The last few weeks were fairly busy in the realm of augmented reality and remote meetings developments. Most of that activity was generated by some mammoth announcements from Snap and its Spectacles AR smartglasses, and Google, with its Project Starline experimental holographic video conferencing system.
Few brands have been more enthusiastic about augmented reality than Lego, which has now expanded its AR experiences from toys to theme parks.
The surging activity in augmented reality in both the business and consumer sectors is being matched with a wealth of updates and partnerships from Snap Inc.
Apple has a sterling reputation when it comes to managing its supply chain; it's where CEO Tim Cook proved his mettle to succeed Steve Jobs. Now, the company has made a strategic investment with a supplier that will be crucial to its future plans for AR wearables.
If you're like me, you're not too keen on being tracked. So when an app asks you if it can track your iPhone activity across other programs and websites for ads or data brokers, the answer is pretty much always "no." If you're tired of choosing "Ask App Not to Track" over and over again, there is a way to stop apps from even being able to ask in the first place.
The year is still off to a roaring start, with augmented reality at the center of nearly everything, from enterprise solutions, to entertainment, to safety.
When it comes to augmented reality wearables, it's currently an enterprise world. As such, Magic Leap's latest Lumin updates are centered on features that appeal to enterprise customers. And Epson and Spinar are joining forces with a solution for distributed workforces.
After weeks of reports about their first augmented reality device, Apple actually shipped a real AR product this week in the form of a TV tie-in AR app.
If there is one constant in currently available AR headsets, it's that, for a quality experience, they'll carry a high price tag. Price is one of the reasons these devices are mostly marketed towards enterprise customers for now.
Hand tracking is a key component in making natural interactions with augmented reality content, and one of the leading technology makers in this discipline has just improved on its tracking engine.
The economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have been felt in practically every business sector. Now, as we look back at the top augmented reality investments of 2020, the AR industry has been no exception.
Quietly, while the rest of the world was engaged in pandemic and political concerns, a few weeks ago Facebook casually upgraded its Spark AR platform with what it calls Unified Effect Publishing.
What does it mean when a software company obsessively focused on innovating the way we use our mobile devices to see and communicate with the world adds virtual voice agents? Possibly e-commerce magic, with a powerful layer of augmented reality.
Alongside the launch of Android 11, Google has gifted Pixel users with several exclusive features, including App Suggestions on the home screen. Another exclusive feature involves Live View, the augmented reality walking navigation feature in Google Maps and one of the more useful implementations of AR for the average consumer.
UPDATE: The OnePlus 8 Pro has been released! Check it out on the official OnePlus website or read through the rumored specs we've left below for posterity.
If you had a phone in 2004, there's a pretty good chance it was a Motorola RAZR. The iconic phone is the tenth highest-selling of all time, and it marked the height of the flip phone era. Now that the technology has caught up, Lenovo (Motorola's parent company) is bringing it back in a big way.
Apple Card has generated quite the buzz since its March 2019 announcement. The iPhone maker's new credit card pairs with Apple Wallet on your device, is simple to sign up for, includes enhanced security over other cards, has zero fees, and provides daily rewards right to your Apple Cash account. And as good as that sounds, the fine print can complicate things real quick.
In just a few weeks, on May 29, the annual AWE (Augmented World Expo) conference will take place once again in Silicon Valley (Santa Clara, California, to be exact).
If you want to get started sniffing Wi-Fi networks, you usually need to start with a wireless network adapter. But thanks to a Wi-Fi sniffing library written in Arduino and the ultra-cheap ESP8266 chip, you might not need one. For less than $10 in electronics, you can build a tiny Arduino Wi-Fi sniffer that saves Wireshark-compatible PCAP files and fits anywhere.
The year 2018 was a rough one for Snap, the company behind the Snapchat app and the Spectacles wearable camera device. From executive departures to reports of slowed user growth, the company that once spurned Facebook's multibillion-dollar advances is now facing a moment of truth as it stares down its uncertain future.
