Particle a new start up shop which produce several tiny applications, has released a brand new and massively tiny application called Robo.to.

The application did not look too convincing or to be taken too seriously initially, but as more research was put into the it, the GIF-esque Flash avatar which was present on the home page slowly unraveled little delights. The application had been created for users to enjoy what they were doing while social networking while not having to think too much about it. So in short the application was created to simplify processes and create user friendly technology served on a platter!

The flashy avatar that appears on the front page contains a badge that appears in a narrow, mobile-friendly form and links to a page with any pointers one can choose to direct visitors to other online homes. This application also helps you record videos  which you can post on Facebook, Twitter and all the other networking sites, the only hitch here being the vidoes are soundless.Considering it’s a tiny application and is fresh into the market is has been found to be delightful making it very simple for users to make use of it.

Just like any new application, once released ,it has to compete with all the bigger sharks in the ocean(namely Facebook and Twitter) if it has to survive. Even though it has user friendly technology and has simplified step wise links and also seems like glittery eye candy, the question of revenue comes into play. Primarily not many users are aware of the tiny applications like Robo.to and moreover if all they get to record are soundless videos they might not want to come back. Moreover the software does not have any distinctive features that make it more desirable than the other bigger products and users may not even remember it! And finally with upcoming new softwares that users would rather log into the newer tiny applications usually get demolished due to lack of revenue.

All these facts considered Robo.to seems an interestingly delightful application today in the market, but the question of its survival can only be defined with time.

Recent developments in sensor network technologies have taking the virtual world into a smarter level. The projects of the Responsive Environments Group at MIT explored an emerging trend called “Cross reality”. The cross reality experiments are done in second life, a 3D virtual world community with 15 million current subscribers.

Well, what is cross reality? It connects “location specific 3D animated constructs” in the virtual world to in-building sensor installations.  In one of the projects, they chose to use power strips as they are present everywhere plus they have a power and can be connected to a network. MIT made the strips to blow and take the virtual world into the next level. The researchers also added some features to the power strips via expansion boards such as motion sensors, temperature sensors, and memory cards for local data logging.

The group has created a whole portal network known as Ubiquitous sensor portal in the real world media lab. It has an array of sensors as well as audio and video capabilities for user interaction. There are 45 portals currently in the Lab; each one is integrating a myriad of environmental sensors such as motion, light and sound level, vibration, temperature, and humidity.

They also showed a set of simpler 2D visualizations that enable mobile devices to efficiently browse and interact with sensor network data. The group of MIT is still working on this experiment to give the best result.

Graham Hawkes maker of Deep Flight Super Falcon, explains it as “This one, instead of being a crab you drop to the bottom, is like a dolphin. It will fly off and move through the ocean with grace. It looks like a big animal moving and can do barrel rolls with whales,”

He calls it as “the most beautiful machine ever built” in the launching event of Falcon at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. Already he had sold a Super Falcon to Mr. Tom Perkins who made his fortune as a venture capitalist backing companies like Google, Symantec and Genentech.

Mr. Perkins commented on Falcon as “I believe the Super Falcon is the future for underwater adventuring.”

The main principle behind Falcon is use of downward lift on the wings to fly down to depth. It is the first aqua machine to operate on the same principles as flight. One more advantage of Falcon is the reduction of the internal volume of the pressure hull.

Falcon is powered by a set of Lithium polymer batteries. The cabin pressure is maintained at one atmosphere, hence there is no issue with crew or passengers suffering from the so-called bends or their pressure related illness.

The next mission of Mr Hawkes is to turn Super Falcon into an “ambassador of the seas.”

The dream of controlling TV channels with thoughts will soon come true. Not only TV channels, you can control light switches, door and any households in a smart home through thoughts. No more hassle of lost keys and remotes, thanks to brain-computer interface (BCI) technology which was being developed in Europe. BCI technology lets users perform everyday tasks with thoughts alone.

