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Archive for the ‘business’ category: Page 308

Jan 9, 2014

Intel Aims For Post-Smartphone Era With SD Card-Sized Computer

Posted by in categories: business, computing, human trajectories, innovation

Written By: — Singularity Hub

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Up to now, wearable computing has been a niche market dominated, but for Google Glass, by startups. Yet, with the tiny size and low cost of sensors and chips, wearable computing could be a huge market in which smart sensors in everything from baby diapers to workout gear connect to users’ smartphones, giving them constant insight into how things formerly hidden are operating.

It may sound like yet another techno-topian promise, and before the 2014 Consumer Electronics Show it might have been. But at the annual Las Vegas tech blowout earlier this month, Intel, one of the weightiest firms in the tech industry, endorsed wearable computing with the launch of a new chip designed for it.

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Jan 9, 2014

The Bitcoin-Mining Arms Race Heats Up

Posted by in categories: bitcoin, business, computing, economics, hardware


Behind this week’s coverJoel Flickinger’s two-bedroom home in the hills above Oakland, Calif., hums with custom-built computing gear. Just inside the front door, in a room anyone else might use as a den, he’s placed a desk next to a fireplace that supports a massive monitor, with cables snaking right and left toward two computers, each about the size of a case of beer. Flickinger has spent more than $20,000 on these rigs and on a slower model that runs from the basement. They operate continuously, cranking out enough heat to warm the house and racking up $400 a month in electric bills. There isn’t much by way of décor, other than handwritten inspirational Post-it notes:

“I make money easily,” one reads. “Money flows to me.” “I am a money magnet.”

Flickinger, 37, a software engineer and IT consultant by trade, doesn’t leave the house much these days. He’s a full-time Bitcoin miner.

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Jan 9, 2014

We Do Not Need Flying Delivery Drones, Just Smarter Ground Robots

Posted by in categories: business, complex systems

By John O’Donnell — IEEE Spectrum

While the idea of an Amazon Prime Air drone dropping onto my doorstep and delivering my latest purchase might seem fun and cool, the reality is it simply may not be needed.

The only reason delivery trucks—such as the large brown trucks we see everywhere—only deliver to me around 4 p.m. each day is simply the time taken for one driver to take each parcel to an address. I call this one at a time parcel delivery. It’s the same story for the USPS service. Each day our excellent delivery guy comes to our neighborhood and then spends a long time going door to door.

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Jan 4, 2014

Zynga Links Up With BitPay For A Bitcoin Payment Test In FarmVille 2, CityVille And Other Web Games

Posted by in categories: bitcoin, business

by — Tech Crunch

Gaming giant Zynga has started to accept the cryptocurrency as a payment option for those buying tokens for virtual goods on the web versions of FarmVille 2, CastleVille, ChefVille, CoasterVille, Hidden Chronicles, Hidden Shadows and CityVille. It makes Zynga the first major gaming company to accept Bitcoin.

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Jan 3, 2014

Hey, Elon and Sergey, did you see these SpaceGlasses?

Posted by in categories: 3D printing, augmented reality, business, engineering, futurism, human trajectories

By 3D Printing Industry

http://youtu.be/LuMv29nKo2k

Two-thousand-and-fourteen is already looking like a great year for 3D creativity. Assembled 3D printers are coming out priced at under 500 euros, new low-cost high-quality 3D scanners are launching and, if that weren’t enough, the first SpaceGlasses are going to be delivered in July.

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Jan 2, 2014

World’s biggest pasta maker wants restaurants to 3D print your food — with their cartridges

Posted by in categories: 3D printing, business

By — Geek

pasta head

3D printing is attractive to a lot of different people for a lot of different reasons, but in general its supporters talk about the economic and efficiency benefits; it can build things faster and easier than competing methods, bring down manufacturing costs and remove the need for large amounts of international shipping. That’s usually what you hear in defense of 3D printing — but now, Italian food corporation Barilla is looking to 3D print their art.

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Jan 1, 2014

Apple Inc, Google Look to Robots for the Future

Posted by in categories: business, robotics/AI

Michele WesselGuardian Liberty Voice

robot

Apple Inc. and Google have invested heavily in robots over the past year, giving the impression that the tech giants see robotic technology as the way of the future.

Apple Inc. has been reported to be investing a significant portion of its $10.5 billion in capital expenditures for 2014 into a variety of robots. This response is likely as a result of a leveling off in sales of their devices as other companies like Samsung infringe upon their territory in the world of electronics innovation.

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Dec 30, 2013

Overmanagement

Posted by in categories: automation, big data, biotech/medical, bitcoin, business, complex systems, cosmology, defense, economics, education, energy, engineering, ethics, existential risks, futurism, geopolitics, government, information science, life extension, nanotechnology, neuroscience, physics, robotics/AI, science, scientific freedom, security, singularity, transparency

Overmanagement by Mr. Andres Agostini

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This is an excerpt from the conclusion section o, “…Overmanagement…,” that discusses some management strategies. To read the entire piece, just click the link at the end of article:

BEGINNING OF EXCERPT.

Question: What other contemporary issues particularly concern you? Do you find signs of
hope or resistance around these issues that, perhaps, you finding heartening?

Continue reading “Overmanagement” »

Dec 28, 2013

The U.S.‘s 5 Most Bitcoin-Friendly Cities

Posted by in categories: bitcoin, business

Dec 28, 2013

Bitcoin miners do not have to register as money transfer services: ruling

Posted by in categories: bitcoin, business, government

Will Conley — Slash Gear

Bitcoin miner Milly Bitcoin has done a little citizen letter-writing, and the results should make virtual currency miners breathe a sigh of relief. Milly Bitcoin’s mining company Atlantic City Bitcoin last June wrote to the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) requesting an official administrative ruling on whether ACB must register as a money transfer service. FinCEN has now replied, and the answer is no.

ACB requested the ruling because there has been much confusion as to whether mining — and spending the proceeds — constituted a money transfer service. This may seem a ridiculous question to virtual currency aficionados, but the confusion arose because some businesses dealing in virtual currencies do indeed operate as money transfer services. Mining and spending virtual currency, however, is not a transfer service. Such was the ruling by FinCEN.

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