MoviePass was once the best subscription service on the market for getting cheap movie tickets. For the price and the number of films you could see and save money on, it was unbeatable, but recent changes to the service have made it less enticing. While it still works well for some users, others may have to rely on other options. Personally, I'm leaning toward the latter.
You can mod every aspect of your phone's software with root, but if you want to make changes at the hardware level, you'll need a custom kernel. If you've looked into custom kernels before, one name undoubtedly kept coming up: ElementalX. It's easily the best custom kernel out there, and the reason for that is its awesome developer, flar2, aka Aaron Segaert.
In the battle for best stock Android flagships, there are really only two choices: Google Pixel phones and OnePlus phones. Although the latter isn't true stock Android, it is impressively close and usually paired with more impressive hardware than the Pixel lineup. The latest is the OnePlus 6T, which will be a bit controversial for fans this year.
In this jam-packed October, the Huawei Mate 20 Pro has flown under the radar in the US. Due to Huawei's lack of presence in the States, many are unfamiliar with the second largest OEM in the world. Huawei has continuously put out amazing mobile devices, and this year they released a phone that's nearly perfect on paper.
People say that money makes the world go 'round. And it's no different in the world of augmented reality.
Contrary to popular belief, augmented reality apps have been available for a while now. I remember using the Layar app (still available for iOS and Android) to explore nearby businesses and landmarks with varying success via an early-generation Android handset.
The war on dehydration is a commercially burgeoning marketplace. An increasingly sophisticated consumer population hoping to conquer everything from 26-mile marathons to vodka shots is deconstructing every functional remedy in the fight to quell the effects of severe dehydration.
The holidays are stressful. Between traveling, family, and dinner, Thanksgiving weekend can feel like weeks. Many families have traditions that make the days long, but some of us would rather curl up somewhere and watch our favorite shows. But all is not lost — our phones do so much for us now that they can help make the long stressful weekend much more bearable.
Clumsiness is the great equalizer when it comes to smartphones — it makes no distinction between the most expensive flagship handset and cheaper mid-range models. A hard drop onto pavement will usually result in a shattered screen, regardless of how pricey your device is. And with a smartphone breaking every two seconds, we're truly our own handset's ultimate nemesis.
When shopping for a new smartphone, you'll encounter comparisons and spec sheets that are filled to the brim with values like mAh, GB, and GHz. To the average consumer, however, these values are meaningless, so we end up looking at which device has the specs with the highest actual numbers.
Apple just announced the iPhone 6, and no matter whether you've been with Android for a few months or few years, there's a good chance you're enticed by the idea of switching over to the other side.
Thanks to rapid advancements in the field, generative AI can do some amazing things already, from generating text, images, and video with just a prompt to automating tasks and developing new products and services. Now, artificial intelligence can even help you craft emails directly in Gmail.
On this platform, we talk a lot about the future of augmented reality, and we pay attention to what is being said elsewhere as well.
It's already been a banner year for mergers and acquisitions in the augmented reality industry, with WaveOptics and Ubiquity6 among the notable companies acquired. Two of the more active M&A players, Snap and Epic Games, continued their respective buying sprees this week with major deals supporting their AR strategies.
Over the past few weeks, Google, Snap, and Facebook have all taken their turns to show off their new augmented reality technologies. This week, it was Apple's turn, with new AR features for iOS 15 along with new capabilities for developers.
Facebook's annual earnings call on Wednesday didn't come with any big surprises, that is, if you took everything at face value.
Snapchat may trail Facebook and Instagram in terms of daily active users, but a new partnership with Samsung may get those innovative AR Lenses onto the mobile devices of a lot more users.
The process of trying out new augmented reality and virtual reality hardware is as personal as it gets. Bottom line, if you can't directly try these immersive devices on, it's difficult to really understand the benefits they can bring to your life and work.
Among the various components of the emerging augmented reality space, the most lucrative is the advertising market. The prospect of turning every object, every location, ever signpost in the real world into a discount code or virtual transaction interface is why AR will ultimately be more profitable than VR.
When life hands you lemons, make lemonade. At Magic Leap, the lemons are the COVID-19 pandemic, and the lemonade is a new solution for virtual meetings born out of social distancing.
