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Why Snapchat Spectacles failed http://ift.tt/2gLtSii How come only 0.08% of Snapchat’s users bought its camera sunglasses? Hundreds of thousands of pairs of Spectacles sit rotting in warehouses after the company bungled the launch. Initial hype and lines for its roving, limited time only Snapbot vending machines led Snap to overestimate demand but underdeliver on quality and content. Massive piles of assembled and unassembled video-recording sunglasses sit unsold, contributing to Snap’s enormous costs and losses, says The Information. Internal Snap data shows less than 50 percent of buyers kept using Spectacles a month after purchase, Business Insider’s Alex Heath reports. A “sizeable” percentage stopped after just a week, with a source calling the retention rate “shockingly low”. What was the problem? Snap generated huge hype for Spectacles, but then waited 5 months to openly sell them. Once people actually tried Spectacles, few kept wearing them, and word of mouth about their disuse spread. Snap never got visionary video markers onboard. And as Snapchat’s popularity waned in the face of competitors, the fact that Spectacles only interfaced with its app rather than a phone’s camera roll became a burden. Snap did somethings right with Spectacles. The fashion photo spread announcement felt classy and surprising despite clues and photos of CEO Evan Spiegel trickling out ahead. The initial launch was a marketing extravaganza, with multi-hour lines of cool kids waiting on the Venice Beach boardwalk to buy them. And the Snapbots being dropped in random locations was exciting and made people feel special if they got ahold of them. But once people put them on their face, the excitement died off. Karl Lagerfeld’s photo of Snap CEO Evan Spiegel donning Spectacles for their September 2016 reveal Here’s a breakdown of the major flaws that emerged with Spectacles in the year since their debut, with a focus on the stilted launch strategy: Botched Roll OutSnap first announced Spectacles with some Karl Lagerfeld photos of Spiegel wearing them on September 24th 2016. Hype was high despite the beachey color options that turned some people off. It took until November 10th for the first Snapbot vending machines to launch. While the hype had cooled slightly, demand was huge as people wanted to be the first on the block with Spectacles, and lines stretched down streets. But Snap whether it was because Snap wanted to milk the Snapbot promotion, couldn’t tell if Spectacles should be exclusive or widely available, or it had supply chain problems, it took until February 20th for Snap to start openly selling Specs online. Waiting five months after the initial announcement was an eternity in the fast-moving teenage fad cycle. They weren’t cool by the time they were buyable. Everyone had already seen the sunglasses and circular video all over the Internet, most owners had long since stopped using them, the holiday season had passed, and few people wanted to buy so late. It took until June, 8 months after their debut, for Spectacles to become available in Europe. If Snap had instead made it’s announcement, quickly outfitted some lucky normal users and celebrities with Spectacles, then launched a giant Black Friday sale at the peak of its hype, all those people fascinated with the gadget might have bought immediately. Everyone would have paid before word got out that people weren’t going to wear camera glasses all that much. Alternatively, Snap could have gone the path of exclusivity lit by its fashion-focused debut. Rather than ever selling Specs openly, it could have gotten them into runway shows and magazines while sticking with the limited-edition Snapbots. Then after a few months it could have ceased all sales, turned existing pairs into fought-over collector’s items, and saved the mainstream rollout for an eventual v2 launch. Unfortunately, Snap seems to have got stuck between these exclusive and mass-retail strategies. Where Were The Spectacles Influencers? – To drive demand, Snap needed to demonstrate all the creative things you could do with Spectacles, and the cool people who wore them. Yet at the time, it still had a very hands-off approach to dealing with traditional celebrities and web influencers. Snap didn’t make outfitting creators with Specs and training them to use the camera glasses a priority. Instead of top Snappers constantly posting circular videos and encouraging fans to do the same, Snap effectively left the gadget out to dry. Snap let random Spectacles buyers, often over-enthusiastic social media amateurs, define the image of the product, similar to how Google’s core mistake was allowing geeky developers to become the face of Glass. 
TechCrunch’s video host Tito Hamze became a de facto face of Spectacles as there were so few influencers using them Few Examples Of Great Content – Stemming from Snap’s failure to foster a Spectacles creator scene, it did a terrible job of showing off how Spectacles could be used beyond the initial commercial. Neither Snap’s in-house team or independent social stars were recruited to make videos exposing the creative opportunities of the device. It did little through event marketing or in-app promotion to encourage Spectacle content creation. Karen X. Cheng was perhaps the only Spectacles influencer lighting the path, with her first-person mirror dancing video and Spectacles-on-babies ad she helped Brawny make. But Snap should have ensured the Internet was flooded with these videos proving what you can’t do with your phone’s camera, and why you should buy Spectacles.
