Wednesday, 14 January 2015

ViewSonic V55 Smartphone With Iris Scanner


Iris_Scan
One of most exciting rumors of 2014 was the inclusion of Iris-scanning technology as a prominent feature of the smart phones. Even though the technology was expected to be introduced in the flagship Samsung Galaxy handset, it really did not happen but still kept making headlines throughout the year. The technology was expected to see the daylight in 2014 but it could not happen.

However, the good news is here in 2015, the New Year brings out a break to this jinx and hopes are soaring higher as we will see the very first smartphone featuring the iris scanning and recognition technology. This is expected from ViewSonic, which is company largely associated with displays. The company will reportedly launch a smartphone packed with the Iris recognition technology sometime in January 2015.

Viewsonic’s New Smartphone: 

The California-based company is known to highlight their products at CES every year and hopes are quite high that the company will be launching the smartphone at the event this year. Gizmochina in a report has depicted the functions, features and also some of unseen images of this new  smartphone. The publication has even gone ahead and posted a YouTube video with the title "ViewSonic V55 teaser with Iris recognition technology". This video highlights the different features and how these features work on the smartphone. At the moment there is no information pertaining to the price of the new smartphone.

According to some of the reports, the new technology will ensure that only the owner of the phone, whose iris patterns are pre-recorded with will able to unlock the phone and allow the user to access information from the smartphone.

The reports also suggest that the ViewSonic V55 smartphone will have the iris scanner on top right corner of the handset, which will be covered with a small piece. The users of the phone will have to slide this covering piece to use the scanner. The report also indicates that when the user slides the screen to open the scanner, a light will automatically turn on to indicate that that scanner has been activated.

 The user or the owner of the smartphones will be able to protect their personal files and documents stored on their V55 smartphone by making use of the iris scanner. The reports add that for anyone to access any information that has been stored and protected by the Iris recognition sensor, they will need to the owner to scan their eye into the sensor and that’s how the information will be unlocked.

Specifications of ViewSonic V55: 

This smartphone is expected to be full of pack a 64-bit Snapdragon 410 quad-core processor clocked at 1.4GHz; 2GB RAM, Adreno 306 GPU; and comes in two built-in storage variants - 16GB and 32GB.

Further the smartphone is expected to sport a 5.5-inch full-HD (1080x1920 pixels) OGS display and also includes a 13-megapixel rear Sony camera. The smartphone is expected to support 4G LTE networks. But the only drawback is that there is no information pertaining to the operating system used on the smartphone.



Vine Appears to Have Verified a Fake Beyoncé Account


 Fake_Beyoncé
According to the reports, the recently verified Beyoncé account, which was opened four days ago on Vine, appears to be fake. The account was suspended on Sunday afternoon, but until that time the account was able to get nearly 40, 000 views on the single video posted, this is the same video, which was posted by the star on her Instagram account. However, all this was after the welcoming tweet links to the video-sharing network were tweeted by employees of Twitter and Vine.

This also included Vine’s head of production. All these people later went on to delete their tweets. Therefore, the main question that remains is as to why the company Vine, verified a fake account. At present, the company was not reachable to respond to any of this issue and this issue clearly highlighted a loophole in the Vine’s verification process that has easily hackers to fake a Beyoncé and also get her green badge.

The verification process

The Vine has two ways of verifying their users, one of the ways is a manual process and the second one is by authenticating the user with the Twitter account (which owns Vine). If a user tries to open a Vine account by making use of their Twitter account, there Vine account will get automatically verified.

Once the verification has been completed, the user can change their Vine account to whatever they like. This method was used by Ross Miller to create a perfectly verified account for Vine for his Twitter super-friend Taye Diggs.

He just had to borrow the username that is used by Diggs for his Instragram account, he changed the profile photo on Vine and over: Verified account for Taye at Vine, at least working till it gets suspended.

On a boarder security scale, it is really a big loophole which requires immediate attention and needs to be fixed soon. Twitter as more than 100000 verified people and the verification bug is grabbing for attention. This loophole can easily make impersonator to fake an account for American singer. Reports have clearly indicated that the account created for Beyoncé has been already identified to be fake.

