Day: January 11, 2018

Comcast’s Xfinity division has made some forays into the smart home world already — Xfinity Home started out as a home security product, but it now handles a number of common devices like locks, thermostats, light bulbs and so on. However, the millions of people who subscribe just to Xfinity Internet haven’t been able to take advantage of these features; you need to also have an Xfinity Home subscription. That’s going to change this year — Comcast just announced that millions of its internet customers will be able to use their Xfinity "gateway" routers as smarthome automation hubs, free of charge.

Specifically, Comcast says that people using its two most recent Gateways will get these features — that’s more than 15 million customers, or more than half of its 26 million internet subscribers. In comparison, Comcast says it only has about 1.3 million subscribers to its home security service, so the company is opening up these feature to a vastly larger group.

Comcast’s Dan Herscovici (senior VP of the home group) told Engadget that the notion is to expose home automation controls to people who otherwise might not have considered using them before. "At our scale and scope, you’re talking about way more than early adopters into this tech," he said. "We wanted to find a way to unlock the opportunity of home automation to everyone, even those that might not be interested in home security."

Part of this new addition comes from Comcast’s acquisition of Stringify in September. The company built a cloud-based smart home device platform that worked with about 500 different products, and that tech will all be integrated into Xfinity’s offering. Additionally, Comcast is also pushing its "Works with Xfinity" program to get more hardware manufacturers on board. And naturally, you’ll be able to see settings for your smart home setup on your TV, through the Xfinity Home app and give voice commands to your devices through the voice-enabled Xfinity TV remote.

But the best part about this system goes back to the free price. It’ll enable people who’ve only dabbled with smart home devices (a Nest thermostat here, a Philips Hue lightbulb there) start stringing together multiple products and build true home automation systems. That said, it’ll be a little while before this rolls out — Comcast said that the rollout would start sometime in late Spring and would take six to eight weeks to hit its whole customer base. Still, most modem / router combos that you rent from your ISP don’t offer these kinds of features — between Gigabit speeds and smart home controls, the Xfinity gateway actually might be worth the monthly fee.

Click here to catch up on the latest news from CES 2018.

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After facing backlash for remaining tight-lipped over Logan Paul’s controversial Aokigahara forest video, YouTube has finally spoken. The company has limited the social media star’s ability to earn money from its platform, starting by cancelling his lucrative Google Preferred ad deal. Google’s Preferred program allows brands to publish ads in the videos of the top five percent creators on YouTube. So while Paul can still monetize his videos, he won’t be earning the same money per click like he used to.

In addition, YouTube has also put Paul’s original projects for its ad-free streaming service on hold, including the sequel to his dystopian sci-fi film The Thinning. It was supposed to launch on YouTube Red later this year, but now it’s unclear whether it will ever be released. His character’s fate in Red comedy Foursome also remains unclear, since YouTube has chosen not to feature him in season four.

Paul was heavily criticized for posting a video showing him and his friends laughing and joking around upon coming upon a dead body inside the Japanese forest. (Aokigahara near Mt. Fuji is known as one of the most prevalent suicide sites in the world.) Critics slammed him for being disrespectful of the suicide victim and claiming that his video was meant to raise mental health awareness.

Source: Kotaku, Hollywood Reporter

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In a move that’s sent bitcoin spiralling, officials in South Korea have announced plans to ban cryptocurrency trading in the country. The plans come against a backdrop of concerns regarding tax evasion, as cryptocurrency trading in the country is highly speculative and similar to gambling. Many currencies, such as bitcoin and ethereum, are priced much higher in South Korea’s exchanges than elsewhere in the world. Industry data provider CoinMarketCap has even begun excluding some South Korean exchanges in its calculations "due to extreme divergence in prices from the rest of the world".

Earlier this week, police and tax agencies raided the country’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges. A source at Coinone, a major exchange in South Korea, told CNBC that local police have been investigating the company since last year, adding that "they think what we do is gambling".

"There are great concerns regarding virtual currencies and justice ministry is basically preparing a bill to ban cryptocurrency trading through exchanges," said South Korea’s justice minister Park Sang-ki at a press conference. The proposed legislation will need a majority vote of all 297 members of the National Assembly in order to ban trading outright.

But according to Mun Chong-hyun, chief analyst at EST Security, the ban "will make trading difficult here, but not impossible". Speaking to Reuters, he said, "Keen traders, especially hackers, will find it tough to cash out their gains from virtual coin investments in Korea but they can go overseas, for example Japan".

Nonetheless, the announcement triggered a massive selloff of cryptocurrency on both local and offshore exchanges, with the local price of bitcoin dropping as much as 21 percent. Despite the drop, it still trades at around a 30 percent premium compared to other countries, highlighting the disparity of prices in the country.

Via: CNBC

Source: Reuters

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In the future, autonomy won’t just mean you can relax in the passenger seat on your drive home from work. Driverless vehicles of all kinds are set to revolutionize the cargo industry, too, from delivering a pizza or dropping off an Amazon package, to hauling much larger shipments across continents and the high seas. Naturally, Boeing is one of many companies investing in cargo planes of tomorrow, and is keen to show off some of its early work in the form of a huge octocopter capable of carrying loads of up to 500 pounds (over 250kg). In less than three months, Boeing eggheads built and carried out successful test flights of the all-electric prototype, possibly (but unofficially) breaking a Guinness world record in the process.

The rough-and-ready concoction of metal and batteries measures 15 feet long, 18 feet wide and 4 feet tall, weighing in at 747 pounds (nearly 339kg). In other words, it dwarfs the consumer DJI drone you got for Christmas. Obviously Boeing’s prototype is far from a commercial product, but the firm says it’ll be used "as a flying test bed to mature the building blocks of autonomous technology for future applications."

Boeing’s work in the realm of cargocopters is running alongside that of Aurora Flight Sciences, a company with a particular focus on autonomous drones and planes that Boeing announced it was buying last October. Aurora is working with DARPA to develop some zany vehicles and technologies, as well as with Uber on its flying taxi project. And most recently, Aurora demonstrated how unmanned resupply missions could support troops on the ground using a US Marine UH-1H helicopter retrofitted with autonomous systems.

Via: The Verge

Source: Boeing

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