People Are Still Freaked Out By Camera Glasses – Google Glass tainted the market with its “not sure if you’re recording me” design. Even though Snap put more obvious recording signal lights on Spectacles, people would still question you about whether they were on camera. That not only made people uncomfortable being around Spectacles, but made you feel like a bit of a creep just wearing them even if you never tapped the shutter button. Limited Content Portability – When Spectacles debuted, Snapchat clone Instagram Stories had only just launched. But soon reaching over 250 million daily users, Instagram Stories grew bigger than Snapchat’s whole app that now has 173 million. Snap didn’t have the only Stories in town, and lots of people began cross-posting between the two apps. But Spectacles made that difficult. Specs shoot in a proprietary circular video format. On Snapchat, you see the content full screen no matter what orientation you hold your phone in. But when exported, those circular videos get inset within a white square in a locked orientation. That makes them look obviously ported from Snapchat rather than made for these other channels, especially inside a rectangular Instagram Story. Spectacles wouldn’t connect to your phone’s camera roll, only to Snapchat, making exporting a chore. And they didn’t take photos, just videos.
Stuck In The Fuzzy Sun – The shaded lenses in Spectacles made them tough to wear indoors or at night. That disqualified a lot of the parties, concerts, meals, and hang-outs people like to Snap. Beyond music festivals, beaches, back yards, and parks, there fewer opportunities to use them then buyers may have expected. I saw one guy who had popped the lenses out so he could wear them anywhere, but that made their look stick out even more. Snap never struck any official partnerships with companies offering non-shaded or prescription lenses, though some providers of lens replacements cropped up. That led some people with vision problems or who stay out of the sun to write-off the product entirely. 
Only unofficial third-parties made clear or prescription replacement lens for Spectacles. Snap didn’t. Usability Problems Galore – Having to pair Spectacles with Snapchat instead of the standard Bluetooth menu was annoying. Data transfers from the glasses to the phone took forever and would get easily interrupted. They only recorded videos in 720p, not 1080. Videos were clumsily first sent in low-resolution until a higher-res version could be delivered. Spectacles drain your phone battery super fast. The bulky and oddly shaped triangular prism case was tough to fit in bags and impossible to get in your pocket. The battery and recording lights were confusing. Sometimes Spectacles would require a “hold the shutter button for 55-seconds” reset that wasn’t clearly explained on any of Snap’s support pages. And finally, our hands are already an incredibly agile, auto-stabilized, selfie-able conveyance for a camera. For a v1 product, Spectacles were a valiant effort. But it was the stuttered roll out, lack of promotional support, and rising competition combined with their hardware problems the doomed Spectacles. Hopefully v2 will correct these missteps. Snap already has a patent for an augmented reality version, and it’s shelved other product ideas like a drone. If Snap wants to truly live up to its name as a camera company, it either needs to nail a single gadget you want to use multiple times per week forever, or release an array of short-lived but fun camera toys. Either way, it must seize on the hype it creates rather than letting it fade, and put the work in to foster an ecosystem of creators to pioneer videography styles everyone else can try. Building a trend-setting camera isn’t just about the tech you put into it, but encouraging the content that comes out. Digital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com October 28, 2017 at 02:55PM
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Small UFO Obliterated By Oklahoma City's Chartered Plane http://ift.tt/2zMhA0S Following their loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves Friday night, the Oklahoma City Thunder flew from Minneapolis to Chicago for the second leg of a back-to-back. En route, their team plane seems to have wiped out a very tiny UFO:
A Thunder team official told ESPN the flight was “a little rough, but not extreme or out of the ordinary.” ABC’s Chicago affiliate says Delta chalked the dent up to a bird strike (but where are the feathers???) I have a terrible feeling it was Marvin the Martian, but thankfully Thunder center Steven Adams has recruited our brightest science minds to handle the case: Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com October 28, 2017 at 02:48PM
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Nintendo’s Reggie Fils-Aimé on the evolution of Super Mario Odyssey http://ift.tt/2hjkK5a From the outside, at least, Nintendo is a study in contradictions, at once devoted to the constant development of new gaming experiences, while remaining deferential and staunchly loyal to its past. Fittingly, the gaming giant’s American president Reggie Fils-Aimé references its longtime executives and creative forces with great reverence, quoting predecessors several times over the course of our half-hour-long conversation ahead of the launch of Super Mario Odyssey. The game has been out for a day now, and the results from the gaming press have been everything the company could have dreamt of. In a review posted on Thursday, Devin called it an “embarrassment of riches,” echoing its currently near perfect 97 on Metacritic. The tent-pole title was a bit of a glaring omission when it launched in March, a fact due in part to Nintendo’s decision to get it just right. “We were fortunate that Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild was far along in its development,” explains Fils-Aimé. It could be that anchor title from a day-one launch perspective. And then to have Super Mario Odyssey as the key game going into the holiday. It was, on one hand, quite well planned. But the other piece is that it always comes down to the development schedule.” The executive pauses to paraphrase a quote from Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, which goes, “A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever.” By all accounts, Mario Odyssey certainly isn’t the latter. And while Nintendo may have gotten some pushback from the press for its decision to delay the product, a Zelda-fueled launch gave the company exactly the boost it needed, coming off the prolonged stumble of the Wii U. And the result is in the game play.
