will benefit from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) mad scientist projects (see: thinking cameras and flying Humvees). As part of its just-announced Innovation Pathway, a priority review program for breakthrough medical devices, the FDA will fast-track the review of DARPA's mind-controlled robotic arm.The arm, which was developed at a cost of over $100 million by DARPA and Johns Hopkins University over the past five years, is controlled by a microchip in the brain. The microchip records neuron activity and decodes the signals to activate motor neurons that control the prosthetic. DARPA's prosthetic works much like a regular arm, with the ability to bend, rotate, and twist in 27 different ways. It is designed to restore almost complete hand and finger function to patients dealing with spinal cord injury, stroke, or amputation. Now that the arm has been expedited through the FDA's program, Johns Hopkins will implant its microchips in five ...

FDA prosthetic robotic arm

09 Feb 2011 15:34:18 EST

FDA prosthetic robotic arm

NASDAQ CEO on "Cyber Terrorism," Holograms, and 40 Years ...

09 Feb 2011 08:30:20 EST

Click to Expand >On Tuesday, Fast Company Editor Robert Safian joined NASDAQ CEO Robert Greifeld for a frank discussion about the ups and downs in the stock exchange's 40-year history. Greifeld took on not only the evolution of the technology that's driving NASDAQ but also the increased threat of hackers in an electronic trading environment, a threat that's popped up recently in the news. But the CEO is thinking beyond what he calls "cyber terrorism," to an era where technology catapults NASDAQ into an almost science-fiction-like future. "I'd like to see holograms in our market site," he says.

Innovation Agents: Heather Knight, Social Roboticist

07 Feb 2011 09:57:00 EST

obots are automating our daily lives, beating us at Jeopardy, and one day taking over the world. They are also incredibly entertaining -- which is where Heather Knight's Marilyn Monrobot enters the scene.

Game Face: L.A. Noire Brings Actors' Full Performance to ...

04 Feb 2011 12:06:51 EST

With a technology called MotionScan, an actor's complete performance--their facial expressions, how they talk, when they blink--are captured for use in a video game. We spoke to Brendan McNamara, the head of the team behind the detective game using this tech, "L.A. Noire."

The Daily Turns Congresswoman Giffords Tragedy Into iPad ...

03 Feb 2011 11:21:06 EST

Just 24 hours in, the buggy, first ever daily newspaper for the iPad blurs lines between print and digital, advertising and editorial, "wow" and "eww" with a featured video.

8-bit Invite to the Crappy Code Games

02 Feb 2011 11:53:33 EST

Pungent promotion just let loose by fast growing start-up targets SQL programmers in the U.K.

Apple and News Corp's "The Daily" Hits the iPad for ...

02 Feb 2011 10:07:54 EST

The media world has been impatiently waiting for Apple's iPad daily newspaper, built as a collaboration between Steve Jobs' company and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. for months. It was first teased for a January launch--which Steve Jobs was slated to attend--then delayed. Today, it's live. The Daily will cost $0.99 per week, or at a small discount for $40 per year, and is promising to include over 100 pages of original news in each issue. The newspaper is billed automatically, to customers iTunes accounts, on a weekly or annual basis.At its launch News Corp.'s owner Rupert Murdoch was careful to note Steve Jobs and Apple's role in its development, saying "I'd like to thank the amazing steve jobs the man who has singlehandeldly changed the world of media. We're honored Apple has put its support behind this venture, and Steve has been a champion of The Daily from day one." Then Murdoch noted that the digital revolution really has caught the traditional newspaper ...

Change Generation: Mike Del Ponte and Sparkseed Help ...

26 Jan 2011 05:00:00 EST

Mike Del Ponte is the founder of Sparkseed. Del Ponte had been traveling the world, involved in various activist and charitable projects. As he saw social entrepreneurship take off, he decided to create Sparkseed, "We identify the most promising social entrepreneurs, we help them launch their ventures, connect with capital, and scale their impact."

Syyn Labs' Chief East Coast Geek Builds Scrappy Rube ...

25 Jan 2011 19:58:24 EST

Last fall, when most of Syyn Labs was hunkered down in its Los Angeles warehouse building a Rube Goldberg machine for the Google Science Fair, Heather Knight was building one to kick off PopTech, the brainy and fun annual conference in Camden, Maine. PopTech's video on the making of Knight's creation just came out, and it's a must-see.Director Beth Cohen, PopTech's director of media production, and her crew follow Knight, the only Syyn regular based on the East Coast, as she and two friends (Syyn volunteers Chris Becker and Marek Michalowski) scour antiques and collectibles shops for everyday objects, such as a softball, a shopping cart and a rocking chair. Over four days, they assembled a series of whimsical and physical chain reactions that evoke the OK Go machine that Knight contributed to (a row of books tumbles just as dominoes did in that earlier piece). But what's particularly instructive is seeing the wondrous contraption stop. It happens more than once. The conference ...

