The Knowledge » New Technologies

Always in Beta

TechDept — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:26:19 +0000

Beta releases used to be restricted to small groups of Beta testers. A Beta release allowed you to work out the bugs before a general market release. When a product shipped, it was considered final until the next release.

Nowadays, many products are in perpetual Beta (and we’re all Beta testers). Gmail, Flickr and del.icio.us carry the Beta designation for years at a time as the products are developed and refined in the open. This creates a mindset of continuous improvement and treats users as co-developers. The pace of innovation happens so quickly that traditional release cycles don’t apply.

By Tom Fishburn for www.tomfishburne.com August 22 2010

Firefox 4 Beta 4 Introduces Sync and Panorama

TechDept — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:58:35 +0000

Mozilla has released Firefox 4 Beta 4, bringing two very interesting features to the table: Panorama (previously called Tab Candy) and Sync.

Panorama is a nifty visual tool that lets you overview all of your open tabs and group them into sets with a simple drag-and-drop interface. It’s activated via an icon at the right end of the bookmark bar, which takes you to your tab playground, where you can expand or delete your tab sets, create new ones and organize them around the canvas as you see fit.

I don’t see the need to organize my tabs in a way other than the default, but then again, I’m not an extreme tab user — I’ve seen people with 30+ tabs open at all times, and in such cases a feature like Panorama can come in handy.

Article by Stan Schroeder for mashable.com, Video by Aza Raskin for Vimeo, August 23 2010

The evolution of cell phone design between 1983-2009

TechDept — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 14:58:23 +0000

Cell phones have evolved immensely since 1983, both in design and function.From the Motorola DynaTAC, that power symbol that Michael Douglas wielded so forcefully in the movie “Wall Street”, to the iPhone 3G, which can take a picture, play a video, or run one of the thousands applications available from the Apple Store. There are thousands of models of cell phones that have hit the streets between 1983 and now.
Here are a few of the more popular and unusual ones to take you through the history of this device that most of us consider a part of our everyday lives.

By webdesigndepot, May 22 2010

An intro to FX Studio

TechDept — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 11:04:14 +0000

An introduction to FX Studio, an upcoming mobile and web-based application that allows people everywhere to add a range of Hollywood-quality special effects to their video clips.
FX Studio is being produced by Framestore & Nokia.

by Framestore for Vimeo, July 26 2010

Open Innovators

TechDept — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 16:21:41 +0000

Open innovation is a new paradigm in which company boundaries are crossed, and collaboration and external inputs are key. In this approach, companies use both internal and external knowledge to fuel innovation, and both internal and external paths to commercialise new products and business models. Within this context, Open Innovators wants to bring new insights and best practices on open innovation, crowdsourcing, and co-creation - for business leaders as well as entrepreneurs.

Examples:

Innocentive - open innovation problem solving
TekScout - crowd sourcing R&D solutions
IdeaConnection – idea marketplace and problem solving
Yet2.com – IP market place
PRESANS (beta) - connect and solve R&D problems
Hypios - online problem solving
Innoget - research intermediary platform
One Billion Minds - online (social) challenges
NineSigma - technology problem solving

Open Innovators, 2010.

Unilyzer – Social Media and Internet Marketing Software

TechDept — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 08:24:13 +0000

Great for pulling data from sites like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and Digg. In seconds the Unilyzer™ can tell you exactly what you need to know, so you can fine-tune your tweets and videos to generate more traffic.

Visit site

Q&A: David Tarbuck of Argos on multichannel retail

TechDept — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 08:59:49 +0000

Multichannel sales reached £1.9bn for Argos in the last financial year, 43% of the retailer’s total sales. The latest addition to this strategy is a new Check & Reserve iPhone app.
I’ve been talking to David Tarbuck, who is head of multichannel development at Argos, about the new app, and the company’s approach to multichannel retail.

By Graham Charlton, June 2 2010

The Magical Classroom

TechDept — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 10:43:09 +0000

A short film by SMART Technologies showcasing the magic of their touch screen interactive whiteboards.

Augmented reality: 10 real world examples from the superbrands

TechDept — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 10:01:42 +0000

Exciting things are happening in the whizz-bang new world of augmented reality, which will surely hit the mainstream before too long.
Many of the world’s top brands have experimented with AR recently, and while some of the first wave of apps are more gimmicky than useful, others certainly shine a light on what we can expect from this space in the months and years to come.
Read more

By Chris Lake, May 20, 2010

TwitterDJ

TechDept — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 17:06:23 +0000

Twitter DJ is the latest from Richie Hawtin, who’s already spent much of his career pioneering new technologies as a DJ, producer and label owner, from the development of midi enabled DJ mixers such as Allen & Heath’s Xone92 & 3D mixers, to Final Scratch DJ Technology.

The Minus developed application utilizes feeds from an updated version of Traktor’s standard broadcasting technology to send 60 second updates during Hawtin’s set of what’s currently playing to a designated Twitter account. Anyone following the Twitter group can obtain a unique insight into how a DJ builds the atmosphere and dynamics of a set, track by track, all in real time.

By TwitterDJ