Odyssey is far and away the richest Mario experience, one that works to balance the influence of old and new, playing on Nintendo’s strength of reinventing its most popular properties time and again console after console, and decade after decade. More so than any of Nintendo’s other franchise stars, Mario has worn a lot of different proverbial hats. And this time he’s got an actual new one in the form of Cappy, a sentient hat that possesses whatever you toss it on. Fils-Aimé says the feature, which takes advantage of the Switch’s gesture control, has been a central game dynamic since the game’s earliest stages. It’s a new feature that differentiates the game while remaining true to what it means to be a Mario game. “In its essence, it’s about progressing forward to be the hero and save the Princess,” explains Fils-Aimé. “That is a consistent element, but how it all comes together is driven by the game developer, the producer. Certainly there are conversations that are had with Mr. Miyamoto. When you look at a game like Super Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Odyssey, they’re very different types of experience, and yet the common thread it moving forward in this platform-like experience.” But while products like the NES and SNES Classic are indeed simple reheats of old glories (and wildly successful ones at that), Odyssey’s successes lie in offering something new. Fils-Aimé quotes the late Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata’s “we do not run from risk, we run to it,” adding, “We are a company that always takes chances. We are fortunate in that often times those chances and risks win in the marketplace, but sometimes they don’t. But at its heart, we believe in differentiated experiences.” Digital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com October 28, 2017 at 02:47PM
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Gillmor Gang: Hype Cycle http://ift.tt/2zMIFRn The Gillmor Gang — Frank Radice, Keith Teare, Denis Pombriant, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Sunday, October 15, 2017. G3: It’s Time — Francine Hardaway, Mary Hodder, Kristie Wells, and Tina Chase Gillmor welcome Tina Hui. Recorded live Friday, October 20, 2017. @stevegillmor, @fradice, @kteare, @DenisPombriant Produced and directed by Tina Chase Gillmor @tinagillmor G3: It’s Time Digital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com October 28, 2017 at 02:15PM
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Rumors That Facebook Is Secretly Recording You Refuse to Die http://ift.tt/2yTG7UU Is Mark Zuckerberg spying on you? Oh, yes, absolutely. Is he secretly recording your voice like, all the time? Probably not. Per the BBC, Facebook was once again compelled to shoot down rumors it is secretly hijacking computer and mobile device mics to covertly record conversations after Reply All presenter PJ Vogt raised the issue during a recent podcast. After people who called in to the show related a number of eerie anecdotes—mostly regarding product ads showing up for items that were allegedly only brought up in verbal conversation—Facebook advertising V.P. Rob Goldman responded on Twitter. Advertisement “I run ads product at Facebook,” Goldman said. “We don’t—and have never—used your microphone for ads. Just not true.”
