Daily Archives: September 13, 2015

The Sensel Morph – finally a replacement Fingerworks Touchstream!

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These guys have launched a wildly succesfull kickstarter to produce what is basically a large touchpad. You can print 3D overlays which magnetically lock into place. Programming new overlays shouldn’t be too tough. It’s sensitive enough to detect paint brushes. Now let’s hope it can be a keyboard with the pinch and zoom and multifinger gestures the guys at Fingerworks invented before it was bought up (and then commercially killed) by Apple!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1152958674/the-sensel-morph-interaction-evolved

Estimating the reproducibility of psychological science – not doing too well…

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Yet again a major study looks at reproducing results (in this case only in psychological studies) and finds that the strength of the results is much lower than published.

Expect this to happen for economics, political science, etc as well.

Reproducibility is a defining feature of science, but the extent to which it characterizes current research is unknown. We conducted replications of 100 experimental and correlational studies published in three psychology journals using high-powered designs and original materials when available. Replication effects were half the magnitude of original effects, representing a substantial decline. Ninety-seven percent of original studies had statistically significant results. Thirty-six percent of replications had statistically significant results; 47% of original effect sizes were in the 95% confidence interval of the replication effect size; 39% of effects were subjectively rated to have replicated the original result; and if no bias in original results is assumed, combining original and replication results left 68% with statistically significant effects. Correlational tests suggest that replication success was better predicted by the strength of original evidence than by characteristics of the original and replication teams.

Source: Estimating the reproducibility of psychological science

Philips Hue – strip lighting connected to wifi that changes colour

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Philips Hue combines brilliant LED light with intuitive technology. Then puts it in the palm of your hand.Together, the bulbs, the bridge and the app will change the way you use light. Forever. Experiment with shades of white, from invigorating blue/white to cozy yellow/white. Or play with all the colors in the spectrum.

Source: Meet hue | The system

Basically it comes in all shapes and sizes and can turn your house into a nightclub. You run it from your mobile or you can automate the on and off through a website. It plugs into your normal fittings and you have to buy a controller (bridge) that can handle 50 bulbs.

Ex-Secret Service agent who siphoned almost $1m worth of Bitcoin from Silk Road takes plea deal

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The US Department of Justice (DoJ) said Bridges admitted to using a seized administrator account on Silk Road in order to lift Bitcoin from various accounts and deposit them into his own wallet. He then sold off the Bitcoin on the Mt Gox exchange between March and May of 2013 and came away with $820,000 in cash.

Bridges also admitted to lying to investigators and working to obstruct others who were investigating both Silk Road and his own actions.

Source: Ex-Secret Service agent who siphoned Bitcoin from Silk Road takes plea deal

Apply Magic Sauce – Cambridge University Prediction API that takes your Facebook likes and creates a predictive psych-demographic profile

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his is a prediction of your psycho-demographic profile based on your Facebook Likes. It uses a snapshot of your digital footprint to visualise how others perceive you online and therefore may not be an entirely accurate picture of who you really are. You could take more psychometric tests as well and compare the results!

Source: Apply Magic Sauce – Prediction API – Test

Translucent Li-ion Battery Charges Itself by Using Sunlight, could be used as smartphone screen

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A Japanese research group prototyped a translucent lithium-ion (Li-ion) rechargeable battery that can charge itself by using sunlight.

With the battery, the group aims to realize a “smart window,” which is an almost transparent window that functions both as a large-area rechargeable battery and as a photovoltaic cell (when the window receives sunlight, it is pigmented, lowering light transmittance).

The group is led by Mitsunobu Sato, president of Kogakuin University and professor at the Department of Applied Physics, School of Advanced Engineering of the university. The battery was exhibited at Innovation Japan 2015, a trade show that took place from Aug 27 and 28, 2015, in Tokyo.

Source: Translucent Li-ion Battery Charges Itself by Using Sunlight

381 Wikipedia editors ban hammered for extorting article subjects to pay “protection money”

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Wikipedia is no stranger to scandals, but a quiet update on its administrators’ announcement board reveals a big problem. The site’s CheckUser team recently banned 381 editors’ accounts for “undisclosed paid advocacy.” In other words, these Wikipedians were secretly shilling for brands and even resorting to extortion.

The scam is relatively straightforward. Using sockpuppet accounts, the fraudster editors would create complete but unpublished articles about anything from Bitcoin casinos to rock bands. They’d then approach the subject of the article and offer to publish it for a fee. If the subject agreed, the page would go live, and the Wikipedia editors would then offer the subject of the article an insurance policy of sorts. For about $30 a month, they’d “protect the article from vandalism and prevent its deletion.” That’s kind of like how you can pay off the mafia so that you don’t get robbed.

Source: Wikipedia Bans Hundreds of Editors Who Extorted Users for Cash