Lifeboat Foundation

Circa 2015

Death is the one thing that’s guaranteed in today’s uncertain world, but now a new start-up called Humai thinks it might be able to get rid of that inconvenient problem for us too, by promising to transfer people’s consciousness into a new, artificial body.

If it sounds like science fiction, and that’s because it still is, with none of the technology required for Humai’s business plan currently up and running. But that’s not deterring the company’s CEO, Josh Bocanegra, who says his team will resurrect their first human within 30 years.

Continue reading “A New Start-Up Wants to Transfer Your Consciousness to an Artificial Body So You Can Live Forever” »

Barely a week goes by without reports of some new mega-hack that’s exposed huge amounts of sensitive information, from people’s credit card details and health records to companies’ valuable intellectual property. The threat posed by cyberattacks is forcing governments, militaries, and businesses to explore more secure ways of transmitting information.

But as the Chinese authorities embrace new information technology to monitor, manage and control the public like never before, the prospect of a sweeping social credit system has raised alarm around the world, especially with the ever-tightening grip on civil society, rights activism and religion.

A dozen or so cities are test beds for carrot-and-stick programmes to encourage businesses and individuals to comply with existing rules. The schemes have been criticised as Orwellian, but experience varies for those on the ground.

Salim Ismail and Francisco Palao

Nothing lasts forever and the startup era is no exception. Exponential Organizations (ExOs) are a new breed of organizations disrupting entire industries by scaling as fast as exponential technologies do. In addition, the ExO model is the framework that finally allows both entrepreneurs and corporations to speak the same language and disrupt industries together.

In the late 90s, the emergence of the Internet brought new opportunities to most existing industries and created vast new markets. As a result, a new type of business peaked in that decade: the technology startup.

Continue reading “Forget startups, ExOs (Exponential Organizations) are the new way to innovate” »

The country’s antitrust regulator told Facebook it couldn’t demand so much data from users simply to have an account. Experts say it’s a big deal.

How competing software, hardware and political ideology could accelerate existing divisions in humanity into the future

It’s been great to get people’s thoughts and feedback on the last article on “The iPhone 20”. Some of your responses considered that given Apple’s business model is effectively a walled garden, this makes any integration with the human body very unlikely in the future.

That’s why in this article, rather than focusing on Apple, I’ll look to explore some of the ways tech companies and organisations (including government bodies) will compete on software, hardware and protocols that will shape humanity’s journey to 2029, which may accelerate our existing divisions that stifle collaboration and splinters our future societies.

In part three of Hello World Shenzhen, Bloomberg Businessweek’s Ashlee Vance heads out into a city where you can’t use cash or credit cards, only your smartphone, where AI facial-recognition software instantly spots and tickets jaywalkers, and where at least one factory barely needs people. This is the society that China’s government and leading tech companies are racing to make a reality, with little time to question which advancements are net positives for the rest of us.

Part One — Inside China’s Future Factory.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLmaIbb13GM

Continue reading “Inside China’s High-Tech Dystopia” »

Forensics is on the cusp of a third revolution in its relatively young lifetime. The first revolution, under the brilliant but complicated mind of J. Edgar Hoover, brought science to the field and was largely responsible for the rise of criminal justice as we know it today. The second, half a century later, saw the introduction of computers and related technologies in mainstream forensics and created the subfield of digital forensics.

We are now hurtling headlong into the third revolution with the introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) – intelligence exhibited by machines that are trained to learn and solve problems. This is not just an extension of prior technologies. AI holds the potential to dramatically change the field in a variety of ways, from reducing bias in investigations to challenging what evidence is considered admissible.

AI is no longer science fiction. A 2016 survey conducted by the National Business Research Institute (NBRI) found that 38% of enterprises are already using AI technologies and 62% will use AI technologies by 2018. “The availability of large volumes of data—plus new algorithms and more computing power—are behind the recent success of deep learning, finally pulling AI out of its long winter,” writes Gil Press, contributor to Forbes.com.

Continue reading “The Coming AI Revolution in Digital Forensics” »

Hands are old news. VR navigation, control and selection is best done with the eyes—at least that’s what HTC Vive is banking on with the upcoming HTC Vive Pro Eye, a VR headset with integrated Tobii eye tracking initially targeting businesses. I tried out a beta version of the feature myself on MLB Home Run Derby VR. It’s still in development and, thus, was a little wonky, but I can’t deny its cool factor.

HTC announced the new headset Tuesday at the CES tech show in Las Vegas. The idea is that by having eye tracking built into the headset, better use cases, such as enhanced training programs, can be introduced. The VR player also says users can expect faster VR interactions and better efficiency in terms of tapping your PC’s CPU and GPU.

Of course, before my peepers could be tracked I needed to calibrate the headset for my special eyes. It was quite simple, after adjusting the interpupillary distance appropriately, the headset had me stare at a blue dot that bounced around my field of view (FOV). The whole thing took less than a minute.

Continue reading “HTC Vive Pro Eye Hands-On: Feeling Powerful With Built-In Tobii Eye Tracking” »