The reasons behind the rumors are understandable—Facebook’s global domination of social media and rights to everything users put into it tend to conjure ominous implications in the popular mind. Many if not most of those worries are justified. But the reasons to be skeptical of this particular rumor are largely practical, rather than divinations of Facebook’s true intentions. Advertisement For one, Facebook is necessarily tethered by the reality that users can always choose to opt out, and any revelation that it was activating users’ recording devices without explicit opt-in permission and sharing that information with the highest bidder could easily qualify as one of the largest corporate scandals of all time. The legal implications would be massive and likely criminal. As powerful as Facebook is, there’s no reason for it to risk alienating so many users by flexing its muscle so nefariously. Second, Facebook does have some audio recognition features, such as an opt-in “Identify TV and Music” feature that records snippets of sound to identify what users are watching. Even if you don’t believe Facebook when it says these and other features only activate when users tell them to and are never used for advertising, recent updates suggest the company’s years-old voice recognition research program just isn’t to the stage where it could spy on millions of users simultaneously. In May, Messenger product chief Stan Chudnovsky told Recode that Facebook has only completed the initial steps of voice recognition—determining vocal triggers for activating the software—but had not yet mastered translating verbal inputs into machine-comprehensible text or translating that machine-comprehensible text into a coherent automated response. Advertisement Chudnovsky was referring to the complicated task of building a Facebook AI assistant like Amazon’s Alexa or Apple’s Siri, but many of the underlying technical principles would work similarly to Facebook’s theoretical spyware. “You are still in the world of multiplying probabilities, which means that the outcome of that exercise is actually lower than you’d like it to be,” Chudnovsky told Recode. “... Once we nail those things then we can go into voice. But until we nail that we don’t want to go into a world where we teach people what we cannot do well.” Recording everything users say for advertising purposes may not be worth the effort until that technology is more refined. Handling large chunks of data requires filtering out noise, and the percentage of useful data in any conversation one might be having at any time could be very low. But Facebook can already see all the text users put into it, which is already in a format it can easily analyze and is working to understand on an even more in-depth level. Advertisement Third, there’s no reason to suspect Facebook is secretly activating microphones and transmitting data to itself because no security researchers have ever detected that kind of behavior. None of this means that in the future, Facebook will not lure users into sharing more and more of the world around them—for example, by perfecting their AI assistant to work with voice commands and then subtly pushing users towards being comfortable with it recording more and more of their day-to-day lives. They accomplished the same feat with profile information, status updates, messaging, and location tracking, so it’s probably inevitable the company will try to find a way to normalize recording your voice all the time too. But in the meantime, possible explanations for Facebook’s seemingly creepy ad placement include things like predictive data analytics, spying on users and their friends’ statuses and messages, and random coincidence. If you’re unconvinced, you can just turn off Facebook’s access to your phone’s microphone. If that doesn’t reassure you, migrating as much of your day-to-day internet use away from the Facebook mass surveillance programs we already know about would probably be a better use of your time than fretting about Facebook mass surveillance programs that only might exist. Advertisement We’ve reached out to Facebook for comment and will update this post if we hear back. [BBC] Digital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com October 28, 2017 at 02:06PM
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Carry Away This Portable Crock-Pot for $32 http://ift.tt/2ySNN7t
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With a locking lid, this 6-quart Crock-Pot is ultra-portable and can serve up to 7 people, all for $32. You can even program it start cooking while you’re away at work so you can come home to a warm meal. It’s part of Amazon’s Gold Box deals today which means, although it’s a slow cooker, this deal will go fast.
$32
Gizmodo Media Group may get a commission Even though there are lots of recipes available for slow cookers (aka crock pots), there are… Read moreDigital Trends via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com October 28, 2017 at 02:06PM
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Facebook VP of ads promises the company is not using your mic to spy on you http://ift.tt/2zNypIv Spend enough time on the internet and you’ll eventually see ads targeted specifically to you. Facebook is no different. Watch a trailer for Justice League and you’ll start seeing ads for comic books or other superhero movies. Many of you likely didn’t realize it was happening for some time after it started. It’s a system we’ve basically accepted as part of our daily lives, but some people are now theorizing that Facebook might be using a computer’s microphone to mine your conversations for ads. The BBC reports that PJ Vogt, who presents a tech podcast called Reply All, sent out a tweet calling for people’s stories regarding why they believe Facebook may be listening in on their conversations for the purposes of ad targeting. Rob Goldman, Facebook’s VP of ads, chimed in to reassure people that Facebook does not use people’s mics as a way of spying on them.
Despite Goldman’s comments, Vogt got hundreds of replies to his tweet.