About Vine: 

Vine was founded in June 2012 by Rus Yusupov, Colin Kroll and Dom Hofmann, it provides the sharing services for a short-form videos. Microblogging website Twitter has acquired it in October 2012 before the official launch of website.

Features of Vine: 

If you love to record and edit vedio, so Vine if perfect platform for you. It allows all users to record and edit short vedios, which is of five- to six-second-long clips and later with the help of revine you can share it with other followers. Popular Vines have a feature to revined automatically and all of the Vines can be published or shared on other social networking sites such as; Facebook and Twitter. If you wan to browse the videos of others, so all you need to install a Vine's app where you will get the option of groups of videos by trend or theme or popular videos.

Monday, 12 January 2015

The New Panasonic 4K UHD Blu-Ray Player Prototype Packs a Punch


Panasonic
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2015 displayed some fantastic innovations that promise to light up the gadget market in the coming time. Among many, the Panasonic 4K Blu-Ray player prototype has managed to grab some attention of many visitors in CES 2015.

The electronic manufacturing company Panasonic has launched its generation next Blu-Ray player at CES this year, which was held in Las Vegas. The new launch is one of the series of Flagship televisions, called CX850U 4K TV. This prototype player is able to offer a resolution of 3,480 * 2,160 and a bit rate of 100 Mb per second. Its ability of displaying 4K resolution images at the rate of 60 frames per second makes it a special one. Its specific design is exclusive for supporting video processing technology which is presently on the way of inclusion in the current standards of Ultra HD Blu-Ray. It’s High dynamic Range (HDR) and immersive audio technologies are also expected to be included under the UHD standards.

Colour Features

Similar to other renowned TV manufacturing companies, Panasonic flaunts a modified LED version with phosphor coating that delivers the colour brightness never seen before. It has a much broader range of colours which fills up to 98 per cent of DCI colour space. The fresh new Panasonic CX850U stands out for its picture processor engine called Studio Master Drive that enhances richness of colours and emphasizes on the accuracy of the colours in vivid images giving a much superior quality of pictures. Going through the prototype player one can undoubtedly say that the CX850U 4K Panasonic TV is just the perfect alternative to the kind of colour features displayed on cinema theatres.

Operating System

The Panasonic CX850U runs on the Linux based Firefox Operating System along with an exclusive Graphical User Interface of Panasonic. It has got a versatile combination of web-based Operating System along with a clear and convenient interface for the user benefits. The Linux based Firefox OS has a voice assistant associated with it called Xumo Guide that has got a touch of smartness in it for content discovery and some more added functions.

Appearance

It was quite surprising to see that Panasonic did not prepare a centre stage for them on the occasion of announcing their new launch of 4K UHD Blu-Ray player prototypes. It deserved much bigger limelight than what it received having such fantastic features of its kind. The small black box Blu-Ray player will be developed in collaboration with UHD alliance which includes partners like Samsung, Panasonic and many more from the Hollywood industry such as 20TH Century Fox, Technicolor and Warner Brothers.

Prospect

The fact that there is a rapid increase in availability and affordability of the 4K TVs point towards the mere future where there will be hardly any homes left having 4K UHD Blu-Ray technology get installed in the drawing rooms, starting from the year 2015 itself. But before that there is a long distance to cover up starting from the point of being a prototype till ending up enjoying the success.

LG Defends OLED TVs Future

LG
OLED, which stands for Organic Light- Emitting Diode, is in itself a film of organic compound with a layer of emissive electroluminescent, which responds to electric current with an electric current.

The Creation of Organic Light- Emitting Diode (OLED) 

LG, the famous Korean Electronics giant is the only major company which manufactures these OLED televisions. In the absence of any strong and solid competitor, this company has managed to reach the top and rule the market by itself. It has cornered the market in the absence of any cut throat competition. LG presented themselves as the promoters of the amalgamation of the OLED with the modern technology high definition television screens. They also focused their attention on the WebOS 2.0 TVs on the latest "wellness platform", which has a much simpler and uncomplicated user interface which operates with a much faster speed.

