A Bit about what Apple has been working on with AI and VocalIQ

Steve Kovach, reporting for Tech Insider:

Apple now has the tech in place to give its digital assistant a big boost thanks to a UK-based company called VocalIQ it bought last year.

According to a source familiar with VocalIQ’s product, it’s much more robust and capable than Siri’s biggest competitors like Google Now, Amazon’s Alexa, and Microsoft’s Cortana. In fact, it was so impressive that Apple bought VocalIQ before the company could finish and release its smartphone app. After the acquisition, Apple kept most of the VocalIQ team and let them work out of their Cambridge office and integrate the product into Siri.

A lot has been said in the last few days about Apple, Siri and how the company is severely lacking against its competitors Amazon — which has Alexa, and Google — which has Google Now and has just announced Google Home at Google I/O a few days ago.

Reading about VocalIQ, I’m excited about WWDC now.

May 28, 2016 ✚ Permalink

Apple Watch Gets a Price Cut in India

Apple Watch New Bands

Alongside the announcement of iPhone SE and 9.7-inch iPad Pro at the Special Event held yesterday at the company’s Town Hall in Cupertino, Apple also announced a new Space Black Milanese Loop and a new range of Woven Nylon bands for Apple Watch. During the presentation, Tim Cook also announced that the Apple Watch pricing now starts at just $299. This price change only affects the Sport models, with the 38mm version now priced at $299 (previously $349) whereas the 42mm version is now priced at $349 (previously $399). Both versions get a price cut of $50 each, which is about INR 3350.

Thanks to this, the Apple Watch pricing in India has been reduced as well. The Apple Watch was officially launched in India back in November, with the price starting at Rs. 30,900 for the 38mm Sport version and Rs. 34,900 for the 42mm Sport version.

After yesterday’s price cut announcement, Apple has confirmed that the 38mm Apple Watch Sport is now priced at Rs. 25,900 in India, while the 42mm version is now priced at Rs. 29,900. That’s a reduction of Rs. 5000 ($75) on the previous MRP.

It’ll take a while for this new pricing to be reflected across Apple’s retail presence in the country. The pricing of the Steel models as well as Apple Watch Edition remains unchanged.

March 22, 2016 ✚ Permalink

Apple is Hiring a Country Manager for App Store, Apple Music & iTunes Stores for India

I have a habit of keeping an eye on Apple’s job listings for India, hoping to come across something relevant that I can apply for. Over the last few months, it seems Apple has been on a hiring spree as I’ve seen all kinds of roles being listed, especially for Apple’s new tech development centre coming up in Hyderabad. All of the roles listed for Hyderabad are related to the Maps team, while other cities have had roles ranging from Sales, Marketing, PR, Business Strategy and even Big Data Frameworks.

Today, I came across a certain listing that really caught my attention. Apple is hiring a Country Manager, India — App Store, Apple Music, iTunes.

Apple is seeking a dynamic business leader with an impeccable track record in the entertainment and technology industries to drive its growth in India.

The role is interesting to me due to a lot of factors, most notably because the role is based in Dubai. Apple says,

The candidate will be responsible for the App Store, Apple Music and iTunes business, personnel and strategy implementation for this key market, as well as fortifying exceptional relations with the developer, music, movies, technology and media sectors in the region. The candidate will have strong and established relationships within the Indian technology, music, movies, entertainment and media industries in India, and will be able to lead Apple’s relationships with the Bollywood and regional movie studios, record labels and artistic talent communities.

The mandate is to deliver high revenue growth from premium content services as the Indian population connects to faster and cheaper data connections. He or she will also help to build a strategy for the distribution of Indian apps and content globally.

Apple’s recent hires have indicated that the company is pushing for a stronger focus towards the Indian market and this role only strengthens that belief.

Some other interesting roles Apple has listed in the past include Affordability Program Manager, Thermal Architect and Business Manager — Online Channel. As of this writing, Apple has 34 open positions listed on its job site.