Despite the many responses that Vogt received, there isn’t much, if any, concrete proof that Facebook uses people’s mics to spy on them. As for why Vogt’s Tweet got so much attention, one explanation is that it is simply a matter of coincidence. The ads might have been there the entire time and people simply didn’t notice them at first. Facebook isn’t the only company to come under fire for this issue. Many people believe that smartphones are being used by companies as a means of collecting information on consumers. Editor's Recommendations
Digital Trends via Digital Trends http://ift.tt/2p4eJdC October 28, 2017 at 02:02PM
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New seed funds pursue AI, hard tech and the Midwest http://ift.tt/2yVuCdg 
Stories about seed funding often contain sappy metaphors about planting seedlings and nurturing them to maturity. In reality, it’s a brutally Darwinian business: most companies fail, successful ones get diluted and exits commonly take a decade or more. That said, seed also has the highest potential returns of any investment stage. Unlike most VCs, seed and angel investors can do a lot of deals with a few million dollars. And no one complains it’s boring. So far this year, the relative turn-offs of seed-stage investing seem to be outweighing the draws. Fewer North American seed funds launched in 2017 compared to year-ago levels, according to an analysis of Crunchbase data. Total investment and round counts are also down sharply over the past 12 months from the year-ago period for seed and angel deals, even as late-stage investment is on the rise. So who are the brave souls venturing out with first-time seed funds? Crunchbase News culled through this year’s new fund data to unearth more than 30 interesting new U.S. and Canada-based funds. We identified some areas particularly in vogue with seed-stage newcomers, most of whom share a sense that the window for backing early movers in select areas will only be open a short time. Some of the fashionable seed investment sectors should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the buzz around artificial intelligence and virtual reality. Other trends were less predictable, including rising funding for some geographies long considered underserved by venture and angel investors. Here are some trends we observed. Invest in the MidwestThere’s nothing new about venture and angel investors talking up the merits of the Great Lakes region, given the rich technical talent and less-rich startup valuations that can be found there. However, there’s a difference between talk and action. What we’re seeing recently is new Midwest-based seed firms actually raising capital in the area, not just saying nice things about founders there. So far this year, Crunchbase identified several Chicago-based seed funds. Purple Arch Ventures backs startups affiliated with alumni of Northwestern University. Germin8 Ventures, as the name would imply, invests in agtech. Nameless Ventures, meanwhile, is seeking accredited investors who want to invest in Chicago-area startups. It’d be incorrect to classify interest in Chicago as solely a 2017 phenomenon, as it’s something that’s been percolating for the past few years. Crunchbase detailed at least 10 Chicago-based seed investors that have cropped up in the past year or two. Their geographic focus areas vary, with several concentrating on the Chicago area, others on the Midwest and still others looking at deals nationwide. Some of the fashionable seed investment sectors should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the buzz around artificial intelligence and virtual reality.
Other Midwest-focused funds founded this year include Grand Ventures, a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based fund that invests in Midwestern technology startups, and Loup Ventures, a tech seed investor with offices in Minneapolis and New York. “Being in Minneapolis and working to establish our network among other VCs, there’s no question that there’s a lot of excitement about the Midwest,” Andrew Murphy, a partner at Loup, told Crunchbase News. Compared to coastal tech hubs, the Midwest “is underinvested, prices are better, and the opportunities are fewer in volume but no different or better in quality.” Hearty appetite for hard techStart cheap and build fast has long been a popular mantra for seed-stage startups and their investors. Lately, however, there seems to be a pendulum swing back to more seed investment in so-called hard tech, targeting companies working on complex technical problems with lengthy development time horizons. Probably the poster child for this approach is MIT’s The Engine, which closed a $200 million debut fund in September. The fund’s stated mission is to help founders develop, commercialize and scale scientific discoveries in “tough technologies,” with a focus on Boston-area startups. So far it’s backed startups working on satellite communications, a digital approach to sensing smells and technology to deliver drugs more effectively to the GI tract. Hard tech isn’t something that seed and angels have exactly shied away from in the past. Life sciences startups, which are well-known for their long development cycles, have traditionally snagged a good-sized share of seed-stage dollars. Hardware, medical devices, space tech and other areas known for long exit timelines have also been popular with the angel crowd. Yet a rising profile for hard tech may indicate investors’ interest diminishing in quick-to-market, consumer-facing startups that proliferated amid the rise of the app economy. It’s a brutally Darwinian business: most companies fail, successful ones get diluted and exits commonly take a decade or more.