The Introduction of Organic Light- Emitting Diode (OLED) 

The company expressed its interest in continuing the production of OLED tv, better and improvised and more advanced versions. In the press conference conducted by company of LG at the CES 2015, they introduced some of the latest models. The center stage was taken up by the OLED.

The Evolution from Cathode- Ray Tube Sets to Organic Light- Emitting Diode (OLED) 

The company's spokesperson who happens to be the director of new products development, introduced the matter of the evolution of television to the spectators, which were majorly consisting of journalists. In his speech he placed emphasis on the fact that change and evolution keeps happening by the seconds. Prior to the LCD screen televisions, the cathode-ray tube sets were in vogue and most efficient. After the emergence of the LCD's, they slowly went out of vogue and at present, the OLED televisions have been evolved from the LCD screens. Currently, the OLED are better as they are known to produce nearly, perfect blacks, which are important for rich and brightly contrasted colors.

The Upcoming Year

LG has released a notice which states that the upcoming year will launch five latest designs. These designs will deal with a variety of changes, ranging from 55 inches to 65 inches, from flat screened to curved and slim bodied ones. They also plan on launching a 77 inch flexible television, which can be manipulated to be flat screened and form a curved conformation. Plus, it would have the added benefits of the amazing OLED picture quality and webOs interface as the smart features.

New Kids in the Block! 

In 2015 LG has lined up a plethora of new advanced gadgets. The reception of the OLED will determine the future course of this technology. The OLED is a complete class all by itself. Quantum Dot is another technology launched by LG, which is known for providing the rich- color technology. Though all these advancements don't come cheap, they are worth every dime that is spent on this latest updated version.

CES 2015: Toyota Opens Patents on Hydrogen Fuel Cell Technology


Toyota
In a strong hope of a developed future of Hydrogen fuel cell technology being an alternative fuel source, the Japanese car maker Toyota has promised to offer around six thousand patents (related to the technology), which is owned by them, as royalty-free. Last Tuesday, the Japanese car maker Toyota made the much awaited announcement at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2015, which was held in Las Vegas.

Summary 

The pledge made by Toyota includes 5,680 Hydrogen fuel cell related patents, including the technologies that have been used in developing the company’s latest innovation Toyota Mirai. Approximately, 1,970 patents are related to fuel cell stacks, 290 patents are related to high-pressure hydrogen tanks, 3,350 patents are associated with the software used to control fuel cell system and rest of the 70 patents are related to hydrogen production.

Plan

The infrastructure required to support the electric cars has started to rise across many countries, even though the re-fuelling stations for hydrogen fuel cell powered cars are hard to find. Therefore the step taken by the Japanese car maker makes it all the more significant, by opening their patents for other companies to own and in the process boost up the places that the hydrogen fuel cell cars are starting to fill.

The announcement made by the company reflects their positive approach in supporting the development of infrastructure of the Hydrogen powered society.

Previously on many occasions, the Japanese Automaker has tried their hand with this initiative of developing hydrogen powered society. One such example is the developmental set up in California. Toyota made huge investments in improving the facilities of Hydrogen fuel cell technology in California and in the North Eastern states of America. Last year, the company extended their support towards First Element Fuels with a loan grant of $7.3 million covering around 19 different hydrogen fuelling stations of California.

The Japanese car making company welcomes the interested companies over negotiable individual contracts for the usage of related patents. However it must be notified that the pledge made by the company on Tuesday covers only the patents related to the fuel cell vehicles which will remain available until 2020 ends, whereas the patents that are related to the production of hydrogen and its supply are kept open over indefinite period of time.

There is a small catch in this pledge although, which is that the Japanese car making company expects the interested companies to share similar technology related information and make their patents related to fuel cell as open. But make no mistake thinking it to be a pre-requisite condition to be filled before approaching for patent negotiations.

Future of this technology: 

The company strongly believes that the first generation of Hydrogen powered vehicles, that are going to get unveiled in coming few years, requires good amount of collaboration between automakers/ car makers, state authorities, power generating firms and the family of researchers. The Consumer Electronics Show 2015 was probably the best platform to be had for such an effort to get initiated and for a whistle to be blown for the start of its on-field implementation.