“The BCI lets people turn on lights, change channels on the TV or open doors just by thinking about it,” explains Christoph Guger, the CEO of Austrian medical engineering company g.tec that developed the application.

g.tec has teamed up with a group of international universities and research institutes as part of the EU-funded Presenccia project to incorporate its BCI technology into virtual environments. “A virtual environment could be used to train a disabled person to control an electric wheelchair through a brain-computer interface,” explains Mel Slater, the coordinator of the Presenccia project. “It is much safer for them to learn in Virtual reality than in the real world, where mistakes could have physical consequences.”

This project could offer liberating possibilities for disabled people. The BCI technology will gain ground in medical applications for the disabled and for rehabilitation. The g.tec CEO says that g.tec’s smart home application will soon be deployed in a real smart home.

It is always very interesting to know something new about usual things. What do we all know about technology and its history? Let’s see who was the first to use this term and how everything developed.

The term technology was first introduced around 18 century by Iohann Beckman, who used this word as the name of the scientific discipline. Today, with the development of the Internet, appearance of digital signage solutions, cell phones, etc., the word technology is used in its broad sense. It is all the knowledge that is used for creating and producing goods. The process of the development of technology is very interesting and arouses many heated arguments among scientists.

Some of them believe that things like, for instance video splitter, appeared because of the evolution. People did something from century to century, which helped them to understand processes happening around them better. And if one stage was missed, everything would be different. Others are sure that everything happened spontaneously, thanks to great scientists. Let them argue. But people know, that our lives are impossible without technology, without the Internet, video walls, cell phones and so on. Now we all know more about technology.

Adgregate Markets has signed a contract with Google DoubleClick to enable visitors to buy products through Adgregate without visiting seller site. It allows consumers to browse, interact and purchase the products through banner ads. Through Adgregate consumers can buy the products on publishers site without moving into the product’s own site.

Adgregate present their technology on September 2008 in-front of the panel members including entrepreneur Marc Andreessen, Chris DeWolfe – Myspace CEO, Marc Benioff – Salesforce founder, Yossi Vardi – Angel investor, Ash Patel – former Yahoo executive VP. The panelists unanimously agreed that Adgregate was a great idea that will make money and address a need in the display ad market.

User can buy a product through a single click on “add to cart” button on the ad widget. Adgregate get share from both DoubleClick and retailer, but publisher can get revenue from the advertisers.

Webstock, a conference for Web professionals, is happening in Wellington New Zealand this week. As usual it’s a classy lineup of speakers and a number of international webheads will be jetting in for the event. They include science fiction author Bruce Sterling, Flickr’s Heather Champ, Social Web designer Joshua Porter, Dopplr’s Matt Biddulph, Institute for the Future’s Jane McGonigal, Six Apart’s David Recordon, The Guardian’s Meg Pickard, NZ Foo Camp’s Nat Torkington, Yahoo’s Tom Coates, online performance artist Ze Frank, and many more.

In Washington, 17/12/2008, Yahoo announced that it will cut to three months the time it stores personal data gathered from Web surfing, making its retention policy the shortest among peers. Due to the pressure from European and other data protection officials to do more to protect the privacy of users, Google halved the amount of time it stores personal data to nine months. The European Union has recommended that Internet search companies keep data no more than six months and urged the sector to adopt an industry-wide standard.

Adobe will be releasing six different versions of creative suite 4.

Adobe Creative Suite – CS4 Design Standard ($1,400, $600)
Adobe Creative Suite – CS3 Design Premium ($1,800, $600)
Adobe Creative Suite – CS4 Web Standard ($1,000, $600)
Adobe Creative Suite – CS4 Web Premium ($1,700, $600)
Adobe Creative Suite – CS4 Production Premium ($1,700, $600)
Adobe Creative Suite – CS4 Master Collection ($2,500, $900)

On Monday, Intel launched Dunnington six core processor, “Xeons 7400” specially designed for virtualization applications. It’s the Xeon line–server processor, and not a desktop. Three processors are dedicated for low voltage offering. The cost ranges from $856 to $2729; “Xeons 7400” has 50% more best features compared with “Xeons 7300”.