That perspective is echoed by Jason Cahill, managing director at McCune Capital Management, a New York-based seed and early-stage tech investor that launched this year “I sense we’re nearing a saturation point when it comes to startups with mass consumer appeal, like social sharing apps, ride sharing, as well as fintech and adtech,” Cahill told Crunchbase News. “Yet in industries such as transportation, clean-tech, waste collection, and even publishing, I’m extremely excited by what I’m seeing and by the volume of opportunities.” The Engine and McCune are two out of several seed investors that have raised a first-time fund in the past year. We put together a list of several here. AI is under-hypedSeed investors don’t seem to think AI is over-hyped. A lot of new seed funds list artificial intelligence as a core focus area. We counted at least a half-dozen North American ones this year. There are probably more. “There’s definitely a timing element,” Loup’s Murphy says of AI investing. For Loup’s partners, the decision to start a seed fund now stemmed in large part from founders following Apple and other large-cap technology companies in their prior gig as analysts at Piper Jaffray. The big tech companies have been investing heavily in AI (as well as robotics and VR), and it’s reasonable to expect them to continue along these lines. That’s a sign of confidence in the sector and also means there are plenty of deep-pocketed acquirers. Yet while seed investors are excited about the potential of artificial intelligence, they’re also skeptical about a lot of the self-described AI startups out seeking funding. Founders, after all, have caught on that AI is an area that attracts more funding, says Eric Bahn, founding partner at Hustle Fund, a seed investor launched this year to focus on fast-moving, very early-stage startups. That’s led a number of companies to “attempt to backfill some sort of AI story, when they are actually not an AI company.” Fertile soil?It remains to be seen, of course, whether the currently sprouting crop of Midwestern, AI-enabled, hard technology startups will bear fruit for investors. As previously noted, most seedlings don’t make it. However, the ones that do could bring some game-changing technologies to the forefront, not just another app to make your shopping more convenient. Featured Image: Li-Anne DiasDigital Trends via TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com October 28, 2017 at 01:06PM
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CAPTCHAs may be a thing of the past, thanks to new machine learning research http://ift.tt/2yTp02X CAPTCHA is an acronym for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart. The term was coined in 2003, when the use of automated bots was becoming commonplace, and it refers to those annoying squiggly distorted letters that you have to type in when creating an online account. Although some companies have found ways around them, CAPTCHAs are still ubiquitous online. Researchers at the AI company Vicarious may have just made CAPTCHAs obsolete, however, by creating a machine-learning algorithm that mimics the human brain. To simulate the human capacity for what is often described as “common sense,” the scientists built a computer vision model dubbed the Recursive Cortical Network. “For common sense to be effective it needs to be amenable to answer a variety of hypotheticals — a faculty that we call imagination,” they noted in a post at their blog. The ability to decipher CAPTCHAs has become something of a benchmark for artificial intelligence research. The new Vicarious model, published in the journal Science, cracks the fundamentals of the CATCHPA code by parsing the text using techniques that are derived from human reasoning. We can easily recognize the letter A for example, even if it’s partly obscured or turned upside down. As Dileep George, the co-founder of the company explained to NPR, the RCN takes far less training and repetition to learn to recognize characters by building its own version of a neural network. “So if you expose it to As and Bs and different characters, it will build its own internal model of what those characters are supposed to look like,” he said. “So it would say, these are the contours of the letter, this is the interior of the letter, this is the background, etc.” These various features get put into groups, creating a hierarchal “tree” of related features. After several passes, the data is given a score for evaluation. CAPTCHAs can be identified with a high degree of accuracy. The RCN was able to crack the BotDetect system with 57 percent accuracy with far less training than conventional “deep learning” algorithms, which rely more on brute force and require tens of thousands of images before they can understand CAPTCHAs with any degree of accuracy. Solving CATCHPAs is not the goal of the research, but it provides insight into how our brains work and how computers can replicate it, NYU’s Brenden Lake told Axios. “It’s an application that not everybody needs,” he said. “Whereas object recognition is something that our minds do every second of every day.” “Biology has put a scaffolding in our brain that is suitable for working with this world. It makes the brain learn quickly,” George said. “So we copy those insights from nature and put it in our model. Similar things can be done in neural networks.” Editor's Recommendations
Digital Trends via Digital Trends http://ift.tt/2p4eJdC October 28, 2017 at 01:05PM