The JACO Robotic Arm Can Scratch Your Back, Hand Out Drinks

23 Jan 2011 20:48:25 EST

Would you pay $35,000 for a robotic arm that can scratch your back? It sounds like a silly investment, but makes sense for people who don't have use of their arms due to a spinal cord injury or degenerative disease. That's what Kinova, a Montreal-based startup, is banking on with its JACO robotic arm. Fast Company had a chance to check out the robot in action last week at Kaiser Permanente's Garfield Innovation Center. The joystick-powered JACO robot can be installed on any power wheelchair. The wheelchair's battery powers the bot, which consumes less energy than a light bulb. The wheelchair was released last summer, and so far, Kinova has found the most success in the Netherlands, where the government fully reimburses users for the cost. Check out the JACO bot below. Ariel Schwartz can be reached on Twitter or by email.

Up Close With Berkeley Bionics' eLEGS: An Exoskeleton ...

21 Jan 2011 20:49:49 EST

When Berkeley Bionics first unveiled eLEGS, an artificially-intelligent bionic exoskeleton that helps paraplegics to walk, it created a stir throughout the tech community. Everyone wondered: Could this be the big breakthrough that gets wheelchair users back onto their feet? After witnessing the eLEGS in action this week at Kaiser Permanente's Garfield Innovation Center, we're hopeful that the answer is yes.ELEGS was revealed to the public last October, but Berkeley Bionics has been working on exoskeletons for the past five years. Originally, the company was focused on military uses, but now Berkeley has ambitions to bring eLEGS into the homes of paraplegics everywhere.The lithium-ion battery-powered device is fairly simple to use--wearers can secure the eLEGS' Velcro straps and clips to themselves in a matter of minutes once they have had a little practice. The device's gesture-powered interface senses where users intend to go and acts accordingly.Practiced users can walk as fast ...

Nintendo 3DS: The Agony and the Ecstasy

20 Jan 2011 11:58:54 EST

As a fun gaming machine Nintendo 3DS gets so many things right, but as the latest piece of tech aimed at gadget geeks it falls short.

Change Generation: Brian Chesky and Airbnb.com Open Your ...

19 Jan 2011 05:00:00 EST

Brian Chesky packed up and moved to San Francisco, and found no open hotel rooms due to a convention. Thus, the idea for Airbnb.com was born. Anyone can be a Bed and Breakfast, renting rooms online. And Chesky is not only the cofounder and CEO, he is a client, "Every 3 to 5 nights I stay with a different family in San Francisco."

Kraft Store Kiosk Scans Your Face Then Knows What to ...

14 Jan 2011 17:58:28 EST

Dinner planning: It's the bane of every five o'clock shopper who can't bear to serve up frozen pizza one more night. Now, with the help of some spooky video analytics, Intel and Kraft aim to help harried shoppers come up with better--or at least different--solutions, right in their grocery aisles. Debuting at this week's 2011 National Retail Federation show (along with an amazing checkout counter of the future from Adidas), The "Meal Planning Solution," part of Intel's "Connected Store," is a sort of kiosk you might find in an upscale suburban market, catering to families desperate to find something the kids will eat.The average shopper, says Kraft's VP of retail experience, Don King, has a paltry 10 recipes in his or her average meal-time rotation: Spaghetti, pizza, hamburgers, chicken, etc. Kraft's goal is to help them expand that repertoire using, of course, Kraft products. Plus, 70% of them enter the store without a clue as to what to serve that night for dinner. So, when he ...

Jack Dorsey of Twitter and Square

13 Jan 2011 10:58:13 EST

"We have everyone you can imagine against us," says Jack Dorsey, the CEO of mobile credit card pay startup Square and cofounder of Twitter. But he is not cowed by fact that his startup is competing against banks with far more money to spend on pushing their products to market. Because by allowing design and engineering to lead his strategic decisions, Dorsey knows that he can out-innovate everyone else. Square sees receipts not as something to be thrown away, for example, but as a "publishing medium." Instead of making credit card transactions opaque, Square delivers a rich set of analytics to the seller. And in this video you'll see that where many others saw useless data, Dorsey saw opportunity. This interview is part of a series about the paths that innovators took to get where they are today. See more Innovation Agents.Video produced by Amanda Holt of Shatterbox.