March 2, 2016 ✚ Permalink

Why Netflix Does Not Release Any Show Ratings

The New York Times has a great piece on Netflix titled, “Netflix’s Opaque Disruption Annoys Rivals on TV”. The article talks about how Netflix, which has around 70 million subscribers around the globe, has never published its show ratings or has no plans to.

Ted Sarandos, the Chief Content Officer at Netflix says that he wants to avoid a “weekly arms race” and says,

Once we give a number for a show, then every show will be benchmarked off of that show even though they were built sometimes for very specific audiences,

and adds

There is a very natural inclination to say, ‘Relative to this show, this show is a failure.’ That puts a lot of creative pressure on the talent.

I signed up for Netflix after their global availability announcement at CES 2016 and have been a happy subscriber since then.

February 27, 2016 ✚ Permalink

Experiment Shows Standing on Escalators is Better

In fact the three-week experiment in 2015 had even better results than the Transport for London researchers predicted based on the Greenwich research. For example, one escalator that normally transported 12,745 people between 8:30 and 9:30 a.m. on a typical week was able to move 16,220 because of standing rules.

Also,

The approach asks people to do something they are often bad at: delaying instant gratification in the interest of a greater good.

Heh!

January 24, 2016 ✚ Permalink

A Look at Video Streaming Services in India — Part I: Spuul

This is Part I of a multi-part series that takes a look at the various video streaming services available for India.

If you’re a savvy internet user like me, you know there are quite a few streaming services now available for the Indian audience, both for audio and video content. I have tried and/or extensively used quite a lot of these video streaming services over the last year or so, and while we’re still far from seeing Netflix or Hulu launch here in India, the services that we do have available are definitely showing some promise.

I’m starting off this series with a look at Spuul. Spuul is one of the first streaming services that I had come across, somewhere around 2013, a year after its public launch. Spuul currently focuses on offering a large catalogue of Indian movies and TV shows to a global audience and offers a Universal iOS app, an Android app, as well as the option to streaming movies in a broswer (Flash required).

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November 4, 2015 ✚ Permalink

Apple Watch Charging Clip by Studio Neat

The folks at Studio Neat have come up with this nifty 3D printed product out of an idea that was born originally to Matthew Panzarino. Of course, the nice people that they are, got to solving the problem and here’s what we have.

A few weeks ago Matthew Panzarino emailed us a photo of a crude setup: a rubber band wrapped around the face of the watch, holding the puck securely as a sort of seat belt. He had been using the watch extensively during the day and needed to charge while out and about. He wanted to simply throw the charging watch in his bag, and this was his MacGyver’d solution.

The Apple Watch Charging Clip is a little thing that attaches to the back of your Apple Watch to hold the magnetic charger in place.

stuido-neat-apple-watch-charging-clip

The clip is available via Shapeways in multiple colors for both 38mm and 42 mm watches. Shapeways is also offering Free worldwide shipping this weekend.

I love that 3D printing has made it so easy these days to solve small problems like these.

October 4, 2015 ✚ Permalink

WD My Passport Pro Review — Thunderbolt Powered RAID Storage

WD My Passport Pro

For as long as I can remember, Western Digital (WD) has been my favorite storage companies. They’ve long been making phenomenal hard disk drives and I’ve personally owned several of their products since 2003. I presently own four external drives to house all kinds of data and to power my backup and I couldn’t be happier with their performance, compared to the drives from a couple of other companies that I’ve tried in the past, one of which failed on me in just six months. That’s why I’ve only recommended WD drives (or Hitachi) to my friends & peers whenever I’ve been asked about one.

A few weeks ago, WD India was kind enough to send me a review unit of the My Passport Pro. I have a 13” MacBook Air with a mere 128GB of storage and this drive has been a near perfect storage extension for me over the last few weeks.

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October 2, 2015 ✚ Permalink