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Best new shows and movies to stream: ‘Stranger Things’ returns, ‘Arrival,’ more http://ift.tt/2zfljYE Online streaming is bigger than ever, and with so many streaming services adding new shows and movies every week, it can be nearly impossible to sort through the good and the bad. If you need something to watch and don’t want to wade through the digital muck that washes up on the internet’s shores, follow our picks below for the best new shows and movies to stream on Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Amazon, and other services. On the list this week: Stranger Things returns for a darker season, Tarantino returns to the Wild West, and more. ‘Stranger Things’ season 2The first season of Stranger Things was a surprising juggernaut, a sci-fi/horror adventure awash in ’80s nostalgia that took the internet by storm. A well-crafted show with likable characters and an intriguing premise, Stranger Things leaned heavily (some might say too heavily) on the legacies of the films of Spielberg and his contemporaries. Season 2 moves the series in a new direction, expanding its scope and raising the stakes. Set a year after the events of season 1, Stranger Things returns to Hawkins, Indiana, where the characters are trying to move on with their lives after a creature called the Demogorgon rampaged through their town. Will Byers (Noah Schnapp), who spent much of the first season in a nightmarish dimension called the Upside Down, is plagued by his memories, and a horrific vision of a massive, shadowy creature. As Will and his friends deal with the challenges of growing up, a new threat emerges, and the people of Hawkins must band together. Watch now on: ‘The Hateful Eight’Although he has a reputation for flashy staging and violence, Quentin Tarantino has always been a master at slowly escalating tension. The quintessential Tarantino scene involves a group of people talking, for a long time, their conversation morphing as hints of danger appear on the horizon. The Hateful Eight takes this practice to extremes, trapping a collection of rogues in a room together, and watching as tensions slowly build up to a violent climax. Set after the Civil War, the film initially focuses on two bounty hunters, Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson) and John Ruth (Kurt Russell), as well as Russell’s prisoner, Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh). At the onset of a blizzard, they seek shelter at a stagecoach lodge, along with a collection of other characters including a former Confederate, a cowboy, and a hangman. It quickly becomes clear that everyone in the room has their own secrets, and their own prejudices, and the film masterfully teases out these personality conflicts before erupting in blood. Watch now on: ‘Arrival’Denis Villeneuve’s first stab at sci-fi — the second being the beautiful Blade Runner 2049 -- Arrival is an intelligent entry in the genre with a novel premise. Although it’s a tale of first contact with an alien species, Arrival begins with a mini-story: A collection of images chronicling the brief life of the protagonist’s daughter establishes that this is a movie as much about the human heart as interspecies conflict. The plot kicks off when alien ships appear in various places around the world; although they do not attack, the governments of the world are naturally uneasy. The United States military brings in linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams) and physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) to communicate with the creatures and find out why they have come to Earth. As Louise tries to translate the creatures’ strange, circular language, the various forces on Earth debate how to handle the situation. Arrival is a beautiful, thoughtful sci-fi film built around its strong concept and a moving performance by Adams. Watch now on: ‘Split’It might be a bit early to proclaim we are living in an M. Night Shyamalan renaissance, but Split — along with his 2015 horror film The Visit — shows that the director may have found his footing again. The film follows three friends: Casey (Anya Taylor Joy), Claire (Haley Lu Richardson), and Marcia (Jessica Sula). A man (James McAvoy) kidnaps them, locking them in an underground building. Kevin has dissociative personality disorder, shifting between 23 different personalities. As the girls try to escape, they learn that some of Kevin’s personalities believe a 24th is on the way, and that this personality, The Beast, may be the most dangerous of all. Although it doesn’t offer the most tasteful depiction of mental illness, Split is a tightly scripted thriller, with a gleefully zany performance from McAvoy. Watch now on: ‘Nosferatu’Need something creepy to watch the weekend before Halloween? There are plenty of great, modern horror films online, but if you prefer films older than the New Deal, you can’t go wrong with Nosferatu, F. W. Murnau’s unauthorized adaptation of Dracula. The silent film begins with Thomas Hutter (Gustav von Wangenheim) journeying to Transylvania to tend to some business with the mysterious Count Orlok (Max Schreck). Staying in Orlok’s castle, Hutter grows increasingly worried by Orlok’s eccentric behavior, while Hutter’s wife, Ellen (Greta Schröder), suffers haunting dreams. Being a silent film from the 1920s, Nosferatu may not have the jump scares some modern audiences crave, but its stark visuals and ominous atmosphere remain chilling. Watch now on: Editor's Recommendations
Digital Trends via Digital Trends http://ift.tt/2p4eJdC October 28, 2017 at 01:05PM |
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